Warrior and the Wanderer (13 page)

“In,” one of the guards grunted and gestured to a gaping black hole in the wall. The light from the torch had not made it inside.

Ian’s choices were to man up and go boldly into the prison cell, or he could fight back and get all twenty-four inches of Scottish steel shoved into his neck by one of his guards. Either way he was screwed. He hoped Bess appreciated his gesture.

“
In
,” the guard repeated.

“I heard you the first time,” Ian said taking a step forward.

It was one step away from getting back to his time, or seeing Bess ever again. He could not go inside that hole. All of his options, those he had yet to weigh, would suddenly be nil.

Suddenly, he heard other steps pounding on the stone floor, behind him, and coming up fast.

“That filth should be in the gaol! Ignore my order and ye’ll find yerselves in there with him!”

Ian turned to face, after he looked down about twelve inches, the guard who earlier had worn Bess’s dirk in his shoulder.

“Put this English bastard in the gaol!”

“English?” Ian asked.

“Aye, ye bastard,
English
.” The guard placed his hands on his waist. “Anyone who speaks as strangely as ye do must be English.” He drew his sword and placed the tip against Ian’s leather jacket.

“I was born here,” Ian said taking one step back from the blade.

“Aye, and I was born in bloody Timbuktu. Get ye into the gaol.” He pushed the blade into the leather, and through to the linen shirt beneath.

“I get your point,” Ian said and stepped backward into the black hole. The other guard, empty manacles in hand, clanged the iron door shut and turned his big key in the equally big lock.

Ian wrapped his hands around the damp metal bars. He was not yet prepared to turn from the meager light and survey his new dark home.

“Hey, you,” he said, nodding to one of the guards. The man turned and glared at him.

“What is it, Englishman?”

“When’s my trial?”

The vapid smile on the man’s thin lips brought fear to Ian for the first time since he had been packed away to this place. Yet, he stood firm in the nasty rushes beneath his boots, and gave the guard a hard stare. It did nothing to diminish the man’s smile. All it did was heighten Ian’s growing anxiety about when he was.

“Trial?” the guard droned. “For attacking one of the royal protectors? Yer trial will be with the block when Her Majesty returns from Stirling and signs the order.”

“I might have known,” Ian said. Five hundred years in the past, justice was swift and frequently involved a large axe. “How long before the Queen returns?” He couldn’t remember what queen exactly.

“Six days.”

Ian nodded. “Good to know how long I have.”

“We’ll make the rest of yer life…
hell
, Englishman,” the guard said.

“I look forward to it.”

The guard walked away, down the narrow passage he had come through, his laughter ringing around the dank walls covered with black slime.

Ian stepped from the torchlight that had seeped in between the iron bars. He squinted in the gloom and saw a pile of rushes against one wall. He stepped over to it, feeling something brush the top of his head. He reached up and quickly discovered the ceiling was no more than an inch above his head.

“Bloody Munchkinland,” he mumbled.

A stirring, made him turn around. The guard who had unmanacled him was staring at him through the bars.

“Boo!” Ian said.

The guard quickly retreated to the wall opposite the gaol, folded his arms, and stared at the door to Ian’s cell.

Ian turned and walked to the back of the cell. He knelt down and took a handful of rushes. Hesitantly, he took a sniff. These rushes were surprisingly fresh. He plopped down on top of them; sat with legs crossed, and rested his arms on his knees.

“Think,” he told himself.

He couldn’t rely on what he knew of history to get him out of this mess. What he knew he could fit in a thimble. For the first time in his life he wished he had paid more attention in school, the days he bothered to attend.

“Think.”

He closed his eyes. Why had he taken the blame for Bess’s rashness? Behind his lids he conjured her standing there in the pub, dirk in hand, hair swept from her face like a fiery mane except for one lock that hung right down the middle of her forehead. She had saved his life.

Of course, he had to step in, take the blame, him with his watered-down Scots accent that sounded like English to the unforgiving. Bess, bless her soul, had given him a smile to his wink before he was carted out into the sludge of Cowgate Wynd.

He was in here, and Bess was out there somewhere.

“Stop thinking the bloody obvious,” he said. “The next thing you’ll say is that you’re attracted to Bess. That’s obvious too.”

So was the fact that he had tallied up countless scenarios all involving Bess, him, and one of those old fashioned four-poster beds with velvet draperies, a roaring fire in a hearth large enough to accommodate his Corvette, and some of the best wine French grapes ever wept. That was one scenario, the one that made being in this dank, musty prison slightly less disgusting and hopeless.

“Blaze,” he whispered.

“
Er De glad for at vaere her?
”

“Oh, God,” Ian said shaking his head. “That Swede in my head is back again.”

“
Jer taler Dansk.
”

Ian opened his eyes and looked at the barred door. His guard was sleeping. The voice was in the cell with him.

He looked straight ahead, to the shadows. One of them moved.

Ian scooted his body hard against the wall, pulling a great deal of the rushes with him.

“Who the hell are you?” he demanded.

“
Jeg er Johan,
” the shadow said. “I am Johan.”

Ian squinted up at the figure looming over him. It wore a blonde beard that seemed to glow in the cell’s gloom. The blue eyes glowed as well, like radioactive marbles. Ian squirmed a little under the penetrating stare. The figure knelt down before him, eyes squinting under bushy, blonde brows, studying him.

“Johan?” Ian asked. “Are you the Swede that spoke to me the other day?”

“
Ja.
”

Ian noticed the figure was clad in great amounts of wool and fur, like a Viking, except he had no pointed hat with horns.

“I am Danish,” the Viking said.

“Danish, Swedish. Same bloody thing. Why the hell are you here?”

