Lost in Time_Split-Second Time Travel Story 1

by Ken Johns

  “Heretic.” Henri lifted his faceplate. “Two of my men are dead at your hands. I would be perfectly within my rights to kill you now and be done with it. However, the bishop wants you alive. I will give you one chance to surrender and live. If you choose otherwise, my men will kill you and enjoy the sport of it.”

  The woman did not move.

  “Climb down,” Henri said. “If you try to flee, Luc will run you down.”

  Luc lifted his faceplate, smiling with his three teeth.

  The woman began to climb down. As she neared the ground, Eric put his hands on her ass. She spun loose and jumped to the ground, punching him in the face when she landed. He went down hard. She tried to run, but Luc was there. He lifted his boot clear of its stirrup and kicked her in the face. She dropped like a sack.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  April 28, 1341

  Mila walked next to the horse as Margaret led it down the hill. Sandra rode the horse’s rump, trying to hold John in the saddle. The horse rocked from side to side as it stepped, and John’s head matched the rhythm. Mila might have smiled if she hadn’t been so stressed about getting back to meet up with Jess. As soon as she and Margaret had climbed into the forest, she’d regretted leaving Jess behind. They should have stayed together and just left the carriage. The Roman road came into view and Mila sped up, no longer needing Margaret to show her the way.

  “What’s wrong?” Sandra said.

  Mila didn’t answer. She hurried through the trees, searching as far along the road as the dense undergrowth would allow. Nothing. She checked the other direction. The carriage should be visible by now. Jess could have moved it, but that would be stupid, knowing the rest of them would be expecting to find it where they’d left it. She ran out on the road, her heart thumping in her ears.

  She found the spot in the mud where it had been parked. But she saw no sign of it. A deep breath could not control the squeezing in her throat. Where would Jess have gone? There was no reason to move the carriage. Mila had no idea how to even begin to figure out where her sister could be. With John out of it, and Jess gone… She sucked in a breath. Solve this. Just solve it.

  Margaret crunched out of the forest, leading the horse. John had his eyes shut as his head swayed… That was it. They had watched John Wayne westerns together when Mila was a kid. John had usually fallen asleep, but she had been fascinated by the movies. Wayne always had a Native American tracker with him and… Mila snapped her eyes down to the mud. The ruts left by the carriage wheels led back up onto the road in the direction of the inn and disappeared. Mila took off down the road.

  “Mila! Wait!”

  She ignored Sandra’s pleas. Jess was all that mattered. Scanning the mud on both sides of the road as she ran, she slowed a bit to conserve energy and absorb more detail. She couldn’t afford to miss any clues. And there. On her right. The tracks reappeared in the mud.

  Mila stopped, bending over to catch her breath. The ruts sliced off the road and deepened where the carriage had stopped. Hoof prints dug up the surrounding mud. Unless Jess had detached the horses, which seemed unlikely, there were more than just the two carriage horses. There were too many horseshoe imprints outside the grooves cut by the wheels. She followed the two parallel slices that angled back up onto the road. She walked across the road and checked the mud on the other side. They reappeared in a semicircle, turning in the opposite direction.

  Mila raced back to the others. She could usually run for miles with no pain, but today her chest burned. She focused on her breathing and tried to clear her head. Breathe in, three strides, breathe out, three strides. She had to think.

  But she didn’t think. She wasn’t a thinker. She reacted. Maybe John knew her better than she wanted to admit.

  Sandra and Margaret were kneeling next to him when she ran up. He lay on the ground near the horse. Mila slowed to a walk and stopped.

  “Mila, don’t rush off like that.” Sandra stood to face her. With one hand on her chest she said, “You scared me.”

  “Well, that’s about to get a lot worse. I think Jess has been captured.”

  “What?” Sandra’s hands flew to her mouth. Tears welled in her eyes.

