Heroes Live Forever (Knights in Time)

by Chris Karlsen

  "I forgot Lucy was stopping by on her way to Nottingham this afternoon," Elinor mumbled with a long sigh of disappointment. When she twisted around Basil had gone. "Basil?" No one answered. She plastered a smile on her face and headed for the house.

  "Sorry, Luce, I didn't realize the time."

  Lucy tilted her head and stared hard at the area Elinor came from, before she turned around. “Who were you talking to out there?”

  "No one," she said, without missing a beat.

  "I could have sworn I saw you talking to a man dressed like a highwayman."

  "It must've been a shadow. Trust me, if I'd been talking to some gorgeous, tall, dark-haired fox, you'd know about it."

  Lucy blocked Elinor's path. "Hold on just a second," she said and wagged a finger. "It's funny you should say he was tall with dark hair, because I don't recall saying that. You're supposed to tell me, your best friend, when someone tall, dark and looks great in boots crosses your path."

  "You're right. You didn't say tall. Knowing you as I do, I simply filled in the blanks." Elinor stepped past Lucy and forced a laugh. "Don't worry. If someone fitting your description drops from the sky into my drawing room, you'll be the first to know. Now, let's go inside before you start seeing ghosts again."

  Inside, Lucy went straight to the refrigerator. "How did the date with Jeremy go? More importantly, is he going to ask you out again?" She took a soda and sat across from Elinor at the table.

  "The date went okay." The evening with Jeremy was the furthest thing from Elinor's mind. "He called me early this morning." One shoulder lifted in a lazy half shrug as she told Lucy about the short conversation. "He sounded strange. He talked really fast and was so muffled, I had a hard time understanding him. If I didn't know better, I'd say he had his hand around the receiver. The call couldn't have been more than a minute long."

  "What did he say?"

  It wasn’t one of those male-female conversations a woman commits to memory. "He asked me out to dinner Thursday."

  "You don't seem very excited. Are you going?"

  "I guess so, but I told him it would have to be an early night. I have school in the morning." Deep down, she was relieved the date would be short. "He has to get up early too, but Thursday was the only night he had available. On Saturday, he leaves with his mother for Yorkshire."

  The corners of Lucy's mouth curved down, "He's not a momma's boy is he?"

  "No, it's not what you think. She asked him to drive her around while she shops for retirement property."

  "All right, that’s acceptable." Lucy put her bottle down. "You're oddly unenthusiastic about a handsome and charming man. Let's get to the interesting stuff. Is he a good kisser and did you sleep with him?"

  "You know I don't sleep with men on the first date, and he's not a good kisser." Elinor got up and busied herself with kitchen chores. Even if he was a good kisser, Jeremy's couldn't compare to Basil's. No amount of busy work could put that thought from her mind.

  Lucy walked over and took Elinor by the arm. "You know you're being silly. Nobody. I mean nobody waits anymore. It's stupid. Men don't put up with women who play hard to get. They don't have to. The sooner you realize it, the better off you'll be. No one will think you're a slut, believe me. You need to get with the times. Besides, it’s not like you’re a virgin.”

  Elinor rolled her eyes and went back to wiping down a counter. “News flash, there’s a good chance I’ll never sleep with him.”

  "How bad was this kiss?"

  "Like kissing a plunger, is that bad enough for you?"

  Lucy wrinkled her nose at the comparison. "Kissing badly doesn't mean he's bad in all areas."

  Elinor patted Lucy's hand and walked away. "I agreed to go out with him again, a date, that's all. I am what I am. I'm not turning myself inside out for anyone, and I won't be badgered into having sex. Okay?"

  "Whatever you say, my Victorian friend. Just out of curiosity, your reticence doesn't have anything to do with that dark Zorro look-alike I hallucinated does it?" Lucy cackled and grabbed her purse, "No need to give me your Medusa stare, I'm on my way out, t.t.f.n."

  "Oh, ta-ta for now yourself," Elinor grumbled at Lucy's departing back, "and I'm not in the least Victorian."

