In the Time of Kings

by Sasson, N. Gemini

  “I don’t like the forest,” Mariota says, unprompted. “There are too many places for the English to hide.”

  “We agree on that. What do you like, then?” Anything to steer the talk back to something more lighthearted. I don’t need to feed my paranoia. I still remember that English detachment we came upon after Archibald and the others found me.

  She thinks a moment. “The sea. From the topmost tower window of Blacklaw, you can see forever across the sea.”

  “Beautiful, I’m sure.” But I’m not talking about a castle perched above the sea. I have a clear picture in my mind — of her, standing at the edge of a very tall cliff, her arms wide, the wind fanning the hair from her face ...

  A vacuum of shock sucks the air from my lungs with a sudden, terrifying force. She is the woman in my dreams. The one I’d seen since childhood. The one I’d known since before I was born.

  “Watch it!” Malcolm glares at me as he rides by, a furrow of anger cleaving his brow. “If you are going to stop like that, take your horse off to the side.” He jerks an elbow as he guides his mount past us, then adds under his breath, “Stupid bastard.”

  Mariota darts a curious look at me as she joins her brother. I don’t remember doing it, but I must have yanked back on the reins and halted my horse when the revelation hit me like a wrecking ball: that this body I’m inhabiting doesn’t belong to me. I’m just borrowing it for the time being. And all those visions I’d had growing up — they’re memories.

  I hadn’t fallen into a wormhole and gotten sucked back in time. I’ve been remembering who I once was. So maybe, just maybe, I can go back — or forward, however you want to look at it. But how?

  That still doesn’t answer what happened to the real Sir Roslin. Had he died in a scuffle with his captors as they brought him back north? Or was he still here, in this body, unable to speak, waiting for me to leave?

  I shake myself, nudge my mount in the flanks and ride on. Malcolm and Mariota are now several horses ahead of me. I’d seen my reflection in the water the day I woke up here and then in a piece of polished metal while at Lintalee. I look a lot like the old me, but not entirely. My face is leaner, my shoulders more muscular, and my hair is more burnished, as if I’ve spent more time out of doors than my previous academic lifestyle would have leant itself to. Everyone here has accepted me as Sir Roslin without question — even Duncan, who’s known me ... Sir Roslin, I mean, all his life.

  Rain begins to fall, heavily. In minutes, I’m soaked to the bone and shivering. My senses tell me this is real, not a dream. Intensely, miserably real. Still, my logic-driven brain is having a hard time accepting it.

  For two more days as we ride on to Blacklaw, I can’t stop asking myself, wondering, when this will all end. I’m starting to think I’ll never get back to 2013, never see Claire again, never go home.

  The worst part is that I’m not sure I want to go back. Not if Claire isn’t going to be all right. Not if the baby isn’t going to make it.

  Might as well be somewhere else. Even here.

  My world has more than been shaken. It’s been flipped upside down, turned inside out and beaten bloody with a spiked iron mallet. Like nothing I ever planned, let alone even imagined.

  Before a week ago, I’d been meticulous about plotting out my future, graphing our combined incomes versus long and short-term investments, our retirement savings plan and a college fund for our still-in-negotiations 2.5 children. Claire and I had debated over which school district to purchase our next house in, which was the most reliable car to buy once my 2001 Toyota Camry slurped its last tank of gas, and how much of our money should go to every assignable budget category. She wanted to buy organic, locally grown food and I pushed for bulk packaged foods from Sam’s Club. Even though we were often on different ends of the spectrum, our debates were always logical exchanges of intellect and shining examples of compromise.

  This is bad. Very bad. Already, I’m starting to think of her in past tense. Not ‘we are ...’, but ‘we were ...’

  I can feel the gaping hole in my heart. And it needs filling.

  God, how I miss her spontaneity. I ache for the little surprises she always showered me with that brightened otherwise mundane days. A few weeks ago, when we were up to our ears in the details of wedding plans, she had told me she’d pick me up at lunch to take me for a tux fitting. I’d been avoiding it for weeks. Crawling out of my T-shirt and donning a button-up Oxford for important functions at work has always been absolute torture for me. I tried to convince her I had to work through lunch, that I was behind on grading papers, but she refused to buy into my flimsy excuse and hauled me from the building.

