Heroes Live Forever (Knights in Time)

by Chris Karlsen

  He rolled his eyes at her take on typical ghost behavior. In his six hundred years, he’d yet to meet one who enjoyed hanging around crypts. As to spirits walking around headless, well, of course, a few did, but not all the time. Out of boredom, some of the spirits frightened mortals that way as a joke. He’d considered the same once or twice, when certain people aggravated him. Mortals never seemed to find it funny.

  Basil moved a bit closer to Elinor.

  She rubbed her arms several times and checked the counter around her. She stepped down and pivoted in a slow circle. “Do you see a bug on me?”

  “No, why?” Lucy asked.

  “I had this ticklish feeling, like something was on me.”

  Guy brought his open palm close to Lucy’s neck and grinned at Basil.

  “Ugh.” Lucy brushed at the back of her neck with her hands. “Now, you’ve got me feeling the creepy-crawlies.”

  Guy moved his hand away.

  Lucy stopped swiping at her neck. “Maybe your grandma is haunting you, invisibly tickling you,” she whispered in a spooky voice along with fey finger movements.

  “Don’t be an idiot. My gran isn’t haunting me. Although, I still walk into a room sometimes and expect to hear her talking to herself.” Elinor looked thoughtful for a moment and smiled. “She’d be jabbering away and in quite colorful language too. At times her chatter was so animated it sounded like one side of an actual conversation.”

  Elinor leaned against the sink. “Back to your dishy ghost, I hate to break it to you Luce, but I seriously doubt Galahad’s ghost is anywhere nearby. I doubt many look like Sean Connery either. If only.”

  Lucy looked over the kitchen. “This is such a big place. I know you loved Theresa. But because she left you the house doesn’t mean you have to keep it. Have you considered selling?”

  “No.” Elinor gazed out the kitchen window. “I’ll never sell. I love this house. I love my view of Ashenwyck Castle, or what’s left of it anyway. When I was little, I fantasized I lived in a castle where knights walked, and jousted, and rode huge destriers.” She turned back to Lucy. “I want to raise my children here. I want to marry a man who loves the area as much as I do. I want my little girl to look out at the castle and dream of gallant knights too, just like I did.”

  Lucy gave an unladylike snort of derision. “You’re such a die-hard romantic.”

  “So? There are worse things to be, and when did you become such a pessimist about love?”

  “When I started dating. I think it’s incurable,” Lucy said, drawing a heart pattern on the table with her finger.

  Elinor nodded. “Dating does have that effect. I give men the chocolate cake test. I ask myself, would I rather be at home in my robe with chocolate cake and the telly, or making small talk with this guy? The cake wins ninety percent of the time.”

  “I’m convinced dating is the Black Plague of the twentieth century. If you’re done, can we go?” Lucy stood. “All this talk about romance or more specifically lack thereof is making me hungry. I’m ready for lunch.”

  Elinor grabbed her purse. “Sounds good to me. I’m famished. Since the pub doesn’t carry Ghost Food Cake, for dessert I’m ordering Angel Food Cake with strawberries.”

  “He didn’t look angelic. That was part of the attraction. He was devilishly handsome,” Lucy said.

  “Of course, silly me. Who wants a sweet-faced ghost?” Elinor asked, as they walked out the door.

  Chapter Four

  Basil waited until the women drove away, and then drifted with Guy into the drawing room.

  “Did you hear? The Lucy woman called me, ‘devilishly handsome,’” Guy said.

  “Her assessment is clearly impaired by the fact she only got a glimpse of you,” Basil said.

  They busied themselves examining unpacked boxes. An open one contained vacation photos of Elinor. Guy removed one of her in a hot pink bathing suit and tipped it so Basil could see.

  Unlike most women he’d known, Elinor’s complexion was sun darkened, at least in the picture. “It’s pleasant, this color on her face. I wouldn’t have thought so, if I hadn’t seen for myself. The exposed skin is another boon.” He began his own search of the box it came from. “Have you ever heard of this Sean Connery?”

  “Scottish fellow as I recall.” Guy wrinkled his nose. “An actor, I think.”

