Highlander Assassinated (Highlander In Time #16)

Chapter 8

CHAPTER 8

J etlag, Lissa decided, not liking the anxious feeling that was creeping over her. This was probably a symptom of jetlag. She hadn’t done a lot of international travel in her life, but she knew people who had, and they always talked about how crazy the effects of time changes could be. You’d think you were feeling fine, but then you’d wake up in the middle of the night and start making coffee — stuff like that. Maybe that was what had happened. Somehow, while her mind had been distracted with thinking about witches, and castles, and ruins, she must have gone into autopilot and found her way onto a walking track, or something.

That made sense, at least. It wasn’t like she’d blundered into the forest — the dirt path she was on was wide enough for three or four people to walk side by side, and it looked like it had been kept deliberately clear of vegetation. Annoying as hell, of course, and she was going to be embarrassed once she finally reached the hotel and had to explain to Davey how she’d managed to get lost in less than half a mile of straight road, but at least there was an explanation for it. Shaking her head, Lissa turned and started walking back the way she’d come, hoping she’d find the road again quickly.

But as the path she was on continued in the fog, it showed no sign of giving way to paved road. On the contrary, she found herself having to step with more and more care as the smooth, packed dirt began to give way to mud, and its surface became rutted and uneven, almost tripping her repeatedly. The fog was still pressing in, though it had lost most of its fairytale, magical quality — instead, she found herself grimacing at it resentfully with the strange and completely irrational conviction that it was the reason she’d gotten so badly lost.

At last, something other than trees and fog came into view, and Lissa exhaled with relief as she realized she’d reached the gates of the hotel. Not that there was any signage to indicate that — she frowned, slowing to a halt with the gates about twenty feet ahead of her. Was she really in the right place? Why hadn’t Davey mentioned that there was a dirt road to the hotel? And why did it feel like she’d traveled much, much further than the map had suggested?

Map. That was a good idea. Shaking her head, Lissa pulled her backpack off her shoulders, annoyed with herself for getting so spooked. Was that part of jetlag, too, getting superstitious about magical fog luring you into the woods? Or was that just the after-effects of the spooky stories Davey had been telling her about women getting lost, spirited away by faeries, and magically transformed…

Movement caught her eye, and she froze. Through the gates up ahead, she could see a point of warm, flickering light. Squinting through the fog, she realized it was a light. Not the kind of light she was used to, with a bulb and batteries — this was the kind of light they carried in the kinds of stories Davey had been telling her. A torch. For a moment, she wondered if she was dreaming. There was a man standing there, holding a flaming torch, looking every bit the part of an extra from Davey’s stories, right down to the period costume. In combination with the antique gates, the forest, and the fog, it made quite the impression. There was even a sword in a scabbard on his hip.

Lissa bit her lip. She’d looked at photos of the place she was staying, and while it had been clear that sometimes the staff dressed in period costumes and the like, there had been plenty of regularly dressed people in the pictures, too. And she sure as hell hadn’t seen anyone holding weapons. Maybe she was being silly, but Lissa hadn’t survived in her industry as long as she had by ignoring her intuition. As she watched, a second man in the same kind of costume as the first moved up beside him. They were too far away for her to hear what they were saying, but they were speaking to each other, and nothing about their body language suggested that they were there to welcome guests. This second guard — because that was how they were dressed — didn’t have a sword like the first one, but when he turned, she could see that he had a crossbow on his back.

Absolutely not, Lissa thought firmly. She’d had enough to do with armed strangers for one lifetime. And so she turned on her heel and walked straight back into the mist. Sure, it’d be embarrassing to explain what had happened to Davey, but right now she liked that idea a whole lot better than the idea of getting the attention of the costumed weirdos. There was just something deeply off about the whole situation.

And so she walked, jaw tight and face set. The fog was leaving an unpleasant damp residue on her skin, and she wrinkled her nose when she touched her hair to find it damp — no doubt it would be frizzy as hell once she took it out of its braid later. The uneven, rutted road drove her to walk on the very edge of it — was that how she’d somehow missed the point where the paved road gave way to dirt? Where had that been, anyway? She increased her pace until she was almost running, scanning the road intently for the familiar shape of Davey’s car by the side of the road, something uncomfortably close to panic rising in her chest with every passing minute. Where was he? Had he driven off? How could he have gotten past her without her seeing his headlights or hearing the engine?

Eventually, a shape did come out of the fog ahead of her — but it definitely wasn’t a car. At first convinced that she was having some kind of weird dream, she stopped dead by the side of the road, squinting in disbelief at the figure as it resolved itself. It was a man on a horse — the sound of hoofbeats thudding against the muddy road had reached her ears ahead of the sight of him, but she hadn’t realized what it meant. There was a touch of relief in her at the sight of another human being, but it was quickly eclipsed by more of the unease she’d felt when she’d looked through the gates at the strange men in costumes. This man had to be one of them. He wasn’t wearing their strange uniform, at least, but he certainly wasn’t dressed like any equestrian she’d ever seen. He was wearing a tartan kilt, in fact, with a thick woolen cloak around his shoulders and covering the rump of his horse. In one hand, he held the reins, and with the other he lifted a lantern, in which burned a small, cheerful little light.

Lissa’s uneasiness intensified. The guys at the hotel had been one thing — but this guy was on the public road, dressed like an extra from Braveheart or something. This was not the kind of man she was keen on meeting by the side of the road when she was alone, disoriented, and — most importantly of all right now — unarmed. But it seemed she had no choice. He’d already seen her and was riding in her direction with a relieved-looking smile on his face. His blond hair was damp from the fog like hers, and by the light of his lantern she could make out that his eyes were a bright, arresting blue. Lissa frowned as he started climbing down from his horse, realizing why she was struggling to make out his features. Why the hell was it so dark? she wondered It felt like the night had closed in while she was walking — but that made no sense at all.

Lissa braced herself. Uneasy or not, this guy was most likely her best chance at figuring out just how the hell she’d managed to get so lost.

“Hi there,” she said, surprised by how loud her voice sounded in the dark of the forest. “I’m hoping you can point me in the direction of the hotel?”

But her question, it seemed, had fallen on deaf ears. Because when the horseman had gotten close enough to her to see her face, he’d frozen in place where he stood — and he was staring at her as though he’d seen a ghost.