Katie Watson Mysteries in Time Box Set

by Mez Blume

  He winked and ruffled my hair, then his face turned grave again, like he was struggling with the thoughts inside him. “If you see her,” he said at last, “if you see my Ramona, tell her we can’t never forget her. We just want her back.”

  “I will,” I promised.

  We rode away from Hiwassee Garrison, from Jim, in silence. I tried to take in every moment of the ride, knowing that if Ka-Ti’s song worked, it would be the last time I’d see 1828, the enormous ancient trees, the untamed forest, the great grey horse whose steady, strong gait was taking me closer to home with every step. I could swear Robin Hood wore a smile in the way he walked since we’d locked his former master behind bars.

  When we reached the ravine near the cave, I started to dismount, then realised the warriors were staying on their horses’ backs.

  “It looks safe, so they will travel around the base of the mountain,” Wattie explained. “They want to find the other passage Jim led you in through. Maybe not all of Nickajack’s stolen possessions were destroyed when the cave collapsed.”

  As the warriors rode on, I tethered Robin Hood’s reins to a maple tree and stroked his neck. “You’ll look after him, won’t you?” I asked Wattie. “He deserves a better life from now on.”

  “Of course, we will,” Wattie promised. “Now can you tell me why coming to this cave is going to help you get home?”

  Imogen gave an exasperated sigh. “We’ve already told you, Wattie. You’ll just have to wait and see.”

  At that moment, we were silenced by a shrill cry like the call an eagle makes before swooping down on its prey. It seemed to come from the ravine. Then an echoing cry came from our left. We all turned and saw them coming, five or six bare-chested, fierce-eyed Cherokee men running out of the trees with rifles, knives and tomahawks raised.

  Wattie threw himself in front of us and spread out his arms, and Imogen and I clutched each other, not wanting to watch, but not able to look away. When they were close enough for us to hear their heavy breathing, a thundering storm rose up behind us. The warriors who had ridden with us! They had heard the enemy’s cry and come back! But now we were in the crossfire.

  “Come on!” Wattie was shouting. He ducked down low and we followed him, running into the trees just as the two groups of warriors collided in combat.

  “Will they be all right?” I said through heaving breaths once we’d reached the waterfall and slipped behind it into the safety of the cave.

  Wattie nodded, panting. “Those were Black Fox’s men. They were outnumbered two to one. They will surrender.”

  We all leaned against the wet cave walls, catching our breath when, without warning and before I could so much as scream, something hooked me around the neck, strong as a python’s death grip, and I felt cold, sharp metal touch my chin. Even as terror blinded me, I knew we had walked right into Black Fox’s trap.

  I was only vaguely aware of the others watching, speechless, as Black Fox hustled me across the cave floor, coming to stand with his back to the waterfall. The stone was slippery, and it was only his anaconda arm around my neck that held me upright. I was seeing spots, gasping for each breath. I heard Black Fox say something in Cherokee. It sounded muffled, far away.

  “We don’t have your stone, Black Fox!” Wattie was shouting.

  The stone. Of course, he wants the stone. The thoughts flitted across my mind like moths around a fire. He doesn’t even realise it’s right here, in my pocket.

  I would surely pass out if I didn’t get a breath soon. Was I imagining things? “Sophia?” I gasped, but no sound came out. I looked again. No, it wasn’t Sophia. It was Imogen standing there with a face as fierce as any warrior’s. She had something in her hand, and she was shouting as she pulled back her arm. Then she hurled the thing, and I saw what it was. Imogen’s mobile phone whistled through the air. I felt its impact when it made contact with Black Fox’s skull.

  The second the phone struck, I was jerked backwards. Three sets of hands grabbed hold of mine and pulled, even while Black Fox still kept his grip on me, pulling me back. I thought I’d tear in two, but the hands holding mine held tighter, and at last I swung forward, gasping for air.

  I saw Wattie, Imogen and Ka-Ti panting with relief, then swung around just in time to see Black Fox stumble backward over the ledge. Even he was no match for the waterfall. It swept him down with a mighty roar.

