Chapter 21
Chapter
Twenty-One
Brodie stayed close to Maddie, guiding her over the uneven ground with a steadying grip on her elbow. She moved like someone in a dream, her face pale beneath the wet tangles of her hair. The Cailleach walked ahead, leading them away from the stones.
“Where are we going?” Maddie’s voice was rough, strained.
“To the threshold,” the Cailleach said without turning. “The door stands open, but not for long.”
Thunder rolled overhead—distant but growing closer. Brodie knew that sound, felt it in his bones the way he’d felt it on the slave ship when the storm had broken his chains.
“It’s happening again,” he said. “Like the night ye freed us from the ship. The storm that came from nowhere.”
The Cailleach glanced back over her shoulder, storm-gray eyes meeting his. “Aye, lad. The threshold opens when the need is great enough. When justice demands it. When choices must be made.”
They reached a clearing at the edge of the plantation grounds, where the cultivated land gave way to wild jungle. The rain came harder now, soaking through Brodie’s shirt, plastering Maddie’s dress to her skin. Wind whipped through the trees, bending them nearly double.
“Here,” the Cailleach said, stopping at the clearing’s edge.
There, half-hidden in the undergrowth: a squat stone, waist-high, covered in the same spiral markings as the center stone in the garden. But these markings glowed—not sickly green like the widow’s corruption, but pure white-gold, pulsing like a heartbeat. Like something alive.
Lightning split the sky, close enough that Brodie felt the crack of it in his chest. In the flash of light, the Cailleach changed, no longer the old woman from the beach, but a figure woven from storm clouds and sea spray, vast and ancient, with eyes like stones smoothed by centuries of tide.
“The stone is cleansed,” she said, her voice the rumble of distant thunder. “The widow’s blood magic burned away. The door between worlds stands open again.”
Maddie reached for him, her fingers finding his and gripping tight. Cold. Trembling.
“What do you mean?”
“Touch the stone, child, and ye’ll return to your own time.” The Cailleach’s gaze fixed on Maddie. “To your friends, your life. Everything ye left behind when ye fell through the threshold.”
Understanding struck Brodie like a blow to the chest. The stone could send her home. Back to her time. Away from him.
“And if I don’t?” Maddie’s voice was barely audible above the rain.
“Then the door closes. The threshold collapses. Ye’ll stay in this time, with no way back.” The Cailleach’s expression held something that might have been pity. “Forever.”
The weight of it settled on Maddie’s shoulders, pressing down until she swayed on her feet. Brodie steadied her, his hand at her waist, even as his own world tilted sideways.
“The threshold willna wait.” The Cailleach gestured to the stone, its markings pulsing faster now, brighter. “Touch it and see what ye’re choosing between. Then decide. But know this—once the stone goes dark, the door is sealed. There is no third chance.”
“I don’t understand—”
“Touch the stone,” the Cailleach said. “Both of ye, to see what lies on either side of this choice. Then she decides.”
Brodie’s throat tightened. “I dinna need to see—”
“Yes, ye do, lad.” The Cailleach’s voice was gentler now. “She needs to see her world again. To remember what she’s leaving. And ye need to see it too. To understand what she’d be giving up.”
Maddie looked at him, rain streaming down her face, her eyes wide with fear and something else. Something that made his chest ache.
“Together?” she asked.
He nodded, not trusting his voice.
They stepped forward. Placed their palms against the glowing stone.
The world exploded into light.
The vision hit him like a physical blow.
Light exploded behind his eyes, and suddenly he was no longer standing in the storm-soaked clearing. He was somewhere else—somewhere that couldn’t exist, shouldn’t exist, but felt as real as the stone beneath his palm.
He stood on a street paved smooth as glass, but hard beneath his boots.
Buildings rose around him—not stone or timber, but strange materials that gleamed like polished metal and reflected the sky.
They towered higher than any cathedral he’d ever seen, reaching toward the heavens with impossible confidence.
And the noise. Sweet Saints, the noise.
Roaring filled his ears—mechanical, inhuman, like a thousand forges all burning at once.
He spun, and his breath caught. A carriage rolled past, but no horses pulled it.
