Character guide

Ross Murdock

major

Also known as Ross, II Ross, Reluctantly Ross, VII Ross, XII Ross, XIII Ross, Ross Murdock of the Project

Ross enters the project as a reluctant recruit with a delinquent's instincts and a talent for keeping his mouth shut while his eyes work. Captured by horsemen who plan to sell him to a hairless, fire-wielding chief, he must argue, bluff, and endure while bound and bleeding. His outsider's suspicion—of his captors, his rescuers, and the enemy alike—makes him the reader's wary guide into a war fought across centuries.

Ashe

major

Also known as the old Ashe

Ashe moves through the past as Assha of the traders, a man known and trusted in villages where a wrong word could unravel centuries. Standing over the crater that was Outpost Gog, he reads the dead with grim precision and decides to walk into Nodren's town grieving and asking questions. His steady competence and willingness to shoulder danger—even staging a quarrel with a god—give the mission its spine and Ross a standard to measure himself against.

McNeil

supporting

McNeil is the mission's memory, able to recite Sanford's informant network from Britain to Brittany and to swear no warning ever came. He explodes at dead ends and needles Ashe for a plan, but his knowledge of the dead agent's methods is what keeps the investigation moving. His raw frustration gives the hunt for the Reds a human cost, and his sharp questions push the team toward the truth.

Lal

supporting

Also known as Apparently Lal

Lal is a small man caught between great powers, frightened of Lurgha yet shrewd enough to know that quarrels of gods are not for him. When Ashe stages a fiery display and offers the rare wolf skin for the Mother's shrine, Lal accepts the bargain and promptly removes himself from the village so he cannot be asked questions. His cheerful cowardice and practical cunning make him both a liability and an asset—and a window into how the past's ordinary people survive the agents' war.

Kurt Vogel

supporting

Also known as Kurt, Granted Kurt

Kurt arrives at the arctic base with ingenious devices and a plan to reach his own rendezvous, and he nearly sells Ross on the gamble. When the project's mechanical hound and Kelgarries's team close in, his boasted immunity proves hollow and his friends walk into a blast. His only visible emotion comes when he learns what happened to them, a flicker that makes the Reds feel less like abstractions and more like men Ross might have become.

Assha

supporting

Assha is known from his father's post to the marsh villages as a trader of his own race, one who pulled Gurdi from a flooded river and paid for it with his goods. That reputation is armor: it explains his presence, his questions, and his movements among people who would otherwise be suspicious. When Ross, concussed and reciting a borrowed identity, is hauled before a chief, it is Assha's name and standing that keep the story—and the mission—alive.

Lurgha

supporting

Lurgha belongs to warriors and great men, too high to bother with a wretch like Lal — until he speaks out of the air and names Lal his meat. That voice turns a timid Great Mother follower into an unwilling instrument, ordered to bind one of the evil traders and drag him to the ruined hill post. The terror he plants in Lal is what puts Ross's flight, and Ashe's patient counter-argument, into motion.

Foscar

supporting

Foscar leads the riders who take Ross on the trail, and his camp moves at a lounging, unhurried pace that keeps the prisoner bound to a tree with a noose at his neck. He and his men have already heard the hairless stranger's offer of fire-magic and good things, so Ross's talk of payment at the bitter water lands as a split-tongued gamble. His practical calculus — why do the hard thing when the easy one pays — is the wall Ross must talk his way through.

Ennar

supporting

Also known as the watchful Ennar

Ennar studies the captive trader and finds him unlike the hairless chief who put a price on his head — hunter people, hair and eyes, nothing strange. When Ross insists his own people will pay much at the bitter water, Ennar jeers: they might ride many sleeps to no people and no water, while the chief waits not even one sleep away. His calm, mocking reasonableness makes Ross's helplessness plain and forces him to argue for his life on foreign terms.

Dr. Webb

minor

Also known as Webb

A scientist involved in the time project.

Nodren

minor

A native of the ancient world encountered by the agents.

Tulka

minor

Also known as This Tulka

A Beaker trader and contact for the time agents.

Major Kelgarries

minor

Also known as Kelgarries, Major John Kelgarries

A military officer overseeing the time project.

Nelson Millaird

minor

Also known as Millaird, Only Millaird

A scientist and member of the time project team.

Hardy

minor

Also known as The bandaged Hardy

An injured agent encountered during the mission.

Ulffa

minor

A native of the ancient world with a minor role.

Hodaki

minor

A hostile native figure in the ancient setting.

Gurdi

minor

A native of the ancient world with a minor role.

Judge Rawle

minor

Also known as Rawle, The man Judge Rawle called Major

A judge involved in the project's legal aspects.

Cassca

minor

A Beaker woman with a role in the native society.

Rossa

minor

Also known as The Beaker trader Rossa

A Beaker trader who interacts with the expedition.

Jansen

minor

A member of the time project support staff.

Alexander

minor

Also known as Sandy

A minor character mentioned in the narrative.

Sanford

minor

Also known as the redoubtable Sanford

A minor character associated with the project.

Feng

minor

A minor character mentioned in the story.

Miles

minor

A minor character in the time project.