Page 38 of The Tides of Time (Storm Tide #1)

A rmitage tried to shout Lili’s name. Over and over he tried, and every time, the unrelenting slap of water stopped his voice. The cork vest was keeping him afloat, but only just. He needed to get out of the water, but how could he countenance leaving without her?

“Li—” More water. “Li—”

He wasn’t keeping his head above the surface as well as he had been a moment before. Lili had been struggling as well, but she hadn’t disappeared under the waves. She had simply disappeared. They had been trying to get back to shore. The sky had flashed green, infecting everything with the unnatural hue for only an instant. When that instant ended, the green light was gone. And so was she.

“Li—”

His strength was draining from him. Cork vests kept sailors afloat long enough to be fished back out by their shipmates. They weren’t meant to keep a person on top of the water indefinitely.

The sky was growing darker. He was so cold that his arms and legs struggled to move. Though he made a valiant attempt to swim, he couldn’t. He’d been in the water too long. Dark spots in his vision grew with each passing moment. He was losing his battle with the sea.

A voice called out, but he couldn’t understand the words. He couldn’t tell where it was coming from. It felt distant and close all at the same time. The jumbled words mingled with his confused thoughts. Nothing in his surroundings made sense.

A rowboat. An extended hand. Indecipherable words.

Nothing relieved his overwhelming disorientation. He was out of the water. Then climbing a rope ladder. Slipping a little. Being caught. Then belowdecks. In dry clothes. Slumped over. Exhausted. Heartbroken.

Alone.

Armitage awoke in a boat. It rolled gently and smelled of the sea. For a moment, he couldn’t remember why he was there. But the memory of angry waves and a flash of green filled the gaps in his recollection.

He’d been pulled from the water. And he’d lost Lili.

Had the Tides of Time pulled her away or him? He didn’t know when he was. He needed to know that. A person couldn’t piece together what had happened if he hadn’t all the information.

His lungs and muscles protested as he pulled himself to his feet. He left the small room he’d been sleeping in and climbed the ladder to the upper deck. Dawn appeared to be not long off. They were anchored in a large river. No buildings stood nearby. Armitage could see no houses in the distance. There was no way of knowing where he was.

At the prow, a man in a heavy wool coat, not unlike the one Armitage was borrowing, stood looking out over the water. He was resolute and focused.

Armitage hoped the man spoke English. But considering the state of Armitage’s fortune of late, he knew better than to count on it.

The man must have heard Armitage’s footsteps.

“We will be continuing our journey shortly.” A Frenchman, though he spoke in English.

“Where are us journeying to?”

“That will depend a great deal on you, Armitage.” The man turned to look at him.

Armitage stared, mouth a bit agape. Captain Travert. The tides, then, had pulled Armitage away from Lili and not the other way around. He was back in 1873, back in his own time.

The captain took a sip from his cup. “I’ve been waiting for some time now to thank you for helping me regain control of my ship. You and Mademoiselle Minet had disappeared by the time I was in a position to offer my gratitude.”

“Us—I was—” How could he explain that he and Lili had disappeared because they had been thrown across time? Perhaps he would do best to ignore that part of the conversation. “How long has it been since you regained your ship?”

The man kept his eyes on the water. “Three years.”

Three years? “It is 1876.”

Captain Travert looked at Armitage once more. Dawn was beginning to break, making the captain easier to see. He was, without question, the captain Armitage knew from his own time and home. “It is 1793.”

1793. He’d been pulled backward in time to the year he and Lili had been aiming for. She had been part of 1793; it was a piece of her original timeline. Depending on the day, she was either living in this year or had already been transported to Loftstone Island in 1873. Attempting to make his mind understand how one person could exist in more than one time was proving maddeningly difficult.

Lili had lived in multiple times. Now, so had he. And his parents were in Paris in 1793. They were likely there in that very moment.

A realization struck him. “You must know about the Tides of Time to realize when us are and not be confused by that.”

“I’ve known about the mysterious waters for a very long time. And so did Monsieur Gagnon, though he didn’t realize what he had experienced until we saw each other on Loftstone Island.”

It was an unexpected declaration.

“He wished to make my acquaintance because I was French and had a ship. He wished for me to return him to his homeland. Once he actually saw me, though, he felt he had a chance to return to his own time, which he wanted far more.”

“What about you told he such a thing?” Armitage asked.

“We had met before, in the 1790s, and we were seeing each other again in the 1870s. He knew I had crossed the Tides of Time just as he had.”

Géraud had given no indication of any of this. How soon had it happened after the man’s arrival?

“Why did Géraud try to steal your ship?” Armitage asked.

“He believed he could sail it over the Tides of Time and return directly to his actual home. When I told him one could not simply demand that the tides deposit him when he chose, the man grew livid. He took the ship in an attempt to prove me wrong.”

Armitage looked out at the water, just as the captain had been doing. “Where are us now?”

“The 2nd of December 1793, anchored on the Seine a bit beyond Honfleur.” The captain finished the contents of his cup and set the cup on a wooden box. “Where we go from here will depend a great deal on you.”

“Me?”

“Does that date not feel familiar to you?” the captain asked.

“No.”

“It is my understanding that you read the book containing the names of those who met their ends at the guillotine.”

He had. And Lili had spoken of those names. She’d known many of them and had been grateful not to find others. She’d not found his parents on the list.

But she had found hers.

Elisabeth Minet, seamstress . They’d tried to explain that away as a coincidence, a different seamstress with the same name. But he didn’t think she had believed the explanation. He hadn’t entirely.

“Elisabeth Minet, seamstress,” the captain said, as one speaking aloud the exact words he had read and committed to memory. “Held in la Conciergerie. Executed by guillotine, 12th of December 1793.”

