[Druids Bidding 02.0] RenFaire Druids: Dunskey Castle Prequels

by Jane Stain

  “Yes.”

  “Ye wrong me. I would na carry on with ye, if my wife yet lived.”

  They turned by palms with their corners.

  “I’m so sorry to bring up your loss. Forgive me.”

  “Nay, there be nowt tae forgive. ’Tis glad I am, that ye asked.”

  They admired each other while their corners turned them by elbows.

  Clap clap.

  “Well, then you’ll forgive me for asking how she died?”

  “Aye, she died giving birth tae oor second son, two years ago.”

  Their opposites turned them by palms.

  “Who’s watching your sons while you’re away?”

  “The clan cares for them, o’ course, and for their sister. Does na a clan care for all children?”

  He finished escorting her around. They all bowed, and he led her to the next dance set.

  “No. In my t … in America, most couples live alone with their children. They visit their relatives, but only the lucky ones have relatives who babysit.”

  “Aw, ’tis sad I am tae hear that.”

  They bowed to their new set.

  “What’s the name of your clan?”

  “MacGregor.”

  Smiling at each other, they arched their arms for all to go under. They didn’t get a moment to whisper during this set, which consisted entirely of arching and going under. The next dance set was better.

  “So you have three children. How old are you?”

  “I hae twenty and five years, lass. How is it ye hae twenty and three years and are na yet marrit?”

  Their corners turned them.

  “How do you know I’m twenty three?” At the look he gave her, she added, “Here in … America, only half of us get married anymore, and if we do, we wait until we’re 30.”

  “Och, sae auld? How dae ye manage tae hae children?”

  Their opposites did a dance step she didn’t know, and Emily had to concentrate for a moment, mirroring her opposite’s moves.

  “Women take fertility pills if they have trouble having children.”

  “This … country is sae verra different tae mine.”

  The only time Dall and Emily had any privacy to talk was while they were on stage being displayed. After the Scot clan’s stage dance, they went to see Short Shakespeare, and after that, backstage for lunch, and then to the sword demonstration, and then Dall and Ian gave Emily and Vange dagger lessons. Another Short Shakespeare show, and then the women hawked a second hour for Simon.

  Ian and Dall hung out nearby, watching the women display Simon’s work on their feet and direct the passersby into Simon’s booth.

  Emily was distracted by Dall the whole time, but at least every time she looked at him, he was smiling at her.

  Vange was her usual exuberant self. When they heard the ring-out parade coming, she ran over to Ian. “Bye, Simon. See you next week.”

  “Bye, ladies. Thanks very much for your help. I’ll have your custom boots ready Friday night, Emily?”

  Emily looked at Vange since they shared the car and it was a two-hour drive.

  Vange gave her a thumbs up and a big grin.

  Emily turned to her first ever employer.

  “Yep, I’ll be here Friday for them, Simon.”

  How I wish I could just stay here all week.

  But Emily’s parents expected her home each Sunday night for a late dinner, and for dinner every weeknight during her university’s four-month summer break.

  And Emily didn’t want yet another argument about how they were paying for college, so the least she could do was spend time with them while she was home for the summer. The last time she had argued for more independence, they had said they might just quit paying for school.

  It wasn’t fair.

  It’s just one more semester, and then I’ll get that job they want me to get so bad and be able to do what I please.

  Dall seemed to understand it was time for her to leave. Giving her their special smile, he pulled her in for an embrace.

  Fireworks went off in her head, and the world disappeared.

  In her ear, he whispered, “Sae I wull see ye Friday, aye?”

  All tingly from feeling his breath in her ear, she whispered in his, “Yes, and I will try to call you during the week.”

  He kissed her then for the second time. It was another long wet kiss, but while their first kiss had been an insistent hello, this one was a sweet goodbye.

  The time before Friday crawled by.

  As Emily had suspected, her parents had seen Vange’s Facebook posts with the pictures of her and Dall kissing.

