Lost Highlander Page 16

  “Sam?” Evelyn called in little more than her regular speaking voice. The wind blowing through the trees carried the sound away ineffectually, but she was scared to be much louder.

  Not quite panicking yet, she carefully made her way to the creek. She leaned down at the edge and rinsed her hands and splashed her face, taking a small sip against her better judgement. It was so cold and she was so thirsty, but she was scared it might be filled with dysentery or some disgusting parasite. She was determined not to return to the twenty-first century with a worm of any kind.

  She quietly called Sam’s name again to no avail. Where was he? She couldn’t believe he would go that far from the cabin without waking her first. She stood and walked along the creek a little ways, peering into the trees on the other side, hoping to see a glimpse of him coming back, maybe with a rabbit. She grimaced at that thought, wondering what in the hell they’d do with the rabbit if he had managed to catch one. Her stomach growled loudly, but she didn’t think she was hungry enough yet to skin and gut a poor little bunny.

  Her fear was definitely starting to get the better of her and she rushed back to the shack to try to find a clue of some sort. There was nothing. He’d obviously put on all his clothes - she blushed at the thought of him without them, but quickly got herself together - and then left without waking her up. She had no earthly clue what time it was, and looking at the sun, the weak area of light struggling to show in the overcast Scottish sky, told her nothing. She cursed at every damn television show she’d ever seen that showed a person looking at the sun and then knowing what time it was. Common sense told her it was some time in the morning and that was going to have to be good enough.

  So, he’d dressed and gone out to either get a drink or scout the area, and hadn’t returned. Was she supposed to wait? What if he was in trouble out there and needed her? After a moment, she got the brilliant idea to look for footprints. She picked up her foot and examined the tread on her hiking boot. Any larger footprint or print with a different tread, she would know wasn’t hers. Feeling exceptionally good about this plan, she went back outside with renewed gusto. Almost instantly she found prints that had to have been Sam’s and followed them. They went completely around the shack, as she had earlier, then down to the stream, then back halfway before turning to go into the woods. Evelyn stood at the spot where Sam had entered the woods and sighed, not wanting to go in alone, but scared to stay put, especially if Sam had run afoul of some strange past danger. Maybe Scotland had bears or wolves in this time, she thought, then considered something even more sinister. Traps. Picturing Sam with his leg stuck in the mighty metal jaws of a bear trap caused her to push aside her fear and hastily venture into the trees.

  Sam’s tracks were easy to follow for about the first thirty yards, but then the trees got thicker and she was forced to try to figure out which way he went based on bent branches or trampled foliage. She was getting more and more frustrated, having never been a girl scout, only ever hiking in parks that weren’t more than a mile or two in any direction. She remembered Sam talking about how vast this forest was. Was that just yesterday? She was about to turn around and go back to the shack before she got hopelessly lost, when she came to a large clearing and saw Sam’s boot prints at the opening of it.

  Stepping carefully into the clearing, avoiding the prints, she looked around and was alarmed to find other prints, lots of them. They were large like Sam’s but clearly not his. The other prints were flat soled, with no tread, possibly riding boots.

  “Oh no,” she said, tip toeing around the clearing, trying to figure out what happened. It looked like there was a scuffle, Sam’s prints stopped abruptly in the middle of the clearing and the smooth ones came from three sides, then there was a big mess of stirred up dirt and jumbled prints, then long tracks leading out of the clearing, with smooth prints on either side.

  “Oh, Sam,” she whispered, crouching down and touching the footprints. It seemed that several men, at least three, had ambushed Sam here in the clearing, then dragged him away. Her heart started pounding and she wanted to run, but knew she needed to calm down and get her bearings or she’d be lost for sure. Was he hurt? She frantically searched the dirt, but didn’t see any drops of blood. Maybe they’d hit him or knocked him out, but he didn’t seem to be bleeding, at least not badly enough for it to fall to the ground. She exhaled with relief, but it was short lived. Now she was well and truly alone. Sam wasn’t just out hunting, he’d been taken.

