by Jill Jones
Wind whipped at her cloak, and Taylor attempted to tighten it around her body, although with the unwieldy rushes she carried tucked beneath her arm to provide her a torch later, such an effort was difficult. She and Pauley made their way noiselessly along the parapet toward the southeastern corner of the castle wall. Only inches from them, the sheer cliffs dropped off into blackness. Taylor’s heart thundered, and she tightened her grasp around the Scottish Rose. She had hoped to put it in her pouch, to free both hands for the difficult descent to come, but it was too large, and she had no pockets other than in her jeans.
Pauley hurried ahead of her, and being unable to call out to stop him, she walked faster than she would have liked over the uncertain terrain in order to keep up. At least he seemed sure of the way. She didn’t know what she would do if he took a wrong turn. But he stayed exactly on the path Mrs. Ogilvy had indicated, and shortly they arrived at the break in the wall she’d said led to the path. At last the boy paused, and Taylor caught him by the arm. “Slow down,” she mouthed, giving him a smile and a gesture that asked for his sympathy in letting her catch her breath.
The night was dark, but the pale crescent moon shed enough light for her to make out the path. Until they reached a place where Taylor believed no one would see them, she was afraid to turn on the flashlight. She had wanted to show it to Pauley beforehand, but had not had the chance. She knew he was likely to be afraid of this strange “candle,” but she was counting on his trust of her to keep him from freaking out.
She signed to him, “go slowly.” He nodded, and they began the perilous climb down the narrow, overgrown path to where Mrs. Ogilvy had said they would find a boulder protecting the entrance to the passageway that led to the cave where she wanted Taylor to place the rose chalice. Taylor went ahead of Pauley this time, to break his fall if he should lose his footing, and also because she wasn’t sure he knew where the entrance was and might lead them past it.
Down into the darkness they half-walked, half-slid. Taylor was almost glad for the dark of the night around them, because she suspected if she could see the vertical angle of their path clearly, she might lose her nerve. How far was this place? She began to wonder when they had traveled along the way for several minutes. Had she missed it?
The path took an unexpected turn, which Taylor would have missed had not Pauley grabbed at the hem of her cloak and pointed out the twist. Likely he just saved me from stepping off this cliff, she thought, swallowing her fear and continuing on. Another few minutes brought them to a large boulder that seemed to block the path, although she eventually discerned the outline of the trail to the right of the rock. This must be the place, she said, her lungs heaving from the exertion and her heart racing with excitement. Pauley took her hand and drew her to the left side of the boulder, opposite where the path led. There, inconspicuous unless a person knew where to look, was a slender opening between the rock and the mountain that spawned it.
Pauley passed easily through the opening, but Taylor wasn’t sure she would be able to follow him. Mrs. Ogilvy was right. There was no way her stout body could have squeezed through here, if she’d been able to make it down the hill at all. But Taylor was thinner than she’d ever been as an adult as a result of the scarcity of food in the castle, and she edged herself through the portal sideways with no problem. Inside, it was blacker than black, making the nighttime outside seem as day. Taylor took the torch from under her arm, glad to be relieved of that scratchy and useless burden. Instead of seeking out the “lighting stone” and piece of metal given her by Mrs. Ogilvy, she reached beneath her apron and unzipped the pouch. She smiled when her hands touched the cold, smooth metal of the flashlight. She just hoped the batteries would hold out until they had finished their assignment.
She clicked it on, and she saw Pauley, who was several feet away from her, freeze in alarm. His eyes grew wide with fright, but Taylor knelt down on the cold rock floor of the passageway and motioned to him to come to her. Reluctantly, he did as she bade, and she gave him the flashlight to hold. He turned it over in his hands then looked at her questioningly. She put her hands around his on the light, then showed him where the switch was. Together, they turned it off, then on again. In the gray-blue illumination emitted by the instrument, Taylor nodded and smiled. Then Pauley did likewise, but he quickly handed the thing back to Taylor as if unsure that it wasn’t dangerous.
