Chloe's Guardian

by Cheri Gillard

  “Never mind. Forget I said anything. I am just looking for a mount. I will be on my way.” He turned to get out of there as quickly as possible.

  “Don’t be so impetuous. Wait a moment. I didn’t realize you were so earnest. You have never heeded anything I said before. I do have one animal you can borrow. She is in the back stable. Be gentle with her. She is old. Use her name to calm her. She likes to hear it—Bethesda. I call her Beth. Do not beat her. I do not want her returned to me tyrannized.”

  Furious with himself for confiding, but more so at Knox for his arrogance, Horatius dashed to the stable and flung open the door. A loud bray greeted him when the setting, angled sunlight glared into the eyes of a mule. A swayback, matted, mean old mule. Horatius let out a string of curses. The animal answered with a bray as profane as the words Horatius had used.

  CHAPTER 27

  Kaitlyn breathed slow, steady, and deep. She was curled up next to Chloe on a smelly blanket spread on the ground next to a campfire. The skinny orange-haired captor had pulled it off his horse and tossed it at them.

  Unable to close her eyes, Chloe lay motionless staring into the darkness. She was numb and couldn’t cry any more. Images of her family abandoned in their burning house had scorched her brain. Being kidnapped by horrific monsters had left her paralyzed with terror. When her emotions weren’t shaking her with dread and anguish, her brain was trying to get around what had happened with Horace; to comprehend talking to glowing, winged celestial beings; battling against demons alongside Michael the archangel; flying through the heavens and—dare she think?—different dimensions. Had they actually been to heaven? Were they truly in a different time now? If Horace could do all she’d seen, was it such a stretch to believe he’d taken them to a different time?

  The town they’d hurried through—could it really have been old Edinburgh? The castle on the hill looked mostly the same as its modern version. But everything else looked and smelled in every way like a medieval town. The vulgar people and feral horses, the spoiled food, the filthy clothes—it was all so unsophisticated and uncontained, crass and barbaric. And wildly frightening. The men were big and hairy, with untrimmed beards and dirty dark mops on their heads. Their kilts, if she could call them that, were nothing like the colorful pleated skirts she knew. The men strutted around with stained, worn plaid blankets draped around dingy yellow nightshirts. The few women they saw were rough, hairy, and nearly as dirty as the men. Children looked like they’d been sprinkled in oil then rolled in the dirt. Kaitlyn and she had finally admitted there was no other explanation but that they were in a different century.

  But what on earth—or in heaven, or the universe for that matter—could she do to get home? She couldn’t click her heels three times and wake up from the nightmare. Her dad couldn’t come get her this time. Horace hadn’t come. Marooned and abandoned. That’s what I am. The distress and despair were enough to start her crying again, even when she thought she couldn’t possibly spill one more tear.

  Nighttime was the only time Kaitlyn and she were left alone together. Otherwise, the big one kept Chloe with him all the time, and the orange-haired one kept Kaitlyn, though the leader barked unintelligible words at him frequently, seemingly keeping him from bothering Kaitlyn when he started to act up. The big one used Chloe’s extra sleeve coming out the middle of her bodice as his handle to pull her around and keep her close. Even now he had the sleeve tied to a rope—like a leash on an elephant’s trunk. He didn’t make the orange-haired one tether Kaitlyn because it was clear she was going wherever Chloe went.

  And Chloe was going to escape. They had to get away before getting killed. Their captors were toying with them, holding out until suddenly snapping and doing horrible things to them until they died. She and Kaitlyn had to get to a church and tell the angel guards they knew they were there, knew they could hear them, and they’d insist on help. She’d tell them what happened and that Horace was in trouble.