  Mila slammed her eyes shut and sucked in a breath. She had to keep it together. Seeing your mom cry was the fastest way to lose your shit. She opened her eyes, facing Margaret. “The carriage tracks go around the bend and stop. There are at least two other horses standing around the carriage, and then it turns around and comes back this way. Where would they take her?”

  “To the castle,” Margaret said matter-of-factly.

  Mila stared down the road in the direction of the castle. Her heart rate climbed. Jess needed help, and it wasn’t coming from John or Sandra. Mila was Jess’s only chance. “I guess I’m going to the castle.”

  “No one’s going to the castle.” Sandra wiped her nose on her sleeve.

  “Somebody has to help Jess.”

  “No. I’m not losing you too.” Sandra put her hands on Mila’s triceps. “Let’s take your father back to the future and get him fixed up. Then he can come back and get her.”

  Mila took a beat to process it. She hadn’t considered it until that moment. “We can’t.”

  “Why not?” Sandra’s voice cracked.

  “The MCV was in the carriage with Jess.”

  Sandra staggered back. Her legs must have given out, because she sat down hard and stared off into the forest.

  Mila fought the urge to go to her. If she held her mother, she knew she’d lose it. Instead, she reached out and touched her shoulder.

  “Don’t worry. I’m going after Jess. I’ll get her back.”

  “Are you joking?” Sandra chuckled bitterly. “What can you do? You’re not a cop or a soldier.”

  Mila pulled her hand back as if she’d been slapped. She choked back the tears. Sandra was not herself, of course, but the words stung like hell. When she could speak without a quaver in her voice, she said to Margaret, “How can I get into the castle?”

  “Invitation by the baron. It’s the only way I know.”

  “What do you do to get an invitation?”

  “Usually something quite good,” Margaret said, shrugging, “or something quite bad.”

  “I’m sorry, Mila.” Sandra got to her feet. “I don’t know what you think you’re planning, but—”

  “Shut up! I don’t want to hear it.” To Margaret she said, “Please look after John.”

  Margaret nodded. “I will.”

  Mila started running but stopped after three strides. “How do I find you?”

  Margaret thought for a moment. “In the village square, there is an inn. It has a cock hung outside. Very easy to find.”

  “Thank you.” She turned and ran.

  “Mila!” Sandra’s cry chased after her, but she did not look back.

  Mila kept her pace easy. How far would she have to run? And what would she do if she caught up with the carriage? What could she do? She almost stopped then but forced herself to keep running. To work the problem.

  The oaks and beeches that slid past in her periphery started to look the same. But she wasn’t lost. It was mainly a straight road with some undulating hills but no forks. She couldn’t possibly have made a wrong turn, because she hadn’t made any turns. When the light started to fade, she glanced skyward. She had hoped to be out of the forest before dark, but it seemed to go on forever.

  Margaret had said it was half a day from Annie’s inn to Chad’s, so it must have been around noon when they confronted the guards. She’d also said Fast’n’smart could walk to town from there in half a day. It had taken them the better part of an hour to get the carriage free, and then they had doubled back into the forest to get her parents. Her hike up the hill and back had cost at least an hour. So, all things considered, she was probably looking at a three-hour run. Shit. She’d never run a marathon. The longest she’d ever done was a 10k with her friends and Jess.

  Jess.

  Mil
a kept running.

  She heard the horses before she saw them. She ran straight to the side of the road and hid in the trees. She struggled to control her breathing, but it was impossible. She just let herself breathe long and heavy, hoping she might have more control by the time the riders got close enough to hear her.

  A pair of riders approached, one man and one woman. Mila caught glimpses of ruffles and lace peeking out from beneath long riding cloaks. They were wealthy. Behind them came a cart, well loaded and ridden by a man driving a single horse.

  As Mila crouched in the undergrowth, her thighs started to cramp, and she stifled a scream. She desperately rubbed her quads to ease the pain. She’d had cramps before, but this was by far the worst. It was a sure sign of her dehydration. Only when the riders were well ahead was she able to stand and walk out the cramps.

