Wayfarer

It was only because he had mentioned her mother. It was only because the memory of the Winter Palace was still so close to the surface, blooming with renewed pain every few minutes. It was only because of those things that Rose’s words circled back to her then, and tentatively linked with what Julian said.

“You can say if I’m telling it wrong,” he told Octavia. “But there’s this old story, about a group that lives in the shadows and takes traveler children who stray from their families. I always thought it was made up to explain how kids got left behind in time periods or were orphaned. Is that not the case?”

“Killers—” Octavia let out a brutal cough, bringing blood to her lips. Julian leaned forward, gently dabbing them with the wet cloth.

“Easy now,” he told her.

“Murderers…the whole lot of them,” Octavia said. “We knew of them…Cyrus—he wants the same thing that—that they do. Destroyed all records of them. Never wanted…anyone to know about them…otherwise, they’d be too frightened…to help him search for it.”

It. The astrolabe.

You don’t know what’s coming, what’s been chasing me for years, her mother had said. I’ve kept them off your trail for weeks, from the moment you were taken, but the Shadows—

But the Shadows…

What had Henry told her about Rose’s delusions? That she’d become afraid of the darkness, that the delusion of the radiant man who’d haunted her had sent Shadows out after her?

“What do they look like?” she asked. Rose’s attention in the palace had been drawn away by attackers in black. She’d assumed they were Ironwoods, even palace guards, but—her mind was moving too quickly, strumming through possibilities. There was one more piece to this, something that would weave the truth together. It couldn’t be as simple as…no, it wasn’t.

Henry wasn’t wrong. Her mother needed help. She was a murderer who’d killed a member of her own family—her best and only friend.

“Don’t…know,” Octavia said. “I don’t—just stay away—”

“All right, it’s all right,” Julian said, glancing at Etta.

But the Shadows…

What’s been chasing me for years…

Octavia’s chest began to rise and fall, fluttering shallowly. When the old woman turned to him again, it was with a wide-eyed desperation, with wretched, gasping breaths. Julian stood from his stool, and Etta thought for one infuriating second that he was about to bolt for the exit—but he only slipped that same tattered notebook out of the fold of his clothing. He retrieved the stubby pencil secured to the back cover with string. The leather was so soft, the journal fell open on the bed, revealing an unfinished sketch of a street.

He’s an artist. Etta had forgotten that, somehow. Or maybe she’d just never been willing to see him as anything other than a coward and a flirt, because it would have been another complication when her entire world had become a series of them. If he had been one of her mother’s paintings, one of those at the Met she had worked so hard to restore, peeling back layers of age and patches, Etta wondered how bright his colors might be beneath.

“Do you remember the old house, Nan? The one we lived in just off the park, up on Sixtieth?” he asked her. His right hand held hers, but his left was already sketching on a blank page.

“With the…with the…”

“The columns and marble and carriage entry,” he continued softly. “Our little palace. Remember how I slid down the banister and cracked my head on the ground?”

She nodded. “Blood. Amelia…fainting. Butler moaning about…the damned vase…”

“That’s what you remember,” he told her. “What I remember is this.”

He held up the rough sketch for her to see, but the cover blocked it from Etta’s sight. It wasn’t meant for her, anyway.

“I remember you scooping me up, holding me, telling me that it would be all right, and that you were there and always would be, to take care of me,” Julian whispered.

Octavia touched the page with her finger. “Beautiful…”

“That’s right. I had a proper, beautiful life, thanks to you.” He kissed her bandaged hand. “And now I’ll do the same for you.”

“Don’t do…anything…foolish….”

“Nan,” he said, fighting for his smile. “You can bet on it.”

THE WOMAN SLIPPED INTO SLEEP AND ETTA MOVED AWAY, leaving Julian to keep vigil. Her head felt empty of real thought, even as her heart was clogged with everything threatening to burst out of it. What surprised her most, though, was the jealousy, burning just beneath the pity and fear.

He gets to be with her.

Julian would be there for Octavia when she died. Etta didn’t think she had much time left at all, but she knew with certainty that Julian would not leave her. It was more than she’d been able to give to Alice.

Henry had stayed with Alice.

And who had stayed with Henry?

Etta lost track of time, walking between the rows of cots, trying not to notice the new openings in the beds. It didn’t feel like nearly enough hours before Julian emerged and came straight toward her, shooting through the rows of the dead and dying like a fiery arrow. He took her arm and drew her forward, stopping only long enough to lift a pile of plain gray trousers and white shirts—the same thing the nurses had changed most of the wounded into.