  We watched in disbelief. Imogen put her arm around my shoulder, and I realised I was shaking and she was crying.

  “Katie Fire-Hair, it is time,” Ka-Ti leaned over and said in my ear.

  I took a deep breath and nodded. Then finding my voice again, I said, “We’re ready.”

  Wattie helped me and Imogen stand up. He looked shaken.

  “Thank you for everything,” I said, giving Wattie a hug. He hugged me back but still looked too bewildered to speak. “And please tell your parents and Grasshopper and … and all the others, that we will never forget them.”

  I stepped aside to give Imogen her chance to say goodbye. Sniffling, she held out her hand to Wattie. “Sorry for being so difficult sometimes. You’re a great leader, really.” And to the surprise of all of us, but especially Wattie, she stood up on her toes and planted a kiss on his cheek.

  Wattie tugged on his collar and stumbled back a step into the wall. I turned back to Ka-Ti, whose cheeks had also turned slightly pink. I remembered what I had to say. Taking the quiver from my back, I pulled out the leather folder of paintings she’d given me, all snapshots of Ramona’s travels through time.

  “These are yours,” I said.

  She shook her head. “They are yours.”

  I threw my other arm around Ka-Ti’s neck. “I hope your mother finds her way home one day too,” I whispered. We released each other, and with a heavy sigh, I turned back to face the wall with the painted horses.

  Imogen and I locked arms and slowly approached until we were close enough to reach out and touch them. I slipped my hand into my pocket and squeezed the Uktena Stone. Then, as quiet as a gentle breeze, Ka-Ti began to sing. Her voice grew into the pure notes of a pan flute and spoke words I didn’t understand. And yet each word sounded just right. And as I listened, I felt a wriggling in my hand. I looked down. The serpent etched into the stone seemed to glow and wriggle like a living snake.

  When I raised my eyes back to the horses, they had begun to trot. Soon they quickened into a canter. At last, as the song reached a triumphant note, the horses broke into a mighty gallop, and Imogen and I fell forward into a swirling whirlpool of wind and autumn colours.

  36

  The Journey Just Beginning

  A whirlpool of autumn leaves settled to the forest floor all around us. Imogen and I, arms still linked, sat in a pool of freshly fallen leaves and afternoon sunlight. We looked at each other, but no words came. Wiping our eyes dry, we helped one another up, brushing off the leaves that clung to our clothes.

  Imogen straightened up, frowning. “We’re still in the same clothes … Do you think it worked?”

  Before I could answer, a familiar voice calling our names turned our eyes downriver. My dad appeared on the trail with the bucket and water filter. “I came down to see if you girls needed help, but it seems you’ve been off exploring.” He rustled my hair, then stood back to look at me, frowning. “Were you wearing deerskin leggings and moccasins earlier?”

  Again, I was prevented from answering by another call; this time it was my mum. “Peter! Girls! Hurry up with that water if you expect to have any dinner tonight. I’m aching for a cup of tea!” She too appeared just uphill and immediately stopped in her tracks, taking in the strange sight of Imogen and me in our muddy, old-timey dress. “Where on earth did you girls get those clothes?” she asked.

  Imogen thought faster than I could. “Oh, we bought them, Auntie Jemima, at that gift shop we stopped at on the way.” She gave me a sideways look.

  Mum was still eyeing us both as if we were mad. “Ok? I … didn’t realise you two were such e
nthusiasts for Native American dress.”

  “Oh, didn’t you?” Imogen answered, a little too enthusiastically, “I just can’t get enough of it. Nothing I love better than Cherokee history.”

  Mum laughed nervously and scratched her head. Dad, on the other hand, lit up at the words “Cherokee history.”

  “Well, why didn’t you say so before, Imogen? If you’re that interested in Cherokee history, there’s a brief history of all the local villages in my archives.”

  Imogen and I exchanged another look, then took off running up the hill towards camp, leaving my mum and dad behind and no doubt bewildered.

  I found the archive tucked safely away in Dad’s duffel bag. We carried it back to our own tent, zipping up the door for privacy, and eagerly dove in, flipping through the pages until we found the one with “A Brief History of the Cherokee of Lower Tennessee” typed at the top.

