Stockholm,  Summer 2010

The kind gentle eyes of the king Karl Gustavus III Josephus stared down at Timeo and the milling crowds behind him.

Despite his frequent visits, he’d never seen it. At the time, parts of the palace were open to the public as an almost secondary museum to the ones that had already existed and in full prominent display, this had been in view of most of the visitors. He had not even glanced at it once on any visit. 

Now, after all those years, here it was. Here he was, actually looking at it for the first time. 

Monarchy. Tch! 

A fierce cynicism that any soldier soon acquired then (even those who’d swear blind loyalty to the king and actually believed it, he’d argue) had made him wary of lionising the figureheads of state. The king had not been in charge, not since those below him had removed much of the teeth of the very idea of a monarch in charge. All the same, he may not have given the orders but he'd tacitly endorsed them. Didn’t matter who gave them, one leader was very like another. 

Joseph hadn’t been bad. Kind to a fault,maybe. Too preoccupied with how people saw him, yes. But years of reflection had secured in Timeo a subtle re-evaluation that maybe he hadn’t been as terrible as the others. 

He bit down on the instinct to spit at the multitude of memories rising to the surface. He was in the palace, it’d be rude. And for another thing, it was not 1880, 1888 or any other yesteryear after. 

It was 2010. This was, supposedly, modern times. These days, the spitting was done online in various forms of social media. He’d never do it though,not publicly. 

His online presence had been limited to a website he’d made half out of boredom and half out of wanting to show off how immaculate his collection of 19th century rifles was, followed by a very limited social media he only ever used to point people to the site or debunk some trash theory on 19th century warfare. If he strayed out of that, he feared he’d never stop complaining. 

Timeo pulled himself together and tried to appreciate the picture. 

The reason for him being here, after all, was just to relax. No one had summoned him here. The royal family had not needed him at all for so many years now. Not since… When was it… Oh yes. 1914.

Nonetheless he had felt some duty being here. 

A few years ago, more pictures by an artist called Ana Lingstrom had made their way into the public. He kept an eye on art markets, an after effect of a particular mission where he’d gone from Cyprus to Madrid after a suspected art thief. That had been interesting and had opened his eyes to the goings-on of the art world and it was how he knew of this event months before the public did. 

Ana Lingstrom. He’d not heard that name in years. He still carried the locket she’d given him and this he now drew out carefully and flicked open. 

Heh. They had most of her collection. Some of it was in the Nationalmuseum of Stockholm, but here some of the more notable portraits of the royal court at the time resided, a loan before they also went back to the museum. 

They had most of it, but Timeo had one thing no one else would ever own. 

The locket still had the picture she’d made for him to remember her by. It was a small nude self-portrait. Tame by standards of today but he recalled he’d often had happy solo moments to it when he’d been travelling. And he would never ever sell it. Ever. 

He put it away and under his many layers. Summer in the north was still cold, especially compared to anywhere else. 

He looked up at the king again. For some reason, he felt the benign look was more one of pity now. The portrait was looking down at a feline who was, for all intents and purposes, out of his time and maybe a little lost. Timeo sighed. 

Maybe I am, he thought. Maybe I am lost and I just needed to ground myself. 

He shook his head then he moved on to the next. 

He knew this one instantly. Marielle, the loud obnoxious French one. She’d have loved it today. Definitely one of those faces you’d see on TV, spilling all the celebrity gossip. He smiled faintly at a recollection. Heh. maybe he’d been too hard on her then. There’d only been so much of her he could take though. It wasn't as if he could stand the modern French either. 

Then one he hadn’t seen. He looked up as he saw… Yes. It was Ana, seated and looking very demure. Older too. There at her side and stood up, with one arm on the chair, Dag Lingstrom. The ram had greying curls on his head but it was still him. Still that steely look to the eye Timeo had always known. 

The picture was of them as an older couple and he didn’t even have to look at the date. She’d been 45 at this time. 

Besides them were two children. One he recognised as Sven, a hybrid of feline and ram with smaller horns that did not curl and a curly tuft that made up his hair. Next to him…

The beast of recognition swirled in depths of watery memory. 

The other was Storm. He didn’t need to look at the plaque. Storm was a near-perfect hybrid of Ana’s dark brown coat and Timeos distinct blue. It had somehow manifested as an almost calico pattern but those blue stripes were hard to miss once you knew what to look for. It was as if the powerful Ericsson genetics had fought hard against the latent ones and both sides had agreed a truce. 

