The River of Time Series

by Lisa T. Bergren

  I saw that someone had left me a pitcher of water and a pewter mug. I sat up and poured a glass, gulped it down and then another, my throat parched. Then I pulled on a dressing gown around me—who changed me last night?—and slipped my feet into ballet-like slippers. I went to the window and unlatched the three sets of latches on the shutters, then opened it wide. I was looking south, toward Roma. But all I could see was fog clinging to the brown and green hills below me. I peered over the edge—I was on the second floor, at the back of the castle. Knights loitered below me, on duty, trying to keep moving, stay warm. They were clearly bored.

  Bored is good, I thought numbly. I’d had it with the fighting-for-our-lives thing. Maybe we were through it. Forever. Maybe we could settle into regular medieval life now. Embrace life while not having to battle for it every other day. Yeah, that’d be nice.

  The door opened, and Giacinta came through with a tray in her hands. “Oh, m’lady!” she said in surprise, as if she didn’t expect to see me at all, let alone up and about. “You’re awake!”

  “I am,” I said with a smile. Why’s she so excited? Because we are all back, home in the castle?

  She scurried over to me. “Please, m’lady, come away from the window. You’ll catch a chill.” She took my hand and led me to a wide, ornate chair by the fire before throwing a log on the glowing coals, covering my lap with a blanket, and returning to the window to close it up tight.

  “’Tis good to see you, Giacinta,” I said. “I’ve thought of you often.”

  “As it is to see you, m’lady,” she returned.

  “Was it quite trying, your time away?”

  “We managed.” She studied me. “The entire valley is celebrating our lord and lady’s rightful return, regardless of our somber weather. But when you didn’t awake, we were so concerned—”

  “Wait. What do you mean by such words?”

  Her eyes widened. “Why, m’lady, you fell back into your deep slumber on your way to the castello and did not wake yesterday. Your mother said you were fiercely exhausted.”

  I nodded and accepted a mug of warm porridge from her. I ached from head to toe. Like I’d been in a car accident. Giacinta bustled around, making my bed and fetching a gown from a massive armoire at the far end of the room.

  “Your sister slept by your side that first night, but she said you thrashed about too much to do it again.” Her delicate eyebrows lifted and knit together. “Your dreams must have been most vivid.”

  I tried to remember them but could not. But maybe that was why I was so fuzzy-headed. Besides sleeping so long, I had probably been wrestling with nightmares.

  “Is everyone well?” I asked. “All those who arrived with us?”

  “Indeed. I heard in the kitchen that Father Tomas is sitting up and feeling much better.”

  I smiled. “That is good news. And what of…Castello Paratore?” I had to force myself to ask it. “Firenze? Do they move against us?”

  She shook her head in surprise. “They have made no move to try to reclaim Castello Forelli. Mayhap they have accepted that Lord Fortino’s sacrifice”—she paused to cross herself somberly—“was a steep enough price to pay.” She drew more fully upright. “With all of Siena behind Lord Marcello, they dare not attack us again. Still, Lord Marcello is taking all necessary precautions. There is no cause for you to fret, m’lady.”

  “I see. Thank you, Giacinta.”

  She bobbed her head. “Would you like me to fetch a tub and hot water so you can take a proper bath? I did what I could while you slept—”

  “That would be lovely,” I said.

  “I’ll see to it right away,” she said, with another quick bob. And then she was gone.

  I forced myself to eat the rest of the porridge, knowing I’d feel better if I did, even if I didn’t feel hungry. A few minutes later a soft knock sounded at my door, and Mom peeked in. “Ah, Gabi. I’m so glad you are awake.”

  I forced a smile—not wanting her to know I’d hoped she was Marcello—and waited for her to approach. She was in a fine gown I recognized as one of Lady Forelli’s. I’d almost worn it once myself. She looked regal, stately, and she gave me a big hug and kiss before sitting in the chair beside me. “Brr, it’s cold in here,” she said.

