“Sorcha, wait!” Mr. Devereaux calls. The pompous old duck is always telling me to wait. “Feudal Japan isn’t safe for foreigners. Europeans could be killed on sight.”
“Did anyone warn my brother of that?” I yell over my shoulder.
I plunge through the dripping trees to the road beyond.
“Show me how to save Jem!” Sorcha snarls.
“Call off your men first.” I match her glare, ignoring the ropes chafing my wrists. “I want to speak to your leader.”
It’s my fault Sorcha’s brother is hurtling through the time vortex in a wayward time machine, bound for God knows where… and
I knew I would regret taking Cuthbert Devereaux’s navigation advice.
When my old nemesis butted into my mission in Nazi Germany, he brought nothing but trouble. It’s entirely his fault we landed in colonial Australia. Now we’re trussed like roasted chickens and propped against a pile of dusty saddlebags in an outlaw camp.
Hiroshi sighs loud enough to be heard over the rain drumming the kitchen windows. “Whenever you’re finished, Tamiko…”
“Just a minute.” I rummage in the cupboard, silently cursing the overbooked Tokyo hotels that forced me to crash on my least-favorite cousin’s futon. If only our grandmother hadn’t died during cherry blossom season…
“Homeward bound,” I announce, opening the door of my time machine. The chromium steering lever on the control panel gleams invitingly.
“Blitzkrieg!” Cuthbert the parrot flaps onto my shoulder.
“You can stop shrieking that ridiculous code word now,” I grumble. “The mission is over.”
And what a mission it was. I’m not one
I’m going to enjoy shooting Hernandez.
I smile grimly as I run my feather duster along the balcony rail. My titanium blaster is a satisfying weight in my apron pocket. Too bad it’s set to “stun,” not “kill,” but I suppose one can’t have everything.
Twenty feet below me, the brightly-lit ballroom
If I told you I’d picked up a girl in the French Revolution and brought her to 1930’s Berlin to assassinate Hitler, you wouldn’t believe me… would you?
“It’s time.” Charlotte Corday’s soft whisper brushes my ear as she accepts a champagne flute from my tray. “Colonel Geissler promised to introduce me to
I smell the humans before I see them.
Their oily scent mixes with the sharp freshness of wet snow. I catch a whiff of woodsmoke and the faint crackle of a campfire.
My hackles rise. I growl deep in my throat. My wolf pups are asleep in their den a safe distance
“Ready when you are, Cap’n Muldoon.”
My first mate O’Hara squints expectantly through his good eye, the other covered with a black patch. The crew of the Muirgen clusters behind him, waiting for my signal.
Our target, the whaling ship Pawtuxet, flounders on the choppy gray sea, her mast shattered by a well-placed
“Blitzkrieg!” the parrot screeches, hopping from perch to perch inside the brass cage. “Blitzkrieg! Blitzkrieg!”
“If that parrot continues its intolerable squawking,” I say through clenched teeth, “I shall not be responsible for my actions.”
“Cheer up, Miss O’Reilly.” My fellow time travel agent chuckles. “Hernandez must like you a lot to send
Malther is lucky I have a family to avenge. Otherwise, I’d have left his squad long ago.
He leers at me through the drizzling rain. I meet his gaze with a stony stare. Malther may wear a sergeant’s stripes, but the notches in my gun barrel speak louder than any rank. I’m more than a match for you.
Family reunions, am I right?
I stalk through the crowd, the knives strapped to my thighs jangling with every step. Wizards spot me and clutch their oak staffs. Hardened warriors stroke their swords thoughtfully.
Sharp eyes rake me from my spiky raven hair to my black leather boots. I hold my head high.
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