Mystic Memories

by Gillian Doyle

  Cara slowly repeated his pronunciation, tracing the indigo lines imprinted on his flesh. Suddenly an eerie realization dawned on her, sending a chill down her arms. “That was the name of the ship that went down in San Pedro, Blake. The Mystic.”

  “I had forgotten until now, but it seems rather appropriate. Everything considered, I mean. There you were on that ill-fated brig, one of only a few survivors. All of the twists and turns of fate could be described as mystical.”

  “Yeah . . . mystical.” She thought of her trip through time, as well. How could she begin to explain something so far beyond his realm of comprehension? It was hard enough convincing him of her own psychic abilities, which he hadn’t accepted until he’d seen proof for himself. How could she claim to be from the future without something to substantiate her story?

  “If I had not witnessed all the mysterious events, I doubt I would believe any of it,” he said, confirming her worries. “But it would make a fascinating piece of fiction, don’t you agree? The telling of a great adventure on the uncivilized coast of California?”

  “Someone will tell it, Blake. A young Harvard man named Richard Dana will write a book. Not about our experiences but about his own journey. He’ll expose the injustices of a sailor’s life and title it Two Years Before the Mast.”

  He shifted sideways on the edge of the bed and stared at her for a long moment. His expression told her that his skepticism was creeping back in. Her warning bells went off. She had to take this slower, to let him adjust to her clairvoyance before dropping another bomb in his lap.

  “How do you know such things?” The corner of his mouth quirked into a teasing grin of disbelief. “Did Gabriella pay you another visit?”

  “No, her recent assistance is new to me.” Sidestepping his question about the book, she avoided any mention of time travel. “As for how I know things . . . I’ve been called a freak of nature because of my sixth sense. But I’m not a freak. To me, my gift is as normal as breathing. I just breathe deeper than most people.”

  His black brows pinched together in a frown of confusion. “I don’t understand.”

  “My intuition is stronger than most people’s,” she amended with a weak smile. Still, he continued to look perplexed. “Haven’t you ever had a gut feeling about something?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “And do you pay attention to it?”

  “Usually.”

  “Well, I do, too. But my gut feelings also come to me in different ways. Sometimes it’s in my stomach. Sometimes I have thoughts show up as if I’ve just read them or heard them a moment earlier.”

  “Are you saying you hear voices?”

  “Not always.” She grinned sympathetically at his obvious bewilderment. “Let’s say, for the sake of explanation, that I get the sudden thought ‘Jimmy’s leg hurts.’ I don’t hear someone tell me. The thought is just there, in my head, in the same way that a memory is there in your head. The only difference is the memory is a recollection of a previous event, such as actually witnessing Jimmy hurt his leg and remembering it afterward. Well, I get the word or thought before it is happening in the physical sense. For lack of a better term, I dubbed it my ‘Reverse Memory.’”

  Blake gazed down at her in awe, seeing the love and compassion in the depths of her dark eyes. She was a mystic, and a most beautiful one. “You amaze me.”

  Clearly uncomfortable with his reverence, she averted her eyes as an endearing blush crept into her cheeks. He watched her expression change into uncertainty.

  “What’s wrong, lauaʻe?”

  “Are you sorry I came here? That I have caused you so much pain?”

  “If I said no, you would read my thoughts and call me a liar. In the beginning, I was sorry, but now I see things differently. If anyone should be apologizing, I should—for my behavior, my distrust.”

  “You reacted naturally. I never meant to hurt you.” Her velvet touch drew him back into her arms.

  “I know that now.”

  “Touching me doesn’t bring back any more bad memories?”

  “No longer. Touching you has made new memories for me. Good memories. Mystic memories. Whatever you may be, you have me completely enchanted. I am at your mercy.”

  “No, it is you who have weakened me with all of this lovemaking. Correction, wonderful lovemaking—Hoʻokela ka hoʻoipoipo.”

  Unfamiliar feelings deep in his heart bewildered him, feelings that he was not quite ready to examine, not quite ready to name. His hips nestled snug against the juncture of her firm, slender thighs as his mouth came down upon hers, hungering for her as though he had not tasted her in days and weeks and months. He could never imagine having his fill of her.

