Chapter 7 #3
Ailith licked her lips. Teagan was trying to get rid of William. Mayhap Ailith could learn Teagan’s truth if William were not present.
William, God love him, got the hint.
“Where is this shadowy place? I know what type of place Ailith prefers for her wee plants.”
“Continue toward the standing stone,” Teagan said, pointing north. “Ye will find a rowan overgrowing onto the path at the start of the glen. Turn at the tree, and ye will find a collection of moss-covered stones. It might work for ye, and ye shall be gone but three-quarters an hour at most.”
William’s cautious azure gaze shifted to Ailith, and she nodded. She sensed nothing worrisome about Teagan, and neither did William, if he was willing to seek out the place for the mushrooms.
With a lingering kiss and a soft caution of be safe whispered in her ear, William exited the croft, and she heard the jingling of Lugh’s harness as he mounted.
Once he was gone, Ailith joined Teagan at the table and took a deep breath.
No time like the present, she thought with a twinge of irony.
“Where are ye from, truly?” Ailith risked asking.
Normally, she’d have more caution in her words, but when Teagan said mushrooms at the market, Ailith knew, she knew, that Teagan was a voyager like herself.
“Who won the war?” Teagan asked in a soft voice, keeping her gaze upon her herbs. “The Great War?”
The Great War? Ailith knew of only one war called the Great War. World War One.
“The British. And French and Americans,” Ailith added softly.
A slight smile tugged at Teagan’s thin lips, and her eyes watered, churning like the water in a summer loch.
“We won,” she said in an awe-struck voice, then wiped her eyes. “Who sent ye?”
Ailith cleared her throat. Telling William about her voyage through time was one thing – sharing that information with a stranger who might have made the same voyage was altogether different.
“A Romani woman. She called herself a witch. She said I needed to go back in time to save these mushrooms. They are needed to help cure a dreaded illness.”
“Romani?” Teagan asked with a slightly raised eyebrow.
Ailith opened her mouth to explain to the woman about the Romani, but a hundred years earlier, Teagan probably wouldn’t understand the context. In 1916, those groups were only known by the older, more disparaging term.
Ailith pursed her lips. “Her people may have been called Gypsies in your time?”
Teagan’s eyes remained on the tabletop, but she nodded. “I left America during a long season of illness, but ‘twas no’ why I left. When did ye leave?”
If Teagan was asking about the outcome of World War One, then she must have left sometime between 1914 and 1917. She might not take Ailith’s information well.
“I left over a hundred years after ye. In 2023.”
Teagan’s averted eyes widened. “2023,” she whispered. Finally, her face shifted to Ailith. “It seems an impossible year.”
“All of this seems impossible,” Ailith admitted. “Why did ye come back in time? What is your purpose?”
“Purpose?” Teagan asked, straightening. “My lone purpose was to save my own life.”
Ailith’s hand dropped flat to the tabletop as her brow furrowed. “Nay. Eladon, the Romani woman, said there must be a purpose. Whose body did ye overtake?”
Now Teagan appeared confused. “Body? None but my own. What happened to ye?”
Ailith licked her lips. “My family has deep roots in these lands. My father was the last of the Gordon men, and I the last of the Gordon women. Eladon said she could send me back where I would overtake my great-grandmother many times removed and live out my life as her. And my purpose was to save these mushrooms from being razed by the mad king.” She swept her hand over the pile of mushrooms on the table.
Teagan tilted her head and touched one of the mushrooms with a fingertip.
“Och, like a fae changeling. Mayhap her way meant ye were certain to make it. My woman, she was a Gypsy in America, in Wilmington, Virginia. I was a nurse at the hospital there. A good job for an Irish, eh? I had a patient who became enamored with me. He started following me everywhere. He even tried to attack me, and I moved. I had to move so many times . . .”
Her voice trailed off. But she didn’t need to say more. Ailith realized her meaning, and it was not an occurrence that had diminished with time.
Teagan had a stalker. Oh dear.
Ailith remained quiet to let Teagan tell her story.