  “Scottish,” Basil grunted in disapproval, “a savage lot.”

  Guy leaned back on his heels, arms resting on his knees. “Before he joined my knights, Stephen first squired with a knight who lived near Carlisle. The incessant reiving on the part of their Scots neighbors presented never-ending problems. He used to say it wasn’t a Scots fault there were Scots, no more than it’s the fox’s fault he’s a fox. He claimed the problem lay with the Romans.”

  “The Romans?”

  “According to him, they should have built their wall higher.” Guy moved to a pile of albums stacked by the stereo. “So, what’s this plan of yours? Personally, I don’t see why we can’t just pop in the kitchen like we did with Theresa.”

  “Not much put Theresa off. She took most anything, including us, in stride. The last thing I want is to frighten Elinor. I’ve decided on a different plan from my original, and it came from the lady herself. When she’s alone and gone to bed, we’ll make our entrance.” Basil couldn’t resist a smile at his own cleverness. “You heard her. Mounted knights in shining armor, jousts, chivalry, childhood fantasies she still holds onto. We can be her dream knights come true.”

  “When?”

  “Tonight.”

  Chapter Five

  Basil kept an eye on the stairs watching for Elinor. She’d returned from lunch that afternoon and finished emptying all the boxes in the kitchen. Afterward, she’d gone upstairs but left the lights on in the drawing room. He hoped she’d return to unpack the boxes in there.

  Elinor didn’t disappoint him. He looked up as she came down and went straight to the stereo. He joined her as she rifled through the stack of albums and pulled one out.

  “She’s playing that plague music again,” Basil said to Guy. “The one about Saturday night fevers.”

  The knights leaned over to get a better look at the cover. A man in a white suit posed on colored boxes, while a mirrored ball appeared ready to drop onto his head. Elinor lingered over the picture before removing the black disc.

  “Surely, she can’t find this skinny fellow handsome. He’s so—common,” Basil said.

  “Probably French,” Guy said with a measure of disgust.

  The record dropped down and as the first notes played, Elinor began to hum and sway. The white man’s shirt she wore covered all the essential spots, as long as she stayed moderately still. She danced over to one box, opened it, and then moved to another. The shirttail flipped back and forth as she sorted through their contents. Flashes of lacey panties popped into Basil’s view where the garment rode high.

  Guy’s gaze slid from Elinor back to Basil. “Do you think it odd we find ourselves, such as we are, so drawn to some mortals? I’d have thought that sort of feminine attraction might have ended or have no validity for us now.”

  “Elinor has joyousness, a generosity of spirit, a kind nature. That’s in and of itself, a strong enticement.” Basil followed her as she worked, moving nearer as she sorted through the boxes. “There’s a pleasing grace about her.”

  Elinor removed two large paintings from their containers and set them against the sofa. She picked off the fragments of packing material stuck to them.

  Basil studied the artwork. The first was a beautiful woman in a long white gown. A dark-haired man in chain mail and surcoat knelt before her. The lady held a sword to his shoulder as though knighting him. It was titled, The Accolade.

  “Interesting paintings, don’t you think?” Basil asked, curious how Guy would interpret Elinor’s choice.

  “I think I’d rather bed the wench than be dubbed by her.” Guy peered over to where Elinor was dusting the frames. “Thoug
h, I’d not mind having her dub me.”

  “You are confusing dubbing with tupping.” Basil joked back and went to the sofa. “In my experience, women and swords are a bad combination.”

  The second picture, called Godspeed, showed a company of knights passing through a castle portcullis. One knight on horseback was stopped. A young woman with reddish gold hair bent to tie a fringed silk favor to his mailed arm.

  Basil tilted his head and critically appraised the works. “This is her ideal of what knights were like. This is the vision she is enamored with and has stamped on her heart.” A pensive sadness touched his eyes as he studied the art. Basil’s gaze lifted to Elinor. “Oh milady, sometimes it was this lovely, but more often, it wasn’t.”

