to be allowed on the premises.”
“Mr. Basingame authorized it,” the porter said. He held the damp paper out.
Gilchrist snatched it from him. “Basingame!” He stared down at it. “This isn’t Basingame’s signature,” he said furiously. “Unlawful entry and now forgery. Mr. Dunworthy, I intend to file charges. And when Mr. Basingame returns, I intend to inform him of your—”
Dunworthy took a step toward him. “And I intend to inform Mr. Basingame how his Acting Head of Faculty refused to abort a drop, how he intentionally endangered an historian, how he refused to allow access to this laboratory, and how as a result the historian’s temporal location could not be determined.” He waved his arm at the console. “Do you know what this fix says? This fix that you wouldn’t let my tech read for ten days because of a lot of imbeciles who don’t understand time travel, including you? Do you know what it says? Kivrin’s not in 1320. She’s in 1348, in the middle of the Black Death.” He turned and gestured toward the screens. “And she’s been there two weeks. Because of your stupidity. Because of—” He stopped.
“You have no right to speak to me that way,” Gilchrist said. “And no right to be in this laboratory. I demand that you leave immediately.”
Dunworthy didn’t answer. He took a step toward the console.
“Call the proctor,” Gilchrist said to the porter. “I want them thrown out.”
The screen was not only blank but dark, and so were the function lights above it on the console. The power switch was turned to off. “You’ve switched off the power,” Dunworthy said, and his voice sounded as old as Badri’s had. “You’ve shut down the net.”
“Yes,” Gilchrist said, “and a good thing, too, since you feel you have the right to barge in without authorization.”
He put a hand out blindly toward the “blank screen, staggering a little. “You’ve shut down the net,” he repeated.
“Are you all right, Mr. Dunworthy?” Colin said, taking a step forward.
“I thought you might attempt to break in and open the net,” Gilchrist said, “since you seem to have no respect for Mediaeval’s authority. I cut off the power to prevent that happening, and it appears I did the right thing.”
Dunworthy had heard of people being struck down by bad news. When Badri had told him Kivrin was in 1348, he had not been able to absorb what it meant, but this news seemed to strike him with a physical force. He couldn’t catch his breath. “You shut the net down,” he said. “You’ve lost the fix.”
“Lost the fix?” Gilchrist said. “Nonsense. There are backups and things surely. When the power’s switched on again—”
“Does that mean we don’t know where Kivrin is?” Colin asked.
“Yes,” Dunworthy said, and thought as he fell, I am going to hit the console like Badri did, but he didn’t. He fell almost gently, like a man with the wind knocked out of him, and collapsed like a lover into Gilchrist’s outstretched arms.
“I knew it,” he heard Colin say. “This is because you didn’t get your enhancement. Great-aunt Mary’s going to kill me.”
26
“That’s impossible,” Kivrin said. “It can’t be 1348,” but it all made sense, Imeyne’s chaplain dying, and their not having any servants, Eliwys’s not wanting to send Gawyn to Oxford to find out who Kivrin was. “There is much illness there,” Lady Yvolde had said, and the Black Death had hit Oxford at Christmas in 1348. “What happened?” she said, and her voice rose out of control. “What happened! I was supposed to go to 1320. 1320! Mr. Dunworthy told me I shouldn’t come, he said Mediaeval didn’t know what they were doing, but they couldn’t have sent me to the wrong year!” She stopped. “You must get out of here! It’s the Black Death!”
They all looked at her so uncomprehendingly that she thought the interpreter must have lapsed into English again. “It’s the Black Death,” she said again. “The blue sickness!”
“Nay,” Eliwys said softly, and Kivrin said, “Lady Eliwys, you must take Lady Imeyne and Father Roche down to the hall.”
“It cannot be,” she said, but she took Lady Imeyne’s arm and led her out, Imeyne clutching the poultice as if it were her reliquary. Maisry darted after them, her hands clutched to her ears.
“You must go, too,” Kivrin said to Roche. “I will stay with the clerk.”
“Thruuuu …” the clerk murmured from the bed, and Roche turned to look at him. The clerk struggled to rise, and Roche started toward him.
“No!” Kivrin