  Imagine my surprise when she turned her car into the botanical gardens parking lot and pulled a picnic basket out of the trunk, complete with roasted Cornish game hens, a fancy raspberry vinaigrette pasta salad with little black olives and sun-dried tomatoes, a bottle of sparkling cider and a red checkered tablecloth. What I wouldn’t give for another day like that.

  But it’s slowly sinking in. There’s no way to go back. None.

  I’m here, in this place. I’ll never see her again. Ever. And it hurts like hell.

  23

  LONG, LONG AGO

  Blacklaw Castle, Scotland — 1333

  My first impression of Blacklaw Castle is that it doesn’t look like much of a home. More like a prison. I can see why Mariota finds the place so desolate.

  Ahead of us, a long narrow road curves around a small bay, before winding its way upward along a finger of land that juts out into the sea. Towering cliffs soar above crashing waves, with only a thin strip of shingle beach edging the shore below. Thousands of sea gulls are perched on tiny ledges in the cliff face. Here and there, fledglings peek from their nests, crying out in hunger to watchful parents. Others glide on crescent wings above the froth-capped ocean, sometimes dipping their heads to dive, dive, dive, into the dark, choppy waters, later emerging with a flopping silver fish in their yellow beaks.

  Above the cliffs, almost at the very end of the peninsula, squats the castle. Built more for defense than residence, it imposes on the landscape for miles around. A tall curtain wall maybe fifty feet high throws long shadows across the outer court. Beyond that is a lower wall that spans the width of the land from the sea cliff facing us to the other side, where I assume is another equally sheer drop-off. Two stout towers flank either end of the inner wall and in the middle a semicircular gatehouse projects, complete with drawbridge. The moat between the inner wall and outer yard is a dry one, but steep.

  As we round the bay and pass through a small village, I see movement along the wall walk. Archers are scurrying to their positions, bows gripped.

  Blacklaw might not be the biggest castle in Scotland, but anyone inside it is certainly well protected from the enemy.

  At the head of our party, Alan breaks away, galloping his horse boldly toward the outer gate, helmet tucked beneath his arm. Malcolm is close behind him. Shouts are exchanged. A loud groan issues from an unseen winch as the portcullis slowly lifts. The drawbridge lowers, as gears and chains clank and screech. It hits the far side of the moat with a low thud. Alan and Malcolm ride across, disappearing into the shadowy throat of the gatehouse.

  Duncan eases his horse up to mine. “Are you ready?”

  “No.” I urge my mount forward, eager to settle onto a chair or bed and rest my back after three days in the saddle. “But are we ever really ready for anything?”

  Heaven knows I wasn’t ready to land here in the fourteenth century. It’s a wonder I’m not dead yet.

  His gait is stiff as he lumbers across the inner bailey, like he’s got an iron rod shoved up the backside of his trousers. His hair bushes out from his head in a wiry brownish-gray mop, the ends grazing the tops of his rounded shoulders. A bristly beard, threaded with silver, fans from his cheeks to partway down his chest. He’s a man with a substantial frame, his torso as broad and deep as a whiskey barrel, but there’s lion-like strength in
his movements, however battered his body might be. The man reminds me of Hagrid from Harry Potter — but without the friendly disposition.

  So this is Henry Sinclair. He looks less than happy to see his only son again.

  I don’t know if it’s the disdain in his stare, or the fact that my lower back aches, but I go down on one knee before him, my head bowed.

  “How did you manage it?” he says.

  I raise my eyes, trying to gauge his mood. His brow is clouded with anger and I can tell by his tone that he’s accustomed to being feared. “Escape, you mean?”

  “Of course I mean your escape, you imbecile!” he bellows.

  “Henry.” Duncan steps forward. “Been almost a year, has it?”

  “More than a year — but still too soon.” Henry clasps Duncan’s forearm in greeting, as something vaguely resembling a smile plumps his cheeks. “I’ll post a guard by the cellar door. Last you were here you drank my stores dry.”

  “You should tell your serving girls not to refill tankards so readily. I was only accepting the generosity of my host and dear friend.”

  “A liar and always were. Some things never change.”

  “You received my message?” Duncan tips his head in my direction, then motions for me to get up. “About him?”