  I unfolded the blanket on my lap, sharing it with her. “Here,” I said.

  She smiled and tucked it on the far side of her lap, then lifted her hands to the crackling fire. “That feels good.”

  “It does,” I said.

  “How are you feeling?” she asked, turning to stroke my hair with her left hand and look into my eyes.

  “Like I was run over by a semi.”

  She nodded. “I understand. I endured about a tenth of what you did and am feeling the same way. But then I have twenty years on you. I’ll fetch some foxglove tea for you in a bit. You ate something?”

  “Some oatmeal,” I said.

  “Good girl. In a few days, with proper rest, I bet you’ll feel yourself again.”

  Myself again. Who was that exactly? What was that? I was so terribly weary. Weary was the only word for it. It was far different than tired. It was a bone-deep-ache kind of whupped.

  “Gabi, your dad and I want to talk to you, when you’re feeling a little better.”

  “About what?” I could feel the tension start to take hold in my neck.

  “About the future. Your future. And ours. On the road…coming back here…”

  “I lost it,” I said numbly.

  She nodded and turned to stare into the fire as I was doing. “It’s understandable, Gabs. You’ve been through so much. But it—”

  “Scared you,” I finished for her. I knew what she meant. It had scared me, too. Left me in this numb place.

  “Yes,” she said, daring to look at me again. I glanced at her and saw there were tears in her big, blue eyes. Normally that’d make me tear up too—I’d inherited my dad’s Kleenex response to Hallmark commercials—but it was like I was watching us from the corner of the room. Observing. Not feeling.

  “I know you think you want to stay here, but—”

  “I do want to stay here.” I knew that. Regardless of what else seemed to be adrift in my mind right now, my heart had only one goal—to be with Marcello.

  “R-right,” she said. “It’s only that your father and I would like to see you in a safe place. A place of peace.” She shook her head. “We don’t want to see you like you were, you know…”

  “Freaking out.”

  “We don’t want to see that again. We’re worried about you, Gabriella. Seriously worried.”

  I nodded and took a deep breath. I wanted to deny it, to tell her it was fine, just a really, really bad moment for me. But it wasn’t the truth. In that moment, as I walked toward the oak trees, as I struggled with Marcello’s arms around me—I had literally thought he was Captain Ruisi capturing me again. Psychotic and break would be a couple of keywords I’d type into WebMD.com, if I was back home. Panic and attack would be two others.

  “I understand, Mom. Give me a few days, though?”

  “You’ve got ’em, kiddo. We’re here for you. If you need to talk…”

  “Thanks,” I said after a moment’s hesitation. I loved my mom, and she loved me. But I couldn’t remember the last time she’d tossed out the classic “If You Ever Need to Talk” opener. Was that a symbol of our new relationship, here in old Toscana? Or because she was really, really freaked out about me?

  I pushed the thought away. It was too much to think about, yet. It only made me want to crawl back into bed and sleep through the afternoon. There was one thing that kept me from it. “Have you seen Marcello?”

  “He is out with Luca and the other knights, securing the perimeters, reestablishing boundaries between Castello Paratore and Castello Forelli.”

/>   I looked at her quickly. “It is safe?”

  “It seems so. At the moment, anyway. Marcello said he’d be back by supper. It was good for him to go—he spent all of yesterday pacing the hall outside your room.”

  I smiled sadly. That was a pathetic way for anyone to spend the day. But I could picture him doing just that, fretting about me. “Giacinta seemed to think that Firenze has chosen to honor our move back into Castello Forelli.”

  “It seems so.”

  I heard the hesitation behind her words. “Or…”

  “Or they only want us to think that.”

  I sighed. Meaning, of course, that they wanted to lull us into a relaxed state so we wouldn’t be ready when they attacked.

  Giacinta walked back through the door, leading six servants, carrying a tub between them and bucket upon bucket of steaming water. They emptied eight buckets into the wooden tub and left two for me to rinse with.