  Her dad teased her about it as soon as she walked in the door.

  “So who’s the hottie, Emily?”

  Her mom joined in.

  “I’m not so surprised you got a job at that faire now. So who is this guy? He’s really handsome. Does he have a name? What does he do?”

  “His name is Dall … and he’s from Scotland” was all she could think to say.

  Big mistake.

  “Oh. Does he still live there?”

  “Yes.”

  “Honey, you really shouldn’t get too attached to him, then. It will only break your heart when he goes back home.”

  “We just want the best for you.”

  Yeah, those conversations weren’t any fun, and they had one every day.

  At least I distracted them from asking again what Dall does. I think they would put their foot down about me working at the faire if they knew that was the only job he had. Little do they know.

  Each evening, Emily suffered through dinner with her parents and some of their friends. It was a small town, so for example they were good friends with their family doctor and his wife. Emily had known him all her life. At least he no longer made comments about how much she’d grown.

  During the days her parents were at work, so Emily was free to hang out with people her own age for a change. But out of all those who were in town, Vange was the only one who understood Emily and liked the same things she did, such as the renaissance faire.

  It had been that way since fourth grade. When her parents were at work from 8 to 5, Vange was Emily’s only company.

  She spent as little time alone missing Dall as she could.

  Instead, she and Vange practiced with their daggers by setting up a dummy made of rags and taking turns stabbing it. When they were too tired to practice daggers, they tea-dyed their peasant clothes, scrounged their parents’ attics for old leather belts, and made several pouches each out of some old leather purses Emily’s grandmother had used in the 1960s.

  After Emily tested an old all-natural bota bag to make sure it didn’t leak, she was happy to add the water-carrier to her ensemble, along with an old pewter beer stein, minus the lid. She hoped it would pass as a tankard.

  The best thing Emily found in the attic was a reversible hooded wool cloak. One side was green, the other brown. It was moth-eaten, but that made her shout for joy because it revealed the waterproof oilcloth between the layers. She silently thanked her hippie grandma.

  She wanted to tell her best friend about Dall being a time traveler—and that she hoped to go back to his time with him, probably at the end of faire in nine more weeks.

  But Emily’s memory of the druid Aiden stopped her. She could tell the man was powerful, could sense it. And she had a feeling he would be the one who decided if she went with Dall or not. She didn’t think he would approve of Vange knowing, and although Vange wouldn’t tell anyone, her knowledge would show in her behavior.

  Emily tried Monday night to call Dall, through Siobhan.

  But the woman was adept at not allowing Dall to get on the phone—without saying that was what she was doing.

  When she called on Tuesday night, Emily got voicemail. Three times. Rather than leave more than one message and sound desperate, she stopped calling. She got Siobhan’s message, loud and clear.

  “Thank you so much, Simon. They’re perfect.” Emily
twisted and turned every which way to admire her new custom boots on her under Simon’s flashlight. She had wanted to come earlier, but her parents had insisted she have dinner with them and a few of their friends before she left for another whole weekend away.

  “I took a few liberties with their construction,” Simon was saying. “They have steel plates inside the soles and steel toes inside their uppers, so even if you step on a rusty nail, your feet should be well-protected. Also, they are weatherproofed. It won’t last more than a season, but your feet should stay dry.”

  Emily hugged Simon, she was so grateful.

  “Also,” he said, “I saw the devices you ladies were using to charge your phones last weekend. I had a friend disguise a few as brooches so you can wear them all day, instead of leaving them here. I see you’ve acquired a cloak, Emily, so that’s perfect. Here, let me show you.”

  The tin-encased solar panel did look like a brooch, albeit a large one, but for connecting Emily’s cloak to her so that her hands were free, it was actually perfect. It also looked like it might afford the solar charger some protection if it were dropped, always a plus. It protected her phone, too, where it slipped into a groove behind the charger, connecting to it with a cord.

