All the while, he whispered over and over again, “Eshmun Hamilcar hanno ashtzaph byblos rae; Zephon anana akilokipok silatuyok anik toe; Takiyok keorvik suluk yo; Uyarak ek chua lo.”
After bringing the spiral’s edge all the way out to both tree trunks, Malcolm stood back to survey his work. The two trees still stood there as immovable as ever, but now with an invisible web stretched between them that cut off the path heading into the shadowy trees.
The sound of footsteps coming up behind him sent Malcolm plunging into the greenery. He barely got himself hidden in the shrubbery before Vic came tramping down the path. His heart thumped and every nerve tensed in anticipation for the moment of truth.
Vic strolled down the trail with her nose stuck in her phone. A few more steps and she would walk straight into his web.
Malcolm fought down the urge to yell. Was his life really going to change right here in front of his eyes?
At the last possible second before she crossed through the invisible net, Vic’s phone rang and she stopped dead in her tracks.
She punched the screen and pressed the phone to her ear. “What’s going on? Can’t I go out for a walk without putting out some fire back there? What’s so important that you—?”
She listened to the caller intently.
Malcolm’s blood pounded in his ears. What if it didn’t work? What if she turned around and walked back the other way? A thousand things could go wrong right now, and then what would he do?
She whirled away from the path and stopped a few steps away. “I don’t know about that because I’m not there, but there’s something wrong with the ELISA assay you sent me. It doesn’t make any sense. Are you sure you tested the right compound?”
She listened again.
Malcolm’s life hung in the balance. What if he made a mistake? What if years of planning and centuries of hoping came to nothing? What if he got some of the information wrong?
Vic threw her free hand into the air. “I don’t care! That’s not my concern. How many times do I have to tell you? You figure it out. Until I get some answers, you’re on your own. Don’t call me again until you’re ready to talk.” She yanked the phone down and jabbed the screen, then huffed while she crammed the phone into her handbag.
To Malcolm’s great joy, she set off up the path again and walked straight into the net.
The disembodied lines he drew in the air crackled once. Gleaming sparkles of light danced along the lines between the trees, radiating out from the web’s center where Vic broke the field. For a fleeting instant, the bright web shone in the late-morning sun. Then it blinked out, and Vic Doyle vanished before his eyes.
Malcolm rose to his feet behind the bushes and looked again, but nothing remained of her. Deadly stillness descended over the park. Not even the birds disturbed the silence inside his mind. He stared at the place where he’d spread his net to catch her. She was gone, just like that. When and where she would return, he couldn’t say.
His spirits wilted. Not even the thought of her coming back could ease the torment of her being gone, just like that.
He had to do this. He had to send her away, but that didn’t make it easier. Where could he go? What could he do to occupy himself until she came back? He had to take his own advice to Stewart. He had to stay busy, but he couldn’t bring himself to go back to work.
He turned away from the trees. Staring at the spot wouldn’t bring her back any sooner. His heart ached that he couldn’t have prepared her better, but it couldn’t be helped.
He walked out to the beach and sat staring westward across the Pacific Ocean. He couldn’t get any farther west than this before he started heading back toward Europe.
Where was she right now? Was she safe? Was she scared? He would give anything to be there to meet her on the other side, but that wouldn’t help, either. He’d never met Vic Doyle. He was a stranger to her, just like all the other strangers. He had to trust her to do this on her own.
Chapter 3
Vic’s world turned from serene to a crashing, vibrating tornado. She found herself abruptly swept up into the air and thrown around like she was on the most intense fairground ride she’d ever been on. By the time her heart had leaped into her throat and her mind registered that yes, she’d actually been swept off her feet and sent hurtling through space, she came crash landing back to Earth with a bump and yelp.
Her chest heaved, fear and adrenaline juddered through her veins as her wide eyes took in what were now bizarre surroundings. For a second, she wondered if she’d just passed out and was now having some kind of hallucination. She couldn’t convince herself no matter how hard she tried that she was still in modern San Francisco.
