Beyond the Fortuneteller's Tent

by Kristy Tate

  Emory slid a bolt through the door and stared at Chambers through the haze, amazed that the plan had, so far, worked. Looking out the window, he saw Petra smiling and pointing her thumb in the air. She looked so beautiful, wet and happy with her thumb protruded he wanted to vault over the sill and swing her in his arms.

  For the moment he had a heavier and uglier armful. Not for long, he promised himself, not for long. He dropped Chambers into a chair.

  ***

  Although part of her wanted to vault into the room and help Emory with Chambers, Petra knew they had to get back to the wagon. She tugged at Anne’s hand. “Anne,” Petra whispered, “Come on.”

  Anne’s face was chalk-white. Petra followed her gaze and saw an equally stupefied Garret staring at them through the window that neighbored Chambers.

  Rain trickled down Petra’s back, sending icy streams along her spine. “It’s not what you think,” Petra told him, wrapping a protective arm around Anne.

  “Pray tell, my lady, what do I think?” Garret said in a strangled voice.

  Anne had frozen. She held herself perfectly rigid; she didn’t blink and didn’t try to speak. Petra took a deep breath and then stuttered, “I…I..I don’t know. What do you think?”

  Garret’s eyes lingered on Anne’s breeches. Throwing open the window, he climbed out, exposing long and hairy legs. He wore a cotton button up job that looked like a knee-length pillowcase with sleeves.

  Petra rushed over and shut the window, squelching the billowing smoke. Standing in front of the window, trying to block its radiating orange and red haze, she realized that she needn’t have bothered. Garret, now outside and striding across the wet grass, had eyes only for Anne.

  Garret pulled Anne against his chest and wrapped her in his arms. “By my faith, ‘tis heaven to see you.” Bending her backward, he kissed her long and deeply. When he lifted his lips from hers, he said, “That you would risk coming here, in the dead of night, in a raging storm, for us to be together.” His voice choked with emotion.

  Petra stood, rooted at being witness to such an intimate moment.

  “My lord, I, I --” Anne stammered.

  Garret put a finger to her lips. “Hush. Come away from this charade. Let us go to Scotland and be married immediately.” He pulled her toward the carriage house.

  “But your father…” Anne seemed to be struggling to bring her truth up to speed with Garret’s fiction.

  “My father is of no importance.” Garret strode away, towing Anne after him, his bare feet splashing through the sodden grass. Rain and mud splattered up his legs.

  Anne balked. “Of no importance? Your lands, your title? They matter not to me, but I won’t let you give them up!”

  “Fear not, t’will all be mine upon his death.” He spoke as if that couldn’t happen too soon. “I tried reasoning with my father, but he’s controlled by greed. Gold dictates all his logic. Fortunately, I’m also heir to my mother’s fortune. Until my father asks for forgiveness for his hardness and bigotry or dies, we shall live as man and wife on my mother’s Scottish estate. We’ll leave now.”

  “Pray wait, my Lord. This is all new to me. What about my father?”

  Garret took off Anne’s hat and ran his fingers through her hair. He smiled as the hair tumbled through his fingers. “We’ll send word. He may join us, should he choose.” He stared into Anne’s eyes, and put a hand on her cheek. “Have you not come to be with me? That is why you’re here, is it not?”

  Tell him the truth, Petra mentally urged.

  Anne answered him with a soft kiss on his lips.

  “How you knew that I would be longing for you, how you knew that I would need you tonight, it astounds me. You amaze me.” He caressed her cheek with his thumb.

  “My lord, I am not amazing; you must not think of me so.” Anne cast Petra a nervous glance. “I would travel anywhere to be with you, but --”

  “You are good, kind, and modest.” Garret scooped her into his arms, and headed toward the carriage house. “Nothing matters but our life together.”

  Anne giggled. “My lord, you’re wearing naught but your nightclothes.”

  Naught is right. Petra flushed and looked away. Rain pelted him and the wet fabric clung. He wore nothing, naught, beneath the cotton night shirt.

  “I’ve ample clothes in Yorkshire,” Garret said, not breaking stride.