  Horace. What happened to him? What had happened between them? That fleeting moment together had been incredible beyond description. Chloe was so confused with feelings, she couldn’t even process what had occurred. What she was feeling with him was nothing like what she’d experienced with Todd. It was foreign—and in some way wonderful. Todd had always been an aloof, not-fully attainable obsession. Horace actually talked to her about things that mattered, and treated her like she mattered. He’d saved her life. He'd risked his very existence for her sake. That someone who could do anything chose to sacrifice so much just for her filled her with deep joy and hope. Yet at the same time, dread gripped her heart. She didn’t know if she’d ever see him again. And if she didn’t, did that mean no one would be able to save her family? No one would be able to save her? She couldn’t wait around for something to happen. What if he couldn’t find them? What if he never came? Surviving might be completely up to her. And she had to save Kaitlyn. Kaitlyn was only stuck in this mess because of Chloe.

  Her heart pounded. The moon moved up the sky.

  It sounds like everyone is soundly asleep now.

  Her breathing sped up. She had to get them away.

  I just need to get Kaitlyn and we’ll make our break.

  Snores rumbled around the fire pit. It was time. She mustered her fortitude.

  I have to do it before I chicken out.

  The rope tied to her extra sleeve was taut between her and the disfigured giant’s wrist. It lay along the outside of the rock fire pit. Too much movement and her captor would wake up. With all her might, she pulled and stretched the sleeve away from her body to relax the rope, and she rolled as close to the fire pit as she could without getting burned. With what little slack she made, she put the extra sleeve into the fire.

  The fabric sat in the fire but didn’t even darken. In contrast, the hairy fibers of the rope heated and recoiled, smelling and burning away until it fell into ash and slipped off the sleeve. She rolled away from the pit and the sleeve wasn’t even hot.

  In Kaitlyn’s ear she whispered, “Kaitlyn, wake up. Don’t move. Not yet. Don’t talk. Just do as I do.”

  Kaitlyn nodded. Chloe rose to her feet and her knee cracked. It sounded like a gun in the silence. The giant rolled onto his side. She sank back down, shrunk into herself, trying to be invisible. They waited. Nothing more happened. Chloe gave Kaitlyn a hand and helped her to her feet. She was as light as Benji and popped right up.

  Oh, Benji. She had to get back.

  Her first step off the blanket broke a dried stick. The giant rolled onto his back. She froze, just certain he’d jump up swinging the humongous sword next to him.

  He let out a sigh. Chloe still didn’t move.

  But Kaitlyn did. She grabbed Chloe’s hand and pulled her away. She took off like she knew where they were going, her feet taking quick, short steps because of her closed skirt.

  They ran. They ran until they couldn’t run another step.

  When they slowed, their breath heavy and quick, Kaitlyn said, “You okay, Cello?”

  “Yeah. You?” Chloe clutched her side where a sharp pain bent her over.

  “Much better now, thank you. I did not like those men.”

  “Where should we go?”

  “Let’s go that way, toward that pretty star.”

  It wasn’t a bad idea. It would keep them from walking in a circle and returning back to their captors in time for breakfast.

  They pressed ahead, Chloe walking and Kaitlyn trotting and heading them straight for her star. The sky was filled with uncountable crystal lights. Chloe had never seen a night sky like it. The land just kept going forever in every direction, and millions of pin pricks of light filled the dark canopy overhead. Was Horace up there flying among the stars? Or still facedown in the barn? Or dead?

  All she wanted was for Horace to suddenly appear and take them away, get them back to her house, and get her family to safety. She could only hope that what he’d said was true, that the fire hadn’t happened yet and they’d have time t
o get there before anything went wrong.

  Kaitlyn kept them moving forward. Her confidence comforted Chloe. She couldn’t think of a better person to be stuck with in another century.

  Every few steps, Chloe changed her gait to match Kaitlyn’s and they trotted in synch to put more distance between them and their captors. The bobbing upset the one bird left in Kaitlyn’s hair nest. It squawked and fluttered, and dusty down puffed from its frantic wings. Kaitlyn sneezed.

  When she finished rubbing her nose, she said, “Hear that? It’s a river.”

  Chloe stopped to listen better.

  “Let’s follow it,” Kaitlyn said. “I bet we’ll find a village or someone to help us.”