With the light shining before her, and Pauley trailing behind, Taylor edged through the narrow passageway that wound into the very heart of the castle rock. High above, Mrs. Ogilvy kept a vigil for their return while, hopefully, the rest of those confined to the fortress slept unawares of their sojourn. Silently counting her paces, as she’d been directed to do by her employer, Taylor tried to think brave thoughts to keep from choking on her fear. She felt her body start to shake, as it had done the night when the first awful suspicion had started to sink in that they had traveled through time. The night Duncan had held her and comforted her and protected her…
Stop it, she scolded herself silently. Don’t think about Duncan. Not now. Think only about the work at hand. One step at a time. One step at a time.
After the appropriate number of steps, she beamed the light across the cold, wet slash of wall. It fell upon a small indentation at the base that cast a black shadow against the shimmer of the wet obsidian.
“Bingo.”
The hole in the wall was low to the ground and less than two feet wide, but she crouched down and flashed the light through the opening. On the other side, she saw a rounded room big enough for Pauley to stand up in.
“Well,” she said aloud, as if the sound of her own voice would calm her jangled nerves, “here we are.” This had to be the place. She turned to the boy, who still showed some fear of the flashlight, but who also seemed unafraid of this cave. Taylor signed, asking him if he would crawl through the narrow space, and with an enthusiastic grin, he nodded. Placing the pouch containing their treasure on the floor, she helped him through the small space, keeping the light on so he wouldn’t be suddenly entombed in darkness.
She started to hand him the Scottish Rose, then remembered why she’d brought along the camera. Here in the depths of the mountain there was no one but a small deaf mute boy to witness her use of such “witchcraft,” and she was not about to forgo the opportunity to photograph this relic before leaving it in its hiding place. She did not know what she planned to do with the evidence once she returned to reality, as she considered her own time to be, but while she existed in this alternate reality, bad dream, or whatever-it-was, she wanted to document as much as she could without jeopardizing her safety and that of the little boy she now considered to be her own.
Quickly, she laid the flashlight down on the flat stone floor of the entrance between her and Pauley. She unzipped the bag again and took out the small camera. She saw Pauley peering out at her curiously. What would he do when the camera flashed? Taylor wondered, but if he decided to run, there was no place for him to go. Still, she did not want to frighten the child, so she motioned for him to come back out of the cave for a moment. She showed him the camera and put it into his hands, as she had done with the flashlight. She let him hold it as she slipped the golden rose-shaped cup from its protective pouch and set it next to the flashlight. Then she encircled Pauley in her arms and held the camera to his eye. He peered through the viewfinder for a second, then nervously handed the camera back to Taylor. Not releasing him for fear he would run away when she took the picture, she adjusted the camera and pressed the button.
The chamber exploded with light, and she knew if Pauley could have screamed, he would have. He struggled to get away from her, but she held him firmly and closely against her and began to rock him gently. She hummed a tune and placed her throat on the top of his head so he could feel the familiar vibrations, for she’d often rocked him to sleep like this when he was so sick. Slowly, he calmed down. Maybe this was a good experience for him, Taylor thought hopefully, a way to begin prepari
ng him in this time for all the magic that he would encounter when she returned with him to the future.
She wanted to take another shot, but she didn’t want to risk terrifying the boy completely, so she decided one would have to do. In a few moments, Pauley recovered his composure, and to her surprise, he indicated he wanted to look at the camera. She let him hold it again, then she took it and secured it in the waistline holder. She noted that he watched her carefully and knew that he would remember what was in the “magic bag,” as she’d begun to call it. Her fingers touched the roll of candy mints, now almost half gone, and she flicked one loose and handed it to Pauley. “To reward you for your bravery,” she said, wishing he could hear and understand.
The boy took it eagerly, then Taylor asked him to go back into the cave. She wasted no time now. With one long last look at the Scottish Rose, she put it back into the pouch, tied the drawstrings, and handed it through the entrance to Pauley, who placed it on a rock ledge that jutted like a natural shelf on the far wall. Taylor signaled “okay” and nodded with a smile, then motioned for Pauley to come out of the cave.