  Chapter Eighteen

  Elinor heard the car drive away as she stood at the archway to the drawing room. Guy, ever fascinated by the record player hovered around the machine for hours on end, today being no different. He’d recently taken to listening to his favorite songs, over and over. She debated her options. Should she risk sitting in the drawing room with a good book? Could she bear hearing Born to Be Wild, for an hour straight? Or should she try to find Basil? Common sense dictated when he wanted to return he would.

  She ventured into the drawing room. As expected, she found Guy picking through rock albums.

  “Have you listened to some of the classical records I have? I think you might like Mozart or Beethoven,” Elinor suggested, curling up at the end of the sofa.

  “I have heard them. Their music is just that, only music. I like the songs with words. I like to listen to the story.” Guy turned to her. “Can I play one or two for you?”

  “Certainly.”

  “Pay attention to the lyrics. You’ll see what I mean.”

  “Yes, sir, I will, sir.” Elinor snapped a hand to her brow in mock salute. Guy’s eyes narrowed and the tiniest of frowns came and went before he fixed his attention on the stereo.

  The rich bass voice of Bill Medley came on with the first lines of You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling. Elinor stretched a leg out and rested her head on her arm. The song was one of her favorites.

  Guy sat on the floor next to the sofa. “Listen, can you not feel the heartbreak in his voice?”

  “Every woman I know loves this song. It’s great to dance to, even though it’s about a breakup.”

  Guy tipped his head and looked up at her. “One day we will have to dance to this.” It ended and he got up to put another record on, “Now this one is most perfect for a man to woo a lady by.”

  Her eyes widened with curiosity. A statement like that, coming from Guy, would have a saint holding her breath in lusty curiosity. Exile’s Kiss You All Over, came on, and Elinor couldn’t resist laughing. If ever a song suited a man, this one fit Guy to a “T.”

  He lay down on the floor with his arms folded behind his head. A slow smile crept across his face as he closed his eyes and tapped his foot to the music. A low, primal growl preceded one stanza, “I love this part about being her fantasy,” he said, with another soft growl.

  In spite of his teasing manner, his love of music and lyrics made Elinor suspect he was a die hard romantic. “Guy, were you ever in love?”

  He opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling, no longer tapping his foot.

  “I believe I might’ve been. It’s hard to say I was very young at the time.”

  “Tell me about her. If you remember a girl from your youth, you must’ve been in love.”

  A few seconds passed before he added, “I guess you could say I was.”

  Elinor fussed with the sofa pillows trying to situate herself to see him better and get more comfortable.

  “Being in love is like being pregnant, either you are or you aren’t.”

  Guy sat up on one elbow and glared at her, “Who tells this story Madame, me or you?”

  “Jeez, don’t get your knickers in a knot. Go on, I promise I’ll be quiet.”

  “As I was saying.” He cast a stern glance in Elinor’s direction. “I was quite young, only twenty summers. She was but ten and five years and besotted with me. She seemed happy just being near me. I enjoyed her company too. We did simple things. We’d take long walks and talk, sometimes she’d sing. Her name was Lorraine. She was kind and gentle with the voice of a lark.

  “Her father approached mine about marriage negotiations. My father asked me. I told him I’d no interest in marrying anyone. My plans, you see, did not include being saddled with a b
ride.”

  “If you loved her, couldn’t you have agreed to be married at a later date?”

  Guy laughed; a quiet, almost bitter laugh. “As I said, I was young. I had battles to fight, dragons to slay, a full court of women to conquer.” He twisted his hand in the air, mimicking the movements of a sword. “I wanted no burden of any kind to slow me down.”

  “What happened?”

  “After a few years, I tired of court intrigues, the gossip and the boring sameness of it all. By then, Lorraine had married someone else.”

  He got up; pulled an album from the stack and stared at the disc for a long moment before putting it on. This time when he sat on the floor he kept his back to Elinor and rested his hand against a propped up knee.

