Poul Anderson - The Shield of Time

Novak spoke uneasily: “Sir, does that not make our task still more difficult and dangerous?”

Everard’s mouth tightened. “It sure does.”

“What can we do?” Tamberly asked low.

“Well,” Everard said, “by ‘randomness’ I don’t mean that things have taken this direction without any cause. In human terms, people have done whatever they did for their own reasons. It just happens that what they did was different from what they did in our history. We’ve got to find that turning point—or fulcrum point—and see if we can’t swing the lever back the way we want it to act. Okay, let’s return to base.”

Tamberly interrupted before he could read off destination coordinates. “What’ll we do then?”

“I’ll see what the investigators have found out, and on that basis try a little further detective work. You, well, probably you’d best proceed to your naturalist station.”

“Huh?”

“Oh, you’ve done fine, but—”

Indignation flared. “But you mean that now I should sit twiddling my thumbs when I’m not chewing the nails off them. Well, you pull that self-satisfaction out of your ears, Manson Everard, and listen to me.”

He did. Never mind if Novak was disconcerted. She had a point or two to make, and they were valid. What knowledge she needed could readily be instilled. The more basic knowledge, of how to deal with people and danger, could not be; but she already had it, in her experience and her genes. Besides, the Patrol’s orphans needed every able campaigner they could find.

In his private chamber the silk merchant Geoffrey of Jovigny received two visitors. They were a huge man, well clad, and a tall, fair-haired young woman who, though decently quiet in public, looked about her with a boldness well-nigh brazen. The apprentices were astounded when they learned she would sleep with the children.

Otherwise these callers drew less heed than they would ordinarily have done, for Palermo seethed with tidings. Each newcomer brought a new story. At the end of October King Roger met disaster at Rignano and barely, by aid of the saints, escaped the battlefield. At once he rebounded, laid fresh siege to Naples, won back Benevento and Monte Cassino, forced his enemy Abbot Wibald out of Italy, and got a clerical friend elected to head the great abbey. Now only Apulia held out against him, and it seemed he might actually become arbitrator between the rival Popes. Sicily rejoiced.

In the paneled room upstairs, Everard, Tamberly, and Volstrup sat as bleak as the December day outside.

“We’ve come to you,” the Unattached agent said, “because what the databases know about you suggests you’re the best man available for a certain mission.”

Volstrup blinked above his winecup. “I? Sir, with respect, jokes are inappropriate when we have gone immediately from one crisis to a second, equally desperate one.” He alone in the city had experienced Everard’s previous visit; in the course of that salvage operation he had twice been brought downtime for consultation.

Everard grinned on the left side of his mouth. “No derring-do required, I hope. What I have in mind involves some travel under medieval conditions, but mainly we need a person quick-witted, tactful, and intimately acquainted with this milieu. Before explaining, though—because it may turn out my scheme is impractical—I want to pick your brains, ask a lot of questions, invite your ideas. You have done very well by the Patrol over the years, handling affairs day by day and laying the groundwork for the expansion of this post.”—when Sicily entered its golden age and drew many time travelers—out of a future that had again ceased to be. “You did better yet during the last crunch.”

“Thank you. Er, Mademoiselle … Tamberly?”

“I think I’ll mostly sit and listen,” the woman said. “I’m still trying to sort out the encyclopedia that’s been pumped into me.”

“We really have only a handful of people who know the period well,” Everard continued. “I mean this part of the Mediterranean world at just this time. Agents in China or Persia or even England don’t do us a lot of good, and they have their work cut out for them already, maintaining their stations under present conditions. Of our knowledgeable personnel, some are not qualified to conduct investigations in the field, where anything can happen. For instance, a man could be a fine, reliable traffic control officer but lack the, um, touch of Sherlock Holmes necessary.” Volstrup smiled the least bit, showing he caught the reference. “We have to take anyone we think may be suitable, whether formally rated for that kind of task or not. But first, as I said, I’d like to inquire of you.”

“By all means,” Volstrup replied, barely audible. In the gloom his nutcracker face showed pale. Outside, wind whooped and a dash of rain blew from wolf-gray heaven.

“When word went around about our failure, you got busy on your own initiative, communicating with other agents and making mnemonic arrangements for yourself,” Everard stated. “That gives reason to ask much more of you. I take it your aim was to assemble a detailed picture of events, hoping that might help to locate the new trouble point.”

Volstrup nodded. “Yes, sir. Not that I deluded myself I could solve the problem. Nor, I confess, was my motive really unselfish. I craved … orientation.” They saw him shudder beneath his robe. “This, this uprooting of reality, it leaves us so cold and alone.”

“It does that,” Tamberly whispered.

“Well, you were a medievalist to start with, before the Patrol recruited you,” Everard said. He kept his voice and manner methodical, downright stodgy. Nerves were strained thin enough as was. “You must have gotten the original history well into your head.”

“Rather well,” Volstrup answered. “But although countless snippets of fact had passed before my eyes, most had long since dropped from memory. What reason would there ordinarily be to stay aware that, oh, the battle of Rignano took place on the thirtieth of October 1137 or that the baptismal name of Pope Innocent III was Lotario de Conti di Segni? Yet any such tiny datum might prove crucial to us, when the databases we have left are limited. I requested a psychotechnician be sent here to give me total recollection.” He grimaced; neither the process nor the result were pleasant. It took a while afterward to return to normal. “And I compared notes with various colleagues, exchanging information and ideas. That is all. I was preparing a full report when you arrived.”

“We’ll take it from you in person,” Everard said. “We haven’t got lifespan to squander. What you’ve passed on indicates you’ve found a better clue than anybody else, but it isn’t clear what. Tell me.”

Volstrup’s hand trembled a little as he sipped from his cup. “It is surely clear to everyone,” he replied. “Pope Honorius III was succeeded directly by Celestine IV.”

Everard nodded. “That’s the big, blatant thing. But I gather you have a notion as to what may have brought it about.”

Tamberly stirred on her stool. “Excuse me,” she said. “I am still groping around in a jungle of names and dates. If I stop to think, I can put them in order, but what they signify isn’t necessarily plain. Would you mind briefing me?”

Everard reached to squeeze her hand—maybe that encouraged him more than her—and himself took a throat-warming drink. “You can do it better,” he said to Volstrup.

As he talked, the dry little man gained confidence, vigor. This history was his love, after all.

“Let me begin at the present moment. Events seem to proceed much as they ought, perhaps identically, for decades to come. The Holy Roman Emperor Henry VI acquires Sicily through marriage, the claim being enforced by his army, in 1194. That same year his son and heir Frederick II is born. Innocent III becomes Pope in 1198. He is one of the strongest men ever to sit on the throne of St. Peter—and in many respects, although it isn’t entirely his fault, one of the most sinister. It will be written of him that his was the distinction of presiding over the destruction of three distinct civilizations. In his reign, the Fourth Crusade captures Constantinople; and although the Eastern Empire eventually gets back a Greek ruler of Orthodox faith, it is thereafter a shell. He proclaims the Albigensian Crusade, which will put an end to the brilliant culture that has arisen in Provence. His long contest with Frederick II, Church against state, fatally undermines this diverse, tolerant Norman Sicilian society in which we sit talking today.