Nate had put the uninflated rubber kayaks down and was making a circle of the hill, pushing at the dirt here and there with the toe of his hiking boots. “Well, I’d say there is no stone propped up for all to see, or even freshly buried.”
Dr. B was concerned with other matters. Scanning around with the Callback, our link to home, she let out a sigh of relief. “Our basket didn’t leave. They’re not here yet.”
STEWie’s basket had once been imaginatively described by Abigail as silver Jell-o floating midair in large clumps, if only you could see it. Dr. B’s instruments could—fragments of the basket hung all around where each of us had arrived.
“Good. We have the upper hand, then,” Nate said. “If Quinn and Dr. Holm jump here, the only way they’ll be able to leave the fourteenth century is with us.”
Dr. B went down on her knees to slide a thin probe into the soil. I assumed she was doing some kind of testing for the stone, but when I came over to look, she explained, “It’s a beacon, Julia. We learned pretty early on in the STEWie program how a place without familiar landmarks can be. This way, if we get lost, we can find our way back to the hill and STEWie’s basket by following the signal the beacon sends out.”
“I’m planning on navigating the more old-fashioned way,” Nate said, tapping the compass that hung from his belt. “Though I admit it will be odd not to have GPS. But you need satellites for GPS to work, and the nearest one is more than six centuries away.”
I mused that terms like old-fashioned and modern had loose meanings when it came to time travel.
He was repeating his circuit of the hill, this time looking all around us rather than down at the ground. The look of satisfaction he had because we’d arrived here before Quinn and Dr. Holm slowly melted from his face. I left Dr. B to her beacon and went to see what was wrong.
There was water all around us, serene and unrippling in the sunset. Runestone Hill was an island.
20
“I don’t know why everyone is surprised. The runestone very clearly says Have ten men by the sea to look after our ships fourteen days’ journey from this island. And we found an island.” Ron Tuttle bent down and felt a boulder with his calloused hand. “It would have been bigger than this one,” he muttered, “since the side part was chipped off before carving. And this one’s too knobby…hmm…this one’s too small, and so is this one…” He continued examining the rocks, turning over some of the smaller ones and kneeling down by the bigger ones to feel their surface with the palm of his hand. “Wait a minute—that stone lying on its side between those two trees. I think that’s the one. Oof—What on earth?”
He had been stopped in his tracks. He put his hand up in front of him, as if checking for some kind of invisible wall, and found it. Not even his hand would go through. Ron’s mouth fell open slightly—nothing in his fifty-some years of experience had prepared him for this. He tugged at his beard in puzzlement.
“What’s going on?” Ruth-Ann asked a little anxiously.
“It’s the oddest thing,” her husband said slowly. “Ruth-Ann, come and see this. That’s the graywacke boulder, I’m certain—just lying there between those two trees, but I can’t get any closer.”
“You’re time-stuck,” said Dr. B, who was double-checking that the beacon was operational.
“But I’m not planning on disturbing the stone,” Ron protested. “I was going to turn it over, and then put it back exactly as I found it.”
“Even the smallest of changes can affect future events. Besides, History can’t read your mind.”
“Are there runes on it? Can you tell?” I asked the Tuttles.
Ruth-Ann balanced on the tips of her hiking shoes, one arm on Ron’s shoulder for support. “The stone is face down, so I can’t tell if there’s any writing on it…Can you see any better, Ron?”
“I’m pretty sure it’s blank. Yes, that side—the one facing us—that’s where it will say, Ten men by the sea.”
Jacob had joined Ron and Ruth-Ann and was pushing at the invisible wall of History. “Awesome,” he said, clearly enjoying the sensation of being prevented from falling by an invisible force, even though he’d already experienced it back in 1898. “I expect I’ll have quite a story to tell on my blog when we get back home.”
“I’m not sure we want the details plastered all over the Internet,” I said to Jacob.