  “And I am hardly dressed for a wedding.”

  “We shall go to your cottage for a trunk, if we must.” Garret stopped, as if suddenly remembering Petra. “How now, my lady?” Glancing at Anne’s face, for the first time that evening, Garret seemed confused.

  Petra looked toward the woods and watched Rohan shepherding a rolling powder keg toward the river.

  “Go, Anne,” Petra said. “We’ve… I mean, you have what you came for.” She motioned toward Garret.

  “Petra must come with us.” Anne said. “We cannot leave her here.”

  Garret nodded at Anne but scowled at Petra. “Come along then.” He marched away.

  “Umm, I don’t think so,” Petra said to his retreating back. “I think I’ll go with Rohan.”

  “The friar?” Garret turned. “What, pray tell, is he doing here?”

  What an ego. Did Garret really think that she and Anne would disguise themselves as men and ride to Hampton Court to see him? Petra shifted her feet and felt the cold damp seep through her boots.

  “Tis a long tale,” Anne said, smiling up into his face. “Best told in a coach, away from the wind and weather.”

  “Of course, forgive me. You are soaked through.” Garret looked down at her, his eyes shining, as if he couldn’t wait to have Anne to himself. They disappeared into the carriage house and Petra wondered what the stable hands would think. Could the future Earl ride away in his pajamas? And what about the current Earl? What would he say about his son and an artisan traveling in the dead of night? With naught on? Garret definitely didn’t seem to care what his dad thought. Was that because his father didn’t mind his marrying Anne? No, it was probably the opposite. His father didn’t approve, so if Garret wanted to marry Anne they had no choice but to elope.

  Petra watched, curious, resisting the urge to get closer for a peek. It took several minutes, but in time, Garret’s coach rolled from the carriage house. On the perch, Fritz huddled beneath a large black cape and slapped the reins. The horses looked as sleepy and reluctant.

  Petra felt a twinge of sadness knowing that she would probably never see either of them again. Even if she spent the rest of her life in the seventeenth century, she didn’t know where she would stay and travel to Scotland seemed unlikely. What would become of her?

  Petra shot the dark window a quick glance, but Emory had gone, presumably taking Chambers with him. Smoke milled about the empty room, the bomb remnants fading to a small golden glow.

  A second explosion ripped through the air. Petra covered her ears with her hands and closed her eyes. When she opened them she was dangling two feet off the ground.

  Hands like a vice clamped around her waist. Petra screamed and flailed. She hadn’t seen or heard anyone, which wasn’t surprising. Her ears still rang, and everything sounded underwater. She couldn’t hear above the ringing in her ears or see through the rain pelting her face, but she could fight.

  Although not from midair.

  She kicked, squirmed, and tried to reach behind her to stop the chuckling. She didn’t like being abducted, but she hated being abducted and mocked. Waving her powder horn, she tried to connect with any of her assailant’s body parts, but every bit of him seemed out of reach.

  “Put. Me. Down.” She swung the leather strap that held her powder horn and it whistled through the air, smacking something hard. The impact sent reverberations down her arm. “Ow,” she muttered as leaves, twigs and seed pods rained down on her head. She spit and increased her thrashing.

  “I knew you’d put up a good fight,” said a voice, frustratingly calm and steady.

  Her e
nergy flagged even as her temper flared. This guy seemed to be enjoying himself. He also sounded familiar. When she caught a glimpse of his massive forearm, her hopes for escape waned. This vaguely familiar man easily outweighed her by more than a hundred pounds, maybe two hundred pounds.

  “I like a fighter,” he said.

  Petra willed herself still and tried to go limp with a vague idea of slipping through his hands, but her captor tossed her over his shoulder, holding the right wrist while pinning the left ankle. Petra felt like a calf being carted to the slaughter. The powder horn swung from her neck.

  A calf that blew fire! She twisted and aimed her lighter for his head, but her captor only chuckled, grabbed the powder horn and tossed it to the ground before depositing her in the back of a hay-filled wagon.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  How to blow fire:

  You need fuel (ale) and flame (Girl Scout Gadget)

  Step 1: Take as much ale in your mouth as you can hold.