  “Aye.” Henry studies me. For a moment I’m afraid he’ll figure out I’m not his son after all, that I don’t belong here. With a brusque jerk, he grabs Duncan by the elbow and pulls him aside. “He still doesn’t remember anything? Who brought him north or how he escaped?”

  Duncan shakes his head. “Nothing.”

  “I find it hard to believe he could have managed it without help — or a stroke of luck. However it happened, he saved me a fortune in ransom. Is he ...” — Sir Henry taps his temple — “all right here?”

  “Not entirely, if I may say so. He doesn’t seem a danger, but he’s not quite himself.” I detect a faint wink directed at me. “I suggest you give him time.”

  “We don’t have time, Duncan. You bloody well know that. Balliol has been harassing Berwick for weeks and now Edward has joined him. We need every able-bodied man we can muster.”

  “Let me work with him, Henry. He won’t be a bother to you that way.”

  Henry lets out a loud ‘humph’. “Do what you will, although based on everything he’s done so far,” — his eyes slide to me — “I’m not expecting much.”

  Yeah, some things never change. I may be used to a father’s derision, but it still stings.

  24

  LONG, LONG AGO

  Blacklaw Castle, Scotland — 1333

  For a week I see very little of Sir Henry or Alan. They’re holed up in the meeting room making plans for the movement of supplies and men. On the one occasion Henry did include me, he was annoyed by my questions. So I stopped asking them and sat in the window instead, gazing out at the sea, which only irritated him further.

  Couriers come and go on lathered mounts, bearing letters from all across Scotland. A few nobles and chieftains arrive, but most have already gone on to Dunbar or are on their way to Berwick. Some of them seem to remember me, but they regard me warily; it’s Henry they ask to speak with.

  I’m immeasurably relieved when I hear Alan is supposed to leave for Dunbar in the morning. I’ve barely seen Mariota since we got here. We have separate rooms and while it’s strange to me that a husband and wife reside apart, no one here seems to consider it unusual. While I try to circulate out in the open as much as I can, however uncomfortable it may be for me, Mariota stays hidden away most of the time. I can tell it’s not me she’s avoiding, but Alan. The communal supper in the great hall is the only time she will stay in the same room as him for more than a minute.

  Today, supper is a special occasion. The Abbot of Melrose is visiting. Everyone’s a nervous wreck. The floors have been scrubbed, the hearths swept clean, and the beddings all washed. The cooks began preparing days ago. It reminds me of the time the Nobel Prize winner came to our university to give a talk. The custodians waxed the tiles and cleaned windows in wings where he was never going to step foot.

  The abbot sits at the head table next to Sir Henry, looking very righteous. So far I’ve avoided any exchanges more in depth than a polite ‘hello’. I’m afraid he’ll quiz me on church rituals or the differences between Cistercian and Benedictine monks. Maybe I’ve grown more paranoid in the time since I found myself here, but I’m sure he keeps looking at me. He’s probably heard things: that Sir Henry’s son is mad, that he’s suspected of treason, or that he used witchcraft to defeat his six captors and flee to freedom.

  While I’m preoccupied with whether or not the Abbot of Melrose is passing judgment on me, Mariota glares contemptuously at Alan on the other side of the hall from where we’re seated, not so much in challenge, but as if she’s trying to send a message: Keep your distance. He’s a master at masking his reactions toward her, barely even acknowledging her presence. Her spoon clacks against the table as she lays it down to grab her knife. She attacks her meat, slicing it into ribbons.

  I’ve been sawing away at my slab of meat for ten minutes, letting little chunks fall into my lap and then brushing them to the floor. Without a convenient supply of packaged nuts at hand, my body has been craving protein so badly I almost consider shoving some of the meat in my mouth and swallowing. Almost.

  “Tell me why you don’t like him,” I say aside to her. Looking around to make sure no one’s watching, I slide the last piece of mutton from my trencher into my hand at the table’s edge, then lower it. Hungry jaws snap at my fingers, pinching the tips. “Watch it, you greedy bitch!” I growl, peeking under the table. Lips pull back in a grin of submission before the deerhound slinks away with her prize. Two nosy pups instantly take her place at my knee. I scratch one of the furry beasts on top of the head, grateful to have made a few friends, at least.