  The song was Dust in the Wind, by Kansas. Guy’s head hung a little as the song began and he softly sang along. When it ended he stayed silent and still as the next song started to play. She’d never seen him so solemn and tipped her head to peer at his face. When he glanced at her, his sparkling eyes had dulled.

  Quickly looking away, he said, “Interesting lyric, wouldn’t you say? All we are, all we do, crumbles and blows away, like dust in the wind. Before we left for what turned out to be our final campaign, I’d decided I’d return to my holding once the war was over. It was time to be the future baron.”

  A couple of heartbeats later, Guy made eye contact with her, the light back in his brown eyes. “Death milady is a plague to the best of our plans.”

  The sudden silence when Guy turned off the stereo blanketed the room in the sadness of the poignant memory. He put on Born to be Wild, and resumed his original position, stretched out on the floor, keeping time to the music with his foot.

  Elinor laid her head down on her arm and thought about what Guy had said. How short sighted she’d been regarding he and Basil. Caught up in the novelty of their ghostly presence, she hadn’t really thought about their lives as men. They’d been in their prime, with hopes for a future that ended one bloody morning on an overcast September day.

  What would have happened if they’d lived and had children? Would history have played out the same? What difference might their lives have made? What was changed by their deaths? The unfairness of their loss troubled her for the rest of the afternoon.

  Chapter Nineteen

  That night Elinor put her headset on and went to bed early with her motivational tape.

  Basil lay next to her for a long time watching as she slept. Sprawled out, her hair was in wild disarray on the pillow, the headpiece had slipped, but the earplugs still remained in place.

  He ran the back of his knuckles along her face in a long caress. His fingertips drew a path along the smooth flesh under her jaw. He buried his face in her hair, inhaling the mingled scent of her shampoo and exotic bouquet of her perfume. He slid a fingertip across her collarbone, lingering at the hollow then up a blue vein, wanting to feel her heartbeat. Basil bent close and brushed her warm lips with his.

  He lay back with his forearm across his eyes, "For six hundred years I've wished only for true death. I never imagined there'd be something I'd want more. Now I find there is, and it's more elusive than death. I wish with all my soul, such as it is, you could know me as the man I once was."

  Elinor moaned softly. He turned, afraid she might've awakened and heard the tormented whisper. Her eyes remained closed and she sighed again. He wondered what she dreamed. Basil rolled onto his side and was quiet for several minutes, thinking thoughts he knew better than to have. Then very gently he removed the headset. His lips almost touching her ear, he began to speak.

  Elinor dreamed.

  She stood at the base of a stone archway that housed a dark metal portcullis. Bracketed torches lit the stone interior.

  No sound came from the bailey beyond. Unafraid, Elinor walked into the courtyard and stopped in front of Ashenwyck’s high Keep.

  The thick oak doors of the imposing structure were three times her height and dotted with large iron studs. They opened, bathing the area in light from the great hall. Fresh rushes cushioned her bare feet and she stepped inside.

  So much more than she imagined, the room was warm and inviting, rich in detail and textures. Rough stone complimented carved stone, aged oak swept upward into the ceiling’s skeleton of cross beams. Prisms of light from the torch flames bounced off the window glass. The circle from the blower's pipe in the pane’s center reflected a rippled pattern on the floor.

  She walked to the tapestries Basil described. All appeared new, but for the one dating to the Crusades. The hanging of two leopards bringing down a horse was both horrific and beautiful in its depiction. The golden leopards were majestic with their black and bronze spots. Their claws of shiny black silk were a sharp contrast to the varied pale hued threads used on the white horse. Scarlet bloodlines of silk marked the claw’s trail over the horse's flanks.

  The largest tapestry hung over the dais. A sole leopard stood proudly; lush jungle vegetation in various shades of green and brown surrounded him. Above him in deep gold, the words Virtute et Armis.

  Basil came towards her. Dressed in the dark breeches and soft shirt he'd worn in the wood, his untied hair inky against the white of the shirt.

  "Elinor," he murmured and kissed her.

  She wrapped her arms around his neck, and her fingers wound through his hair.