The thing moved on its own, its body sleek and painted red, windows of perfect glass showing people sitting inside as calm as if this were natural.
Another followed, then another, a river of horseless carriages flowing past in both directions, faster than any mount could ever run.
Above him, something darker than a bird cut across the sky.
He stumbled backward, hand flying to where his sword should be.
The thing was massive—a great metal beast with wings that didn’t flap, roaring as it climbed higher and higher.
People sat inside it. He could see their tiny faces through the windows as it passed overhead, hundreds of souls packed into the belly of this impossible creature that flew like it had been born to the air.
“What devilry—” he started, but his voice was drowned by the cacophony.
Everywhere he looked was strangeness. Lights that glowed without flame, appearing and disappearing at regular intervals.
People dressed in clothes too casual for public—women in trousers that clung to their legs or showed all of their legs, men without coats despite the autumn chill.
No one wore a sword. No one seemed afraid.
And the smell. Not dung and smoke and humanity packed close, but something chemical, burnt, wrong.
He turned, desperate for anything familiar, and caught sight of a woman walking toward him. Dark curls, sun-kissed skin, wearing some strange costume that showed her shoulders and arms with shameless ease—
Maddie.
But not his Maddie. This woman moved with confidence, her face smoother, younger somehow, unscarred by the widow’s cruelty or the weight of her choices. She walked past him without a glance, speaking to thin air, her voice clear despite the roar of carriages.
“I’m fine, I just need—” She pressed something to her ear, something flat and gleaming like polished glass. “No, I haven’t forgotten lunch. I’ll be there in ten minutes.”
She was speaking to someone who wasn’t there. To the air itself, as if this were normal.
Brodie tried to reach for her, but his hand passed through her shoulder like she was made of mist. A vision. This was only a vision of what could be.
The world shifted, and he was somewhere else.
A room with walls painted white, furnished with chairs and tables made of materials he couldn’t name.
Clean. Everything was so impossibly clean.
Maddie sat at a desk in a small room, surrounded by glowing boxes and papers scattered everywhere.
A sign on the door read “Coastal Adventures Tours.”
She was answering one of those strange flat devices pressed to her ear. “Yes, I can book that tour for you. Rose Hall is beautiful this time of year. You’ll love it.”
Her voice sounded hollow. Practiced. Empty of the spark he knew.
The scene shifted again. Maddie alone in a different room, smaller, books lining the walls.
She stood before a window as rain streaked the glass, her hand pressed to the pane.
Behind her, on a desk, one of those flat glass things that glowed with inner light, showing moving pictures like some kind of sorcery.
She was older now. Thirty, perhaps. Still working at the same place, still booking other people’s adventures while living none of her own. He could see it in the way she held herself—the careful control, the walls built around her heart.
Two women appeared—friends, he thought, by the way they moved around her with easy familiarity. They were laughing about something, trying to pull her out for an evening, but she shook her head. Too much work. Too tired. Maybe next time.
The vision shifted forward. Years passing like pages turning. Maddie at her desk, older still. Two score, perhaps. Still answering phones. Still booking tours. Still safe and comfortable and completely, utterly alone.
He saw her on dates that went nowhere, saw the disappointment in her eyes when none of the men were right. Saw her wake up in the middle of the night, reaching for someone who wasn’t there.
Saw her stand on a beach—perhaps in Jamaica, perhaps somewhere else—staring at the horizon with tears streaming down her face.
And he understood, with a cold certainty, what he was seeing. Her future. The life she could have if she went back. Safety and certainty and all the marvels of her time. Carriages without horses and metal birds that flew and lights without flame.
Everything modern and comfortable and easy.
Everything except joy. Everything except purpose. Everything except him.
The vision shattered.
I felt him there, solid and real even in the vision. His hand still pressed to the stone next to mine. His presence anchoring me even as the visions tried to pull me forward.
Light consumed everything, and suddenly I was home.
Not the plantation, not 1693. Home. My apartment, the one I’d lived in for two years, the one that smelled like vanilla candles and old books.
I stood in my living room, staring at my bookshelf, where a framed photo hung—the photo I’d taken of the mysterious stone circle.
Except in the frame, there was only a blank wall behind it.