  One eyebrow arched as if I’ve just insulted her, Mariota plunks her knife down. “Your pardon?”

  “Alan Stewart,” I whisper, darting glances left and right. “I know when you were both young, it was presumed the two of you would marry. What did he do to — ?”

  “Nothing. Why do you ask?”

  “I’m not blind, Mariota.” I point at my eyes like a petulant child. “I see the way you look at him. You hate him, don’t you? And yet if I weren’t here, he’d scoop you up and carry you away on a white horse, kicking and screaming. What went on between the two of you? What don’t you want to tell me?”

  She stares at her food, mouth firmly closed, her delicate nostrils flaring with sharply drawn breaths. Several seconds pass before she lifts her chin and speaks. “As I said, there is nothing to tell, husband. We were childhood friends. He finds it hard to move on. I do not.” Her shoulders twitch in an unconvincing shrug. “That is all. Nothing more.”

  She’s a worse liar than I am. Maybe this isn’t the time or place. She’ll tell me when she’s ready. Eventually, I’ll tell her about me. If I ever think she’ll believe me.

  Setting my cup down, I reach for the bowl of cherries to my right. The hair on my neck prickles. Three seats down, Malcolm is leaning on his elbows, glowering at me.

  Wonderful. I may be getting rid of Alan and the abbot soon, but I’ll still have that oaf hovering around. Not to mention Sir Henry.

  Decision made. Tomorrow I’ll ask Duncan for sword fighting lessons. Can’t say I’m looking forward to getting the tar beat out of me, but if it gets me out if here for awhile, I’m all for it.

  I raise my cup to Duncan. He returns the gesture, the froth of his ale spilling over the rim as he thrusts it in the air, his belly quaking with laughter.

  Duncan marches out the door of my chambers with conviction. I’m less enthusiastic, but better to take a few lumps from a well meaning friend than get skewered by an Englishman in my first — and possibly last — skirmish. I tap the pommel of my sword with the heel of my hand, grab my shield by its hanging strap and follow him.

  Today I’m sore
as hell. Getting out of bed was painful enough, but going down the stairs ...? The only reason I make it to the bottom is gravity. I swear every muscle in my body has been battered beyond repair and every tendon shredded from my bones. I have so many bruises it’s a wonder I haven’t bled to death internally.

  For three weeks now we’ve been repeating this cruel routine. Up before dawn, out the gate on horse, then a mile down the road to a trail through the woods. There in a clearing, Duncan abuses me, liberally. And I let him. Then in the evenings we do it again. For the first several days, he wouldn’t even let me lift a sword. Instead, he made me tear down a stone wall and rebuild it fifty feet away. When I was done, he made me move it back. For variety, I got to run to the top of a very tall hill. When I stopped breathing so hard after a week and told him it wasn’t that bad — I was being facetious — he gave me a sack of stones to carry and told me to do it again. He has no sense of humor. The son of a —

  “Are you coming, Roslin?” Duncan pivots at the bottom of the stairway, tapping his thumb against his hip.

  Morning sun glints above the eastern wall, temporarily blinding me. I blink away the glare, put my head down, and begin down the last few stairs outside the great hall. A rhythmic thumping, emanating from somewhere near the stables, echoes from wall to wall. I stop dead with one foot on the step below and one on the step above it.

  He rolls his eyes. “Forget something again?”

  Before I can dash away in panic, an unwelcome voice hails me from the far side of the bailey.

  “Roslin!” A knight in full chainmail hands his sword and shield to a nearby squire and flips his visor up. I cringe inwardly as Alan parts from the circle of men gathered around him and his sparring partner, Malcolm, and comes toward us. “Impeccable timing. I’ve just beaten your brother-in-law. He was on his knees only a minute ago, pleading mercy like a little girl.”

  Malcolm is standing sideways to us, head down, his wide shoulders heaving with each labored breath. He looks unsteady on his feet, ragged, defeated. If Malcolm had been alive in the twenty-first century, he’d have been a gym rat, bulked up even more on steroids, grunting at the barbells several hours a day and downing protein shakes by the gallon. He might not be quick on his feet, but the man is brutishly strong. If Alan beat him, it was on skill and quickness.