The Time Tutor by Bee Ridgway Page A

madness. We shall waltz at the Savoy.” She smiled. “What a wonderful word. Savoy!”
    â€œIt takes its name from the duchy in the Alps. Savoie in French. And you will Charleston. You must.”
    â€œ Savoir ? To know?”
    He smiled. “No, my hungry one. Savoie . Savoy. If you must know, it derives from the Latin sapaudia . Land covered in fir trees.”
    â€œYou know a great deal about it.”
    â€œIt is my favorite place.”
    â€œI think it very strange that you love a hotel most of all in the world.” She fitted herself into his clasp and began doing a little waltz step. “Why-do-you, live-in-the, eighteen-hun-dreds?” she asked, in three-four rhythm. “When-you-love, the-nine-teen, twen-ties-so, much?”
    He spun her around and onto the bed. But instead of following her there, he stood, looking down at her. He sighed. “Because I have commitments,” he said. “I am bound to the blasted flea-infested, freezing, and benighted eighteenth century. I cannot entirely abandon it.”
    â€œWhy?” She put her hands behind her head and smiled up at him, a heartbreakingly sweet expression. He was, he thought to himself, hers to command. “You are Ofan. You can live anywhere, any when.”
    â€œAnd still,” he said, “I am bound. It is a condition of my birth.”
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    During their third night at the inn, Alva opened her eyes and knew they must leave. She knew it because she could feel the River. Perhaps all of Ignatz’s talk about it had finally sunk in, or perhaps he was getting his talent back, and she was wrapped up, naked, in his arms, and his ability was thrumming in her veins. In any case, she felt it—deep and wide, all around her, the push and the pull of human feeling. It was grand. It was sweeping. It was too much, it was agony, it was drowning her. . . .
    â€œAlva.” He was awake, thank God, and he was wrenching her back, holding her shoulders in his strong hands, his voice commanding her to attend to him. “Alva, focus on me. Open your beautiful eyes and look at me.”
    â€œIgnatz!” She gasped his name. “The River!”
    â€œI know. I know. Hold me. Don’t let it sweep you away.” He held her almost brutally, as if he were hauling her away from the edge of a cliff, careless of her comfort. She could feel the intensity of his concentration; he was clearing her mind with his own, pushing the River away. Rebuilding the present around them, the little room, the quiet night.
    When it was over, he was covered in sweat. “Jesus, Alva.” He collapsed back onto the mattress, half-dragging her on top of him. He stroked his hands roughly down her hair. “Talk about the deep end. That was too much, too fast.”
    â€œI awoke in it,” she said. “It must have been that I could feel it in you, or that you taught me more than you knew. But you have your talent back; you kept me from being swept away.”
    He nodded. “Yes, it’s back. But I don’t want it at that price.”
    â€œIgnatz. We have to go. We have to return.”
    He closed his eyes, and now she could tell that he was testing the River. “Yes,” he said. “We must go. I can sense it, too. And clearly, I am well enough to take us both.” He frowned. “No time like the present.” It was a joke, but he said it bitterly.
    â€œThis has been . . . very lovely,” she said, withdrawing from him. She pulled the covers over her nakedness.
    â€œNo.” He tugged the blanket away. “No hiding. Come here.” He grasped her chin and kissed her demandingly. “We have to go back, but you are not going back to the Guild.”
    She laughed against the intensity of his kiss, and he pulled away, glaring at her.
    â€œMy dark and brooding time tutor,” she said, tracing his three-day beard with her fingertips.