  Step 2: Take a deep breath, inhale through your nose.

  Step 3: Light the flame source and hold it close to your mouth.

  Step 4: Spit.

  —Petra’s notes

  He’d need to wait. Petra and Anne might be able to glide through the smoky confusion without notice, but Emory doubted he’d be able to sling Chambers through the palace without gaining unwanted attention.

  The wait in the dark hall amidst vaporous reek of smoldering cow pies may have only been a few minutes, but it seemed an eternity. He easily carried the inert Chambers down the hall, more afraid of asphyxiation than exertion. Finally, Emory pushed open a door and took a deep breath of clean air. Although Chambers’ room had pulsed red and orange, it appeared the rest of the palace’s occupants had contributed the explosion to thunder. To Emory’s relief, not even a dog was in sight.

  As he’d hoped, the courtyard was also deserted. Then he noticed a bright flame shoot out of the back of a wagon. The flame died as his heart leapt. Was he mistaken? No, Petra sat up just as lightning brightened the sky and glistened off her round shoulders.

  Emory swallowed fear mingling with rage. What was she doing in the back of hay-filled wagon? Where were Anne and Rohan? The wagon lurched over the bridge, sending Petra down again behind the slats holding the straw.

  The wagon turned, and light played on the massive forearms of the driver.

  Marshall.

  ***

  While Emory’s heart thundered in his ears and adrenaline surged, it seemed wrong for Centaur to stand so nonchalantly munching on grass in the thicket of alders where he’d been tied. Emory swung Chambers across the horse’s back. Centaur shifted under the unexpected weight and turned to Emory with large, questioning eyes.

  Chambers’ tied hands and boots pointed to the ground on either side of the horse; he would have a raging headache and a stiff back by morning.

  Emory took a last look at the palace as he bound Chambers to the horn of his saddle. Hampton Court looked asleep until Rohan emerged from the root cellar trap door rolling the last powder keg. Emory sprinted to him. “Any sign of Anne?”

  Rohan shook his head and then pointed at Centaur’s burden. “What you got?”

  “Rubbish. I was hoping you might deposit it for me.” After a quick explanation to Rohan and transferring Chambers to Rohan’s wagon, Emory was off. He knew Centaur could overtake Marshall, who was still in view.

  Marshall could have killed Petra—why take her? In any other circumstance it might have been amusing to watch Petra bobble in the wagon. Several times she attempted to stand, or even come to her knees, but the lurching wagon pitched her up, down, and sideways. She appeared unhurt, but that could change in an instant. A well placed bullet or a blow to the head would silence Petra forever, and from his current vantage point, all he’d be able to do was watch. He tried to imagine his long bleak life without her, and disliking the thought, pushed Centaur harder and faster.

  Did Marshall know they’d destroyed the powder kegs? Had the kidnapping been random? It couldn’t have been directed by the inert and unconscious Chambers. Marshall was a ruffian, hired by who? The Earl? Did the Earl know Petra had staged the explosions?

  Emory dodged a low branch. As of yet, neither Petra nor Marshall had noticed him. He prayed that the rattle of the wagon and clip clop of the nag would overpower the rumble of Centaur’s hooves.

  No such luck.

  Marshall slipped a gun out of his holster. The gun barrel gleamed in the moonlight. Marshall glanced at Petra and then turned to Emory’s direction, aimed and fired.

  ***

  Petra lay on the wagon floor and gathered the hay in a pile. Then, using the lighter, she set it on fire. Bracing herself, she jumped from the wagon seconds before the horses started screaming. The horses smelled the fire before Marshall and bolted. Marshall fought to control the careening horses, but they clattered away as the wagon burned, Marshall hanging onto the reins.

  Stunned, Petra lay on the ground trying to catch her breath. A voice in her head urged her to get up. Emory, the voice said. Struggling to her feet, she lurched toward the palace, searching the dark for him. She found Emory leaning against a tree.