  Chloe started crying. She couldn’t stop it. The thought of someone helping them broke through her courage, or maybe her shock. Kaitlyn pulled her close to her side, wrapped her arm around Chloe’s waist—she couldn’t lift her arm higher—and held her there as they walked.

  “Someone will help us,” Kaitlyn assured her. “Hear those birds singing? The sun will rise soon, and we’ll find a village and someone who speaks English. I’ve been sending thoughts out to find Horace and bring him back to us. And to take care of your family.”

  They walked on. Light seeped into the sky. Chloe's feet hurt and her ankles ached. They followed the river for so long, the sun lifted high and the thick air grew hot. At least their clothes weren’t too hot. Somehow, they were actually cool and comfortable.

  To help cope with the long trek, Chloe watched her lime-green pointed shoes, counting steps. For the first one hundred, she led with her right foot. The next one hundred, with her left. Then she switched back. After she hit one thousand, she felt stupid and she lifted her head.

  A castle loomed in front of them. Kaitlyn was looking at it with a tranquil smile.

  “A castle!” Chloe said. “Why didn’t you say something?”

  “You mean it’s real?” Kaitlyn said. “I thought it was a mirage. I was just enjoying the sight of it.”

  Chloe grabbed Kaitlyn’s hand and broke into a run.

  The gateway in the defensive wall was open with no one standing guard.

  “Do we just go up and knock on the door?” Chloe asked Kaitlyn, like she would know medieval castle door knocking protocol.

  “Maybe they have a door bell. A rope pull maybe?”

  They crept through the empty castle yard. Chloe smelled roasting meat. Her stomach growled. Her feet had been hurting too much to notice her hunger. They went around a corner and found what had to be the front door. A loud whistle stopped them.

  An old man with an eye patch over a map of scars hobbled to them. He wore a grungy tartan blanket of blue and green.

  “We need help,” Kaitlyn said. “We’ve been lost and walking for miles and hoped someone would help us.”

  “And all our people are right behind us. Lots of them. We’re not alone,” Chloe added. The man looked grumpy and not someone to trust too quickly with a sob story. He snarled at them.

  Or maybe it was a smile. His scarred face was hard to read, and his three brown teeth didn’t help define his intent. A long string of jumbled sounds came out of his mouth and they understood nothing. He took hold—not too gently—of each girl’s upper arm and pulled them toward the entrance of the castle.

  “We have some really big friends,” Chloe said. Horace’s face came into her memory, when they were looking at each in the barn. Would he ever be able to find them, especially if they were in the deep dungeon of a lost castle somewhere in the Highlands?

  They passed through the castle entrance, each lifted nearly off the ground in the scarred man’s hands, and strong spices and body odor assaulted Chloe’s nose. A huge room was filled with people eating and chatting around planked tables. The man took them up to the front table, which was on a platform in front of a fireplace big enough to stand in. He shoved them forward before the woman at the center of the table. Her clothes looked like heavy drapes. No wonder it stank. Ninety degrees outside and everyone was wearing thick curtains.

  The woman said something incomprehensible to the man holding them. They were obviously talking about their bizarre appearance. Chloe tried to smooth down her giant hairdo.

  Everyone around the woman sniggered.

  The man said something, holding them a little higher. He gestured with his one eye and head, pointing to different parts of them, and elicited more laughter from the crowd. The woman answered back, and they all cackled again. After exchanging several more apparent insults, he released them, shrugged his shoulders, and left.

  The woman, who was obviously in charge, lost her smile and scrutinized them. While staring, she pulled a chunk of bread from a loaf and chewed it. After a drink from a cup that had been hammered out of metal, she curved her mouth back up into a smile that didn’t really comfort Chloe. She addressed them directly this time, but she might as well have spoken to her loaf of bread for all the good it did.

  “What should we do?” Chloe asked Kaitlyn. She pulled her arms around her middle to try to hide her strange extra sleeve.

  “Do you think she speaks Spanish? I took it freshman year.”

  “What if they don’t like Spain here?” Chloe thought of things like dungeons and chopping off heads, but didn’t want to get too specific and scare Kaitlyn. “You better not.”