  Long legs and more of the frilly panties revealed themselves as Elinor bent and picked up the empty picture boxes. Basil’s attention fixed on her. He took his time letting his eyes travel downward from her bottom, the length of her thigh, over her firm calves then back up in slow appreciation.

  Elinor half-hummed, half-sang along to another song.

  “Rhiannon,” Guy said and smiled over at Basil. “I went to Wales once, on king’s business, to sort out a problem on the border. One of the loveliest ladies I ever bedded was a Welsh maid I met there named Rhiannon.”

  Basil was fascinated as Elinor’s hips rolled to the rhythm of the music. Primitive in his opinion, and boldly sexual, he wanted the dance and song to go on and more. He wanted to slide his hand over every place his gaze touched. He wanted to know if her flesh was as smooth and warm as he imagined. He wanted to make her heart race with his caress. He wanted. The resurrected sensation astonished him.

  Elinor danced over to the table and gathered her hammer, nails and a pencil then danced back without missing a beat. She laid the hammer and nails down and held the pencil in her mouth.

  She stepped onto the sofa and raised the first picture to the wall. She struggled, staggering a bit in the soft cushions with the unwieldy painting’s weight. She positioned the picture and pencil marked a spot on the wall and then lowered the painting. Elinor hammered a nail in and with a small grunt lifted the painting up. She rocked back and forth on the cushion, barely managing to maintain her footing.

  Basil laid a palm under the bottom of the frame while Elinor hooked the wire over the nail.

  “Well, that was easier than I thought,” she said, and then shuddered. “Ooh.” She brushed the back of her legs vigorously and inspected the sofa.

  She sidestepped across the sofa, squinted to gauge the distance between the pictures. She marked another spot and then hoisted the second painting.

  Guy positioned himself behind Elinor on the left, while Basil stood on her right. Each took a corner of the frame and lifted as she raised the picture.

  “I must be getting used to the weight,” she muttered. She lowered the picture long enough to hammer a nail into place. Once again, the knights lifted the corners. Elinor hung the piece with ease.

  The knights lingered close to her.

  “Ugh, spiders!” Elinor cried in a strangled voice as she swatted, rubbed and shook her head repeatedly. She jerked back hard, lost her balance and tumbled backwards.

  Chapter Six

  Strong arms caught her. Strong arms? Before that curious thought formed in her confused brain, she found herself upright.

  Elinor blinked several times, trying to get her bearings.

  “I didn’t feel that. I’ll look behind me and see no one is there,” she reassured herself not wholly convinced. Prepared for flight over fight, she spun around.

  A man stood a few feet away. At least what was visible looked like a man. He appeared to be a knight, similar to the one in her painting, except semi-transparent. She gasped, momentarily more stunned than afraid. The knight seemed as disconcerted as she was shocked. Two ebony eyebrows slashed downward into a harsh frown as he stared back. He composed himself. The fleeting moment where he looked rattled, gone.

  He wore mail and a dark blue surcoat with a leopard embroidered on it in bronze silk. The metal links gleamed and the tunic appeared fresh pressed. Tall, with shoulder length hair, in the soft lamplight, his eyes were as black as his hair. He had a hawkish nose. A bump at the bridge and slightly crooked, it looked like it had been broken and not properly set. The flaw suited the harsh jaw line and high cheekbones. She smiled to herself. Her mother often teased her about her attraction to men with large noses. The distracting thought was short lived and she focused on the strange figure.

  “Milady.” The corners of his mouth tipped in weak smile. “I would’ve liked us to have met under better circumstances.”

  He’d spoken with an English accent she couldn’t place a region to. There was a rich, old world quality to it like strong imported coffee. The exact voice she’d have associated with the knights in her paintings.

  A sinking feeling grew stronger as she began to put two and two together. The paintings, the ones she loved were the last things she saw before falling.

  “Oh, my God, I’m dead!”

  Elinor searched the area around her. Her words came in a breathless running commentary. “Where’s my body? People who’ve had near death experiences say they floated above their bodies. Shouldn’t I see my body too?”

  “You’re not dead. You’re fine,” the knight said.