  He tried to smile, but she crouched beside him and touched his lips with a finger. “Shh, don’t speak,” she said.

  She had never seen so much blood. She pulled him to her. His labored breath blew hot across her neck, and his blood soaked the front of her shirt. She rolled Emory so that his head nestled onto her lap. Beneath her bare skin the ground felt cold and gritty. She tried to inspect the bullet wound, but blood gushed beneath her shaking fingers and the charred and ragged edges of his shirt. Emory’s ashen faced stared up at her, his eyes begging questions she didn’t know how to answer.

  His life slipped away with his spilling blood. She pinched a strip of her shirt. The cotton tore easily and she took a wad of fabric and held it against Emory’s red stain with shaking hands.

  “Petra?” Emory’s voice sounded something between a moan and a rasp. His lips were chapped, bloody, and soot smeared his face. Violent red streaks crisscrossed his chest and arms, and the wound in his shoulder pumped out blood.

  Despite the gore, despite her fatigue, Petra wanted to kiss him. Instead, she brushed the hair off Emory’s face. He shifted and attempted to sit up.

  “Stay still,” Petra whispered, running her fingers through his hair.

  “Bossy,” Emory croaked, settling against her. “Will you always be so?”

  “Forever,” Petra promised.

  “Forever,” he murmured. “There is something you should know about forever.”

  “Don’t speak, Emory, just stay still.” Petra tried to hold him

  Emory pushed up so that he sat directly in front of her. She watched, mesmerized, as the bleeding staunched, then stopped as if a spigot had been turned off.

  Emory took her hand. With his other hand he pulled back his shirt.

  Petra stared as the wound healed, the skin turned pink and completely closed around what had been a gaping hole. “Forever, for me, is a very long time,” Emory whispered huskily.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Thunderstorms are caused by atmospheric instability and not by an angry heaven or a vengeful hell.

  —Petra’s notes

  “I don’t understand.” Petra slowly shook her head. True, Emory’s healing from that sword wound had been miraculous. She didn’t know how that had happened. She guessed it had something to do with Rohan and the faith healing, or whatever it was, that she’d seen him do for the gypsy. It was one thing to know someone had healed way too quickly and another to see it happen right before her eyes, like a trick of television editing or computer animation.

  “Come,” he said. “It isn’t safe here.” He uncurled away from her, standing slowly, but clearly without pain. Upright, not favoring the side where he’d been shot. She let him pull her to him, feeling that perhaps she shouldn’t, that maybe she should scream. Her mind reeled. She touched his blo
ody, tattered shirt, and smooth, unblemished chest. At her feet, a metal gun-ball covered in gore lay in a puddle of blood. The bullet, her mind reasoned the unreasonable.

  Emory held her elbow with a vice-like grip, and she staggered in his wake.

  At the edge of town, Emory put his fingers in his mouth and blew out a long whistle. A big Arabian horse trotted toward them from a thicket of alders. Moments earlier she’d worried that Emory would die in her arms, and now he easily swung her in his arms and placed her on top of the horse. When he tossed her the reins she considered, for only a moment, riding away and leaving him. She’d ride and ride until she found her home—and her own century.

  She couldn’t let Emory just carry her away. Not without explanations. With her arms around his waist, she jostled against him the way her thoughts jostled and bounced as the horse carried them further and further from the town’s sights and sounds. Every lurch should have caused Emory great pain. She touched where he’d been shot and he stiffened beneath her hand.

  “You must wonder…” he said over his shoulder.

  “And you have to tell me.” Petra leaned against his back and spoke into his ear.

  “In time.” He kept his face turned toward the road.

  Petra knew she shouldn’t allow herself to be swept away, yet she couldn’t muster the nerve to slide off the horse and demand answers. She didn’t know what else to say or ask, so she kept quiet, thinking.

  “It will not be long before they regroup and come after us,” Emory said.

  “Why?”

  “Because we thwarted their plan. Dorrington won’t be safe for us for a long time.”

  “Time.” That word again.

  The horse slowed, picking his way along the narrow dirt track that skirted around rocks, stumps and trees until it came to a stream.