Hudson lowered his voice to a harsh whisper. “No one saw us. But you’re right, King John’s men are looking, and if they find us, your master won’t get his Gilead.”
She brushed off his words, unconcerned. “They’re not out looking at this hour. They’re sleeping like God-fearing people ought.”
“Then this is the best time to travel.”
“Only if you want to break your horse’s leg or your neck. My master has no intention of gallivanting about in the night like a common ruffian.” She thrust the blankets at Hudson. “You can sleep safe enough in the barn. It has a spell upon it so that none of King John’s men may see it. A few days past, they came through and demanded half of everyone’s straw. Next they’ll be wanting the straw, and my master has horses to feed.” She looked at Hudson suspiciously. “You see the barn plainly, don’t you?”
“I saw it when we walked up,” Hudson said.
She humphed. “No matter. If you’re not in the barn in the morning we’ll know you’re not what you claim.” She narrowed her eyes at Hudson. “My master may not be the court wizard anymore, but he still has things that work against those who would do him harm.”
Then she slammed the door shut again.
Hudson groaned, then tucked the blankets under his arm and went to retrieve the horses. “Come on,” he said. “I guess we’re resting for the night after all.”
I followed him, casting nervous glances at the street. “Do you think the spell on the barn will work to keep Rumpelstiltskin away too?”
“Don’t worry about it,” Hudson said.
I wanted to tell him I had every right to be worried, but I didn’t. He couldn’t change Bartimaeus’s mind, and the barn was the safest place to be right now.
We took the horses inside with us. I started to help Hudson unpack the provisions, but he handed me the blankets. “You take care of the baby. I’ll take care of the horses.”
I spread some straw on the floor and arranged the blankets on top of it. After I’d settled the baby onto our straw bed, I checked the book to see if there was any new information. An illustration of me riding the white horse and cradling the baby had appeared. I smiled at it, this time liking the fact that I’d been painted beautiful and glowing. The baby’s angelic face was just barely visible in my arms, but he looked up at me adoringly.
I wrote the things I had learned, and was still writing them when Hudson made his own bed. I was almost glad that the things I’d written about him hadn’t stuck, since he looked over my shoulder to read what I’d written. “ ‘There’s no place like home,’ ” he repeated.
“It worked for Dorothy.” The words vanished and I penned another sentence.
Hudson read, “ ‘Lean on people when you’re not strong. They’ll be your friends, they’ll help you carry on.’ Hmm. Are you writing morals or song lyrics?”
“Both,” I said.
He didn’t comment on the futility of my writing. Instead he reached into his pouch, took out a handful of red sand, and walked around me, sprinkling it onto the blanket. It was only then that I remembered he’d taken the anti-fairy ring that King John’s wizard had put around me the second night.
Even if Rumpelstiltskin was able to find the barn, he wouldn’t be able to cross the line to take my son. That’s what Hudson had meant when he told me not to worry.
“Thank you,” I said.
He smiled, then tossed his helmet on the ground near his blankets. “You’re welcome.”
I turned off the flashlight and put the book down next to me. I was safe and my baby was safe. At least for tonight.
Chapter 20
When I woke up, pale sunlight poked through cracks in the barn window. I reached for the baby and found only empty blankets. He was gone. I sat up in panic, my heart beating so fast the gold heart sent ticks of pain through my torso.
Then I saw Hudson sitting on the haystack feeding him a bottle. I exhaled slowly to calm myself and walked over to them. The baby had his hand wrapped around one of Hudson’s fingers and was looking happily at him while he drank. They were a perfect picture of contentment, oblivious to my still-racing pulse.
“You scared me to death, you know. I thought my son was gone.”
Hudson smiled at the baby. “I bet real mothers wake up when their children cry.”
“I slept through his crying?” I’d only been a mother for one night, and I’d already done something wrong. So much for my intentions to be the perfect parent. I sat down on the straw with a dejected huff.
