by Julianne Lee
“Kinda like the Washington Monument.”
Trefor chuckled at that. “I suppose, though I’ve never seen the Washington Monument up close.” After a bit of silence, he pointed with his chin to the banner flapping over the portcullis on the quay and said, “Your arms. That bird is a bald eagle.”
“It is.”
“Mythical beast in the here and now?”
“I let them think that.”
“You sly boots.” Trefor’s voice carried no humor, and Alex took the comment as sarcasm. A dig. Trefor continued. “You put a lot past these people. I bet you get away with all sorts of things.”
Alex opened his mouth to deny, but closed it when he thought of the gun he’d emptied into the enemy at Bannockburn, which had earned him this lairdship, the story he’d let people believe about being from Hungary, the lies he’d told to convince the people of Eilean Aonarach that Lindsay was her own sister so he could marry her. After some thought he said, “I do. I might burn in hell for it, but at least I won’t be burned and sent there for telling the truth. Folks around here will tie you to a stake at the drop of a hat.”
“It’s no wonder you wanted to come back here. Lots of power. Lots of money.”
Now Alex turned to look at his son and wondered what he’d meant by that. “Shouldn’t I have?”
Trefor shrugged. “Search me. I was just saying.”
Alex grunted and looked over the battlement, down at the loading again. The sun was settling over the hilly island horizon, and long shadows of cliffs to the west had swallowed the boats below. The night would be clear, but Alex could see a gathering of clouds low on the horizon that threatened a difficult departure within the next few days. He gave a low groan. “Looks like the weather is going to screw us. We might not get out of here soon. If that storm comes any closer, I’ll have to hold off loading the boats.”
“Bad luck for us.”
“You don’t sound like you care much.” It seemed Trefor would have liked to see Alex fail.
“I care more than you think.”
Again Alex grunted and stared off toward the line of clouds. “This is going to cost us in time. Possibly equipment.” Damage to the boats was a danger.
“Maybe the storm will pass us by.”
“The wind is pushing it straight this way. And they’ve already got the animals and some supplies in the lower bailey. If it hits us hard enough, it’s not going to matter much that we haven’t set sail. If it hasn’t turned or petered out by morning, I’ll have to have all that stuff moved back into shelter.”
There was only silence from Trefor, until Alex tired of waiting for a reply and looked over to find Trefor with his head bowed and his fingers at the back of his head, beneath his hair. He looked as if he were massaging his own neck, fingering the base of his skull, his shoulders tensed and elbows out. Alex wanted to ask what he was doing, but sensed he wouldn’t get a reply. Not a rational one, anyway. Trefor continued that for a bit, then stood straight again and looked out over the water to the approaching storm. In the dusk, his face had paled and there was a sheen of sweat on him. His breathing was noticeably ragged, then he drew a huge sigh and let it out slowly. He whispered to himself, “There.”
“What?”
Trefor glanced at him and said, “Nothing. Just maybe we could be luckier than we think we are.” He said it as if he knew a joke on Alex. His eyes drooped shut, and for a moment he looked as if he might faint. Then he collected himself and sighed.
Alex wondered what he meant by that, but would wait to see what happened with the storm before asking.
Sure enough, Trefor was right. By morning the storm was closer, but the wind had shifted just enough that it appeared the worst of it would miss the island. Alex let the loading continue as they watched the progress. That night the edges of the storm barely brushed the tip of Eilean Aonarach, far from the castle and its boats. A couple of fishing vessels belonging to one of the MacConnells took some damage by banging into each other in the high swells, but that was all the effect the weather had on the island. The loading of boats continued without interruption while the storm beat hell out of the empty expanse of water to the west.
Alex looked to Trefor, who spent the day with the corners of his mouth curled in a private smile. He and his buddy hung out in the Great Hall with Trefor’s mercenaries, and it was plain none of them thought the good luck weather was remarkable.
