Everyone stared at her.
“That’s Fenella,” said Ruthven. “Your sister.”
“I don’t have a sister,” said Cressida. “Check my records. Only child. You think they pick people with families for this job? If you’re not a Founders nepo baby, every candidate for time travel is vetted carefully. No one with emotional ties to the world outside gets admitted to the colleges. Otherwise we might notice they never let us leave.”
A slow, horrible silence swept over the quad. As one, they all turned to look at Oxford. He winced.
“My memories are fake?” said Fenella. “They can do that? Not just take away… they give us new ones?” She pressed both her hands to her mouth.
“What they did to Monterey was bad,” said Oxford quietly. “But, yeah. What they did to you was worse. I’m sorry, Fenella.”
“Is that why they never issued me a cat? There’s something wrong with me?”
“There’s a whole lot wrong with this college,” said Oxford. “Not with you.”
“Stop talking,” Lovelace invited in a hiss.
Fenella darted past Ruthven, past Cressida, heading for the statue. No one stopped her. She snatched up the fallen glass circle and held it tightly in her hand, turning back to face the group.
Her pale eyes glowed purple for a moment, as her fist tightened around the Violet Sunflower. She let out a breath, and turned her eyes on Oxford with an unflinching gaze. “At some point,” she said calmly. “I’m going to hit you in the face, and you’re going to let me. I’ll stand on a box if I have to.”
“That’s fair,” said Oxford. “Sorry, Zadie. I really am.”
Not Fenella, after all. Not Cressida’s sister. Zadie. Ruthven frowned. Why was that name familiar?
“Where are our parents?” demanded the angry young woman in a pixie-cut who was not Fenella Church. “The Founders. Where are they, right now, Oxford?”
“I assume they’re in some kind of committee meeting, making decisions about our lives,” said Oxford. “That’s how it usually goes.”
“No,” said Zadie, rubbing her thumb over the surface of the Violet Sunflower. “They don’t make decisions for us. Not anymore.”
Fifty
The Museum of Lost Things
Boswell remembered Zadie Kincaid. Memories moved through his mind like someone had clawed open his brain, and dropped her inside.
Bright, sunny, big eyes, full of questions. So many questions.
Back then, he was a cat who had lost his partner, and the world felt like it was ending. He wanted to leave Chronos College — went to deliver his resignation in person to Dean Pennyworth.
Daimler Pennyworth was such a clothes horse, a primping and posing sort of man. Like what might happen if Monterey dropped every other personality trait, but doubled down on his vanity.
Boswell remembered quite clearly that the man had been wearing purple that day. A pin-striped suit, a cravat, shoes with red soles that looked like they’d been snatched directly from the wardrobe of Louis XIV… and a monocle, of all things. A lavender monocle, through which he peered at the marmalade tabby while assuring him that he was still valued. Chronos College could use him. Boswell had so much to offer.
Somehow, when he walked out of that office, Boswell had not resigned. He had agreed to be the Professor of Time Mechanics instead.
Zadie was a second-year student in his classes. There was something about her spirit that reminded Boswell a little of Church — she was confident and smart, endlessly curious. Most of the human students chose time travel for the glamour of it, after childhood experiences of watching too many pirate movies, or some other history-related nerdery.
This one, however: she was genuinely interested in how time travel worked. The nuts and bolts. The more questions this daughter of a Founder asked, the more Boswell started to wonder how much he himself knew about what was going on behind the scenes at the college.
It was a dark time for Boswell, that first year of teaching. Learning how to be a cat without a human. It took him far too long to notice that Zadie was having a hard time, too. She stopped submitting assignments on time, skipped classes. When she was present, her questions became abrasive, challenging, cynical.
(Some of the staff gossiped about her, said she had some kind of blog on the college intranet that was stirring up trouble. When that got closed down, she was caught distributing hand-photocopied flyers to the younger students.)
Boswell’s headache stabbed sharply. He remembered Fenella Church transferring over from Banksia the following year. She seemed cheerful and bright. Everyone said she was Cressida’s sister, so he kept his distance.
Now, as the memories rolled back in on top of each other, he saw the truth. Zadie was Fenella. Fenella was Zadie. How many memories had the Founders tampered with, to hide their problem child so thoroughly?
How many other secrets had they hidden, over the years?
Boswell felt a hand scratching the back of his neck, in that particular spot which was so hard to reach on his own. He curled into the familiar scent…
His eyes snapped open. “Church.” Real Church. His Church. He hadn’t quite taken it in, what with the whirl of escaping the thirtieth century together. But he knew her with a certainty he hadn’t felt before, with all those copies.
This was his maniac in trainers. Whole, alive, home.
“Boz,” murmured his human. “You okay there, old man? You sort of toppled over.”
“Memories,” he grunted. “Apparently I’ve had a lot of work done recently.”
“You remember me, though,” Cressida said with confidence. “Right?”
Her scent was not exactly the same as it had been. But she smelled natural, and familiar. His.
Boswell leaned into her hand, rubbing his cheek against it. “Rings a bell.”