The figure moved closer. Ian could smell his breath. Fish. “Swedish and Danish are the same like Scots and English? Do you often greet with an insult?”

Ian winced. “Who the hell are you? My guess is that you are solid evidence that I’m going daft.”

“Johan, I am simply Johan.”

“That means nothing to me.”

“Perchance this will, Ian MacLean.” Johan reached under the pile of fur and wool he wore. He withdrew his hand and dropped several rounds of metal and a few bits of paper into Ian’s lap.

Slowly, he looked down. With great care, he picked up the objects. The familiar feel of them swept fear into his soul quicker than the speed of light. He held his hand up to the light from the torch outside.

“Oh, God. Oh, my good God,” he breathed. He held three American one dollar bills, four pennies, one nickel, and two quarters. He warily looked at the dates on the quarters. Two thousand and fourteen.

“’Tis your change, Ian MacLean. From Last Chance Gas.”

Ian folded his fingers around the money, making a tight fist. He raised his eyes to Johan. “Who the hell are you?”

“A simple messenger,” the Dane replied.

“Don’t give me that shite,” Ian snarled. He rushed to his feet. He breathed out long hard gusts of air. “You were there, in Nevada. You were the one who filled my Corvette with your rocket fuel that shot me five centuries into the past!” He matched the Viking in height, but not in girth. “So, don’t give me that ‘simple messenger’ shite. Who the hell are you, and why the hell am I here?”

“You’re displaced.”

“Displaced? What the bloody hell does that mean?”

“You belong here. I gave you the means to get to where you belong.”

Ian snorted. “Tell me another good one,
Hans
.”

“’Tis Johan. And the other ‘good one’ is you cannot stay once you’ve fixed things.”

“I hadn’t planned on staying longer than necessary,
Johan
. Once I find my Corvette, dry it out—” He stopped. Find his Corvette, dry it out? Who was he kidding? He looked at the Viking. “That’s not going to happen, is it, Mr. Messenger?”

“The tide will be lowest when the moon is full in a little more than a fortnight. You may get your conveyance then. It will take you back to your time.”

Ian narrowed his gaze at the bearded being. “Unh-huh.” He believed him only because he was here in the bowels of Edinburgh Castle, wearing a kilt, and thinking about getting it on with the most beautiful woman he was certain the sixteenth century had to offer. He believed all of these unbelievable things, because he was here.

“What if I want to stay a while longer, get to know Be—?” Was he insane? He should get the hell back to his time, continue to sort out the mess of his life, and not think about some five hundred year old woman.

“
Nej!
No! You will go back when the tide is low and the moon is full.”

“What if I don’t?”

“No one has made that inquiry.”

Ian slumped against the wall and rolled his eyes to the dark ceiling. “You’ve done this before? Shuffling people back and forth through time? What are you, a bloody time-travel transit system?”

“The world is in balance, yet that balance is not kept randomly, Ian MacLean. Sometimes people need to be placed in another time to do a task only they can do. They always go back to from whence they came, and balance is restored.”

Ian took a deep breath and stood away from the wall. The lingering dampness on his clothes made his flesh stand up.

“What balance am I to fix?” he asked.

“You’ve done part of it already by saving her life, and that of the priest.”

“Why?” With a little luck, this Danish bastard would start making some sense.

“Bess Campbell needs to live, needs to be in charge of western Scotland and the isles, not her husband. The priest, well, it simply was not his time.”

“What if they had died? Would the world as I know it end?” Ian asked, his question influenced by science fiction. Step on a bug in the past and return to a future with cities ruled by the mutant mole people.

“
Jah.
Yes. You would return to a world out of balance. Those living in it would not notice the imbalance, but you would exist in nothing short of a living death.”

“Don’t sugarcoat my situation, Johan….”

“Your affection for Bess Campbell has almost brought disaster. Your gallantry brought you to this prison where if I hadn’t stepped in you would surely die. You must suppress your urge to take the same foolish risks you did in your own time. Don’t let your heart be swayed for Bess Campbell.”

Ian took a deep breath. “If I hadn’t stepped in and taken the heat for Bess, she would die on the block instead of me.”

“
Jah.
”

“And I get to go back to my time, where as you probably know I was not winning any popularity contests.”

“You do this task, preserve the balance, and you get something you want.”

“And what is that?”

“Redemption. A fresh start.”

Ian stared into the Dane’s blue eyes. “No one can just give me that. I have to fix things myself.”

“And you will, in this time, and your reward is that all will be changed in your time. Redemption will be yours, Ian MacLean.”

“So you’ve said.” Ian glanced around the dank goal. “And how do I get this party started?”

“Follow me,” Johan said with a wave of one thick arm.

“Where? To the other side of the room?”

“This castle is about as secure a longboat after being pounded by Thor’s hammer.” Johan knelt down and shoved the rushes aside. A hole, with a few flat stones around it, gaped up from the floor. “And the guard outside is deep in slumber.”

“We can’t go through that hole,” Ian said. “It’s too small.”

“Hold your breath then, and follow me,” the Dane said. He stuck both legs in the hole, bracing himself with his arms.

“Are you going to explain to me how I’m to make sure that Blaze—I mean, Bess, gets back home and defeats her husband?” Ian asked.

Johan turned to face him, gaze from under the shadow of his thick brows. “You are here because you have the unique ability to see that Bess succeeds. You will know what to do when the time comes.”

“Clear as sludge. Cheers.”

The Dane disappeared into the hole in a dusty puff of fur and wool.

Ian held his breath and followed him. His name might as well have been Alice.

As he slipped into the stinking tunnel, one thought occurred to him. All that the Dane had told him, and the fact that Ian was a man out of time, had to be kept secret.