  I tried to read it, but I found that my heart was in my throat. I was terrified to find out what had become of our friends … of finding out things we might wish we never knew. “You read it,” I said, passing the scrapbook into Imogen’s lap.

  She took a deep breath and scrolled her finger down the page, stopping suddenly about halfway down. “Oh, Nickajack. Here we go. Oh my gosh!”

  “What? What is it?” I asked, dreading the answer.

  “It says here Jim Weaver became the Indian Agent in 1828! Oh, and here’s Wattie! William McKay (also “Oowattie”), son of a Scottish trader Joseph McKay and Ulma McKay (daughter of the prominent Cherokee chief Grey Wolf) served as a respected member of the Council and delegate on behalf of his people to Washington, D.C. He was a strong voice of opposition against President Jackson’s Removal Act of 1830 which resulted in the Trail of Tears in which thousands of Cherokees were forcibly removed from their homes and relocated in Oklahoma.”

  All the excitement drained out of Imogen’s voice. Her eyes flickered up for moment, but she carried on reading. “No records show William or his family having made the journey to Oklahoma, and it is believed that they settled in the Appalachian Mountains where the Eastern Band of the Cherokee still survives today.” Imogen stopped reading. “It says ‘see page three for family records’.”

  I barely heard her. My heart had dropped from my throat into the pit of my stomach.

  “You were right,” I mumbled, not able to look Imogen in the eye.

  “Right about what?” she asked.

  “I was childish to think I could change history.” I pointed to the page, wishing I could scratch out what was written on it. “President Jackson’s Removal Act. He was no better than the Governor. Blunt or no Blunt, they still had to leave their homes just a few years after we left.” I took a deep breath. “After all we did or tried to do, none of it made any real difference.”

  After a silent moment, I dared to look at Imogen. I expected her to look as miserable as I felt, but instead, she was giving me one of her classic “that’s the dumbest thing I ever heard” stares.

  “Katie, you’re not serious. Of course it made a difference! Do you think it didn’t make a difference to Crow Feather to live another day? Do you think Wattie would ever have become a delegate if we’d left him in prison and let his town be stolen by crooks?” She paused, then, in a softer voice added, “Anyway, it made a difference to me. I’ll never forget what we’ve been through together, Katie. Seriously, it’s been the best holiday of my life. Snakes and all.”

  A smile forced its way onto my face and we both laughed. Then I remembered how Imogen had just saved my life. “But Im, your phone! It went over the waterfall ...”

  She shrugged. “To be honest, I’d kind of gone off it. Not that I wouldn’t have sacrificed it to rescue you from Black Fox anyway.”

  I reached out and squeezed her hand. “Thanks for rescuing me.”

  In her most Imogen-like know-it-all way, she answered, “Really, Katie. That’s what cousins are for … obviously.”

  “Hey, speaking of cousins, what was that it said about family records?”

  “Oh yea.” Imogen scanned the page again. “On page three it says.” She licked her fingers and turned the pages back. The spread of pages two and three together made one big family tree. We both scanned the page, but I found Wattie’s name first.

  “No way,” escaped my mouth. Imogen’s mouth fell open at the same time.

  “He and Ka-Ti got married!” she squealed, clasping her hands over her heart. “That is so adorable. Did they have kids?”

  “Yes. But … that’s weird. Wattie’s name was McKay, but the kids all have the surname ‘Wolf’.”

  “That’s your surname,” she said. “Even if you did tell everyone it was Watson for some strange reason of your own.”

  I didn’t respond. I had that prickling feeling in my skin again, like something important was about to happen. “Look. It says in the footnote here that Oowattie McKay, following the Cherokee tradition of taking the mother’s name, passed down the Cherokee name Wolf to his children and all future generations.” I placed my finger on the line connecting Wattie’s and Ka-Ti’s names and traced it down, right to the bottom where the names Peter and Jemima were joined. Beneath them, in my dad’s handwriting, the names Charles and Katherine had been scribbled in.

