Chapter Eleven #3
The next picture was from York, the crooked old buildings along the Shambles leaning toward one another above the narrow street.
Another showed York Minster, though she’d managed to cut off the top of one tower.
The last was more frivolous, a picture she’d taken of the ridiculous little dessert she’d ordered the evening before everything went wrong, because Mallory had demanded photographic evidence that Anna was actually enjoying herself rather than spending her entire vacation visiting historic sites.
A quiet laugh escaped her.
“What amuses ye?”
Anna looked up to find Bram watching her from across the small hut.
“These.” She shuffled the photographs together and then hesitated, struck by a thought. “Actually, this should prove what I say about what year I actually live in. You don’t have anything like this here, do you?”
She held up the picture of herself beside the Thames.
Bram’s attention sharpened as he stared at her image.
“It doesnae prove anything save that ye’ve access to things unknown,” he said as he sat down against the far wall.
Anna rolled her eyes. “Well, then I guess I don’t have to believe you that the year is 1305—all I have is your word that it is. Maybe that’s not good enough.”
“Ye have that right, to disbelieve.”
She interpreted that to mean that he didn’t particularly care what she believed.
With a sigh, she returned it to the rectangular box, closing the flap. As she returned the package to her bag, she spied the camera itself and an idea struck her.
She readied the camera and moved away from the wall, half-crawling to sit with her back to Bram.
“What now?” he asked, eyeing her camera with obvious distrust.
“It’s a camera,” she answered innocently. “Just... hold still.”
He frowned at once.
Anna scooted a little farther until she sat directly in front of him, then turned enough that her back rested lightly against his knee. Holding the camera out before them, she stretched her arm as far as it would comfortably reach and forced what she hoped resembled a pleasant smile.
“Anastasia...” he growled an unnecessary warning.
She pressed the button, and the brilliant flash lit the little hut from wall to wall before disappearing as suddenly as it had come.
“Bluidy hell!”
Anna only laughed, turning immediately to watch the rectangle of paper emerge from the front of the camera with its familiar little mechanical whir.
Bram’s gaze never left the device.
She pulled the photograph free and held it toward him. “Here.”
He looked at the tiny white rectangle as though it might spring to life and bite him. Rather than take it, he leaned back a fraction, his suspicion deepening into something very near alarm.
That only improved Anna’s sudden good humor. “It won’t bite you,” she assured him, holding it in front of him.
Still wary, he accepted it between thumb and forefinger, holding it gingerly as though indeed, he did fear it might come to life and cause him harm.
“Just watch,” Anna instructed, watching him and the developing photo.
For several moments, nothing happened, and Bram’s brow furrowed yet more. Then, ever-so-slowly, pale shadows began to bloom beneath the glossy coating. Bram’s eyes narrowed. He lifted the little square closer to the firelight, studying it with intense concentration.
The vague shadows gradually deepened into recognizable shapes.
A face emerged first—hers—followed by the dark outline of another figure behind it.
He watched the impossible happen in his own hands.
His suspicion gave way to a puzzled frown, his eyes widening as the vague shadows resolved into her face, then his own.
He went utterly still, staring at the finished image with a stunned amazement he made no effort to conceal.
Anna couldn’t help smiling again.
“Well,” she said, peering over to admire the finished photograph, “I look like I’m having a lovely time.”
Bram said nothing, but continued staring at the image, completely dumbfounded. He turned it over, seeming disappointed to see that the back side remained just white.
“And you...” She laughed now. “You look like you’re contemplating murder. Again.”
She didn’t exaggerate. While she’d managed a smile that, though somewhat forced, might almost have convinced someone she actually was enjoying herself, Bram sat behind her with all the charm of...
well, of a man actively contemplating how long it would take to dig a shallow grave.
His heavy brow was drawn low over his impossibly dark eyes, his mouth was settled into its customary grim line, and the look he directed toward the camera likely wasn’t so far different than the last thing those Englishmen had seen late this morning.
Anna challenged him, “Would you categorize this, also, simply as something I have access to?”
“Nae, lass,” he said slowly after a long moment. “'Tis magic, this business.” He curled his lip and thrust the picture at her. “And I’ll have nae part in it.”
Anna tossed her head back in frustration, refusing to take the image from him. “It’s not magic! It’s just... normal, where I’m from. But whatever. Believe what you want.” She glared down at her false smile and his menacing frown. “Keep it. I don’t want it.”