  “I didn’t think I’d go this young.”

  “Elinor—”

  She slid her hand tentatively over the back of her neck.

  “Did I break my neck?”

  “Elinor--”

  The sinking feeling faded as she struggled to accept her death with dignity. “My poor mom, first my grandmother, now me-“

  “God’s teeth, woman. Will you listen?”

  “This will devastate her.”

  “You’re not dead!”

  His raised voice grabbed her attention. No longer semi-transparent, the knight appeared solid now. “My God...” She backed up until her calves touched the sofa. “What...who...are you,” she stammered. “How do you know my name?”

  “You’re not dead,” he said. “Why would you think that?”

  “I fell off the sofa. Clearly, I’m dead and seeing angels or...I’m in a coma, that’s it.”

  She’d always believed angels were androgynous and...blonde. Masculine and rugged looking with his inky eyes and hair, the angel before her walked out of a fanciful daydream.

  “Why else would a figure from my favorite painting come to life? Quite honestly, I’d say it’s very thoughtful to send me an angel dressed like a knight. I guess you felt I wouldn’t be scared this way.” She sighed. “At least my death was painless.”

  Elinor thought for a moment then pointed an accusing finger. “You swore. Angels aren’t supposed to swear or raise their voices.”

  “I can assure you of two things. I’m no angel, and you aren’t dead or in a coma, whatever that may be. You’re very much alive and I’m very much a ghost.”

  She analyzed what he told her. Her body wasn’t lying on the floor, so she probably wasn’t dead. There were no fuzzy edges to her vision, like she imagined accompanied a coma. This was a hoax, she concluded.

  “Lucy put you up to this, didn’t she? Well, I don’t appreciate the fact you broke into my house to play this stupid trick.” She pointed to the door but kept her eyes on the man. “Get out. Go. Now, before I call the police.”

  He shook his head. “Lucy didn’t put me up to anything, Elinor. I’m telling you the truth. I’m a ghost.”

  “How do you know my name, if she didn’t tell you?”

  “I’ve always known your name.”

  It was late. Her patience was exhausted. And, this bloody actor was in her house. He had to leave or she’d have no choice but to call a constable. “Out!”

  “This is not going well.” Another voice, invisible, whispered loud enough for her to hear.

  “Appear for her.”

  “Who are you talking to?” Elinor considered the intruder with
wary curiosity.

  A brown-haired knight in mail appeared. A fraction shorter, he was handsome in the traditional sense, the way the first knight wasn’t. His surcoat was scarlet and charcoal grey with a swan embroidered on the front.

  “Oh. My. God. In the movies, this is where the heroine faints.” She wasn’t that fragile. Elinor lowered her head, and as unobtrusively as possible, measured the distance between her and the front door. Her heart beat triple time against her ribs. She wondered if her feet could move that fast.

  The first knight smiled. “You said you wanted to meet a ghost and voila, twice as many as you hoped for.”

  The second knight winked at her.

  If they weren’t sent by Lucy, and if she wasn’t dead, they were either truly ghosts or none of this was real. She went with the logical answer. “I banged my head when I fell, and I’m hallucinating.” Something the first knight said clicked in her mind. “When did you hear me say I wanted to meet a ghost?”

  “I overheard you speaking with your friend. I figured you’d be happy we weren’t headless apparitions.”

  “You said Lucy wasn’t involved.”

  “She isn’t.”

  Elinor racked her brain and couldn’t think of an explanation for the second knight’s materializing out of midair. Professional magicians make things appear and disappear all the time. This was no rigged stage. This was her drawing room. No way could Lucy arrange such a sophisticated trick.

  Elinor closed her eyes and pressed her fingertips against the lids. “Maybe this is a dream. When I open my eyes they’ll be gone. I’ll find that I fell asleep on the sofa.” She opened her eyes a crack and peeked out through the narrow slits. “You’re still here. Great, I’ve lost my mind.”

  The back of her neck started to ache with the beginnings of a migraine. Migraine: an innocuous word that lacked the intensity to describe the giant Japanese drums pounding in her brain.