After walking into the trees in Golden Gate Park, she’d wound up on a street flagged with wide, flat, gray stones. Tall buildings of a kind she’d never seen before rose on either side of the narrow street. A towering edifice of gothic architecture loomed before her. On either side, men in kilts and women in long dresses and hoop skirts passed in every direction.
Frowning, Vic glanced behind her and didn’t see any park there, either. Only more people in what looked like theater costumes bustling about more winding streets of gray stone. The people stared at her, murmuring to each other, and hurried on their way. Vic stuck out like a sore thumb in her strange clothes, makeup, and high-heeled shoes. She studied her surroundings, but nothing she imagined could explain the sudden change.
She scrambled to her feet and stood there in a confused fog, her mind now grasping the fact that not all the men were wearing kilts. About half wore suits of a Victorian variety—or what Vic imagined was a Victorian variety. She’d never studied history much, but she knew what a kilt was. Her brow furrowed even more. How did she wind up here, and where was here? She could be anywhere, but it seemed like she might be in Scotland—Scotland, many hundreds of years ago.
Into the jumble of thoughts crowding to be understood, she caught the trace of a conversation nearby and turned around to see two men standing in a shop door. Barrels lined the sidewalk along the store front, and one of the men wore an apron over his clothes. The sign over the door read General Merchandise. He talked to a tall, powerfully built man in a dark blue kilt. A thin red line sectioned off the plaid fabric.
“I tell ye, I dinnae like it,” the storekeeper said in a rough, deep voice. “Cannae ye convince the Guild to change it before we all wind up in the same boat?”
“I’ve already tried more than once,” the tall man replied. “They’ll no’ listen to me again. Perhaps ye should come to the next Council and tell them yerself. Ye’ve as much standing as the rest of us—perhaps more.”
The storekeeper threw back his head and gave a resounding belly laugh. “Standing! That’s a mite pretty piece of work, that is. Go on with yer standing and yer jokes and get back to yer own place.”
The tall man laughed with him, and then the storekeeper stepped back into the shop.
Yep, this was definitely Scotland, though Vic still couldn’t puzzle out how she’d gotten there.
The tall man turned away from the store and almost walked away when his eye fell on Vic standing just off the sidewalk, only a few feet away. A flash of a frown darkened his face for a fraction of a second, and then he smiled at her. “Hello there. And what have we here?”
His hazel eyes sparkled so brightly she had to smile back.
The man dwarfed her, and his broad shoulders filled out his forest-green jacket nicely. A shiny silver badge held a length of plaid pinned against his jacket shoulder. The cloth hung down his back where it tucked into his wide leather belt. A leather pouch hung in front of his hips. The pin design depicted a hand holding a sword. His curly sand-blond hair hung loosely around his face, unlike most of the men in this town who kept it tied behind their necks. His curls brushed his eyebrows and dangled around his chiseled jawline.
He hesitated a moment, scanning Vic up and down, then stepped off the sidewalk toward her. “Are ye… May I help ye at all, M
iss? If ye are…are ye a woman?”
Her cheeks flushed hot. She must look a rare sight in this proper little world. “Yes, I’m a woman, and for a start, you can tell me where I am because I don’t have the first clue.”
“If ye dinnae ken where ye are,” he asked, “how did ye get here? It seems a queer question to ask.”
“Not half so queer as how I got here,” she replied. “I was walking in the park in—” She broke off to survey the town again. How much should she tell some random stranger on the street?
People stared at her and made disgusted faces.
She saw herself from their point of view and cringed. She looked like some kind of circus clown in this outfit, and her makeup made her look more like a monster than a high-class business executive.
The man scrutinized her closer. “Ye were walking in the park, and what happened?”
She glanced over her shoulder again. No matter how many times she looked, she still didn’t see Golden Gate Park back there. She stammered to make sense of it all. “I-I was w-walking in the park, and s-something happened, and I-I wound up here.”
He bent down to take a closer look at her. “What happened? What something happened?”