  Once the pain had receded to a bearable level, she tried to resume her running. But her legs were done. She needed water. She walked as fast as she could, hoping to hear a stream or brook near the road where she might get a drink. Instead she heard the unmistakable howl of a wolf. Shit.

  She pulled the crossbow off her back and loaded it, but she could barely see into the forest. She’d failed to keep track of the fading light, and if it was anything like last night, the darkness would be complete.

  She started running, forcing herself to push through the constant throbbing in her legs. But with the loaded crossbow in her arms, she was in danger of dropping the bolt or, worse, shooting it into the forest by accidentally hitting the release lever. She slowed to a jog.

  The wolf howled again. Closer.

  It was answered by another howl on the other side of the road.

  Shit, shit, shit. On her right, a clump of beech trunks that would be easy to climb offered themselves in the near darkness. Mila left the road and headed for the trees. The branches were higher than she’d thought. She removed the bolt from the crossbow, sprang its release, and slid it back over her shoulder. When she had climbed to the natural platform of the lowest branches, she reloaded the crossbow and sat down.

  Ouch. Tree bark on her bare ass reminded her she was still only wearing the wraparound traveling dress. She pulled as much cloth under herself as she could.

  One of the wolves howled. It seemed even closer, but this time it was answered by something new.

  “I hear you, my beauty,” whispered a man’s voice.

  A dark shadow crept past the base of her tree. She could hardly make out the thin lines of the longbow he held ready in his hands. Her legs chose that moment to cramp up again. Seriously? As Mila suffered silently above him, her pain-addled mind decided this stranger in the dark forest in the middle of the night might be her salvation. Through gritted teeth she asked, “Do you have any water?”

  As the shadow spun toward her, the sound of the bowstring straining under the pressure of a full draw told her she might have made a mistake.

  “Who are you?” The man crept back toward her tree. “You sound foreign. Are you French?”

  “No,” said Mila. “I’m thirsty.”

  “And a woman.” The man chuckled. “Come down here.”

  “Why? Do you have anything to drink?”

  “I do,” he said. “But do you have anything to trade for it?”

  Mila took a mental inventory of what she had on her and realized she had very little. She should have taken some of the silver. They all should be carrying some silver. But it was a bit late now, wasn’t it? As she stared down at the stranger in the dark, she realized she was aiming her loaded crossbow at the center of his shadow. She was actually already in a standoff, and this guy had no idea. Could she shoot him? Did she have the balls, if he called her bluff? Was she willing to kill a man for his water? Her thighs shouted, yes, do it.

  The shadow grew to twice its size in a flash, and something brushed the hair off her ear in the same instant. His screams and the deep growling of a wolf provided the explanation. It must have been the man’s arrow that had flown past her face when the wolf took him. Correction: wolves. In a daze, Mila counted two, no, three individual shadows pulling in opposite directions. The screaming stopped and was replaced by the tearing of sinew and slapping of flesh on hungry lips.

  She tried not to vomit down on the wolves. She didn’t know how well they climbed or how high they could jump, and she really couldn’t see a need to find out.

  Mila couldn’t tell how long she sat there listening to the wolves eat, but suddenly they stopped eating and went quiet. The silence chilled her. Had they finally detected her presence? She couldn’t have been more than fifteen feet above them. A rustle of undergrowth accompanied the shadows as they moved away and disappeared into the forest.

  Mila didn’t hear anything, but something must have spooked the wolves. She sat, listening. She even took a deep sniff of the slight breeze. She couldn’t smell anything either. A long way back along the road, a yellow light bobbed slowly into view. It was a torch. The clop of hooves came next and then the squeak of wooden axles and the rumble of wheels on the stones of the road. She welcomed the sound and the light—whoever came with them could be no worse than the dead wolf hunter. As they drew near, Mila decided she must take a chance or she would be stuck in the tree until dawn.

  She unloaded the crossbow, shouldered it, and climbed to the ground. The light grew closer and began to throw slithery shadows across the remains of the wolf hunter. Mila crawled to the grisly… torso, really: its limbs were all missing.

