Rob let out a breath, sounding more like himself than he had since Woodhurst. “I don’t like it either, Maryanne, especially since Gisborne seems to have the upper hand again. But we can’t help anyone, let alone Miller, if we’re dead. Which is what I think will happen if you all stay here.”
Gisborne had somehow managed to tie our hands and our feet. “I can’t sleep knowing Miller isn’t safe,” I whispered.
“Do you think any of us can?” asked Tuck, with just enough edge in his voice to sound harsh.
“We’re not giving up on him,” said John. “We’re just helping him from a different place.”
Rob straightened his bow on his back. “So, it’s settled? You’re leaving?” He looked from John to Tuck, both of whom nodded. “I’ll find you in a day or two. Sooner if I have any news.” Without a backward glance—or even a glance my way—he turned and disappeared into the forest. Back to the girl who meant more to him than the friends who’d once been like his family.
We moved from Kings Cave to a tiny cave they’d never taken me to until now. It was farther from Kings Cave than I would have liked. They called it Black Hole, and although the ceiling was higher than Kings Cave, the rest of the cave was smaller. The ground was rough and uneven, and places to stretch out and sleep were limited. Plus, there was a stream running through it that made the cave constantly damp and cold, even after we lit a fire. Still, it was better than being out in the open with such low temperatures at night, something Miller might not have the benefit of.
The following day, John and Tuck went out searching for Miller, like they’d said they would, while I waited at Black Hole, in case Miller turned up.
I sat at the mouth of the cave for half an hour before I decided I wasn’t sitting around waiting at this place. Miller would come to Black Hole only after he tried Kings Cave and found us gone. I should be waiting there. As for him leading Gisborne to us, I wasn’t worried at all. Miller would never. And if he did, I’d have my bow and the element of surprise.
I’d watched Rob die in my dreams again last night. Same as always, an arrow in his back at the edge of the forest. Hadn’t been able to do a damn thing to stop it. The powerlessness felt far too similar to what was happening with Miller, and I didn’t know how to fix either problem. I just knew that Kings Cave was where I needed to wait, no matter what anyone else said.
When I arrived, I searched the cave, then tucked myself cross-legged onto one of the mattresses. No one had been here since we left, which was both good and bad. Good because I hadn’t missed Miller, bad because he hadn’t been here. I wasn’t worried about soldiers and their swords. The ceiling was too low to fight in here. Plus, from the darkness of the cave, I had a full view of anyone who stepped inside and would fire on anyone who wasn’t Miller.
Miller didn’t come that day. Or the next. Each evening I went back to the cave at Black Hole, arriving before Tuck and John and hoping someone had found him. No one had.
Rob never came back either and it pissed me off. Miller should be more important than his girlfriend.
I sat on a mattress at the back of Kings Cave, fishing around in my pack for something to eat and instead finding the present Josh gave me at the airport. Somehow, in all the excitement and terror of the past week I’d forgotten all about it.
I ran my fingers over the wrapping paper, blinking back the tears that attempted to form. I’d walked away from my little brother and returned to a place where nothing was as I’d expected. I already missed him. It was worse knowing I might have made a terrible mistake in coming back here. Rob was barely talking to me; Tuck and John were always angry, and Miller was missing. It felt as if everything was falling apart.
The package was just larger than my hand and reasonably heavy. I moved into the light cast by the small hole at the top of the cave and opened it slowly. At home, I was more of a tear-up-the-paper sort of present-opener. Today, I drew out the anticipation. It made me feel closer to Josh to be touching something he’d lovingly wrapped not so long ago.
With the final piece of tape undone, I removed the paper and placed it to one side. Two large blocks of milk chocolate sat at the top of the parcel. My favorite. And possibly the only chocolate I’d ever taste again. I put them back in the bottom of my pack for later.
Beneath the blocks of chocolate was a photo album. The type that was the size of a single photograph and contained about twenty photos in total. I flicked through the pages fast, strange noises coming from my throat as I saw the pictures he’d chosen for me. I couldn’t get enough of seeing my family again, and twenty photos didn’t seem like nearly enough.
I flicked back to the start and looked through them slowly. The tears I’d blinked away moments ago blurred my vision. Josh knew me well. There was nothing he could have given me that would have been better than this.
The first few photos in the album were some we’d had taken in a studio for Mom and Dad’s wedding anniversary last year. Josh was in a suit and tie, Carrie in a rainbow-colored sundress, and I wore black jeans and a black T-shirt. We were all smiling but none of us looked happy.
I hadn’t realized it then, but now I knew none of us had been.
He followed those with older photos; all of us with the snowman we’d made in our back yard when it had unexpectedly snowed in spring a few years back; Carrie and I eating ice-cream on the beach with our arms around each other’s shoulders when I was about six; Josh and I cuddling our pet cat who’d long since passed on, and some photos we’d snapped in the days before I came back here. And finally, a photo I hadn’t known existed. Our family on the beach, posing together moments before my sunhat blew from my head and I chased it down the beach. Dad had always kept the other version of this photo—the version where I didn’t feature—in a frame on his desk. There was a sticky note attached to that photo, written in Mom’s hand but from Josh.
