Greta laughed.
“Of course not,” she said. “That’s not how it works. Has Devon told you nothing about what these excursions are truly about.”
Tina took a sip of her drink. It was cold, just like it had just been in a fridge, but of course that couldn’t be, right?
“He says his compass picked me because I have to fight for this hammer,” she admitted. “It sounds crazy, but its starting to make a kind of sense, if anything in this makes any kind of sense.”
“And does he trust you to keep up your end of the bargain?” Greta just came out and asked.
“Um, what?” Tina replied, not liking the implications behind those words. “Look, I was hired for a job, and this is not it, so there was no bargain. And I haven’t even decided if I’m going to play that crazy game firebomb throwing it turns out he wants me to. I wasn’t asked until I was already here. So it a bit hard to answer your question the way you made it sound.”
Was ever time traveller some kind of manipulative game player?
Greta held her gaze, seemed a little amused, not to mention judgmental.
“Let me put it another way,” she finally said. “Do you think he’s up to this task he set for himself?”
Tina put down the goblet of Sangria. For some reason, at that moment, Tina reminded of the sphinx of all things, speaking in nothing but riddles. She recalled the Greeks also had sphinxes in their myths along with the Egyptians.
“What do you want?” she asked.
“What’s in all our best interests. To secure the hammer for my own client and perhaps get you back home where you belong. Isn’t that what you want?”
“Um.. yes,” Tina replied. “But…”
“Of course this will mean you must come and join my team, at least for the time being, so we can win the hammer. Then you can go home and forget about all this sorry business.”
“That doesn’t sound much different than the deal I’ve already been offered,” Tina told her.
“Oh, but it could be so much more,” Greta replied. “Your home could be much closer to what you want. What you truly want, not the string of dead end jobs and amateur athletics. If you are the murderball player you are purported to be. If you are what the compass actually told Devon you are, you could get the world you desire, not the one you were dumped in.”
“Purported?” Tina said, feeling again a little insulted by Greta’s tone, enough that she didn’t really pay much attention to what the woman said after that. “What do you mean I could get whatever world I want?”
“Apparently you are the Murderball player of the age,” Greta offered with a dollop of obvious sarcasm. “I’ll admit, you don’t look like much, but I’ve been wrong before. And I’m willing to take a chance on you. If you are willing to set aside your preconceived notions.”
“What do you mean by ‘what I truly want’?” Tina asked. “And what did you mean about what the compass told him?”
Greta laughed again.
“Oh, the dwarf hasn’t told you how stepping through actually works, has he?”
“No…” Tina started. “Although he did tell me this is a Constantinople, not the Constantinople. Is that what we’re talking about?”
She really didn’t like the idea there were so many things going on not only didn’t she know, but was that she didn’t even know the right questions to get answers to. What were the right questions? Her mind was reeling.
“Hmm…” Greta gave her another appraising look. “Perhaps there’s more to you than meets the eyes after all. Very well, here’s-”
Artemis burst out onto the patio.
“Your glory,” she gasped out. “Varangians have broken through the gates.”
“Damn that dwarf, he has friends everywhere!” Greta swore. “You are going to have to make that choice Tina. Now!”
“Now?!” she said, getting up as the older woman did.
Suddenly, several quite hairy, well-armored Viking-looking warriors armed with axes and swords burst onto the patio right on Artemis’ heels. And they did not seem friendly at all.
“In the name of Alexios, Emperor of the Byzantines, you will hand over Tina Rutledge or face the consequences,” their red bearded leader yelled, brandishing a lethal looking double bladed axe, which to Tina’s horror was dripping blood.