  Mila choked back the bile in her throat. She needed to search the corpse, because while she was safe from the wolves for the moment, she was still in desperate need of water and food, if he had any. She felt along his stomach, looking for pockets, but there wasn’t even any clothing left, just the slick remains of his intestines held in place by two leather straps. Still warm. Mila dry-heaved. When she recovered, she rolled the torso onto its back. Surely these straps would be attached to a bag of some kind. One strap led to a quiver of arrows of no use to her, as they were far too long for the crossbow. The other strap was attached to a leather pouch. Inside the pouch she found an apple. The most delicious apple that existed on the entire planet. She devoured it, slurping at the juice that ran down her chin, not wanting to waste a single drop.

  The torch moved past her on the road. It was mounted on a post at the front of a large two-wheeled cart. The driver hadn’t seen her, and she knew he could not have heard her slurping over the noise of his passage. The island of light thrown by his torch began to move away as the cart moved on through the forest. Mila had to act. If she stayed put, there was nothing to stop the wolves from returning. The mounded load in the cart eclipsed the torchlight, creating a long shadow behind the vehicle. She loaded the crossbow and crept back to the road. She ran up behind the cart and then slowed to a walk, matching its pace. She could walk there in its shadow, and the driver would never see her.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  April 28, 1341

  When the road finally left the forest behind, it crossed a long series of fields as it approached the town. Mila unloaded her crossbow and slung it across her back. She guessed the wolves were no longer a threat. They hadn’t appeared again in the forest, and now with the town in sight they weren’t likely to. After all, they had just fed. Besides, her arms were killing her. She’d been holding it loaded and at the ready for over an hour.

  The darkness of the forest had morphed into a gray light from the moon. And here in the open, Mila would become a silhouette to watchful eyes. She wasn’t worried about the driver so much as a town watch. Would the town have a wall? What if they had a gate and a guard posted? She stepped to one side and walked where she could see past the cart along the road. A long line of silvery thatched roofs reflected the moonlight, but still she couldn’t make out if there was a wall. At ground level, there was only black except for one small flame.

  Mila stepped back behind the cart and continued to follow in its shadow. If she couldn’t see the gaps bet
ween the buildings, there was probably a wall. And if there was a wall there would be a gate. The flame must have been a torchlight at the gate.

  Behind Mila, a whinny broke over the noise of the cart. Mila spun around. Two riders approached at a trot, and another cart followed them. Shit. They couldn’t help but see her when they caught up. The fields on either side beckoned, but if she ran off the road, she would be clearly visible, both to the approaching riders and the town wall. She stepped up and gently touched the back of the cart with one hand while she felt the load with the other. Short lengths of rough wood filled the cart. Firewood, she guessed. She could easily climb onto the back of the cart and lay still but couldn’t risk the horse or the driver sensing the change in the load or balance of the two-wheeled cart. And there was no guarantee that the wood itself wouldn’t shift when she added her weight to it.

  Mila felt along the underside of the cart. There was nothing but planking making up the floor.

  The approaching riders were near enough that she could hear them talking. She resisted the temptation to turn and see exactly how close. Instead she crouched down and walked in under the back of the cart, keeping one hand in contact with the underside to gauge its speed. The floor of the cart was about three feet off the road. She had to lean over so far that her knees bumped into her chest. There was no way she could keep this pace up without falling on her face.

  Her quads began to cramp. Mila involuntarily straightened them and drove her back into the underside of the cart. Her crossbow knocked the wood flooring, but no louder than the solid wooden wheels trundling over the stones on either side of her. With her legs almost straight, it was easier to move, and the cramp faded. Keeping her back in contact with the cart, she was able to match its speed.

  The voices of the approaching riders grew loud enough to discern as a man’s and a woman’s. The man passed on her left, and the woman on her right. Their voices faded as they moved on ahead. The only threat of discovery now belonged to the driver of the cart behind her.