  The sound of scratching at the door told him Bud wanted to go out. At the same time, someone rapped twice.

  “It is no use,” Blake sighed, levering himself off her sweet, enticing body. “My other duties will not allow me to dawdle the day away, my dear. Be forewarned, however. I may very well come down here at any given time to lift your skirts and have my way with you.”

  “What skirts? I intend to sleep until you return.” She yawned and stretched again, arching her back with a satisfied smile. The sunlight spilled across her coppery skin, causing him more anguish at the idea of donning his clothes and leaving her here without him.

  The knocking persisted.

  “All right, all right,” he called out, then quickly dressed as Cara covered herself and burrowed deep beneath the bedclothes.

  Though he expected it to be Jimmy on the other side of the door, he was not surprised to see Keoni had been the annoying one. As Bud slipped out, Blake glanced down at the tray of food. The delicious aroma suddenly triggered his delayed hunger.

  “It’s about time,” he scolded in jest.

  The Kanaka glanced toward the bed. “Yes, it was about time, kaikaina. But I think you already got plenty good stuff for a starving man, eh?”

  After two weeks of fair winds and fast sail, then nearly a week of slow passage through the doldrums, the Valiant crossed the equator on April 23. Alone on the open seas, she was now more than two thousand miles off the northwestern coast of South America.

  In the captain’s quarters, Cara stood next to Blake at the table, looking down at a map rolled out and anchored at the curled corners.

  He shook his head adamantly. “The Ballade would not be in Callao, Cara. Peru is too far out of the way for a merchantman to stop on his way back to Boston. You can see for yourself how far off the coast the trade winds have taken our own ship.”

  “But Andrew might be there,” she insisted.

  “Are you sure? What about Juan Fernández?” He pointed to a small island about three hundred miles west of Valparaiso, Chile. “If there had been a need to make land for supplies, which I doubt, then it would more likely have been here.”

  She slowly shook her head as she stared at the map. “I just don’t see him on an island.”

  “How can you be so certain?”

  Throwing her hands up in the air, she spun away from the table. “I am not certain. That’s the problem. I told you before, this psychic ability is not one hundred percent accurate. I’m lucky if it’s seventy or eighty percent. I’m just telling you what I’m picking up.”

  Since their wedding night, when Blake had regained his memory, Cara knew he shared her desperate need to reach the boy and was praying he had not fallen victim to a sadistic captain as had Blake. While his nightmares had lessened, he still suffered from long silent spells of painful anguish. Sometimes he would allow Cara to soothe the hurt. Other times, nothing could be done to alleviate his melancholy. She knew he needed more time to heal, perhaps months or years.

  But time was something Andrew didn’t have. During the hours Blake had spent on deck with his crew, Cara had been left with little to do but fret about the boy’s fate. She’d searched her mind. She’d meditated. She’d even called upon Gabriella for help in locating Andrew.

  Not until this mo
rning had she finally felt like she was onto something. She’d been staring at the map for the hundredth time with the same unsettled feeling in the pit of her stomach. Her gut instinct had told her the Ballade was not as far out ahead of them as they’d assumed. While she wished the Valiant could stop at every port between California and Boston, she knew Blake would not be able to account for such a delay to the shipowner. Studying the yellowed paper, she had been drawn repeatedly to Peru. Callao, in particular. Acting on a hunch, she’d broached the idea to Blake. But he would not be easily swayed into changing his course.

  He came up behind her and slid her arms around her waist. She rested her hands on his, dropping her head back against his shoulder.

  “We will find him, lauaʻe,” he promised. Though he often used her pet name, he never said he loved her in either English or Hawaiian. She, on the other hand, told him at least twice a day. Each time, though, she felt a twinge of remorse, knowing she would have to leave him after she found Andrew. The thought of losing Blake always tore at her heart, and it did so now.

  She turned in the circle of his arms and looked up into his blue eyes. “I need to tell you something . . .”