“But Julia, we’ll be heroes. We’re playing a game with History itself, and we’re going to win. We’ll rescue Dr. Holm, arrest Mr. Olsen, and find the Norse explorers…”
“Only if it all turns out as planned,” Nate said with the concern of a seasoned time traveler. “Let’s hope that’s the only way we can’t go. Never mind the stone clearly waiting to be carved. We should inflate the kayaks and get going. I don’t want to stay here tonight. I’m worried that if we wait until morning, we’ll be too exposed to travel across the water in the boats. We could get time stuck here for days if we’re not careful.”
“We’re not just going to wait here for the Norsemen?” Jacob asked.
Nate shook his head, then, as if a thought had struck him, turned to Dr. B. “What would happen, Professor?”
“Sorry, Chief Kirkland?” Dr. B asked.
“If we camped out here and the Norsemen suddenly showed up. How would History prevent us from running into each other?”
“Ah.” Dr. B chuckled. “Since we’re the ones who don’t belong, History would make us leave. We would feel ourselves become boxed in, squeezed into a space shrinking so rapidly that we would soon barely be able to draw breath, the pressure on our bodies so immense that all our bones would be at risk of shattering. Or at least, we think that’s what it would be like. No one has ever stuck around long enough to find out. Everyone leaves along whatever path History permits or gets back into STEWie’s basket real quick.”
I had heard whispers about this phenomenon in the TTE hallways. It was said that the experience was akin to drowning at the bottom of the ocean, only without the water. I had never experienced anything close to it and wanted to keep it that way.
Nate checked his compass, which had a small light attached to it. “We’ll paddle in that direction,” he pointed. “North, like the text on the runestone instructs—will instruct—oh, you know what I mean. I’m not looking to put a lot of distance between us and the island, just enough that we can get moving in the morning. We can camp in those woods over there. They should provide good cover.”
Jacob went over to help him untangle the two kayaks as Dr. B readied the foot pump. I left them to it and squinted at the cluster of trees on the side of the hill where Ron had been stopped by History’s hand. Now he sat on a boulder, sketching the island in the rapidly fading light. The stone wasn’t to be disturbed, not today. But my interest was caught by something else. What I had assumed to be a random collection of trees, distracted as I was by our first look at the runestone, revealed itself upon closer examination to be an orchard. The grove of what I guessed were black walnut trees, going by their gray, furrowed bark and pointy leaves, was shadowy now but would attract plentiful light on sunny days. It was not a modern, fenced-in orchard, but it was an orchard nevertheless. This place had caretakers.
“You want to switch, Dr. Baumgartner?” I heard Nate ask. He took over the foot pump to give the professor a break. I hadn’t realized that inflating a boat was such a slow business. Dr. B had filled in the floor compartment, and I watched the first of the kayaks expand into its slim, double-pointed shape as Nate pumped air first into one of the side tubes, then the other. “Oars?” I asked, not seeing any.
“The paddles are attached to my backpack and Chief Kirkland’s.” Dr. B nodded at the backpacks lying in a heap to one side. “Two for each kayak.”
Ruth-Ann and I set upon detaching the telescoping paddles and expanding them out to their full length. “Who goes in which kayak?” Ruth-Ann asked brightly. “Ron
and I both have kayaking experience.” She and Ron were in their early fifties and a bit—well, stocky—but thinness did not equate to physical strength and agility, and the opposite was true as well.
Dr. B, who was in good shape and enjoyed outdoor activities like jogging and cross-country skiing, said, “I have kayaking experience, too.”
I didn’t. Nor, I guessed, did Jacob.
Nate moved the pump to the other kayak and eyed us all in turn as if to gauge our weight. Jacob, who could best be described as scrawny, hadn’t taken off his backpack; it seemed like it was liable to tip him over as he practiced using one of the paddles in the air.
After a moment’s consideration, Nate said, “Uh—Jacob, why don’t you and the Tuttles go in one kayak. Dr. Baumgartner and Julia and I will take the other.”