  Unhurried, feathery kisses skimmed the corners of her mouth. Basil lifted her and pressed her close. She rose up on her toes and grasped his shoulders for support, moaning in protest as the kiss ended.

  He eased her down and moved away. His image began to fade. She was losing him.

  In her sleep, she called his name.

  Basil rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling. Release her from the dream, he told himself, before it goes too far. An honorable man would take the moment he'd been given, hold it as a cherished memory and go no further.

  Elinor’s eyelashes fluttered as she called his name again.

  His moral battle was lost. Tonight he'd be the man he used to be, the man he wanted her to see. He lowered his lips to her ear.

  Basil's image grew stronger as he closed the gap between them and embraced her again. She felt his warmth as his arms wrapped around her waist. She ran her hands over the hard contours of his biceps and down the well defined forearms. She slid her palms down to his waist, over the silk shirt, and the planes of his chest.

  There was no tickling, no tingling sensation, only firm flesh. She raised tentative eyes to his, afraid the answer would disappoint, "Is this a dream, Basil? Am I dreaming you?

  "Yes, and no." He paused, as if telling her too much might wake her or change how she felt. "You see what you desire to see. I can paint a picture with words. You give it life and breath. It's what you called your subconscious allowing you to dream what is in your heart. The dream is both of ours to make."

  “Yes, it is. Ours alone.”

  Her journey continued. She sought fulfillment to the erotic promise of his words. She curved her hand along his jaw and traced the outline of his lips now pink with life.

  He kissed her temple, teasing her skin with his breath. "You memorize me with your touch."

  "If you’re only a vision, Basil, then I'll commit this to memory and hold onto it after the vision fades." Desperate, she flung her arms around his neck. "I'm afraid to let go."

  "Don't be..." the rest of his words were lost, buried inside a hard kiss, seductive and heated, filled with a thirst long denied.

  As his strong thigh wedged between her legs, her foot rubbed against the supple leather of his boot. She clutched his hair as he slid a hand under her dress and with light sweeps caressed her hipbone with his fingers. Arching at the sensations, her head tilted back, he nipped the tender skin beneath her ear and down her throat.

  She lost herself to him completely. All her fantasies and yearning merged with the urgency fear begets, fear this reality would disappear too soon. As tight as Basil held her, she clung to him harder
. Some part of her wanted to believe if she held him close enough, he wouldn't go anywhere, couldn't go anywhere.

  "Come," he held out his arm and led them towards a wide, stone staircase. Centuries of foot traffic had left depressions in the middle of each.

  They entered a large, high-ceilinged room. The sweet scent of beeswax from the candles filled the air. A helm and sword she recognized as his lay on a wide, plain chest. A long wooden table stood under the window with two ornately carved pewter goblets and a flagon on top. She circled the room touching things, his things, fingering the copper basin where he washed.

  A massive bed with a goose-down mattress dominated the remaining space. Four tall posts supported a railing that ran around all sides of the bed. Heavy velvet curtains in dark indigo blue were attached to each post and tied back with silken bronze cords and tassels. Pillows of chrysanthemum colored Tripoli silk with embroidered dragons rested against a fat bolster.

  Basil stepped close and pushed the hair away from her neck to place a kiss there in its stead. He bit her lightly at the nape. "Dance for me," he commanded in a hushed voice, as his warm hands trailed down her arms.

  She didn’t hear the strange exotic melody at first. Then, from somewhere, came a male chorus singing a repetitive pagan chant. Strong primitive drums drove the beat of the chant, the power of the song building. He lay on the bed as she found the music's rhythm and began to move.

  His gaze never left her as she danced. His fascination excited her and she danced closer. The dress floated in waves around her ankles while the light from the fire silhouetted her form through the gown's gossamer material.

  The music was freeing, the hypnotic melody her guide. A light sheen of sweat covered her body. Elinor lifted the hem of her dress. Caressing her slick thighs in sensual strokes she edged toward the bed. With a glistening wet palm, she beckoned to him.