  How could she find the words to explain about her journey through time? He had barely managed to comprehend her clairvoyance and other supernatural occurrences, like Gabriella’s appearances at the two missions. Without proof of her claim to be from another time, she knew he’d never believe her.

  He smiled his sweet, sexy smile, melting away her determination to come clean with the truth. “I know what you are thinking.”

  “You do?” Taken aback, she couldn’t hide her surprise or nervousness.

  In recent days, he’d started to show little signs of his own sixth sense, finishing her sentences, handing her something before she’d asked for it. He’d dismissed it as a silent language between lovers. But she suspected he might be clairaudient—able to hear her inner thoughts—and highly receptive.

  “You are thinking of Andrew. And wondering how you will talk me into going along with your idea,” he said, relieving her mind of concern. Obviously his radar wasn’t zeroing in on her dilemma over telling him about traveling through time.

  “Are you saying there is a possibility you can be coerced into sailing to Callao?”

  “With you, it seems anything is possible. Whether it is probable is another matter altogether.” He lowered his head and kissed her. His amorous thoughts never seemed to venture too far off the same track.

  Bracing her hands on his arms, she gently pushed back a few inches from him to look at him. “Don’t try to distract me. We were having a discussion, as I recall.”

  “Uh-hmmm.” He squeezed her bottom, pulling her tight against his hips. She broke away, turning to the map on the table. She leaned over to get a closer look and calculate the miles to Peru. He leaned over behind her and kissed the nape of her neck, sending erotic messages to every nerve ending.

  “The way I see it, if you reconfigure the navigational course . . .” Her words trailed off despite her attempt to return his attention to the topic at hand. But his own hands were busy hiking up the back of her skirt. “We can head straight to Callao . . . ohhhh, Blake!”

  Three weeks later, in the middle of May, Blake stood on the deck of the Valiant as the ship headed toward yet another port, the third since crossing the equator. Callao had been the first. And damned if Cara had not been right about the Ballade, though they had missed the ship by only a week. From what he’d been able to learn, the merchantman had been becalmed for an inordinate amount of time in the doldrums. He’d also discovered allegations of illegal trade, which explained the visits to shore.

  After Callao, Blake had strongly suspected the Ballade would have similar business on Juan Fernández. Despite Cara’s insistence otherwise, they had set out for the island, yet found no satisfaction there. Vexed by his own mistake of ignoring Cara’s instincts, Blake had been more malleable when she wanted to look for the elusive ship in Valparaiso.

  Now, during morning watch, a man aloft hollered down, “Land ho!” All eyes turned toward the Chilean port in the distance.

  Blake expected Cara to appear at his side any moment now, certain that she’d heard the cry. As usual, she did not disappoint him. Bud, who had fully recuperated now, was with her.

  “Good morning, Mrs. Masters,” he greeted formally, aware of his crew working around them.

  “Good morning, sir.”

  He suppressed a grin at her strained effort to maintain proper decorum in front of his men. They had all softened somewhat toward the idea of a woman on board, or at least to having Cara in their midst. He suspected the misfortune of her bruised and swollen cheek from the wedding night brawl had garnered the sympathy of every sailor in the forecastle. With or without their silent censure, he would always feel like a bastard for the accident. Yet she had healed quickly and without complaint—and had found begrudging respect among the men.

  “I still say the Ballade is halfway up the Atlantic by now,” he speculated, reaching down to pat Bud on the head so as to occupy his hands with something other than touching Cara.

  “I hope it isn’t,” she answered over her shoulder, heading forward. He watched his dog trot after her, wishing he could do the same.

  “The bow will get there no sooner than the stern,” he called after her. She glanced back at him, a merry twinkle dancing in her dark eyes.

  “ ’Tis still a better view, my husband,” she answered in a saucy tone unlike her own. Her steady gait aboard the moving brig made her bottom sway seductively beneath the soft drape of her skirt.

  A better view? Hardly. He enjoyed a far more pleasant view from the stern, he thought to himself, eyeing his wife. He wished he could call her back and draw her into his arms, but he held himself in check.

