After the closeness of the streets above, the air off the river felt cold and dank, little eddies of mist blowing across the surface. The water shifted in a ceaseless pattern of light and dark, so much more real and immediate than the view from her flat high above. Lizzie felt odd, and small, to be out here instead of locked inside behind the glass walls of her flat or floating in the infinity pool.

Johnny was leaning against the Embankment wall, looking out across the wide stretch of the water. His shoulders were hunched, his face in shadow. “London’s extraordinary, isn’t it,” he said, “so magical and so humdrum at the same time, thousands of years of history layered on top of each other.” He turned to face her. “I promised I’d show you the plaque,” he said. “It’s over here.”

He caught her hand, pulling her over to the wall behind them, high, brick-built, rising to Lizzie’s apartment building above.

“Look... Here...” Johnny sounded breathless all of a sudden. He pushed back the brittle fronds of dying ivy to reveal a plaque, white letters on a dark background, bright in the pale orange light from the street lamps:

NEAR THIS SITE STOOD
BAYNARD’S CASTLE,
1428–1666.

“I told you your penthouse was built on the site of a palace,” Johnny said. “It’s amazing, isn’t it?”

“Wow,” Lizzie said blankly. “That is amazing. I had no idea that was even here.” She stretched out a hand towards the wall. The brick was clearly modern, neat courses with tidy mortar sandwiched between. Her fingers slid across the smooth, cool surface, feeling the dampness of the mist like grease on its face. The smell of the river was stronger now; fish and decay, brine and damp basements. It seemed to catch at her throat, smothering her. The wind off the water was growing stronger too, tugging at her hair, a cold rain chill on her face. She touched the blue plaque and suddenly everything changed. The wall vanished and she could see cobblestones beneath her feet and the remains of brick and chalk and mortar, a jumble of stone and rubble that would once have been a building. She had the dizzy sensation that she could see the high walls and tall towers of Baynard’s Castle rising above her like a cliff, a pennant blowing against a bright blue sky. She could hear the lap of the river at the water gate and the gulls calling. The stench of mud filled her nostrils. There was sun on her face now instead of rain and sufficient heat was blazing down that she felt the sweat spring to her forehead. Voices sounded close by and the clatter of hooves on cobbles.

Lizzie withdrew her hand from the stone as though she had been burned. She turned to look for Johnny but she could see nothing other than his shadow, a bar of darkness falling across the blinding sunlight. The sense of seeing into the past was more powerful even than when she touched familiar objects. She had stepped into the past instead of simply viewing it, and it was immediate and terrifying, all the more so because she had not anticipated it. She had not for one moment expected this.