“I couldn't keep jobs. I had to change hospitals. I was running out of money, out of places to work. I was young, younger than ye, and did no’ know what to do. I was planning on joining the army as a nurse.” She glanced up at Ailith.
“It was 1916, and they needed people for the war. Men to fight, and women to heal. I was going to do that, but the night before, I went to a carnival. An elderly woman had a fortune-telling tent. Her name was Lavina. She opened my hand to read my palm and then grabbed it, hard. She yanked on my hand and wouldn’t let go.
Don’t go, she said. Don’t stay. What was I supposed to do with that fortune?
I tried to get up, and she yanked me back down.
I can help ye, she told me. Otherwise, ye die. ”
Ailith immediately understood the conundrum. She’d die in the war, or her stalker would kill her.
“What did ye do?” Ailith probed, fascinated by her tale.
“Lavina said she could offer me a solution, but ‘twasn’t a guarantee, and I may no’ like the outcome, but she saw it would save me. I’d live considerably longer than if I didn’t do it. Considerably longer, ‘twere her exact words.”
“So she sent ye back.”
Teagan nodded. “She said she’d try, but she was no’ certain it would work. And there was no person in history for me.” Teagan squinted a bit. “Perchance they learned more in one hundred years. Mayhap having a person in history makes it work better.”
Ailith nodded. “Yet it seemed to work for ye. My woman had no hesitation that it would work when she sent me into my grandmother’s body.”
I have done this many times.
Ailith shuddered.
“So your purpose was to save your own life. And mayhap help others with your herbs?” Ailith pointed to the bog myrtle.
Teagan shrugged. “Your words make sense, though I dinna presume to understand how any of this time traveling happens.”
“Neither do I,” Ailith replied. “I consider myself a voyager through time, and that’s about all I understand.”
“Voyager,” Teagan repeated. “I like that. Was it difficult for ye? When ye arrived? On your voyage?”
Ailith nodded. “A wee bit. Ailith’s family thought I was strange, and I had to share some of the story of my voyage with William before I wed him.
But I have a strong history here. My father and I gave tours of Dunnottar Castle, and I grew up in this area.
It made blending in a wee bit easier. What of ye? How did ye manage?”
“I had no family, no clan, but I look Irish and speak with a lilt, so I claimed I was visiting Alba and my family died on the boat from Ireland, or rather Eire. I had to pivot on that quickly,” Teagan said with a tight smile.
“And ye set up a home here, in the wilds by yourself?”
Teagan shrugged again and reached for Ailith’s bot myrtle.
“As I nurse, I had some healing skills. I tried to live closer to Stonehaven when I first arrived, but too many people gossiped about me, and I overheard one person say witch once, and that scared me. I moved out here, and if someone needs assistance, they seek me out. Safer this way.”
“Aye, safer.”
“Be careful,” Teagan warned in a slightly lower tone. “One misstep and ye can be seen as touched in the head or under fae magic. Especially if they see ye as a changeling, which is what sounds to me.”
She fell silent, and then a question popped into Ailith’s head. “Do ye have dreams at all? Dreams of Livina or someone like her?”
She told Teagan of her most recent dream. Perchance Teagan was the someone who knows or could tell her who was in the dream.
“I used to, but they passed once I settled. From what I understand, those in the dreams, they are the touchers. The ones who touch ye to send ye back?” Ailith nodded her understanding.
“From what Livina told me, touchers can also travel, but voyagers can only travel. The person in your dream might be a toucher, if that means anything to ye.”
Teagan emptied the packet onto the table and the quiet resumed for a moment before she spoke again.
“Ye said ye became your grandmother. Ye took her name? What were ye called, before?”
“Emilie. I was called Emilie.”
Teagan smiled at Ailith, the first real smile she had expressed all day. “Well, Emilie. Nice to meet another voyager.”
Then she stuck out her hand in a move Ailith hadn’t seen in a long time. It was a handshake. Ailith took Teagan’s hand, a wide smile creasing her own face.
“Hello, Teagan. Nice to meet ye.”