  Evelyn sat down in the middle of the footprints and hugged her knees, her mind reeling. Focus up, Merkholtz, she told herself sternly. You can’t go to pieces right now. Find Sam, get back home. Those are the only things you need to think about.

  Before she could start hyperventilating, she stood up and quickly and resolutely started back the way she came, going over a plan of action in her mind. It stood to reason that Sam had been taken by the Glens. Out patrolling their forest, they’d come across an interloper in strange clothes, obviously not one of their own, and in a week when they’d already had two intruders, Brian and Lachlan, they weren’t going to go easy on him. So, Sam was probably back at the estate right now, probably in the tower, or maybe the barn. Evelyn wasn’t sure how they decided which prisoner went where. She wondered if Lachlan had disappeared at the same time Brian had, and if so, how? Some sort of magical blast radius they’d all gotten caught in?

  She thought about the shiny gold pendant Fake Piper had put around Brian’s neck, just before he’d vanished into thin air, presumably to the present. Or the future? Evelyn squeezed the bridge of her nose. Just don’t think about it too hard.

  The pendant had looked exactly like the one Piper had shown them, but Piper’s had been dented and worn, not mirror shiny new. How could she have found it in the barn if Piper had it with her up at the house? Evelyn knew she had it, Piper had been weirdly protective of it and was keeping it in her pocket. The pendant Evelyn found in the barn had to have been the same one, just an earlier version of it.

  Fake Piper had said to Brian that it was for protection, but he must have lost it somehow in the barn. Then when Evelyn touched the pendant, it had returned her and Sam to the point at which he left, maybe trying to get back to its mistress. The ritual must have also been what sent Lachlan forward. Her head was hurting in earnest, trying to puzzle it all out. She had to stop and take a breath, relieved to see she was within sight of the shack and hadn’t gotten lost. Her grasp on what had happened was tenuous at best.

  She saw the ritual through the stable window, she’d seen Fake Piper send Brian to the future. The present? Stop it, she thought. Concentrate. If he dropped it in the barn, it was no longer protecting him. Good, she thought, maybe he’ll get sick and die all on his own. Then she remembered Lachlan, pale and weak in the sitting room. She didn’t want him to get sick and die, and for that matter she didn’t want Sam and herself to get sick and die. She was going to get back to the house, rescue Sam and then they were going to figure out a way home, if they had to find that bitch Fake Piper and hold a knife to her throat to do it.

  “Idiot,” she called herself, standing in front of the shack, looking in all directions. She knew they’d come from the other side of the stream, but other than that she had no clue which direction to go. The whole way to the shack she’d followed Sam, staring morosely at his back, not taking a single notice of her surroundings. If she could have punched herself in the face she would have. “You dumb moron,” she continued to berate herself as she tried to find a tree to climb, thinking since the castle was on a hill, if she could get high enough she’d at least know which direction to start out.

  “Well, well,” a silky female voice with a thick Scottish accent purred from behind her. “I don’t think I’m all that bad, now.”

  Evelyn whirled around in terror to see Fake Piper smiling nastily at her.

  “They’ve got yer man back at the castle,” the beastly woman said with a leer. “Everyone’s all in a titter about the abundance o
f rogues in the forest. I thought to myself that the lad might no’ be alone.”

  “Who are you?” Evelyn squeaked, then winced, thinking her voice was going to come out sounding much less scared than it had. Fake Piper smiled. Now that Evelyn was right up close to her, she could see that the resemblance was superficial and slight, the features were similar, but Piper could never have looked so cruel and hard.

  “Yer not from around here then, are ye? Yer lad seemed a might confused and stupid as well.” She cocked her head to the side and gave Evelyn the once over as if determining how she might better taste, roasted or deep fried. Evelyn suppressed a shudder and tried to stare her down, unwilling to take orders from this crazy witch. Fake Piper merely shrugged. “Fine then, if yer wantin’ introductions.” She dropped a sarcastic curtsey. “I am Lady Daria Glen, a cousin to the fine lord of the manor up yonder.” She nodded her head in what must have been the direction of the estate, not at all the direction Evelyn would have thought. Evelyn swallowed and Lady Daria sighed impatiently. “Have ye no manners where yer from? What is yer name, daft girl?” Her voice had grown colder and Evelyn gave up all pretext of being in charge of the situation.