“I…I don’t know,” she stuttered. “I walked between two trees on the path and wound up here. That’s all I can tell you.”
The man straightened up. His eyes hardened to two flinty pinpricks. He turned his shoulder to one side and took hold of Vic’s elbow. “I think ye’d best come along with me. It’s no’ wise for ye to stay out here on the street just now. Come, and I’ll find a place for ye to stay.”
His commanding touch worked on her mind, and she started to follow him but jolted out of her trance and pulled away. “Wait a minute. I don’t know you. You could be taking me somewhere to rob me and kill me. I’m not going anywhere with you.”
To her surprise, he rounded on her with a benign smile. “Ye’ll be perfectly safe with me, lass. Do ye see that house over there?” He pointed to the giant edifice she’d first noticed. “That’s the Guild House. I’m the Guild Master. That means I’m in charge. I’ll put ye up there. Ye’ll be perfectly safe. I can assure ye.”
She hung back. “Guild of what?”
The benign smile burst into a wild grin. “The real name for it is Asif ßləkbərlı, but if ye want to call it something, ye can call it the Guild of Caal. It means ‘the horse.’ Now, would ye like to come along, or would ye prefer to stand out here and give the local people a spectacle to stare at?”
She didn’t understand half of what he’d said, but she understood the last part. She couldn’t stay out here like this. Wherever she was and however she got here, she had to get undercover. She had to change her clothes and wash her face. She had to blend in as much as possible until she figured out how to get back to her own place and time.
She let the man guide her down the street to the Guild House. Kilted men wearing the same patterned tartan came and went all around her. Vic kept her head down so she wouldn’t see them staring at her in wide-eyed horror.
Her escort showed her up the wide steps, through the front door, and into the closest thing to a castle Vic had ever seen. They passed through a foyer and into a side parlor lined in velvet and flowered woven carpets. Statuary and elaborate paintings decorated every wall and corner. Carved plaster ceilings and gold-embellished trim gleamed everywhere she turned.
The tall man closed the parlor door behind her and eased the latch down quietly before he faced her. “Now, my dear, sit ye down here and tell me what brings ye to our fair city.” He motioned toward a china-blue Edwardian couch.
Vic sank down in grateful relief. At least she was off the street, and his manner put her at ease. She couldn’t explain why, but she trusted him. Maybe his mild reaction to her story had convinced her to put herself into his hands.
“I’m…” She glanced around again. “I still don’t know where I am. What city is this?”
He settled himself in a chair opposite her. “Ye’re in the city of Stromness, in the Orkney Islands off the northern coast of Scotland. The year is 1740, and King George II sits on the throne of England.”
Vic’s head swam. Her hand flew to her forehead, and she collapsed back on the couch. “1740! It can’t be!”
The man cocked his head to one side. “Where do ye come from, lass? Tell me all, and I may be able to help ye.”
“I come from America, from San Francisco, in California,” she blurted out. “You’ve probably never heard of it. I was walking down a path in the park in 2018. It was August 25, 2018, at eleven thirty-seven in the morning, and all of a sudden I wound up here. I don’t know what happened. I didn’t do anything. It all happened in the blink of an eye.”
Just for an instant, the man’s eyebrows jumped together in a frown. The next minute, his countenance cleared and he regarded her with an open, friendly expression that convinced her everything was okay.
She waved her hand and stood up. “Look, this is all too weird for me. I know it doesn’t make sense, so I’ll just get out of here. I better find a way to get back…” The color left her face as she swayed in a momentary daze. She threw her hand up to her forehead.
“Sit, lass.” He extended his hand, encouraging her to sit again. “Ye cannae go back the way ye came. If ye dinnae ken how ye got here, ye’ll no’ find yer way back. Sit. Ye’re safe here for the moment, until we figure out what’s what.”
She sat down slowly, her gaze fixed on him, confusion overwhelming her senses.
His bright blue eyes shone up at her. His face remained as open and kind as ever.