The pair made their way back to the rock that covered the entrance to the passageway and squeezed out into the icy night air. Taylor considered dousing the light from this point onward, but it made the return trip up the mountain safer and faster, and she wanted nothing more at the moment than to return quickly to her quarters and the warmth of her bed.
They reached the break in the wall safely, and Taylor turned off the flashlight and zipped it back into the pouch. She helped Pauley through the niche, then stepped through herself. But when she reached the other side, he was gone. Damn, she thought. The kid was like a mountain goat. He’d probably already made it halfway back to their chambers by now.
But a rough hand covered her mouth as a strong arm imprisoned her in a vise grip. “Keep thy tongue, ye wicked woman,” a guttural voice hissed. “We shall soon rejoice t’ be rid of ye and thy evil bairn.”
Chapter Twenty-One
The ring of the telephone startled Robert Gordon, bringing him immediately out of the almost trance-like state into which he had drifted while reading the ancient diary. “Yes?” he said into the receiver.
“John Doggett here, Gordon. I got your message. What’s on your mind?”
At first Gordon was hesitant to share the incredible treasure he’d received from Lady Agatha Keith even with a known expert in antiquities, but he quickly remembered an idea that had crossed his mind earlier in the day. So he gave Doggett a brief run-down on his acquisition of the diary and the Ogilvy letter, as well as his opinion of how well what he had recently translated fit into the historical timeline. He could tell by the man’s reply he had his immediate interest.
“Would you like me to come right away?”
“Would tonight be agreeable? Say eight o’clock?”
Doggett agreed, took down the address of Gordon’s office, and rang off. Gordon ran his hands through his hair, his heart pounding so heavily it almost hurt. He looked at his watch. It was three o’clock in the afternoon. Could he make his way through the rest of the entries before eight? He’d certainly give it his best shot, because he wanted to know the truth of what had happened to Queen Mary, and because he wanted even more to know where to look for the Scottish Rose…
Holyrood Palace
16 April 1567
They have acquitted Bothwell of Darnley’s murder even though we and the rest of the world know of his authorship in the deed. Lennox, who brought the private process against Bothwell, feared to come to Edinburgh, since Bothwell’s four thousand men roam the streets, and having no one to make the charge, the jury had no choice but to acquit. We have mixed feelings about his acquittal, for we abhor and detest rank bloodshed, especially of a royal. At the same time, we shall not miss Darnley. Marrying him was the most monumental mistake we have ever made in our mistake-ridden life. Even so, we are left bereft of any husband at all, and we are still in want of a strong, dependable consort. We are despondent, and our health continues to deteriorate. The pain in our side recurs so often it is almost constant. Our only happiness is in knowing that soon we will visit our son in Stirling, and that his father is no longer a threat to his well-being.
Today we attended Parliament, to which Bothwell carried the scepter, and we had a strange premonition that he would also have liked to have worn the crown upon his own head. Bothwell has long been our friend, a stalwart lord when others turned traitor. But we begin to discern in him a certain greed for power that we have found refreshingly lacking in him heretofore. Even so, he is a strong lord and has served us well since our arrival in Scotland. Could we entertain the idea of Bothwell as husband?
Taylor struggled against her captor, who lifted her as easily as if she were a child and carried her for some distance before setting her on her feet again. He did not release her, however, nor uncover her mouth. She could see Pauley flailing against the strength of a large man she recognized as one of Kenneth’s friends from the village. The man let out a low growl.
“He’s a wild ‘un, this,” he snarled. “At least he canna make a noise, th’ little beast.”
She recognized the voice that replied and knew that it was Duncan’s own “kinsman” Kenneth who held her prisoner. “Light th’ fire,” he ordered, and Taylor’s eyes grew wide in terror. The stake. She’d seen the gleam of malice in Greta’s eyes when she’d told Taylor about the witches in times past that had been burned at the stake, and Taylor had no reason to believe that Greta wouldn’t delight in torching her very own witch.