  With a smile, Simon handed each of them a spare phone cord. They each stowed them in one of their new pouches. Vange had three and Emily had five, plus the stein and the bota bag.

  Emily was starting to worry that something had happened to Dall when all of a sudden he and Ian emerged through the burlap right next to Simon’s booth, along with Siobhan and a dozen more Scots. By now it was almost bedtime, but all the Scots were in good spirits, like someone had just given them a pep talk.

  “Sorry I was na here tae welcome ye, lass.” Dall’s strong arms were around her and they were kissing again. This time, it was a happy kiss. They both left their eyes open and eye-smiled the whole time. Emily felt the way she remembered a rollercoaster making her feel, the moment she topped a hill and started to descend.

  “Ooh.” Emily was dimly aware of Siobhan saying to Vange, “Look at you, all complete now with your boots, belt, and pouches.”

  Complete was a good word for it, because Vange wasn’t even trying to look historically accurate.

  That thought ruined the kissing mood, as Siobhan no doubt had intended for it to. Sure enough, the woman set upon Emily next.

  “You too, Emily. When you reach up like that, I can see how much your new boots look like Dall’s. Simon outdid himself this time. They are the spit and image.”

  Emily pulled away to acknowledge the compliment.

  Dall didn’t let her completely separate from him. He firmly held onto her hand.

  “Thanks, Siobhan,” Emily said. “It looks like you all just came out of a clan meeting.”

  Siobhan smiled sincerely at Emily. “Yes, we meet at the picnic tables backstage. Please join us next Friday. Just walk on up. Everyone knows you’re welcome.”

  “Thank you. I’m sure we’ll be there.” Emily smiled just as sincerely at Siobhan and then turned to Dall to ask if he wanted to take a walk with her before bed.

  But of course, that was not to be.

  Siobhan grabbed Emily’s other hand and Vange’s hand, saying, “Party’s in my trailer, guys.” While everyone followed her to her trailer, she said to Emily and Vange, “You girls are welcome to my room if you need to crash before everyone leaves. You have to be back here at opening, and I don’t have anything until the stage dance.”

  The party was fun. Someone had made real mead, and they all tasted it. That stuff was good.

  Someone else had real home-stilled whiskey. That stuff was nasty, but Emily was glad for the experience of tasting it. Others had brought various store-bought spirits. Some had even brought snacks.

  Siobhan’s trailer was quite jam packed full of people. More sat on the floor than on the furniture. They sang songs to go with their drinking: some period, but most just popular songs of the past few decades. Once in a while, someone would stand and say something like, “OK, this is to the tune of ‘Waiting on the World to Change’.” Everyone would hum the tune, and the person would sing words they made up to it. Usually, the words were funny.

  Through all of this, Emily and Dall snuggled together on the couch, with people pressed in on both sides of them and against their legs.

  Other couples were making out heavily, even getting up to leave and go be alone in their tents.

  But the first time Dall and Emily tried even kissing, Siobhan stopped the singing and led everyone in that hooting noise again. It worked as it was no doubt designed to. Dall and Emily didn’t wish to continue with an obvious audience, so they stopped kissing and just kept on cuddling.

  The cuddling was heaven, anyway. Emily had no real complaints. She wished this evening could go on forever, actually. She fell asleep cuddled next to Dall on the couch. He was long gone when she woke up, but he and Ian came back for breakfast and walked her and Vange to Simon’s.

  This went on for eight more weekends. Every Friday was a lot like this first one, except she and Vange joined in on the clan meeting first.

  Late Saturday nights were much the same. After they all enjoyed the night-shows, they stayed up late partying in Siobhan’s trailer.

  Other couples were practically having sex on the straw bales at night, and they could be heard doing so in their tents.

  But Siobhan and the clan only allowed Emily and Dall to kiss hello and goodbye. If they kissed any other time, they got the hooting noise.

  Dall always held his arm out for Emily when they walked, though, and they cuddled on the couch for hours and hours.