Hudson’s voice softened. “He was mostly just fussing. I’m a light sleeper.”
I shifted in the straw to get more comfortable. I wanted to take the baby from Hudson’s arms and feed him myself, but at the same time, I was afraid to. He was so small, and I didn’t know how. What had Chrissy been thinking to entrust me with a miniature, breakable person?
“What are you going to name him?” Hudson asked.
“In the future? I have no idea.”
“I meant now. We have to call him something.”
I stroked the baby’s tuft of wavy brown hair. He looked over at me, two large brown eyes taking me in. Then he stopped drinking and smiled. The sight of his grin sent my heart skittering. I felt like I’d won a prize.
He made a happy-sounding umm, umm noise and went back to drinking.
“How old do you think he is?” I asked.
“Old enough that he eats baby food, because Chrissy packed some of that too.” Hudson tilted his head and regarded the baby. “I think he looks like a … Remington. Maybe a Colt.”
“Aren’t those gun names?”
“He’s a manly baby. He needs a manly name. How about Stetson?”
“Are you picking names or describing how the West was won?”
Hudson laughed and looked all the more gorgeous for it. His smile lightened his features, made him look approachable, touchable. “You don’t have to keep the name in the future, but people will think it’s strange if your son doesn’t have a name now.”
I ran a finger over the baby’s hand where tiny dimples puckered his knuckles. “If I call him Stetson now, then I’ll start thinking of him as Stetson and when I have him in the future I won’t be able to call him anything else.”
“What’s wrong with that?”
The baby finished his bottle, and Hudson set him upright. He gurgled and reached for me with waving hands. I took him in my arms, not even caring that he spit up a little of the formula. It ran down his chin, reminding me that you were supposed to burp babies after they ate. There were probably dozens more details I didn’t know. I pulled a washcloth out of the diaper bag and wiped his face. “How about we call him Junior? After my husband. Whoever that is.”
Junior reached up and tried to grab my bottom lip.
“It’s not Robin Hood,” Hudson said.
I pulled Junior’s hand away from my mouth. “I never said it would be.”
Hudson leaned back against the straw. “I just mean, you’re blond and Robin Hood’s blond, so you’d have blond children. Apparently you marry a brunet guy.”
“Well, I’ve always liked brunets.” My gaze went to Hudson’s brown hair, then quickly fell away. I didn’t need to announce, more than I already had, that I found him attractive. After all, I had practically thrown myself at him last night at the campfire. I’d taken his hand, then put my arms around him, and when he hugged me back, I’d tilted my face up to his so he could kiss me.
He hadn’t kissed me. Maybe he would have if Chrissy hadn’t popped in, but then again, maybe he wouldn’t have. He hadn’t done anything since then to indicate he wanted to be more than friends. Which made me feel all the more awkward about the way I’d draped myself around him last night.
Thankfully, Hudson didn’t seem to notice my furtive hair glancing. He took the Gilead out of his pouch to check on it, then slipped it back.
I patted the baby’s back. “What will happen to Junior when we go to our time period?” I asked.
> “We’ll take him with us.”
“But he hasn’t been born yet.”
“Neither have we, and we’re doing fine in this time period. We don’t have any other choice.”
He was right, I supposed, but it was hard to imagine how that would work out.
In my lap, Junior grabbed at the beads on my dress. When he couldn’t move them, he twisted in my arms and reached his arms out to Hudson.
“He likes you,” I said in surprise. I had taken his friendliness toward me as proof that he recognized me, but perhaps he was just a happy baby.
Hudson shrugged and took Junior from me. “That’s because I fed him. Babies are like stray cats that way.”
“Babies are not like stray cats,” I said.
Hudson ignored my protest. “Watch. He loves this.” He held Junior up above his head, then brought the baby down and blew raspberries on his neck.
Junior’s cheeks bunched up into a smile, and he laughed a deep belly laugh that wobbled through his whole body. I watched the two of them, wishing I had a camera. I wanted to keep the moment.