  “Evelyn Merkholtz,” she said, then cleared her throat. “Is Sam all right?”

  “Aye, Sam is fine fer now. Tell me then, how ye got here?” She glared at Evelyn and took a step toward her. Evelyn took a step back and hurried to answer.

  “I think, uh, that you did it,” she said, hoping this wouldn’t enrage Lady Daria into turning her into a frog on the spot. “When you, um, sent Brian away.”

  Daria considered this, her eyes never leaving Evelyn’s face, never once blinking.

  “So it worked, then,” she said, almost to herself. “Are ye from another time?”

  Evelyn nodded, then spoke when Daria didn’t seem satisfied. “Yes, from a long time in the future. Almost three hundred years.”

  For the first time, Daria seemed shaken. She raised her hand to her throat, her eyes widening. Clearly, this was not the answer she was expecting.

  “Why did you do it?” Evelyn couldn’t help asking, shrinking back a step from Daria’s harsh look. Daria did not deign to answer, instead strode forward at an alarming speed and grabbed Evelyn by the hair, wrapping it around her fist and yanking her down until she was kneeling on the ground in front of her.

  “I need you back at the castle,” she hissed, forcing Evelyn’s head back. For a small woman, she was incredibly strong. “So, you can walk if you like, or I can hit you over yer head and drag ye. Which do ye prefer?” Evelyn struggled to answer, her head held back unnaturally far. Daria released her grip a tiny bit and raised an eyebrow questioningly.

  “I’ll walk.”

  “Good lass.” Daria smiled.

  She hauled Evelyn up by her arm and shoved her in the right direction. Evelyn stumbled, but started walking, her mind racing. She had to get back to the castle, and Daria could take her in the right direction, but after that, she wasn’t at all sure she liked the sound of Daria needing her for something. She didn’t want to be part of some ritual sacrifice. She didn’t even want to be handed over to the Glens. They were Piper’s ancestors, but this was a deadly time. They might not welcome her as a guest, especially not without an explanation of why she and Sam were trespassing on their land. Their strange clothes and accents wouldn’t help them at all either. Her only hope was to somehow get away from Daria once they were back at the estate, but after that she had no clue and very little hope.

  “Yer going to hurt yerself,” Daria said after they’d walked some distance in silence. Beside the occasional jab to walk faster, Daria had all but ignored her. Surprised out of her mental ramblings, Evelyn looked around in confusion. “‘’Tis clear yer thinking too hard is all.” Daria smiled a mean, bitter little grin. Not wanting to get her hair torn out of her head, or worse, Evelyn just plodded along without answering, trying not to let her despair show on her face.

  “Ye asked why I sent Brian to the future?” Daria said, poking Evelyn, but not painfully this time. “Truth is I did no’ mean to send him so far.”

  “Why did you in the first place, though?” Evelyn asked, emboldened by the chatty tone Daria had adopted. Daria scowled and Evelyn ducked in case something painful was on its way.

  “I was going to send him forward until everyone thought he was dead or left the country,” Daria said, ignoring Evelyn’s question. “Then bring him back to me.” Her tone turned dreamy.

  “You love him,” Evelyn said, understanding at last. Brian was a wanted criminal here, about to be strung up for his crimes when he was caught. Lachlan himself was head of a search party hunting him down. And Lady Daria was in love with the bastard. “You couldn’t just run away to France or America or something?”

  Daria’s eyes blazed with fury and Evelyn recoiled, but Daria merely shrugged.

  “I wanted to see how strong I was, to see if I could,” she said simply. “See, we have a plan. When I bring him back, he’ll have knowledge o’ the future and we’ll use it to gain riches and power.” Daria smiled and looked off into the distance as if she were imagining it all.

