“I rented it!”
“And who rented it to you, as I am the son of this castle’s master!”
“This castle is owned by a holding company in L.A.!”
“Wait…what?” the man asked. “What is a ‘holding company?’”
“Oh my God!” Lily exclaimed while getting to her feet, completely frustrated. “Where is Mrs. Stuart?”
“Mrs. Stuart? What is this nonsense?”
“She is the maître d'hôtel here!” Lily answered angrily, rushing toward the door and wrenching it open. The man yelled after her as she sprinted down the deserted stairs, only to see that the entire entrance hall had changed. Instead of the warm, inviting atmosphere and furnishings of a modern hotel, Lily saw gleaming suits of armor that had not been there the day before. Instead of the large, mounted deer’s head on the wall above where Mammy’s desk was supposed to be, there was a shining red shield, with what appeared to be three severed boars heads upon it, with the hilt of two swords visible at the top corners, reminding Lily of a coat of arms.
The man from the room finally caught up to Lily, and said, “I don’t know from with you come, but cover you, we must. A woman of such rare grace and beauty must carry herself accordingly.”
“What century are you from?” Lily asked sarcastically, “Nobody talks like that anymore!” She didn’t know how right she was.
“I am afraid that I don’t understand what you mean, Miss,” he answered. Look, please, come with me. You and my sister appear to be the same size. Allow me to have her give you some clothes, and we can unravel this quandary.”
Lily stood back and considered his proposal. Could it really hurt to change her clothes? Probably not, she thought to herself. “Okay,” she answered, “But only because you asked.” When he turned to lead her up the stairs once more, she studied him.
He walked and spoke with an elegance that she has never seen or heard of from the brutes in America…clearly, he had a very high intellect, and could hold his own with the smartest of men.
He was a physically imposing man, standing nearly six and a half feet tall. Despite his obvious high class status, he was rugged, and walked not only with the grace of a wealthy man, but also with the clipped, measured steps of a soldier who had seen and survived the horrors of combat.
Lily knew the walk well, having seen many soldiers come to Daytona Beach during the summers (and “getting to know” quite a few of them too). The thing that she didn’t recognize, though, was the already filling beard, as most soldiers she knew were required to keep clean-shaven. His long, well-maintained hair perfectly matched his beard, as both were the darkest shades.
“Wait here,” he said turning to Lily, and he went down a passage that she had not yet noticed, as it was hidden behind a secret door. When he said that, she caught a glimpse of his striking eyes, which were the brightest shade of green that she had ever seen before.
Overall, he was easily the most attractive man that she had ever laid eyes on. “Okay,” she answered softly. As he walked down the hidden passageway, she began to wonder how she came to be in this situation. Clearly, she was in the same castle as yesterday, but it was completely different. How did she end up here?
A few minutes later, she heard footsteps, and the man walked out of the hidden passageway, followed by a plain but pretty young woman, who was likely only sixteen or seventeen at most.
“Hello,” the soft-spoken maiden said, “Matthew tells me that he found you in his bed this morning.”
“Well, I found him in mine.”
“He has asked me if I will provide you with clothing until we can determine how your world and ours have crossed paths.”
“What do you mean ‘my world and yours’?”
“Matthew says that you claim to have rented his bed chamber, is that right?”
“Yes, I rented it from Mrs. Stuart yesterday,” Lily answered.
“We do not know who this ‘Mrs. Stuart’ is,” but apparently in your plane we are not the rightful masters of this castle.”
“What do you mean, ‘my plane’? All this talk of ghosts and other dimensions is really making me wish that I had just stayed home! Scottish people are crazy!”
“Your home is not the home of the Scots?” Matthew asked.
“No, I’m from America.”
“Where is America?”
“My God!...It’s across the ocean.”“Which--
“Matthew,” the young woman interrupted her brother, “she clearly is not from this place. I am going to get her dressed and take her to see Alison.”
Chapter 4
An hour later, Lily found herself in an archaic dress, sitting on the back of a white mare horse, the only vestige of her former clothes being her amethyst necklace. “Where are we going?”
“To see Alison,” Matthew’s sister answered.
“I know, but who is Alison?”
“She’s an old woman, but very wise. She will be able to tell us how you came to be here, and explain how we can get you to your home.”
“Okay,” Lily answered, apprehensive. After ten minutes of further riding, they arrived at a run-down shack on the shores of the Loch. A small, hunchbacked woman sat outside, peeling potatoes.
“Alison!” Matthew’s sister said loudly, causing the hunchbacked woman to look up.
“Marion!” she called, “what brings you to this side of the loch, child?”
“Lily,” Marion answered.
“Ahh,” the wizened old woman answered, looking at Lily. “I daresay that you are not comfortable, are you, child?” the woman said in perfect American English, the first that Lily had heard that day.
“I’m sorry, I don’t understand…” Lily answered, confused.
“I knew that you would be coming, Lily Rey.”