Alex wondered what had really happened on the roof of the Great Hall last night. It occurred to him that he knew very little about the wee folk and their magic. Trefor looked like one of them. Was it possible he had powers like theirs? Alex didn’t even know what that meant in a full-blooded fey. What could it mean with regard to Trefor? Danu had never given him a clue as to what she might have accomplished or how. He knew Nemed had once been powerful, but was no longer. The Bhrochan had wiles and ways, but Alex didn’t really know what those truly entailed, beyond that they could make him very, very sick. Now he looked at Trefor and wondered. He was far more human than not. Lindsay had certainly never shown any sign of magical powers. Nor even an affinity for the Danann, in spite of favor from Danu. If Trefor was his son and not Nemed’s, then how closely related could he be to the fey?
The preparations to leave were completed that day. They would depart for the mainland in the morning.
During the night, Alex was hard put to sleep. His brain buzzed with thoughts of Trefor, for there was no denying he was related to Alex, and no reason to believe he was not the son who had been stolen just a couple of weeks ago. Those faeries were all nuts and certainly could have done what Trefor had said. But Alex’s brain didn’t want to wrap itself around this mess. He didn’t want to believe he was the father of a twenty-seven-year-old man, particularly one who seemed to hate him so well and for so little reason.
Frustration tightened his chest, and he sat up on the edge of his bed to gulp air. The night chill of his bedchamber felt good on his hot skin. The dying fire in the hearth crumbled into its own ashes, sending a sprinkle of sparks toward the chimney. The single glazed window was a small square of lighter black against the far wall, its frames forming a cross at the center. This room was sanctuary, deep within the thick stone of his keep and with access from only one door. Outside that door, three chambers away, lay a man who should be his heir and his closest kin, but instead was more than likely an enemy. There was nothing he could do to change it, but acceptance wouldn’t come. He didn’t want this. Couldn’t acquiesce to the idea of letting this man into his household and his life, and couldn’t countenance sending him away.
Alex rose from his bed, took his silk dressing robe from the foot of his bed to don it, and padded in bare feet from his chamber, through the anteroom, and to the meeting hall beyond his apartments. There he paused before the door to the guest chamber where Trefor and his friend were sleeping. He wanted to ease open that door and look inside. He wanted to gaze on his son as he slept, to watch him and examine him, and to know him as a father.
But he knew if he opened that door he would not find what he was looking for. In that bedchamber he would find only annoyance. Trouble. A man who hated him for something he hadn’t even done. Yet. The confusion and longing choked him. He stood frozen, unable to decide what to do. Finally, at a loss to know how to feel or what to think, he retreated from the door and returned to his bed, then lay there awake until the square of lighter black on the wall of his chamber had turned to the light purple of sunrise.
The company of An Dubhar set sail for Oban shortly after.
Once on the mainland, Alex’s forty knights, plus Trefor’s ten, lined up in a column and set out on the route Alex had taken on his last venture here. He was headed for Edinburgh, a journey of several days. Alex was recovering from his illness, but the long hours in the saddle wore him out. Each night he stripped himself of his chain mail and woolens, fell exhausted onto the pallet in his tent, and reflected on the days when he could have made this trip in minutes by air.
>
Halfway there, as they descended from the Highlands, Hector came to speak to him in private, out of earshot of Trefor and his crew. “Why Edinburgh?”
“Why not? It’s the last place I saw Nemed, and I figure it’ll be the first place Lindsay will go. Or did go, when she got here. We’re grasping at straws. There’s no way to know what’s the most likely place to start looking.” The hopelessness of their situation sank in further as he spoke. Alex took deep breaths to dispel the gathering despair. Trefor could be right. Finding Lindsay might be impossible. Alex didn’t want Trefor to be right about anything, let alone this. “We’ll find her,” he said, and nodded once to affirm his words.
“Who do ye figure we’re looking for, then? Man or woman?”
That was easy enough to answer. “Man. She took my hauberk, so she’s more than likely wearing it. She knows how to pass and knows she won’t get anywhere as a woman without me around. I figure we’re looking for Sir Lindsay Pawlowski, my brother-in-law who was separated from the group escorting his sister to Eilean Aonarach last year. Thought to be dead, but somehow survived the fall he took in his fight with the robber.”
