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It had all been such a seamless integration into function that, with his characteristic arrogance, he’d assumed the competence was as innate to him as the genetic weakness in his retinas, a compensation for what he’d lost unfairly. Now he saw it for what it really was.
Just a familiar landscape.
And at the moment, he was lost in a future that to everybody else was just the present.
As his shoulder banged into something—doorjamb? whatever it was, it had no give and was next to a hole—he threw out a hand. Investigating with his fingertips, he found that yup, it was the molding around a door, and as he measured all kinds of depth and contours, shit was not like what it had been at the mansion, nothing ornate and hand-carved, curving or decorative. This was simple, machine-wrought, commercial-grade pine, a basic highlighter around a rectangle worthy only of a hasty step-through.
But it was home. Because this was where his Beth lived.
“We’re going to figure this out,” he said to George.
The golden snuffled, and waited for Wrath to step forward again. So he did. Nasty business, learning a space the hard way, bumping into things, terrified to trip, tentative, shuffling steps with his free hand out in front of him. He went around the circular space three or four times, and then he got it. The chair, the sofas, the table, the chairs, the food service area.
And when the layout was set in his mind, his awareness had extra bandwidth—and there it was. A scent he remembered.
By a doorway.
Like he could forget how rocky road smelled?
“This way,” he said.
He knew he was back in one of the spokes by the metallic echo of his footfalls, and the confirmation on direction he needed was the next scent that reached his nostrils.
Silver polish paste.
Wrath followed the sweet chemical smell to a steel door, and he punched in a code with his left hand. As soon as he opened the heavy weight, he heard the rush of running water, and felt his boots step onto some kind of tile.
When George stopped, Wrath trusted the dog and went no farther.
“Fritz,” he said as he caught the scent of his dear butler in and among the polish.
There was a rustle and the water was cut off, and Wrath imagined the ancientdoggenturning around from whatever sink he was standing at, his black uniform—with its starched white shirt and bow tie perfectly centered at the popped collar—like something out ofThe Windsor Family Cookbook.
“Miss Rahvyn!” came the cheerful reply. “Whate’er may I… do… for…”
As that familiar voice drifted into silence, the faithful butler’s lined face came to mind: Fritz’s precisely coiffed white hair with its side part, and the wrinkles that gathered around his mouth because he smiled somuch, and his expression of worried servitude, were as clear as if Wrath could see—
The sound of something clanging loudly on the floor rang out between them.
“Sire…?” came the choked question. “Is it truly you.”
Wrath held his free arm out wide. “It’s me.” The scent of the butler’s tears was like spring rain on asphalt. “It’s okay, Fritz.”
“I do not understand,” was the rough reply. “How are you here the now?”
In the silence that swelled as Wrath tried to think of an answer, he thought of Rahvyn. She reminded him of the Scribe Virgin, in the sense that that female tapped into energies that were so ancient, so powerful, they transcended definition or even description. So unfortunately he couldn’t explain anything to his most faithful servant.
“I don’t think the whys matter. It’s all about where we’ve ended up. Back together… at last.”
He tacked on that final part for the both of them.
The lesson in his “death” was becoming clear. Love, like time, was tangible. You could feel both in your bones, in your soul. And the latter was a thief if you were lucky enough to have the former.
“I’m glad to see you,” Wrath heard himself say.
There was a muffled sniffle, and then a scrape across the floor, as if a chair were being pushed out of the way.
“My Lord. Please… forgive me, oh, please… my Lord, forgive me.”