He was right. She had nowhere else in the world to go without the faintest idea of how she got here or why. Still, she didn’t give in. “I’d hate to impose on your hospitality. I don’t even know you.”
“I’m Boyd Gunn, Guild Master of this House, and ye’re welcome here no matter who ye are.”
Vic leaned back on the couch, utterly defeated, and stared down at her hands. Her silvery-white fingernail polish gave her hands a skeletal, deathly appearance. She didn’t recognize herself in this crazy world. “I’m Vic, Vic Doyle.” She glanced up to see him frown again. “I mean, my name’s Victoria, but everyone calls me Vic.”
“I see.” He perched on the edge of his chair, leaning toward her, and murmured in an undertone that hypnotized her mind. “Now, lass, we must get one thing straight before we go on. Ye must tell me all ye can about the world ye came from if I’m to understand how ye got here.”
“I already told you. I was walking down the—”
“No’ that part,” he said. “I must ken all ye can tell me about yer people, yer family, yer friends, yer city—all. I may be able to help ye, but I cannae do that if ye hold anything back.”
Vic’s mind spun through a million details in search of anything useful to tell him. “I don’t know what to say. I work for a chemical company. I’m a biochemist. I live with my older sister Kathleen, who is a nurse practitioner at the hospital. I drive a Volkswagen Beetle, and I listen to a lot of reggae. I don’t know what you want to know.”
He looked away and leaned back. “Never ye mind, lass. We’ll work it out, one way or the other, but ye’ll have to stay here until we determine how ye got sent here and how to send ye back. I’ll assign ye a room where ye can rest.”
He stood up and she copied him, but she hesitated to follow him out of the room. She glanced down at her suit. “Could you… Would you mind, you know, loaning me a change of clothes?”
His smile lit up his face as he turned and flashed perfect white teeth at her. “Of course, lass.”
He rang a bell on the side table and the door opened. Another man entered and came to stand next to Boyd. He was as tall as Boyd and wearing the same tartan kilt, but he didn’t smile at Vic and his dark eyes pierced her to her core. He kept his curly auburn hair tied back, and his shoulders made Boyd look slight and weak. He wore no jacket over his white shirt and plaid draped bandolier-style over his che
st. A bright silver pin fixed it in place, and Vic recognized the design—it matched Boyd’s down to the hand holding the sword.
Boyd gestured toward the man and said, “This is my cousin, Malcolm Gunn. Malcolm, this is Vic Doyle. She’ll be a guest of the Guild for the moment. Malcolm’ll show ye to yer room and see ye have everything ye need.”
Vic didn’t want to go anywhere with Malcolm. His hard eyes and fierce features took her aback. He didn’t smile or put her at ease the way Boyd did, and he certainly didn’t appear interested in helping her.
Boyd murmured low in Malcolm’s ear. “Put her in the Swan Room and see she’s given a change of clothes…and I think ye’d best send up a bath as well.”
He turned away chuckling and headed for the door. “I dine in my private apartment at six o’clock, Vic. Ye must join me there, and we can get further acquainted.”
As the door clicked closed behind Boyd, Vic found herself alone with a ferocious-looking Highlander. He stood stock straight and still between her and the door, clenching his jaw and glaring at her until she shifted from one foot to the other. She glanced toward the door, saying, “Are we gonna go?”
He strode over to her and lowered his face until it hovered inches in front of her nose. Cutting hate-filled eyes down at her clothes and back up again, he hissed through gritted teeth, “I dinnae ken who ye are and what ye are, but ye dinnae belong here. Ye should never have come.”
His manner sparked her natural spirit. She drew herself up as tall as she could, though that didn’t bring her close to standing eye to eye with him. “I just finished telling Boyd I didn’t have anything to do with coming here. I never knew what happened to me before I just appeared in the street outside. I had nothing to do with it, and I still don’t understand what happened. Boyd said he could find out, but until that happens, I’m just as in the dark as the rest of you.”
Spies of the Angui - Cipher's Kiss Book 3 Page 2