“And we assume she has come to this very time, and is in search of her child. We assume she did not learn where Trefor was and follow him there.”
Alex looked over at Hector, and the hopelessness tightened his chest. But he said, “If she knew where he was, she never went there. He’s attested to that.” Alex indicated Trefor with a tilt of his head to the rear. “I figure when she saw those ears she thought the same thing I did. That Nemed had a hand in it and had something to do with the baby’s disappearance.” Alex kept to himself his previous thoughts of cuckoldry, for he was ashamed of them. “She’s probably gone looking for him. She doesn’t know Nemed doesn’t have him.” Whether Nemed had anything to do with Trefor’s appearance was still at question, but it was certain the elf hadn’t stolen the baby.
Hector grunted and nodded.
Then Alex continued, with trepidation Hector might react badly to what he would say next and accuse him of sorcery. “Besides, I think she’s here. I can feel it.”
“Truly, or do ye only wish it?”
“Truly.” Alex wished it, but something in his gut made him believe.
“Given to augury, then, are ye?”
Alex shook his head. “That touchy-feely stuff isn’t for me. But on this I just know. With Lindsay, it’s different. I just... well, know.”
Again Hector nodded. “Well, then, if your heart tells you, it might be so.”
Alex only wished his heart were that trustworthy.
***
Several days later they made camp just outside the gates of Edinburgh. It was late afternoon, but without waiting till morning Alex set off alone to climb the rocky hill to the ruined castle. Atop the hill, his horse picked its way among the fallen chunks of mortared stone lying about, and snorted restlessly. Alex had his best horses with him on this expedition, and today was mounted on his favorite, the dark bay with the thickly feathered fetlocks. The wind off the firth blustered the stallion’s mane this way and that, and wide nostrils expanded to catch every scent on the breeze. After a few moments the animal calmed and reached for a bit of grass by the side of the track.
The ruins of the castle stuck up like broken teeth all around. Wind batted at Alex, and the silence seemed eternal. It hadn’t been long since he was here last, but he noticed there were far fewer pieces of broken wall than there had been last fall. Probably they’d been taken by the town’s inhabitants, and by farmers in the surrounding countryside, for construction material. The smaller pieces were probably now piled onto dikes and mortared into walls of houses and shops along the granite ridge behind him. Nothing ever went to waste in this country.
Last time he was here, he’d fought Nemed and forced the elfin king to send Alex and Lindsay back to the twenty-first century. Now he wished he’d simply killed the guy and had done with it. He’d not wanted to return to the future. He liked it here and had wanted to carve a future for himself and his family from the niche he’d found in history. It had been Lindsay who wanted their child to be born modern.
Lindsay and Danu. He looked down at the camp where Trefor and his men lounged, waiting, and wondered what his wife would think of how the kid had turned out.
Kid. There was only a year’s difference in age between Trefor and his mother. The weirdness of that was appalling, and Alex wondered how this guy might act around a woman his own age, mother or not. Alex certainly didn’t feel like a father. He’d been one for less than a month. He’d never held his son, never watched him grow up, never taught him anything. Never learned anything from him. The grief of that loss was a tight knot at his solar plexus he knew would never unravel.
“Lonely at the top, ain’t it, Dad?”
Alex jumped and turned. “How did you get up here?” What he really meant was How did you get up here without me hearing you? Even Alex’s horse hadn’t given an indication of anyone following.
Trefor shrugged. “You were deep in thought. Trying to figure something out. I could have been driving a trolley car and ringing a bell and you wouldn’t have heard me.”
Unlikely, but Alex let it go. He said, “I’m trying to figure out how come Nemed wanted me on this spot when he was threatening Lindsay.” Your mother. He couldn’t say the words.
Trefor shrugged. “Simple enough. This is a thin place.”
“A what?”
“Thin place.” Trefor spoke carefully, enunciating clearly as if speaking to a particularly stupid child. “Can’t you feel it?”
Alex blinked and had to admit, “No.”
