For what it was worth, she knew there were uptimers who did the same when confronted by the power of the gates through time.
As for the weapon, keeping it would reassure him, more than any words of welcome they could offer. Ianira served fresh fruit juice to the men, deciding against the wine she'd previously planned for their dinner she had no intention of serving alcohol to a potentially explosive guest then returned to the kitchen. Marcus would normally have joined her to help, but the presence of their guest held him against his will in the room that served double duty as living and dining area.
Artemisia, strapped into her toddler's high chair beside the device that kept foods and drinks wonderfully chilled, even frozen, cooed and giggled at her mother's reappearance. Ianira stooped to kiss her child's hair, then filled a bottle with apple juice and gave it to the little girl. While Gelasia slept peacefully in the crib in their one bedroom, Artemisia sucked on the rubber nipple contentedly, gurgling occasionally as her wide, dark eyes followed her mother's movements around the kitchen.
Low male voices, intense and frightening, crept like ghosts into the warm kitchen. Irrationally, Ianira wanted to stand between her children and their new guest with the gun Ann Vinh Mulhaney had taught her to shoot. She knew her reaction was irrational and overprotective, but the Goddess' warnings of impending danger were not to be lightly ignored.
Why hast thou sent this man, Lady? she asked silently, addressing her frightened prayer to the great patroness of Athens itself, wise and fierce guardian of all that was civilization. I fear this guest, Lady. His glance causes me to tremble with terror. What warning is this and how should I listen for Thy answer? Is he the danger? Or merely the messenger? The portent of a greater danger to follow?
In the closed environment of La-La Land, there were no sacred owls to give her omens by the timing of their cries or the direction of their flight. But there was in-house television. And there were birds-strange, savage, toothed birds so ancient that Athene herself must have been young when their kind flew the darkling skies of Earth. Artemisia, her attention caught by the moving colors of the television screen, dropped her bottle of juice against the high chair's tray with a bang. A chubby finger pointed.
"Mama! Fish-bird! Fish-bird!"
Ianira looked-and felt all blood drain from her face. She had to clutch the countertop to keep from sliding to the floor. An Ichthyornis had struck a brown fish and was devouring it while it struggled. Blood flowed in all-too-lifelike color. Ianira lunged across the narrow kitchen, driven by terror, and snapped off the machine with shaking hands. The screen went dark and silent. Fear for Marcus rose like sour bile in her throat.
No, she pled silently, keep this death away from our threshold, Lady. He has done nothing to merit it. Please ...
Ianira's hands were still trembling when she carried the dishes out to their small dining table and offered the food she had prepared for their evening meal. It took all her courage to smile at their guest, who tore into the food like a ravening wolf. Lupus Mortiferus ... Wolf of Death... Ianira did not yet know precisely how danger would come to Marcus through this man, but she was as certain of it as she was certain that her shaky breaths were barely holding terror at bay.
Ianira Cassondra had lost one family already.
She would do murder, if necessary, to keep from losing another.
CHAPTER SEVEN
The Britannia Gate was rich with possibility.
Skeeter chose a likely looking mark dressed in expensive, Victorian-style garments and followed him discreetly until the "gentleman" entered a public restroom. Skeeter entered behind him, took care of business, then-while they both washed their hands at the automatic sinks he dared break the cardinal rule of silence in the men's washroom.
"Travelling to London, too?" he asked, buttoning the fly of his own Victorian-era togs.
The man shot him a startled glance. -Er, yes."
Skeeter smiled. "Take some friendly advice. That place is crawling with pickpockets. Worse than you'll ever read in Dickens." That, at least, was God's own truth. "Don't carry all your money in some predictable place, like a pocket wallet. Some nine-year-old kid'll snatch it and be gone before you even know it's missing."
"I-yes, we were warned about pickpockets," the man stammered, "but I wasn't quite sure what I should do about it. Someone suggested maybe I should ask an outfitter, you know, for a moneybelt or something-"
"I'll show you a trick I learned the hard way." Skeeter winked. "Wrap your money in a handkerchief and tuck it inside your shirt, so it sits inside the waistband of your trousers."
The mark looked doubtful.
"Here, let me show you what I mean." He pulled out a standard white handkerchief stuffed with his own money and demonstrated. "Here, I have a spare hanky. You try it."
The man looked doubtful for a moment longer, then relaxed. `Thank you. I will." He pulled a huge bankroll out of an expensive leather wallet and tucked the money into the center of the hanky, tying it clumsily.
"I'm afraid I'm not very good at this."
"Here, let me help."
Skeeter tied the corners expertly and tucked it into place, showing the mark exactly how the handkerchief was supposed to fit. Then he retrieved it and said, "Try it again" as he tucked his own money-filled hanky back into his own waistband.
The mark-having no idea that Skeeter had deftly switched handkerchiefs on him-tucked Skeeter's much smaller "bankroll" into his slacks. "Yes, that works wonderfully! Thank you, young man. Here, let me give you a tip or something..."
"No, I wouldn't dream of it," Skeeter reassured him. "Hope you have a good visit in London. Some really spectacular sights. Can hardly wait to get back, myself."
He grinned at the other man, then strolled out of the washroom gloating over his success. With any luck, the tourist wouldn't discover the switch until he was through the Britannia Gate. Time Tours would bail him out for the duration of the tour-although they'd charge him double price as refund for their trouble and he'd learn a valuable lesson he clearly needed about hanging onto what was his.
Meanwhile, this haul ought to put Skeeter several hundred ahead of Goldie. He headed directly for the library to have his winnings logged, whistling cheerfully. A group of half-grown boys in Frontier Town-- aw, nuts, looks like the uptime abandonees just cut class again-dashed out of a restaurant directly in his path, yelling and whooping in an excess of energy. Crashes and yells inevitably followed their retreat. Skeeter snorted. Bunch of mannerless hooligans, smashing up anything they could lay hands on just for jollies.
Time Tours, Inc. and the smaller touring outfits tried every trick they could to keep parents from taking kids downtime. After that kid in Rome had gotten himself killed and Time Tours had ended up settling for a huge sum of money (despite the fact it was entirely the fault of the stupid kid and his too-bored-to-be-bothered parents), the outward ripple was as simple as it was inevitable: no touring outfit wanted any kid running wild downtime.
So the new policy to cope was simple: parents either signed a waiver and paid an enormous extra fee for kids' downtime tickets, or they "abandoned" the kids on the station. Theoretically, Harriet Banks, the Station's school teacher, was assigned to watch them. In practice, Harriet had to watch -and teach, Residents' kids, keep tourists' kids from leaving, and make certain that none of the toddlers or infants in the Day Care Center were injured, sick, or just plain obnoxious with the other kids. Skeeter thought Bull should've done something ages ago or one of these days he was going to find himself with a full School and Day Care Center and no one to mind the store.