The barn door opened with a creak, and through the halo of the daylight, a man walked inside. I had expected Bartimaeus to be elderly, with a long white beard and a flowing robe. Instead he was clean shaven with black hair that only brushed his shoulders. He was dressed like most of the men I’d seen in the Middle Ages with the exception that his tunic was cleaner and he wore an embroidered belt around his waist. His eyes had a lofty look to them, and his large, hooked nose gave him an imperial air. Hudson had referred to him as “Bartimaeus the Proud,” and I could see why he had the name.
He strolled over to us, unsmiling. “You say you have the Gilead?”
“I left it with friends.” Hudson handed me the baby and walked over to the wizard. “But things have changed since we made our agreement. A few more of us need to go to the future. We can pay whatever price you’d like in gold.”
Bartimaeus tucked his hands behind his back. “Where are these friends?”
“A day’s ride if we travel on the main road by carriage.” Hudson gestured toward the far corner of the barn, and it was only then that I noticed a carriage standing there. “Two days if we travel on horseback through the back trails. But either way, we need to avoid King John’s men.”
The wizard looked at me for the first time, regarding me sourly. “Ah yes, they’re out searching for a young woman. Tall, blond, and pretty.” He said these things like I’d chosen to be tall, blond, and pretty instead of being useful and productive.
Bartimaeus turned his attention back to Hudson. “Why can’t you bring the Gilead here?”
Hudson folded his arms. “Unfortunately, circumstances don’t permit it.”
The wizard continued to look over us with a deepening scowl. “I have no intention of traveling around the countryside for four days. I’m accustomed to sleeping in my own bed and there’s hardly a decent inn from here to Derby.” He paced in front of us, the sound of straw crunching beneath his feet.
“My apologies,” Hudson said. “Do you still want the Gilead?”
Bartimaeus stopped his pacing. “Oh, very well. I’ll have the stable boy hitch up the carriage, and we’ll find you some less conspicuous clothes.” He shot me one last withering glance. “Something that flaunts fewer jewels than the queen of Sheba would wear.”
Technically, the beading on my dress wasn’t made of jewels, and I had planned on wearing my cloak over the dress, but I didn’t turn down the offer. It would be nice to change into something that didn’t look like it had come from the evening-gown portion of the Miss America pageant.
“Be ready when the carriage is,” he added. “I don’t want to waste any more time on you than I have to.” With that, Bartimaeus turned on his heel and left the barn.
I rubbed Junior’s back through his fuzzy sleeper. “I’ve thought of a new moral for the story: ‘Wizards are a bunch of grumpy old men.’ ”
“Maybe,” Hudson said. “But if he can send us home, I’d vote for naming your baby after him.” He reached out and tweaked the baby’s chin. “Right, little Bart?”
• • •
An hour later, the carriage was packed, the horses were ready, and I was wearing a worn brown dress that smelled of onions and garlic—one of the servant’s gowns. The wizard had also given me a head-covering wimple to hide my blond hair. “If we see anyone, shrink down so as not to appear so tall,” Bartimaeus had told me. I wasn’t that tall, but the Middle Ages was populated by short people. Then Bartimaeus had grumbled disapprovingly. “And for mercy’s sake, do something so you don’t look so pretty.”
Personally, I thought the ugly brown dress and wimple did a sufficient enough job of that. The wizard also gave me an outfit for the baby—a beige shirt that was so long it looked like a shapeless dress. Cute baby clothing hadn’t been invented yet.
Hudson changed into new clothes too because King John had told his knights that I was traveling with one of his guards. He wore an oversized gray tunic, leggings, and a leather belt. Unlike my wimple and kitchen-staff ensemble, Hudson’s outfit somehow looked good on him. It was his broad shoulders. He could make anything look rugged. I had to quell the urge to call him “farm boy,” and pretend I was Buttercup from The Princess Bride.
But I did let my eyes rest on him a lot.