  Evelyn tried not to expose her feelings, afraid if Daria could tell what she was thinking she’d be killed instantly. Daria was batshit crazy was all there was to it. She’d sent her murderous lover to the future, because she could, to avoid retribution for his crimes and to gather information to make them rich.

  “You and the lad are a problem, however,” Daria said. “Unexpected. I’ll have to send you back, or at least somewhere else.”

  Evelyn sighed with relief when she heard this. All she had to do was not upset this crazy, evil woman and she and Sam would get returned. It was too much to hope for but maybe the new spell would send Lachlan and Brian back when they were sent forward.

  “Or I may just slit yer throats and watch my idiot cousins stand around and gawp at yer corpses.” Daria nodded ahead of them. They were back at the edge of the forest leading up to the estate.

  Evelyn stopped in her tracks, looking at the hulking stone edifice at the top of the hill, no less commanding despite the distance. She was rooted to the spot, actually looked down at her feet, willing them to move.

  “Come on, then, let’s get yer man and get on with it,” Daria said briskly, twenty feet ahead.

  Filled with dread, Evelyn somehow managed to follow her.

  Chapter 17

  Piper slowly turned the pages of the book from the crypt. Some of the writing was in English, some in Gaelic, all of it in the worst possible handwriting, but it didn’t seem to matter what language it was in order for Piper to understand it. Some of the pages just seemed to stop her somehow, and she’d know what was on it regardless if it was just a smudged mess of inkblots or not.

  She’d been sitting hunched over the old clothbound journal for hours, her eyes burning from the bad light in the sitting room, but too focused to get up and move into a room with better light. The moment she’d sat down and opened it to the first page, she’d been overwhelmed with the certainty of vast knowledge to be gained. She tried to tell Lachlan what it was that she’d learned and couldn’t utter anything with any clarity. It was as if she were speaking gibberish even though it sounded perfectly coherent in her head. When she showed him what she’d just read, he shrugged and told her it was just a poem, and a rather bad one at that.

  Not all the pages infused her with the mysterious feeling, some were just to-do lists or what looked like recipes, or more poetry. She had to sometimes turn a page and then go back to it for it to work and she was scared she was going to miss out on something, flipping from page to page and back again. She went through the entire journal three times and this final time wasn’t yielding anything at all. Some of the pages she knew had information on them before, now just had silly drawings of flowers or lists of names.

  But she knew that she knew something, even if she wasn’t quite sure what yet, and kept slowly turning the pages, holding them open, leaning
over them, trying to read the words out loud. Mellie kept trying to get her to eat something but she told the girl to either go to bed in one of the guest rooms or go home. The constant distractions made her want to scream with frustration.

  “Please rest, Piper.” Lachlan’s voice rumbled from what seemed very far away and she forced herself away from the book and into the room with him. Blinking a few times to clear her vision, she smiled at him wearily.

  “I think this book holds the key to getting you home, and Evie and Sam back. I just have to find it.” She’d placed the pendants on the table when they’d returned from the crypt and she reached over to touch them. Their presence reassured her somehow.

  “And that as well?” Lachlan nodded to the pendant in her hand and she looked down in surprise, not realizing she had picked up the shiny new-looking one.

  Fearfully, she thought it was like she wasn’t all the way here, or even completely herself. She shook her head and tried to stop being nonsensical.

  “Yes, maybe,” she said, holding it up to him. “Brian had this one when he was sent here. He must have dropped it in the barn.”

  He looked at her strangely. “How do you know he had that one?”

  She waved her hand at the book, at the pendants, at the air around her, in a flustered gesture. “I - I just do. I keep feeling like I know exactly what to do, and then it’s gone.” She shrugged. He stroked her hair, resting his strong hand at the base of her neck for a moment, then giving her a gentle squeeze.

  “I’ll no’ forget all you’ve done for me, to try to return me to my own time,” he said softly. She leaned her head onto his hand and sighed, once again wishing he could stay.