  “Do you know what this means?” I whispered.

  Imogen nodded slowly. “It means … I kissed your great, great grandfather!” Imogen cupped her hands over her mouth.

  “Well, yea, but not just that,” I said, giving her a gentle shove. “It means that Ka-Ti is my great-great-grandmother, and Ramona is my great-great-great-grandmother!”

  A look of revelation came over Imogen’s face. “So there is a reason you’re a time traveller. It’s in your blood.”

  As fast as I could, I took my quiver off my back, took out the folder of dream paintings once again and opened to the first page, the painting of the fire-haired girl on the horse. “I think Ramona meant for us to have these. That’s what Ka-Ti was saying. These aren’t keepsakes; they’re clues of the places she’s been.”

  She glared at me. “Wait, are you thinking what I think you’re thinking, Katie?”

  I bit my lip, but didn’t answer.

  Imogen raised her eyebrows and pointed her finger like a scolding teacher. “Because if you’re thinking of travelling through time again, you had better not dare leave me behind!”

  I smiled and flipped to the next picture of me and Imogen side by side. “I couldn’t if I wanted to. You’re part of the story.”

  Imogen and I could hardly stay awake through supper that evening. We barely made it through s’mores. When Dad took out his pack of playing cards, we begged him to let us go to bed, promising we’d play tomorrow.

  “I hope you girls aren’t coming down with some kinda Cherokee fever,” he said as we crawled into our tent.

  “Nothing a little bear fat wouldn’t fix,” Imogen said just before zipping the door shut.

  Although our discoveries from the archives left us with a billion things to talk about, it didn’t take long for Imogen to start snoring. I felt I’d been awake for years, yet I still couldn’t fall asleep. I slipped my hand under my pillow and stroked the smooth stone I’d hidden there. Then I closed my eyes and let the images of our adventures take shape in my mind. Wattie and Ka-Ti … Old Grizzly with his sad but hopeful eyes. Those images would stay with me forever. I would never, ever forget them. But something Jim had said was beginning to make sense to me for the first time: Don’t use up too much of today on yesterday.

  He was right, I thought. Well, partly right anyway. The past would always be part of my story, but – my fingers brushed the soft leather of Ka-Ti’s notebook where it lay beside my pillow – I had the mysterious feeling my adventures were only just beginning.

  37

  Dear Imogen

  Dear Imogen (Dilli),

  Good news! Mum says I can come and spend Christmas with you! She’s actually talking to your mum on the phone about it right now, so yo
u’ll probably already know by the time you get this. But we agreed to write each other snail mail, so I had to share the exciting news anyway.

  Speaking of phones, how is your mobile phone ban going? I bet your friends at school think you’ve lost it. Don’t worry about it. My friends at school think I’m a little odd too. I think it’s just because we’ve been through a lot of things they can’t understand … and we can’t explain it to them. But it’s way better for me than it used to be … because I have you to talk to!

  I can’t wait ’til we’re together in London. This is going to be the best Christmas ever!

  Write back soon!

  Lots of love,

  Your cousin and TTB (time-travel-buddy), Katie

  Katie Watson and the Caged Canary

  Book 3

  For Gordon. London has given me many treasures, but you are by far the best.

  1

  Upon a Midnight Clear

  Do you ever have that tingling feeling that something important is about to happen? I do. In fact, I had that feeling for two months straight, right from the moment Imogen and I travelled back from the past. But every day that passed proved me wrong. Nothing ever happened.

  Not exactly nothing. Life happened. I went to school, I wrote to Imogen in London, and she wrote to me. And finally, after a forever of days-in-which-nothing-much-happened, the Christmas holidays arrived and my parents put me on a plane to London. I was to spend Christmas with Imogen at my aunt and uncle’s ridiculously fashionable town house, and I could hardly wait.

  Finally, after months of writing letters, Imogen and I would be able to chat face-to-face about our adventure to the year 1828 and the friends we’d left behind in Cherokee Country. Finally, I would have someone I could talk to about the questions I’d been carrying around inside my own head for months, questions that boiled down to one name: Ramona.