MA
Stole this from the album Dad keeps in the top drawer of his desk. Hope you like it.
J
I smiled. I hadn’t even known Dad had an album in his desk. I wasn’t sure how Josh knew, unless Mom had helped him, which was likely.
Thanks, Joshy, I whispered. I love it.
Something outside caught my attention. I didn’t know what it was, just knew I was on edge. I shuffled backward, away from the light, and carefully picked up my bow.
Had it been someone drawing a sword? Gisborne’s soldiers? I cast my hearing wide, but the sounds were ordinary now. Just birds chirping and wind in the trees. Perhaps there had been no noise. Perhaps I was jumping at shadows.
Another noise, down the hill. A stick breaking? No. That would have told me for sure someone was here. Footsteps on the ground, maybe.
I climbed onto my knees and nocked my arrow, tilting the bow sideways to avoid the ceiling. I hoped Miller was out there, though I doubted he was. He’d have run up the hill and sprinted inside. Wouldn’t he? He wouldn’t have made this slow march up the hill, that whoever was out there was currently making.
I pulled the bowstring back. The moment I saw anything burgundy or gold, I would shoot. Then I’d nock another arrow and shoot again.
There was no movement outside the cave. No other sound that seemed out of place. Maybe I’d imagined it. Maybe it was nerves talking.
“Drop your weapon.”
The voice came from the edge of the entrance, like he’d come up the steep side of the hill to avoid being seen. Like he knew this place well.
THIRTEEN
“Rob?” My hand on my bow shook. It sounded like him, but I wasn’t dropping my weapon until I knew for sure.
“Maryanne?” Rob stepped into the entrance of the cave.
I let my bow slide from my hand. It clattered onto the stone.
It was just Rob.
Not some soldier about to gut me alive. Or chop off my body parts the way they had with John.
“What are you doing here?” he asked. “I thought I said—”
/> “I know what you said,” I snapped, the adrenalin pumping through me making me short. “I disagreed with your command.” Also a snappy response, but this one wasn’t entirely due to the adrenalin.
“Well, there’s a surprise,” Rob muttered, bending to enter the cave.
I folded my arms over my chest. “You obviously disagreed with yourself.” Since he was here. Not…wherever else he’d been hanging out this week.
“I thought I’d come by and check Miller hadn’t been here. I didn’t intend to camp out here until he returned.” His voice was gentle and far from accusatory, but that’s not how I took it.
“I’m not camping out. I’m waiting. And I go back to Black Hole every night. Like a good little girl.”
Rob was on the other side of the light coming from the roof. His eyebrows lifted. “I’m guessing Tuck or John don’t know you go anywhere during the day?”
“Why? Because if they knew, they’d have run to you.” Where was all this anger coming from? I knew I was upset about leaving Kings Cave, but the words coming from my mouth were more than just anger.
He pressed his lips together, not even bothering to deny that he did expect John or Tuck to tell him where I’d been, had they known.
“At least I’m doing something. It might not be much, but it’s better than swanning around with my new girlfriend and forgetting the people who’ve been my family for the past few years.” That was it. The reason. I was disappointed and annoyed he’d chosen someone else over Miller. Especially when that boy looked at Rob like he was a superhero.
“Is that what you think?” he asked quietly.
“What else am I supposed to think? You haven’t been near us since we moved to Black Hole. You wouldn’t have a clue whether Miller was back or not!” I felt so helpless with Miller missing. He could be anywhere in this huge forest. He might be dead and I couldn’t fix it, but I expected Rob to. Unfair, and I knew it. But he wasn’t trying nearly hard enough to make it better.
He sank down onto his butt and I realized we’d been face-to-face, arguing on our knees. I copied.
His eyes ran over me, and he pulled his hair from the tie at the back of his neck, retying it before speaking. “I can’t be everywhere.”
“Some places are more important than others.”
“And you think you get to decide what or who is most important in my life?” That was a reprimand and I deserved it.
Only he could make that decision. And I guessed he had, because it wasn’t us. My heart was broken, but it was up to me to live with it. “Sorry.” I sighed, because I really was sorry. “I guess we’re so used to having you in our lives that it hurts a little…” I drew in a deep breath. “…okay, a lot, when you choose not to be with us any longer. But you’re right. How you live your life should always be your choice. Not mine. Not anyone else’s.”
There was a long silence where he watched me in the dim light while I focused on my hands in my lap. I’d gone too far, anger making me say things I would usually keep to myself. Now I was embarrassed for saying too much.
“I’ve been splitting my time,” he said, finally. “Between searching for Miller, checking he’s not already back with you—usually in the middle of the night when you’re all asleep—and…”
“Her.” I finished his sentence for him.
He nodded. “I’m doing the best I can. I want to find Miller as much as anyone. Possibly more. I have other responsibilities, too, with…”
“Her,” I said, again. Ask her name. It was the polite thing to do, and I probably owed it to him, but my lips clamped shut.
He was trying to help us. Knowing it made me feel worse for how I’d acted. “I take it you’ve found no sign of him?”
Rob blew out a deep breath. “Not one. It’s like it was with John all over again. I’ve looked in all the places John suggested.” Rob’s voice caught.