“How do you know my name?” Lily asked.
“I told you,” Marion interjected, “she would know where you came from and how you got here…and how to get you back.”
“Let me see the key,” Alison said.
“Key? What key?”
“You wear the key around your neck, my child.”
“You mean my necklace? It’s not a key!”
“Yes, child, a necklace and a key. Not to the doors you think of, but the key of time.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Didn’t your aunt tell you?”
“My aunt? Aunt Vonny? How do you know about her?”
“Yes, my dear…didn’t she tell you?”
“Tell me what?”
“That the necklace you wear is a powerful talisman! It was blessed by my people to give extraordinary power…the power to control time and space. There is an incantation that will give you the ability to control the amulet.”
“Okay, can I have it?”
“Yes…but please know this: the amulet brought you here for a reason. If you do not fulfill your purpose, then it will have drastic consequences for you…and your family. And now, the incantation is this: ‘tempus imperium.’ If you grasp the amulet in both hands and say these words, a gateway will appear before you. You will need to focus on a specific date or situation, and when you walk through the gateway, you will be instantly transported to that time and place.”
“Can I tell anyone this?”
“Only the one to whom the necklace brought you, and the one from whom it sent you.”
“And who are they?” Lily asked, completely bewildered.
“Follow your heart, child…it will tell you. Now, if you are to prevent the dire consequences that I have warned you about, you need to return to Culcreuch now, or else you will have missed your opportunity. Also, you will need to stay with the one to whom you were sent, or you will fail. Never leave his sight.” Switching to the strange language once more, she turned to Marion and said, “Take her back to your home. She will know what she has to do, and when.”
“Thank you, Alison,” Marion answered, bowing before the ancient witch. “Lily, come…let us go.”
“What year is it?” she asked Marion, breaking the lengthy silence that had stretched between them whilst riding back to the castle.
“It is the year of our Lord, 1314. My father, Maurice Galbraith is the chief of our clan, and built our castle to be the seat of our clan twenty years ago, to keep us safe after King John was forced to abdicate his claim to the throne.”
“So who is the King now?” Lily asked as they slowed to a walk by the stable.
“King Robert I has been king for eight years.”
“Is he the one they call the Bruce?”
“Yes,” Marion answered. Lily (whose knowledge of Scottish history came only from a pamphlet she received in Glasgow when she had arrived the day before and the movie Braveheart) had a lapse in judgment, and said, “Isn’t he that cowardly traitor?”
“Traitor?!” came the booming voice of Matthew from inside the stable. “Robert the Bruce is a good man who has constantly had to fight off challenges to his kingship from pretenders to the throne! Ever since he took the throne, he has been fighting to secure our position! How dare anyone call him a traitor?!”
“I’m sorry…I was told that he had abandoned William Wallace at Falkirk, and that was how Wallace was captured…”
“No. That is not what happened. I fought side by side with Wallace, and he was certainly betrayed, but not by King Robert. The army of the king has lain siege to the royal castle at Stirling, and I will be riding to join him as a member of his personal guard.”
“I’m sorry; I must have been told wrong, please don’t be angry with me!”
“Matthew,” Marion interjected when he opened his mouth to retort, “Peace.”
“Fine,” he said, turning to his sister. “I need to get ready to ride for the ride to the field, so can you please help this young lady to find her way back to where she came from?”
“I can’t,” Lily interjected, a realization suddenly dawning upon her. “I can’t leave until I have done something.”
“What are you talking about?” Matthew asked.
“Walk with me for a few minutes,” Lily answered, turning and walking toward the water.
Matthew turned to his sister, and looked deeply into her eyes, as if asking if he should follow. “Go,” Marion answered the unspoken question.
Chapter 5
“So what you are saying is that you are from another time?” Matthew asked, flabbergasted, fifteen minutes later.
“Yes. I am not from another plane, but I am from another time. My country—”
“The one from across the ocean?”
“Yes. My country has not even been founded yet.”
“But your ancestors came from the land of the Scots?”
“Yes, so I came to learn more about the people I come from.”
“How did your family end up in your country—what did you call it?—America?”
“In a few hundred years from now, my ancestors will go to my country, and they have—or should I say, will be—there for over two hundred years before I was—will be?—born.”
“And Alison told you all this?”
“Well, she told me the necklace brought me here, because I have to do something.”
“What?”
“Honestly, I don’t know. All I know is that I am supposed to stay in your sight at all times, until I’ve done it.”
“How will you know if you’ve done it?”
“I’m not sure…but I think it is safe to say that I’ll know.”
“Well then,” Matthew said with the air of a man who had resigned himself to a conclusion. “I guess that means I won’t be going to the fields at Stirling.”
“No! Go, please! She didn’t say I was to stop you from doing what you need to do! Besides…how do we know that what I came to do isn’t at Stirling?”
“But that would be the height of dishonor for me, to endanger a woman.”