As we carried the kayaks down to the water, Nate seemed to be considering something. “What?” I asked.
“Just a logistics problem. I would prefer to go in the first kayak and lead, but I want to be able to keep an eye on the other one. It would be bad if they got time-stuck behind us and we got separated. Not to mention that our flashlights have to stay off.”
In the end, after warning them not to get to far ahead, he let the Tuttles’ kayak go first, with Jacob firmly ensconced between the two amateur archeologists.
“Here.” He handed Jacob a two-way radio. “Let’s hope these work. I’ll tell you when to pull ashore, then we can set up camp. Try not to tip the kayaks over, everyone. We don’t want to lose a backpack.”
After some creative placement of backpacks so that the kayak was well-balanced, we set out in a smooth glide, Dr. B and Nate expertly paddling us forward. The others were just ahead of us. The rising full moon seemed bigger than usual, like a round, pock-marked face keeping an eye on us from above.
I couldn’t shake the feeling that we were being watched, and I wasn’t talking about the moon. I knew it was almost certainly an illusion from being out on the water at night with our flashlights off and rowing as quietly as possible. Still, I glanced toward the tree-lined shore once or twice to see if anyone—or anything—was visible.
“There,” Nate hissed. “By those reeds. That looks like a good spot.”
He radioed ahead to Jacob, who had been put in charge of communication while the Tuttles paddled. Luckily the radios worked just fine and Nate was able to instruct the other kayak to hold back and let us approach shore first. We glided in, catching a few reeds as we did, which halted our progress. Nate got out of the kayak and into the water, almost tipping us over. He guided the kayak through the reeds and mud onto a small beach, then helped Dr. B and me out.
Ron Tuttle was about to get into the water to lead the other kayak ashore, but Nate waved him off. “I’m already wet. Can’t get any wetter,” he said in a loud whisper. He waded back in and guided the Tuttles’ kayak next to ours, steadying it as it ran aground.
“Careful,” he said in the same low voice as Ron Tuttle hopped out to help him with the final bit. “There are some sharp rocks. We can’t afford to lose a kayak so soon.”
Once everyone was out, we carried the kayaks through some underbrush and stumbled into a clearing between several pine trees where the accumulated pine needles had kept plant growth to a minimum. “Seems like it’s as good of a spot as any to camp for the night,” Nate said. “I think we can chance the flashlights.”
It was all very well for him to think so, but History had other ideas. We tried all of the flashlights in turn, but one by one they refused to click on.
“Okay, then,” Nate said. “No flashlights.”
“Lucky for us we chose a full moon,” Ruth-Ann said brightly as she detached her sleeping bag from her backpack.
Nate was still frowning at the uncooperative flashlight in his hand. “I was hoping to light a small fire to dry off my boots. I’ve already spent too much time with my feet wet this week.”
“Maybe a fire will work since it’s not anachronistic like the flashlights,” I suggested. “Let’s try it after we set up.”
“Bear in mind,” he added, “that if we don’t get the fire or the stoves going, we can’t heat up the water and rehydrate our meals. Unless you want them cold and chunky and still half-dried.”
He and the Tuttles had brought tiny lightweight stoves in their backpacks. We had all brought sleeping bags, but not tents, just individual bivy sacks in case we got caught in the rain. Dr. B had instructed me to add as few items as possible to the bag she had given me. (“After the first hour, your backpack is going to get heavier by the minute.”) I had added my own water bottle and a few small items, one of them being Dagmar’s map.
After giving us all a crash course on wilderness protocol, like putting our food in a bag and hanging it on a tree branch to avoid midnight visits from black bears, Nate turned his attention to making a fire. He gathered some fallen sticks and branches onto a small pile and readied his lighter and a handful of dry pine needles. “Here we go.”