I remembered how he’d talked about the time without John, how he’d hardly slept. Now he was spreading himself so thin, that I imagined the same was true again. “Are you sleeping?”
“Barely. But—”
“You’ll be no good to Miller if Gisborne catches you because you’re too tired to notice him coming.” I nodded to the mattresses behind me. “Lie down. Rest for an hour or two. I’m staying for a bit. I’ll look out for you both.” It was the least I could offer after the way I’d just spoken to him.
Rob rested. I listened to his breathing grow slow and even, and allowed myself to think about the dreams. Obviously, I hadn’t done enough to stop Rob’s death. At home, the answer had seemed so simple—don’t let Rob return to Oxham. But maybe I was missing something. Perhaps where it happened didn’t matter, just that it would. Perhaps I couldn’t actually change the future the way Dad and Maud thought. Perhaps coming back to the twelfth century meant I’d have to watch it happen in real time as well as while I slept.
No. I wouldn’t accept that. I was going to stop it. Even if I had to figure out how as I went along.
Rob woke quickly. It seemed as if I was listening to his heavy breathing one moment, and the next he was sitting beside me, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. “Thanks,” he said, voice rough. “I needed that.”
“You should’ve slept longer.”
He shook his head. “Can’t. Got to get back.”
I sighed inwardly. “Just…make sure you don’t go near Oxham, okay?” I’d keep asking him this day after day, if I had to. For now, it was the only practical way I could keep him safe.
“You know the threat is likely gone from there now? Gisborne knows I’ve left. He won’t send his men back.”
I didn’t agree. I turned to him, hoping he’d see in the dim light exactly how much I needed him to hear what I was asking. “Just humor me, would you?”
His eyes narrowed. “Why? Do you know something?”
I shook my head. Nothing I could share with him without dying myself. And I wasn’t quite desperate enough to allow that to happen.
Silence returned between us. And not the comfortable sort, either. It didn’t take much these days for our conversation to become stilted. Probably because I felt like I was hiding things from him. Maybe I needed to try harder. I took a deep breath and spat out the words I didn’t want to say. “What’s her name?”
Rob looked at me with raised eyebrows. “Her name?”
Okay, then Rob. Make me spell it out, why don’t you. “Your girlfriend.”
He licked his lips.
“Or…boyfriend?” I held up my hands. “No judgement here, whichever it is.”
The corner of his lips quirked. “Not a boyfriend.”
We lapsed back into the same uncomfortable silence. I tried again. “So, her name?”
He shook his head. “Why would you want to know?”
I didn’t. Was just making conversation. “Because that’s the sort of thing friends tell each other, and we used to be friends once.” Back when talking was easy.
He turned to me. I couldn’t read his expression. Regret, perhaps, but more likely, that was wishful thinking on my part. “Are we not friends anymore?”
“Doesn’t feel like it.”
“Friends fight.”
Rob and Tuck certainly did. I’d seen it. I wasn’t sure this was a fight. Yes, I’d said some things earlier, and I was keeping the details of my dreams from him. Perhaps I was being selfish—telling him would bring about my violent death which would in turn save his life. It was one solution to the problem, but I was certain there was another. One where both of us came out of this alive. I just had to find it. Maybe it would come at the expense of our friendship, because it was feeling more and more like we’d grown apart. “Are we fighting?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know.” He ran his hands down his face. “I’m a fool for even trying to have this conversation.”
“It was always going to be this hard when one of us moved on,” I said, my voice soft.
“Have you?
Moved on?” For a moment his eyes were eager, then they hooded over and I could no longer tell what he was thinking.
“I don’t want to answer that,” I said, faster than I should have. What did it matter anyway? He had, and that was part of the problem. We could never talk and laugh the way we had in the past now that he had someone else. He shouldn’t even want to.
Unless.
I glanced at him. What if I wasn’t the only one keeping secrets? He was cagey when talking about her. Maybe there wasn’t a girlfriend at all, but some other reason that was taking his attention. In the back of my mind, I knew it was a stupid thing to say, wishful thinking, but that didn’t stop the words coming from my lips. “You know I don’t believe you.”
“Really?” he asked, pulling his knees up and wrapping his arms around them. “About what?”
“Her.”
Beside me, he stiffened. “Why not?” His question was careful, like he didn’t know the right way to ask it. Or didn’t want to talk about it.
The answer to that was easy. It was because I wanted with all my heart for there to be no her. I’d never tell him that, though. “You don’t talk about her. You come to see us reasonably often, never with her. If I was her, I’d want to know your friends. I’d want to come with you.”
There was a pause before he said, “Maybe she’s just more secure in our relationship than you would have been.”
Ouch.
Maybe. “She should still want to know your friends, your family, the most important people in your life.”
“Like you did?” he said, meeting my gaze. Getting to know his friends had come hand-in-hand with knowing him a few months back.
Something in his eyes stole my breath and I had to look away. “We’re not that difficult to get along with. Most of the time. Which just makes me think…” I shrugged. “Well, is she real?”
Rob ran his hands down his face. “Say I answer that question the way you want me to, what will it achieve?”
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