“Clearly, you missed my point about being from another time. In my time, women aren’t viewed the way that they are in your time. Women fight in the army all the time.”
“Really? Aren’t your leaders worried that one of them will get hurt?”
“Of course, but no more worried than they are about the men.”
Matthew considered his dilemma: to take a woman to battle with him would be to risk dishonoring himself if she was injured. To stay behind would be to risk dishonoring himself if her task was in the battle, which could also harm her. Left with a choice between the lesser of two evils, Matthew was forced to choose the option that risked dishonoring himself less: “How will you protect yourself if I am caught in fighting?”
“I was on the archery team at my high school, so I can join the archers.”
“High school? Is that like the upper schools in Oxford and Cambridge?”
“No, high school in my time is like a junior university: you have to go to high school before going to a university. Anyway, I can join the archers and help the fight.”
“Aye,” Matthew finally agreed. I will bring you with me…but if the fighting becomes too fierce, you are to run and save your own life. Do you understand?”
“Okay.”
They spent the rest of the morning preparing for the battle, never leaving each other’s line of sight, just in case Lily’s task presented itself. Together, they saddled horses and discussed the differences between their times. Lily began to focus on her attraction for Matthew, all while wondering if he had any feelings of attraction for her as well.
The fact was, however, that Matthew was deeply attracted to her from the time that he first discovered her in his bed. There was something about her brash nature, making her unlike any other woman than he had ever come into contact with, that he found himself dreaming about her throughout the day. Her close proximity to him was not helping him overcome his feelings, either. Sure, she was fully clothed now, but he was unable to shake the deep-seated feelings of lust that were building inside him. Being around Lily for this extended period of time was only serving to remind him of how incredibly attractive she was, and how amazingly erotic she had seemed earlier that morning.
Lily was so amazingly beautiful and saucy that Matthew could not help but wonder if there was anything he could do to convince her to stay in the past rather than return to her own time.
Lily, too, kept looking at Matthew throughout the morning, stealing glances whenever she was able to. He was unlike the many assholes that she had dated in the past, and even her bosses at the law firm, because he was the very picture of what a gentleman should be. The “nobility” in her time were not so worried with treating a woman with respect or dignity, because they were so blinded by desire for the area between a woman’s legs. It was almost as if a woman was a trophy to be showcased, not a partner to go through life with.
Matthew, it seemed, was so focused on trying to protect his king and his country that he didn’t appear to have an overt concern for the sweetness between her legs…but oh, how much she wanted him to crave it.
Chapter 6
As the day wore on, the tensions around the castle continued to grow into a nearly palpable density. Everyone was making preparations for the English, who were marching for the field near Stirling…everyone but Matthew and Lily, that was. Marion’s husband, David, had already left for Stirling to let the king know how many men to expect from the Castle Culcreuch, and the rest of the Clan Galbraith were ready to leave by early that afternoon. Matthew and Lily both mounted the horses
they had prepared for the fifteen mile ride, and left for the battle that had started earlier that day.
When they arrived, that day’s fighting had ended, but the English (knowing the importance of Stirling’s royal castle) had not withdrawn, but chose to regroup rather than abandon the castle. The next day, Matthew took up his customary position at King Robert’s right hand, and Lily took a position with the Scottish corps of archers. Within an hour, the English army had massed on the far side of the field at Bannockburn, just outside of the village of Stirling, and proceeded to march on the Scottish positions.
“Ho’, men!” King Robert called out over the ranks of his soldiers. From her position, Lily was able to easily make out the tall, imposing figure of Matthew directly next to the King. The Bruce leaned toward him, and Matthew raised his hand, the signal for the archers to load their bows, so Lily followed suit along with the other archers in the Scottish ranks, taking aim in the direction of the English infantry that were advancing en masse across the field. When Matthew’s hand dropped, the archers all let their arrows fly, immediately cutting down most of the first line of English attackers.
Next, Matthew (at the King’s direction) lifted his massive claymore sword in the air with his right arm, and Scottish infantry fell into ranks like a well-oiled machine. When he dropped his sword, the men began to advance across the field toward the English in uniform, disciplined ranks. In the meantime, the Scots archers were commanded to fire upon the English infantry fifteen times more before the two armies met in the center of the field, substantially thinning the ranks of the well-disciplined English soldiers.
The carnage of war, however, began as soon as the two armies met in the center of the field. The Scots were able to fight without fear of the English cavalry, which had been effectively wiped out the day before. Before long, however, the drastically outnumbered Scots began to fall back in the face of the English horde, even unto the crest of the small hill where Robert, Matthew, and some others sat on the backs of their horses.
Then, from out of nowhere, an arrow (which could have come from either side) struck Robert’s horse in the eye, killing the beast instantly and pinning the King beneath his mass. Lily could see Matthew frantically attempting to dislodge his King, but having little success.
[Runes of Argyl 01.0] The Runes of Argyl Trilogy Page 163