He’d been called Storm because of that coat. And a bit of a bad disposition at birth, so he’d been told after. 

‘Excuse me.’

Timeo turned at a voice approaching with typical Swedish reticence. Behind him a pale goat with small curved horns  and bearing a name badge that had him marked as exhibition staff.

‘I’m very sorry to interrupt but I couldn’t quite help myself.’ The goat coughed in mild embarrassment. ‘Lars at your service. I’m… not quite sure how to put this but you bear a striking resemblance to a painting we have on loan. I wondered if it wasn’t too much to ask-’

Timeo shook the offered hand and smiled. ‘Ask away. He’s… a distant relative. I happened to look extremely similar when I was born so…’ He shrugged, passing the lie off with the air of one who’s done it for years. ‘Just a lucky coincidence.’

Lars blinked then smiled, relief that he hadn’t committed a social faux-pas evident. ‘I see! You must be very used to this. If you’d like to see the picture itself, it’s not too far.’

It wasn’t. Just a few down and Timeo looked up. 

He had seen the canvas Ana had used. It had been huge then. But he’d not seen or paid much heed after its unveiling and time had passed enough he’d almost forgotten what it had looked like. It had felt sacrilegious as he had been extremely grateful for it. But there had been reasons and a distinct lack of time was one of them, a supreme irony given that the Temporal Agency offered nothing but time.

It had been restored. He’d learned paintings tended to degrade and go duller unless restored. Of course it was easy to damage them in such a way as well and he was thankful he hadn’t had to learn about doing their restoration practically.

It was restored and it was beautiful. Memories surged back and he thought back to that day. Seeing it in all its glory for the first time complete and ready for the world. 

He smiled. 

‘You know, she was quite popular then.’ Lars spoke softly,almost reverentially.  ‘But as with most artists, their names fade as their paintings are put away and forgotten. It was lucky we managed to find the ones we did have.’

Timeo nodded. ‘I can hazard a guess she wasn’t taken all that seriously then. Easier to forget then.’ He felt the knot of bitterness twist a little then let it go. That was then and it had been true. Court artists were often on a limited lifeline. ‘Still, a beautiful piece. I had heard he had his picture done and I half-wondered why. He didn’t seem the sort to really favour this sort of display.’

The lies added up. He was so adept at this sort of thing that it was second nature to him. 

The goat checked something quickly. ‘Oh you’re quite right. Ana’s diary showed she found him a little difficult at first. But came round to the idea.’

Yes. Yes he had. But it was only because it was her really. Anyone else he’d have been a lot more difficult.

‘How does it feel to see your ancestor?’ Lars looked a little wary now, hoping he wasn't asking too many questions. 

Timeo glanced up at the painting. Then he recalled young Storm. There’d been an inevitability about the birth. He and Ana had met often enough that it had to happen eventually but here is where perhaps it had felt different. 

Storm had been conceived with some vague idea he’d had of love. Timeo would admit that he had, in his own stand-offish way, loved Ana. He’d been more vulnerable than he usually was with her, a rarity in one who prized his solitude and the tough outer shell he maintained all his life. He’d looked out for her in ways he would have done with no other. 

There had also been the fact that he was only too happy to share in the couple’s lurid fantasies and be, as much as he allowed anyway, a part of their unit. 

And, unusually, he’d broken his other rule where children were involved. His usual rule was never to get involved. He didn’t like children much. He recalled vaguely even at age 14, he’d not liked other kids his own age. In modern phrasing, he’d be one of those ‘deadbeat dads’ or absentee fathers. Not something he was proud of but not something he actively sought to change either.

But here, he did get involved a little with the two boys’ education. He’d taught them how to shoot a rifle and taught them two important things: One, don’t sign up for the army. Two, don’t let anyone give you hell and bite back if you have to. The first one he considered quite important.

It had been love. Yes. It had. For as bad as he’d had it back then, the painting had brought back memories, but most of all it had brought back feelings that were hard to rekindle in his old soul. 

Turning to Lars, he smiled. How could he say all of that in such a way that it didn’t break the modern norms of most Swedes? 

He wouldn’t. Instead he said: ‘It’d be wrong of me to say proud. But I would say that I think he’d be glad to have his place cemented in history.’