  The woman snapped at them like she didn’t like them talking to each other.

  “I’m real sorry, ma’am,” Chloe said, “but we don’t understand you. We don’t understand anyone.” Her voice choked up and Kaitlyn stepped closer to her, touching shoulders with her.

  “We’re lost and we need help,” Kaitlyn said.

  Someone behind them chuckled.

  “I guess you are going to have to depend on me then.”

  They turned in unison to see who spoke, and behind them, seated at a table full of food, were their three captors.

  CHAPTER 28

  John Knox should have kept his blasted swayback mule for all the good it did. Horatius had gotten the beast to travel only a couple of leagues out of town, but then it decided it had had enough. It stood like a statue in the middle of the road, unwilling to budge, no matter how much Horatius kicked its flanks or cursed at it.

  “I am not Balaam. And you are not smart enough to be his donkey. And there is no angel with a drawn sword in your path or I would have seen it. Now, get, get.”

  The animal let out a long bray and turned off the road. It lumbered into the nearby field and munched on the grass.

  Horatius jumped off and slapped the animal’s rump.

  “Get. Get back on that road and get a move on, you mangy, stupid, abominable creature. You are not worth the air you breathe.” He whacked its rump again.

  The animal glanced at him over its shoulder, grass hanging out of its full, masticating maw.

  “Stay here, then, you loathsome beast. I have to go north. I must find the girls, with or without you.”

  He tramped back up onto the road, muttering about the useless animal. “Could have been there by now…crazed beast…can just go to the devil.”

  The sun was high and hot. Horatius had to repeatedly check himself as he thought to fling up a surge of power and change out of his human form. It was odd how something was not working right when he used power. Could Mebahel be prohibiting him from using his power even now? Those Celestials just love making everything arduous and miserable for me. They seemed to enjoy tormenting him.

  But the way he was knocked on his back when he tried to transfigure last was not like anything he’d experienced before. It seemed more that something inside him was mixing with the attempt to use power and turning into something disastrous.

  He needed to get the girls and take them to stay with Mary of Scots and her sister-in-law, Agnes Stewart, William Keith’s daughter. They would keep them safe. Then he could go find out why his power was not working right. And see what he could do to get clearance to fly again. Maybe if he found some charitable deed t
o do along the way, he could win enough favor to get the decision reversed. Or he would submit an Unprecedented Supplication to his overseeing Celestials. He’d have to find some way to fly through the Corridor. Because there was no way he would use the alternative route—if Chloe even found out there was another way. No matter how fiercely she demanded he use it, he would refuse.

  He continued to grumble as he trudged up the road. He cursed the wool cape that kept wrapping around his legs and twisting between his knees. The fabric hadn’t transmuted correctly and was too sweltering—too wooly—for such a hot day. His throat burned with thirst and he carried no supplies. Normally, he would just make what he needed as he went. Now he was with no water, no transportation, no anything. He yanked off his cape and tossed it aside, leaving it along the roadside for whatever damned idiot would find and take the thing.

  Evil, vindictive actions played out in his imagination against John Knox, as likely to be blameworthy for everything as anyone, when a rumble behind him pulled his attention from his malicious musings.

  A giant cloud of dust hovered over the horizon. The ground’s rumbling became a roar just below his threshold of hearing, but he could feel the intensity of it throbbing through the earth. It had to be the Queen’s army. They were due on the road and only hundreds of horsemen could move the ground like an earthquake. This was his chance to get the mount he needed to go after the girls and arrange for Queen Mary to get them to Agnes for safekeeping once he found them.

  He left the road for the center of a field to keep from getting in the way of the galloping horses at the forefront of the convoy. The first wave of the army went by, stirring up a haze so thick most of the convoy was obliterated from view. They spread wider than the road and moved through fields—both fallow and planted—disregarding the harvestable crops. The blowing dirt buffeted his face, blocking his nose and scratching his throat. He spit and sneezed and cursed some more. Oh, how he needed a cold draught.