Oh, my God.
Taylor froze as the flames grew from a single spark into a roaring bonfire that sent sparks high into the night sky. Her heart seemed to stop, and the sheer horror of what was about to happen paralyzed her. When Kenneth felt her cease to struggle, he removed his hand tentatively from her mouth. “There’s a lass who respects her fate,” he muttered. “Where’s Greta?”
“You people are mad,” Taylor said, finding her voice at last.
Greta pushed her way through the mob. “Ye art th’ one tha’s mad, woman o’ th’ divil. Ye thought ye’d get away with thy evil doin’s, goin’ about charmin’ th’ governor and his lady like ye’ have. But we’ve been watchin’ and waitin’, knowin’ ye’d make a mistake. And a sure fine one ye made tonight, trespassin’ out alone like this, likely on th’ divil’s own errand.”
“Let the boy go,” Taylor said, trying to ignore the hateful vengeance in the woman’s voice. “He’s done nothing…”
But her plea was interrupted by a furious curse from Kenneth. “No, by damnation, th’ boy must die!” he roared. “‘Tis th’ evil bairn who’s caused our woes. I knew his mother, and never a more accursed witchy woman spirited this earth. She deserved t’ die, and so must her offspring.”
Taylor’s blood ran cold. Kenneth knew Pauley’s mother? Then a terrible suspicion hit her.
“How know ye of th’ bairn’s mother?” she demanded quickly, and in a strong voice. “She was not of thy village. Could it be…ye art th’ father of this bairn?” The accusation spilled from her lips before she had time to consider the ramifications of what she was saying. But she had effectively caught him off-guard and seized the opportunity to jerk free from his grasp. Another man ran to snatch her again, but she turned all of her pent-up wrath on him and the others, facing them with such boldness that they backed away.
“Beware of crossing me,” she warned, “ye who call me a witch.” She could see her words begin to play with their superstitions. “So might it be. But whatever I am does not remove the stain of sin from this man’s hands. Ask him, if ye dare.” With a sudden inspiration, she hastily reached beneath her cloak and apron, unzipped the waistline pouch and grabbed the flashlight. Switching it on, she directed the beam into Kenneth’s face. The mob emitted a communal cry at this sorcery and edged away even further.
Taylor took advantage of their surprise and fear and pressed forward with her charges. “Did not th
’ woman ye accuse of being a witch enchant you? And did ye not sire this poor bairn within her? Is that not th’ reason ye pour thy venom upon him, and wish t’ see him…deed, t’ protect your secret sin?” She could tell from the man’s expression that her suspicion was dead on.
“Nay, ‘tis not true,” he denied her charge vehemently. “‘Tis th’ lies of this blasphemer,” he continued, looking around to find support among his fellow witch-hunters. But his voice and his manner betrayed him. Taylor watched, astonished, as Greta moved toward her husband, her eyes now filled with suspicion.
“Swear it, husband,” she demanded. “Swear it on th’ book o’ th’ Lord, for if ye so swear and then tell a lie, ye shall be doomed t’ th’ fires o’ hell.”
But Kenneth Fraser would not swear. Instead, he fought back. “This woman is th’ devil in th’ flesh,” he said, pointing to Taylor, “whose false words are meant t’ poison th’ minds o’ Godfearin’ folk. Believe her not!”
Some of those in the crowd gave a shout of approval and began to close in on her again, but Taylor shouted, “Halt! Stay ye away from me, and let the bairn go free.” She swept the beam of light over the faces of the villagers, seeing even as she did so the fear her actions instilled in them. But how long could she sustain this charade? Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Pauley squirm loose and take off into the darkness of the night.
Run, Pauley! Run! Taylor mentally willed the child into the safety of the governor’s dwelling, knowing that when he returned without her, Mrs. Ogilvy would rouse the rest of the household who would come to her rescue.