  As it had been that first Sunday, the only time Emily and Dall got enough privacy to have a serious conversation was twenty minutes each weekend day, while they were dancing on stage in front of five hundred people. These conversations were personal at first, only gradually and slowly insinuating their way into the metaphysical question of time travel.

  “So you never answered my question. How do you know I’m 23?”

  “I asked yer best lass.”

  Elbow turn with corner

  “Oh no. What else did she say?”

  “Ainly that ye hae ne’er marrit, and ye dinna hae any children.”

  Elbow turn with opposite

  “Wow, you don’t waste any time asking unimportant questions.”

  “This life is but a dream, lass, and we wake from it all too soon. ’Tis a waste tae spend oor precious time on frivolous things.”

  Bow to corner

  “Yes, time is of the essence, wouldn’t you say?”

  “Ye ken it is, lass.”

  Vange’s parents invited her to their insurance agency for an open house the Friday before the last weekend of faire. They invited Emily, too, but she could tell they wanted their daughter to themselves, so Emily stayed home alone. She tried to distract herself by playing games on her phone.

  The new app appeared then. Just popped up out of nowhere, covering her game.

  “Siobhan, what are you up to?”

  Emily poked around. It was a huge app that took up almost half of Emily’s free memory on a new top of the line phone that she got for her birthday just recently.

  Oh, the app was named Time Management.

  “OK, maybe I want this app.”

  Siobhan was the only other person who had handled Emily’s phone.

  Emily hadn’t surfed the net or opened any emails or downloaded anything onto this phone, so she reasoned Siobhan must have installed the app. She was mad at Siobhan for keeping Dall from talking to her alone, but she didn’t delete the app.

  Emily understood why Siobhan was doing that. Time travel was a huge deal. People would be pushing and shoving to go along, if everyone knew about it.

  The military would take over to use time travel as some sort of weapon if they found out, and everyone would end up running from The Terminator.

  So yeah, Emily was kind of glad the druids—and she rea
lized here that Siobhan must be one of the druids—were all hush-hush about the time traveler Emily had fallen for.

  Still, it was frustrating.

  Hoping for some answers, Emily opened the app.

  A bunch of buttons appeared, but they were all greyed out. The map showed her current location, with a large glowing dot in the direction of the faire. A message in the middle of the screen read:

  -Hello Emily. You are in your home time and home location.

  Well, that was stating the obvious. Not much help. Based on a hunch, and asking what she really wanted to know at the moment, she typed in:

  What is needed to travel?

  -Clearance is needed for Emily to travel.

  Who can give clearance?

  -See the person who gave you the Time Management app.

  She was back to square one. Except … the fact that she had the app on her phone reassured Emily. When Dall went back to his own time—soon—she would be going with him. And they were able to bring her back here to her own time.

  And then it hit her.

  She would be going back 500 years in time.

  No emergency room.

  No Walmart.

  No industrial revolution.

  Emily called her parents’ best friends.

  “Doctor Anderson’s office, this is Stacy.”

  “Hi Stacy. It’s Emily, George and Sandra’s daughter?”

  “Hi Emily. So you’re in town for the summer, eh? How are your parents?”

  “They’re fine.”

  “What can we do for you?”

  “I’m only home for a few more days. I’ll be traveling this weekend to … the third world. Can I get some antibiotic pills to take with me?”

  “Sure. Come on in.”

  When Emily got back from her doctor’s office, antibiotic pills in hand, she rummaged through her parents’ cupboards, stuffing things into the pouches on her faire costume belt. She packed a big tube of antibiotic ointment and a huge bottle of iodine tablets, some anti-diarrhea pills, anti-vomiting pills, anti-fungal cream, and aspirin. Then she also grabbed her Diva cup, some moisturizer, and a small magnifying glass. And changes of wool socks and cotton underwear. At first she grabbed some toilet paper, but on second thought she packed six small cakes of handmade soap and a linen dishtowel her aunt had given them for Christmas.