“You could say so. I’d love some.” My father sat, took a sip of wine, and nodded approvingly. He made a visible effort to take charge. “So,” he said briskly, “we’ve said hello, you’ve invited me back to your house, and now I’ve had a drink. These are the essential Western greeting rituals. Now we can get down to it. What are you doing here, Diana?”
“Me? What are you doing here? And where is Mom?” I pushed away the wine that Matthew poured for me. No amount of alcohol could blunt my response to my father’s sudden presence.
“Your mother is at home taking care of you.” My father shook his head, amazed. “I can’t believe it. You can’t be more than ten years younger than I am.”
“I always forget you’re so much older than Mom.”
“You’re with a vampire and you have something against our MayDecember romance?” My father’s whimsical expression invited me to laugh.
I did, while quickly doing the math. “So you’ve come from around 1980?”
“Yep. I finally got my grades turned in and headed out to do some exploring.” Stephen looked at me intently. “Is this when and where you two met?”
“No. We met in September 2009 at Oxford. In the Bodleian Library.” I looked at Matthew, who gave me an encouraging smile. I turned back to my father and took a deep breath. “I can timewalk like you. I brought Matthew with me.”
“I know you can timewalk, peanut. You scared the hell out of your mother last August when you disappeared on your third birthday. A timewalking toddler is a mother’s worst nightmare.” He looked at me shrewdly. “So you’ve got my eyes, ears, scent, and timewalking ability. Anything else?”
I nodded. “I can make up spells.”
“Oh. We hoped you would be a firewitch like your mom, but no such luck.” My father looked uncomfortable and dropped his voice. “You probably shouldn’t mention your talent in the company of other witches. And when they try to teach you their spells, just let them go in one ear and out the other. Don’t even attempt to learn them.”
“I wish you’d told me that before. It would have helped me with Sarah,” I said.
“Good old Sarah.” My father’s laugh was warm and infectious.
There was a thunder of feet on the stairs, and then a four-legged mop and a boy hurtled across the threshold, banging the door into the wall with the force of their enthusiastic entrance.
“Master Harriot said I may go out with him again and look at the stars, and he promises not to forget me this time. Master Shakespeare gave me this.” Jack waved a slip of paper in the air. “He says it is a letter of credit. And Annie kept staring at a boy in the Cardinal’s Hat while she ate her pie. Who is that?” The last was said with one grimy finger pointed in my father’s direction.
“That’s Master Proctor,” Matthew said, catching Jack around the waist. “Did you feed Mop on your way in?” There had been no way to separate boy and dog in Prague, so Mop had come to London, where his strange appearance made him something of a local curiosity.
“Of course I fed Mop. He eats my shoes if I forget, and Pierre said he would pay for one new pair without telling you about it, but not a second.” Jack clapped his hand over his mouth.
“I am sorry, Mistress Roydon. He ran down the street and I couldn’t catch him.” A frowning Annie rushed into the room, then stopped short, the color draining from her face as she stared at my father.
“It’s all right, Annie,” I said gently. She had been afraid of unfamiliar creatures ever since Greenwich. “This is Master Proctor. He’s a friend.”
“I have marbles. Do you know how to play ring taw?” Jack was eyeing my father with open speculation as he tried to determine whether the new arrival would be a useful person to have around.
“Master Proctor is here to speak with Mistress Roydon, Jack.” Matthew spun him around. “We need water, wine, and bread. You and Annie divide up the chores, and when Pierre gets back, he’ll take you to Moorfields.”
With some grumbling Jack accompanied Annie back out into the street. I met my father’s eyes at last. He had been watching Matthew and me without speaking, and the air was thick with his questions.
“Why are you here, honey?” my father repeated quietly when the children were gone.
“We thought we might find someone to help me out with some questions about magic and alchemy.” For some reason I didn’t want my father to know the details. “My teacher is called Goody Alsop. She and her coven have taken me in.”
“Nice try, Diana. I’m a witch, too, so I know when you’re skirting the truth.” My father sat back in his chair. “You’ll have to tell me eventually. I just thought this would save some time.”
“Why are you here, Stephen?” Matthew asked.
“Just hanging out. I’m an anthropologist. It’s what I do. What do you do?”
“I’m a scientist—a biochemist, based in Oxford.”
“You’re not just ‘hanging out’ in Elizabethan London, Dad. You have the page from Ashmole 782 already.” I suddenly understood why he was here. “You’re looking for the rest of the manuscript.” I lowered the wooden candle beam. Master Habermel’s astronomical compendium was nestled between two candles. We had to move it every day, because Jack found it every day.
“What page?” my father asked, sounding suspiciously innocent.
“The page with the picture of the alchemical wedding on it. It came from a Bodleian Library manuscript.” I opened the compendium. It was completely still, just as I expected. “Look, Matthew.”
“Cool,” my father said with a whistle.
“You should see her mousetrap,” Matthew said under his breath.
“What does it do?” My father reached for the compendium to take a closer look.
“It’s a mathematical instrument for telling time and tracking astronomical events like the phases of the moon. It started to move on its own when we were in Prague. I thought it meant someone was looking for Matthew and me, but now I wonder if it wasn’t picking up on you, looking for the manuscript.” It still acted up periodically, its wheels spinning without warning. Everybody in the house called it the “witch clock.”
“Maybe I should go get the book,” Matthew said, rising.
“It’s all right,” my father replied, motioning for him to sit. “There’s no rush. Rebecca isn’t expecting me for a few days.”
“So you’ll be here—in London?”
My father’s face softened. He nodded.
“Where are you staying?” Matthew asked.
“Here!” I said indignantly. “He’s staying here.”
“Your daughter has very definite opinions about her family checking into hotels,” Matthew told my father with a wry smile, remembering how I’d reacted when he’d tried to put Marcus and Miriam up in an inn in Cazenovia. “You’re welcome to stay with us, of course.”
“I’ve got rooms on the other side of town,” my father said hesitantly.
“Stay.” I pressed my lips together and blinked to keep back the tears. “Please.” I had so much I wanted to ask him, so many questions only he could answer. My father and husband exchanged a long look.
“All right,” my father said finally. “It would be great to hang out with you for a little while.”
I tried to give him our room, since Matthew wouldn’t be able to sleep with a strange person in the house and I could easily fit on the window seat, but my father refused. Pierre gave up his bed instead. I stood on the landing and listened enviously while Jack and my father chattered away like old friends.
“I think Stephen has everything he needs,” Matthew said, sliding his arms around me.
“Is he disappointed in me?” I wondered aloud.
“Your father?” Matthew sounded incredulous. “Of course not!”
“He seems a little uncomfortable.”
“When Stephen kissed you good-bye a few days ago, you were a toddler. He’s overwhelmed, that’s all.”
“Does he know what’s going to happen to him and Mom?” I whispered.