“All kinds of energy here.” He nudged his horse to move around Alex, and gained another rise to turn and look around. He took a deep breath and gazed off over the firth. His long, dark hair tossed in the wind, revealing his ears for the world and Alex to see. “I bet he comes and goes from this spot all the time.” He had the contemplative air of someone sniffing the wind, but Alex didn’t think it was a scent he was picking up.
Alex gazed across at the town of Edinburgh crouching along the summit of rock that overlooked the countryside. He could bivouac here and wait, or set off in a random direction in search. The odds of finding Lindsay weren’t pleasing for either choice. “You’re sure about this?”
Trefor shrugged. “If you’re asking for a guarantee, I can’t give you one. I just know this is the sort of place that is attractive to those who deal in that sort of power.” He nodded at the ruins of the king’s residence and added, “Over the centuries it’s certainly been attractive to those humans who wield the more mundane forms of it.”
Alex grunted. He knew little about magic and didn’t much like that Trefor seemed mixed up in it. “All right, then. We’ll wait here for Nemed to show himself.” Having decided, he turned back toward the camp and let Trefor follow as he would. Or not.
The ordinary knights stayed encamped where they were, with Sir Henry Ellot in command and a rotating watch set on the castle ruins. Alex, Hector, Trefor, and Mike took a room in town. Alex had never seen modern Edinburgh, but Trefor assured him not one stick of the existing tiny cluster of wood and stone structures would survive to the twenty-first century. Though the town was what passed for cosmopolitan these days, it wasn’t what Alex would have called “bustling.” There were a few shops selling wares of the artisans who lived behind them, and there was a tavern sort of place with rooms in the back for travelers. All very up-to-date and big city in these times, particularly for Scotland, for most towns had neither.
Only one of the rooms in the public house was available, so the four men crowded into it to deposit their weapons and bedrolls. Alex and Hector claimed the bed together, and Trefor and Mike would sleep on the floor before the small hearth. Food was to be had out front in the public room, so the four of them sat around the table there to buy and eat their supper. The only food available was a sorry, watery stew of mutton and turnips — mostly turnips — and
Alex made a mental note to have a chat with the proprietor about making better food available since they would be there a while.
Loud, raucous voices approached from up the high street, and presently three men ducked through the little door of the tavern. Alex looked up and was both pleased and dismayed to see the tall, lanky James Douglas. The Earl of Douglas was in an excellent mood, laughing with his companions, who turned out to be his second knight and his favorite squire, over a joke one of them had just told. Probably James, for he was fond of his own jokes and always laughed uproariously when he thought he was funny.
“James!” Alex rose to greet his erstwhile commander. He’d ridden with James the summer before, making raids on the Borderlands after Bannockburn.
The earl stopped laughing to peer at Alex in the dim light of the cook fire, then recognized him. “Alasdair an Dubhar!” He threw his arms wide and embraced Alex, whom he considered a friend. Alex wasn’t so sure, but didn’t care to disabuse James of the notion they were buddies. The earl was King Robert’s closest friend, and had been since James was a skinny boy squire, so friendship with James was generally considered to be a very good thing and other men jockeyed for the favor Alex had gained without effort, or even intent. “Ailig! What brings you to Edinburgh?”
“The usual.” Alex wasn’t about to go into details of his interest in elves and faeries. “Looking for action. We just arrived, and so haven’t found any yet.” He gestured to the table for the earl to sit, but there was only one chair free. Alex pointed to Mike and jerked his thumb to indicate he should give up his seat to James’ second, who outranked the American on so many levels there was no question as to who should stand.
Mike, lounging in the chair with one arm over the back of it, threw him a cross look, then glanced at Trefor. Trefor, for his part, didn’t raise an objection though he did have a cross glance for Alex. Then he indicated with a nod to Mike that Alex should be obeyed. Mike rolled his eyes like a teenager, rose slowly, and went to stand with James’ squire while the earl and his second in command took their seats around the table. James and the other knight ignored Mike’s insolence, and Alex gave Trefor a hard glance to make clear he would address the issue later.