  As she passed McGinty on his knees scrubbing the deck, she smiled apologetically and stepped gingerly around the water. He sat back with a foolish grin, watching her go by.

  “Back to work,” ordered Mr. Bellows.

  When Blake saw Keoni step out of the galley and join Cara at the rail, he knew his wife was in safe company as he went back to his duties.

  A few hours later, they sailed into the bay with the traditional gun salute. Using his glass, he made out a little hermaphrodite brig flying American colors from her mizzen peak. Fairly certain it was the Ballade, he muttered to himself, “Well, I’ll be . . .”

  He looked around for Cara, expecting to lock his gaze on her smug expression of triumph. But she was nowhere to be seen. Neither was Bud. Calling for his steward, he asked if Jimmy had seen Mrs. Masters.

  “Aye, sir. She asked me to fetch a set of clothes to match the rest of the crew. I just now delivered them to your quarters, sir.”

  “Ready the gig. I shall be paying a visit to the Ballade. That will be all for now.”

  As the boy left, Blake headed below to inform Cara of the other ship, though it would hardly be news to her.

  In his cabin, he found her sitting in a chair, bent at the waist, tying the laces on a worn pair of work shoes. Bud rested in the corner, head on his paws, looking a bit worried.

  “I must insist you stay here, Cara. Let me handle this— captain to captain.”

  “I’ve come too far to sit back and wait,” she argued, reaching up and shoving aside a lock of dark brown hair that was falling across her eyes.

  In the two months since he’d found her aboard the Mystic, her hair had grown longer, softening her feminine features all the more. Although he had initially been fooled by her disguise, she could not possibly expect to pass herself off as a young man any longer.

  “Then we will pay a cordial visit as husband and wife,” he informed her, fingering the soft, dark wisps at the nape of her neck.

  “But—”

  “Listen to me, lauaʻe.” He gently grasped her arm and brought her to her feet. “I do not wish to do anything that will cause suspicion before we can find out if Andrew is on that ship. Few,
if any, would mistake you for a boy, especially when there is no storm to distract them from seeing those beautiful big brown eyes.”

  Her lips parted as if she were about to give a rebuttal, but he silenced her with a deep kiss. In spite of her muffled protest and the resistant press of her hands on his chest, he persisted, knowing her weakness for him, knowing his own weakness for her. When she melted into him, he could not contain the grin that ruined a perfectly wonderful kiss.

  With a ragged breath, she whispered against his lips, “Damn you, Blake Masters. You never play fair.”

  He gently swatted her fanny with his palm. “Get changed back into that skirt, wife. I will return for you when we are ready to leave for the Ballade.”

  Several minutes later, Cara sat up straight and stiff in the chair as Keoni stood behind her, snipping at her hair with a pair of scissors.

  “You must tell him the truth, kaikuahine.”

  “I will. Soon.” But not yet. She needed more courage to tell Blake about her past . . . in the future. He had accepted her as a mystic. But her current role as a time-traveler would take a much bigger leap of faith.

  “If you don’t sit still, I might cut off your ear. You want that?”

  Her hands gripped the arms of the chair as she made a conscious effort to stop fidgeting. “Did you think of me as a mystic, Keoni? Blake said I was a Mea punihei i nā mea āiwaiwa.”

  The scissoring paused, then began again. “I think of you as a special friend. A sister. And yes, a mystic, as well.”

  “But I don’t feel like one.”

  Keoni chuckled. “And how is one supposed to feel?”

  “Not like me, that’s for sure.” Cara smiled to herself, envisioning a Chinese monk speaking slowly and eloquently, poised in a peaceful, centered calm. “When I was growing up, I was taunted for being strange and scary. So I worked hard to be as normal as possible. I’m not the type to sit on a mountaintop, waiting for lost souls to seek me for divine guidance.”

  Keoni laughed. “You are a contented little keiki who would rather sleep than wake up to the early-morning sunlight, kaikuahine. It is time to open your eyes and enjoy the dawn.”