I had pulled out my sleeping bag and was looking around for a good place to lay it out. I heard Nate swear under his breath, but didn’t need to turn around to figure out what the problem was. Ron tried a match and the stove, but that was a no-go either. History clearly had a firm opinion on the matter, but Nate and Ron were equally stubborn and took turns rubbing two dry sticks together. All they got in return were blisters. Whether the procedure itself was close to impossible for newbies like us, or whether History’s hand would have been equally persistent in blocking any attempts to produce fire, there was no way to know.
“It could be something simple, like that the smell of our warmed up food is foreign to this century,” Dr. B said. “Freeze-dried lasagna and beef stew hardly belong here.”
Nate stuck the lighter back in his pocket and squelched away from the stacked wood to set up his sleeping bag on a small rise some distance from us. Meanwhile, Ron turned his attention to using a broom-like twig to sweep sticks and small rocks from the spot he and Ruth-Ann had chosen. He placed their sleeping bags side by side. A voice behind me spoke up as I started unrolling my own sleeping bag. “Do you mind if I bunk with you, Julia?”
“Not at all, Dr. B.”
I made room for her sleeping bag and looked around to see where Jacob had found a spot.
He was nowhere to be seen.
21
“Jacob,” I called, perhaps a touch more loudly than I’d intended, causing Dr. B to drop the granola bar she had just taken out of her backpack. She grabbed it before it had time to gather any dirt. “Is something wrong, Julia?”
“I don’t see Jacob.”
I scrambled to my feet. I had promised Dean Braga I would keep an eye on the student and here we had already lost him. I’d happened to be in her office with some paperwork she needed for a tenure meeting when Jacob had popped in to ask if he could go. Clutching his backpack, in which he had swapped his books and lab notebooks for so many camping items that the zipper across the top couldn’t be closed, the ginger-haired student had pointed out politely that Dr. B had already said he could come along and he only needed Dean Braga’s okay because of the unorthodox nature of the situation. Besides, we had already allowed him go to 1898. And if she thought it best, he promised not to bring his new cell phone, although it would come handy for taking pictures, and was it really that different from a camera?
Dean Braga had finally given in and waved him away.
I remembered thinking that it might be good for Jacob to see that the Internet would do just fine without him for a whole week. Given the way that time travel worked, though, it wouldn’t really be that long for the Internet, just for Jacob.
Now I felt bad for my cavalier attitude and was about to alert Nate to the young student’s disappearance when Jacob emerged from behind a tree. He had his sleeping bag in his arms—a Star Wars–themed one, it looked like, though in the darkness I couldn’t reall
y tell—and was glancing around uncertainly.
“Ah, there he is,” said Dr. B and went back to eating her granola bar.
I dropped back down to the ground and let out a sigh of relief. The feeling that we were being watched was still with me, and I had been sure that Jacob had wondered off and gotten into trouble—though how or from whom, I couldn’t say. I was about to chastise him for disappearing on us for so long, but I realized what the problem was as he continued to look around uncertainly. He was the only student in the group. Ruth-Ann and Ron were already snug in their sleeping bags and had pulled out matching e-readers and settled in to read, using their backpacks as pillows, their faces feebly illuminated. I found it amusing that while we hadn’t been able to start a fire or light the camping stoves, the e-readers’ artificial lights, tinny and scentless, worked just fine. I hadn’t thought to bring one because there was no room in my backpack, and also because it had seemed prudent to leave modern devices behind. Perhaps we should have done a better job of explaining History’s rules to the Tuttles, I thought.
In any case, the pair seemed like they didn’t need a third. Nate wasn’t exactly sending off the vibe that he wanted company either. Having taken off his socks, he was drying his feet with a small towel. That left me and Dr. B, and I could tell that Jacob thought it would be weird to bunk next to his advisor.
“Jacob,” I said firmly.
Jacob eyed me. “Yes, Julia?”
“Unless you want to bunk with Chief Kirkland up there—”
“I’m not sure…uh, that there’s enough room.”
The Runestone Incident (The Incident Series, #2) Page 18