“That is in ten days.” His heart seized anxiously.

“ Oui . In ten days, Lili Minet will die at la Place de la Révolution . We have only those ten days to prevent it.”

“Can a past that is already recorded in the future actually be changed?”

“I know these tides well,” the captain said. “But even I don’t have a clear answer to that. I have seen travelers of the tides interfere in the past, yet somehow, the understanding of those things in the future does not change. They continue to match but shouldn’t.”

“It is likely that nothing us could do would erase her name from that list?” Armitage thought that was what the captain was saying.

“I suspect the list reflects exactly what happens here in ten days, but whether that means we intervened or not, I cannot say.”

So many swirling and moving bits to all this. A month earlier, Armitage hadn’t even believed in the Tides of Time. Now he was attempting to outsmart them.

“If us can think of a means of keeping her name on the list while still preventing her execution, then us might manage to outmaneuver the tides.” Armitage didn’t even know if it was possible.

“The Paris of this time is dangerous,” the captain warned. “For an Englishman who speaks almost no French, it will be particularly perilous.”

“Lili is here somewhere,” Armitage said. “And so are my parents. And them are in danger every bit as much as I would be. I have to do what I can. I will not abandon they.”

The captain gave a firm and approving nod. “I will get us to Paris. There are people there who can help, if you can think of a plan.”

“Act as though you belong.” The captain offered the instruction in a low whisper. “Lili taught everyone she rescued to do that.”

Everyone. Seventy-eight people.

They made their way through narrow streets, past people with heavy expressions. Though nothing about this Paris spoke loudly of the violence that existed there, Armitage could feel it. A weight of danger and uncertainty hung in the air. It couldn’t be ignored or shrugged off.

The captain brought them to a nondescript door in a dim backstreet. He knocked in an odd rhythm. After a moment, a small slot slid open, nothing but darkness beyond.

The captain said something in French. The answer was in that same language. Then they were let in.

Armitage had been told that they were making their way to the home of a person who had helped Lili with her escapes by providing a hiding place for those fleeing the Tribunal. He’d expected a small, empty space awaiting more fugitives. But what he found was a kitchen of some size with several people gathered around. At first glance, it appeared to be a group of friends doing nothing more than visiting. But a closer look revealed too much solemnity in their expressions for this to be a social call.

They were watching him, in particular. Not with distrust but with curiosity, and he didn’t know what they were seeing.

A man standing among them approached Captain Travert. “ Nous avons deux personnes qui ont besoin d’un passage hors de France .”

The captain nodded. “ Est-ce que Monsieur et Madame Romilly sont là? ”

Monsieur and Madame Romilly were the names his parents had used in Paris.

“Oui ,” the man said. “ Ce sont eux qui ont besoin de passage .”

“ Nous devons les voir. Seuls .”

The man waved Captain Travert to an adjoining door. The captain indicated that Armitage should come as well. It was frustrating not being able to speak or to understand anyone.

They stepped into the dim room beyond, and Captain Travert closed the door. In English, he said, “I’ve brought someone who wishes to see you.”

“Why do you speak in English?” someone replied. Merciful heavens, Armitage knew that voice. He knew it as readily as he knew his own.

“Because,” the captain answered, “your son does not speak French.” He pulled Armitage into the light of the candles in the middle of the room.

Mum and Dad. Both of them. There. Alive. Whole. He swallowed at the surge of emotion. Ten years without them, ten years of grieving, and there they were. He couldn’t hold back the tears as his mum rushed to him and threw her arms around his neck.

“Oh, mon Armitage.” Mum held him so tightly. “ Mon fils. Mon fils chéri. ”

He couldn’t speak. He hugged her and held her and tried to convince himself this was real.

Dad encircled them both in his arms. “Us’ve missed you, Armitage. More than can be said.”

“Everyone in 1873 believes you are dead.” His voice broke; he couldn’t prevent it. “I did as well until very recently.”

“How long has it been since the tides pulled we?” Dad asked.

“Ten years. How long has it been for you?”

“Three.” Mum stepped back a little and took his face in her hands. “You are a man, grown now. You were still so young when we last saw you. Only fifteen years old.”

“You both look very much the same.” Except they were worn down, exhausted. The same worry he’d seen in the faces he’d passed walking from the ship to this hiding place had taken up residence in his parents’ expressions as well.

“This is a dangerous time, Armitage,” Dad said. “You’ve taken such a risk in coming here.”

“Lili decided to return because you were in danger. I’ve made the journey because her is.”

They exchanged heavy looks.

“Has Lili been here?”

Dad nodded. “A month ago. Her insisted us hide ourselves without delay. Lili helped we gather what was needed, then plotted a path here. But her never arrived.”

The date in the book was specific, as was the way in which she died.

“We have learned through our connections in the city that she was arrested.” Mum’s French accent was the strongest Armitage ever remembered it being. “She is being held in le Conciergerie, awaiting trial. As near as we can tell, it hasn’t been held yet, and she is still alive.”

Armitage nodded. “Her is, but for only eight more days.”

Mum still held tightly to him. Dad kept one of Armitage’s hands in his. Armitage was grateful for it. They had missed him as much as he had missed them. And they were there, so real they could touch him. Even having experienced the power of the Tides of Time, this moment still felt impossible.

“Lili was with we in 1873.” Armitage knew how odd that sounded. “Us had a book about this time in France, and that book talked about she. It recorded that her will die on December 12 at the guillotine.”

Dad’s posture grew immediately resolute. “Eight days is not a lot of time, but it will have to be enough.”

“You’ll help me save Lili?”

Mum pressed a kiss to his cheek. “Everyone here will. She saved far too many to be left to such a fate.”