  “I’ll leave you now and be back in an hour with that foxglove tea,” Mom said.

  “’Kay.”

  I thanked the servants then and bolted the door before slipping into the steaming water, so hot that I had to get in gingerly, inch by inch, getting used to it. But the extreme heat felt good to me, as if I was scalding off the memories I wished to forget. And the water was easing the tension from my neck and the pain from my body.

  I glanced down at my right shoulder and winced. A massive green and blue bruise covered it like a cap sleeve. From when I dived into Lord Zinicola’s quarters, I assumed. There were others. On my arms and legs—some as wide as five inches. I had no idea where I’d gotten many of them. Running. Fleeing. Fighting.

  I took a deep breath and went under the water, feeling the heat seep through my greasy hair and down to my scalp, over my face, into my ears.

  And for a moment I relished the sound of nothing but the pulse of my heart in my own ears, reminding me that I was alive.

  I wanted to wait for Marcello on the castle wall, for him to see me as soon as he was within view. But the knights would hear nothing of it, since Marcello had given them strict orders to keep me entirely out of sight. I supposed it was wise; I was a bit of a flag waving in the wind to our enemies. But I wanted to see him the second he was back. So I paced the courtyard until Lia emerged from the Great Hall, set up a couple of targets on sheaves of wheat, and handed me a bow and arrow. “Here,” she said. “You can work out some of that tension that’s about to drive us all crazy.”

  I looked at the bow in my hand. “You know I’m lousy with these,” I said.

  “Right. Let’s change that.” She strode off halfway across the courtyard and waited for me to join her.

  With a sigh I trudged toward her.

  “Sheesh,” she said. “You’d think I was making you do all the dirty dishes in the castle. C’mon. It’s fun.”

  “Fun for you. You could do it with your eyes closed.”

  “Well, let’s see if you can do it with your eyes open.”

  I smiled with her, her teasing challenge seeming to awaken something inside me. She knows me, my sister. Better than almost anyone.

  Mom and Dad came out then and wanted in. So we paused and set up more targets on sheaves while they fetched more bows and arrows from the armory.

  “Great. Now I’m going to get bested by three family members,” I whined. They’d all played around with a bow and arrow set for hours every day last summer after we’d get back from the dig. I’d elected to hole up in my room and catch up on texts and emails from friends until Dad called me down for a round of sparring. It was how Lia had gotten so good. What if she hadn’t? And what if Dad hadn’t encouraged me to fence? I shivered at the thought. We probably would all be dead many times over if my family hadn’t been so intrigued with the ancient arts of war and hunting.

  They ignored my whining and settled arrows on their bowstrings, then took aim. With another exasperated sigh, I did the same.

  “On three,” Lia said. “One…two…three.”

  Mom’s went slightly left, missing the target. Dad’s hit the third ring. Mine went high and broke against the stones of the castle wall. Lia’s hit dead center, of course.

  The knights on duty roared and cheered and laughed at our efforts.

  “Who invited the peanut gallery?” Mom asked, already tucking another arrow nock on her string.

  “Ahh, gives ’em a little something to keep them occupied,” Dad said. “Let them have their fun.”

  I bent and retrieved an arrow from the massive bucket Lia had brought out and set up my next shot. If the last had gone high, then I needed to aim slightly below the target. We let another round fly. And this time mine went low, but stuck in the target, in the bottom.

  The men laughed as if I’d hit someone in the heel, and I turned, hands on hips, and stared up at them. “Should you not be on the watch for men of Firenze sneaking our way? What if Lord Forelli is in danger?”

  They instantly sobered and moved off, back to their positions, with chastened looks as they murmured, “Yes, m’lady.” I felt a little guilty as I turned back, and Dad gave me a Was-That-Really-Necessary? look. But I ignored it and took another arrow as my family all prepared their third shot.

  Lia’s was dead center. Mom and Dad both were closer to center. But mine went right. Even after twenty more, I only was able to stick four. “Good thing you’re the archer in the family,” I said to Lia, walking with her to hang up the bows in the armory.