Before we left, the wizard sprinkled a spicy-smelling liquid on each corner of the carriage. “Don’t touch these spots before they dry,” he told us. “If you ruin the hiding spell, our enemies will be able to see the carriage.” He sent me an especially deep frown. “We can’t have that while we carry a fugitive.”
I wasn’t looking forward to a day-long carriage ride with Bartimaeus and his many complaints, so I was happily surprised when he climbed up to the box seat and announced he was driving. “There are things out in the forest that only a wizard can ward off,” he told us in a condescending tone.
Fine. More power to him and more room for us. Junior was already bored with the baby toys in the diaper bag, and I had no idea how I was going to entertain him in a carriage all day.
The answer to this question was soon evident. Junior wanted to play Grab Mommy’s Lips. Hudson was coconspirator in the game and kept holding Junior airplane-style, zooming him toward my face.
After we played that for a stretch, Junior moved on to Try to Throw All of the Baby Toys Out the Carriage Window. Then he tried to teethe on the seats. We fed him creamed carrots, which he somehow managed to smear across not only his bib but his entire body. I only had wet wipes to clean him off, which weren’t very effective, especially since Junior then decided he wanted to eat them.
By the time he took a bottle and fell asleep that afternoon, I was exhausted. I propped him against the crook of my arm and noticed a smear of carrots near the shoulder of my dress. I tried to clean it off with a wet wipe, one-handed.
“Don’t worry about stains,” Hudson told me. “I’m sure the book will erase them.”
“This dress belongs to the wizard’s servant and you know he’ll gripe about me getting it dirty.” I kept wiping but couldn’t manage very well with only one hand. Finally Hudson moved from his seat to mine, took the cloth, and wiped it for me. He was so close now, bent over and touching my shoulder, that my heart skipped a few beats.
He finished, and straightened. “There. Now it blends in with the general brownness of the dress.”
“Thanks,” I said.
Neither of us said anything else. Hudson didn’t go back to his seat. The silence seemed to be waiting for something. Or maybe that was just me.
His eyes were a warm brown, gentle but intense. “You know … I never gave you a good-bye kiss.”
It was hard to breathe. “Oh. That’s right.”
“I was supposed to do that so you wouldn’t be lying.”
“Yeah,” I said. Had I actually told Robin Hood that I was going to kiss Hudson, or had I merely implied it? But then, it was better to be safe than sorry.
The suggestion of a smile played on Hudson’s lips. “We’d better kiss now so fireworks don’t go off around your head.”
Fireworks. I nodded. Somehow I couldn’t speak anymore.
He leaned toward me gradually, as though giving me time to change my mind. I shut my eyes and let his lips come down on mine.
Hudson wasn’t in a hurry to say good-bye. The kiss was slow, caressing. All the bumps of the road and the sway of the carriage seemed to fade away, replaced by the beating of my heart. I didn’t remember putting my free hand around his neck, but it was there somehow, twining through his hair. His arm moved from the back of the seat to my shoulders. I liked the feel of his arm around me. I felt enveloped, cared for. When he lifted his head from mine, my mind was spinning.
I blinked at him. “Well, you certainly have a way with good-byes.”
He smiled, amused, then moved back to sit across from me. I wondered if he really had only kissed me to make sure no sparks went off around my head. Maybe he hadn’t meant to cause the sparks that were now going off inside me.
I waited for him to say something about the kiss, about us. Was he interested, or was he just the type of guy who liked to prove he could turn girls into quivering piles of hormones?
Still smiling, Hudson looked at the baby. “You ought to call him Stetson.”
I tried to keep my voice calm, like the kiss hadn’t really mattered. “My husband might not appreciate me naming our son after a hat.”
“It’s not like you’re naming him Baseball Cap or Sombrero.”
Did he want to be more than friends? Not even that? I wanted to ask, but instead I stared at Junior. He was safe ground. “Can you believe how tiny his fingernails are?”
My Unfair Godmother Page 25