  “We all have something we’re good at,” she said with a shrug. “Does it bother you so much?”

  “Well, it doesn’t bother me. But I’d like to be a little better at it. Your skills, after all, have proven pretty useful out there.”

  Okay, so it does bug me a little, I admitted to myself. I wanted to be better at it than Lia, deep down. Or at least decent. Wasn’t it a big sister’s place to be adequate, if not the leader?

  “How about a little round of sparring?” Dad asked me, setting his bow on a hook beside mine.

  I smiled. “Rain check? I’d love to, but I’m suddenly totally tired again.”

  He nodded, his eyes hooded with concern for me. “It’s best you rest, then. Can I walk you to your room?”

  “Sure,” I said. But inside, I was groaning. First Mom, now Dad. Even though we weren’t scheduled to talk-talk for a few days, they clearly had a lot on their minds that couldn’t wait.

  I should be happy, I said to myself. After all, I had my dad back. He was here, with me, wanting to help me. I should be willing to listen to him read the numbers from the New York Stock Exchange, if that was what he wanted to share.

  We split off from Lia and Mom, who headed to Fortino’s den for a game of chess. A pang of loss struck me then. Fortino, who had worked so hard to live, now dead. “Where did they bury him?” I asked Dad.

  “Bury? Oh, you mean Lord Fortino?”

  I nodded.

  He hesitated. “There’s a plot in back of the castle, on a hill. Marcello buried him as soon as we returned…for obvious reasons. Marcello wished to wait for you, but we had no idea how long you’d be out.”

  I grimaced. I could only imagine Marcello’s pain.

  “I want to see the site. Visit his grave,” I said. Fortino was gone. Being here, in his castle, where I’d first known him, brought it home in a fresh, painful way.

  Dad paused. “Maybe if Marcello is completely sure it’ll be all right…”

  “We’ll be safe,” I muttered. We reached the back of the castle and entered one of the turrets to climb the stairs.

  Why did it seem like there were a hundred stairs instead of fifteen?

  We reached the top, and I paused at my door. “Thanks for bringing me back, Dad. Or are you going to come in and tuck me in?”

  He smiled, and I was reminded of how Ital
ian he really looked. Out of all of us, he was the one who looked like he really belonged here. “You can probably handle it,” he said, still smiling. But then he grew more serious. “He loves you, you know.”

  Marcello. “I know.”

  “I mean, really loves you. I’ve seen it myself, now.” He put his chin in his hand, looked up, and then stared at me again. “It’s pretty complicated for a first love, isn’t it?”

  I stilled over his words. First love. As in…there would be a second? Or was I just being overly sensitive? “Tell me about it,” I said, not really ready to get into it—if we were going to get into something at all. I studied him. “But you have to just go with what you’ve been given, right?”

  How many times had he said that to me or Lia when we complained about the shape of our nails or the size of ears or our height? Things we couldn’t change. You gotta go with what you’ve been given.

  He returned my thoughtful gaze and then seemed to decide to let go of something—or maybe just put it off until later. “Get some rest, Gabs.”

  “I will.” I opened the door and was halfway through when I turned and peeked around the corner. He was striding away, had almost reached the stairs. “Dad?”

  “Yes?”

  “I’m glad you’re here.”

  He paused and then gave me a small smile. “I am too.”

  “Can you come get me? If Marcello returns early?”

  “I can,” he said, “but I’d bet that when he hears you’re up and about, he’ll be to your quarters before I get a chance.”

  I smiled and slowly shut the door.

  I awakened to the feeling of Marcello’s lips tenderly kissing my lids. “Marcello,” I whispered, wanting to feel his presence, smell the scent of horses and leather and pine and cinnamon on him for a moment longer before I dared to open my eyes.

  “Gabriella,” he whispered back. He leaned away, holding one of my hands, and my eyes fluttered open.