Chapter 6
Chapter Six
P olly tugged the last rag from her hair, which bobbed back toward her scalp in a tight curl. All the people from the twelfth century at Dun Talamh used the horrible lye concoction to wash, but Ben had come up with a gentler soap for newcomers to stop them from breaking out in rashes. Rolling her hair up wet in the rags and sleeping on them helped curl her stick-straight hair, now a medium dark brown thanks to the dye she’d made from walnut hulls. A diluted wash of the dye had likewise darkened the skin on her face, hands, neck and arms where they were exposed. She hoped no one would notice the change in her appearance except Rob, who told her she looked even more alluring with her new dark coloring.
“Och, lass, you’re grown as tanned as a dairy maid,” Elspeth said as she finished dressing.
“Not as tan as you,” she sniped back, annoyed that the little darkie had said something. God, she hated having to share a room with two other women, but the only way to rate her own space was to increase her status or pair up with one of the clan. Old Eachann, the head gardener, wouldn’t give her a more important job, and she wasn’t going to waste herself on a guard or a patroller.
“I think your new hair color is lovely,” Inga said as she finished making her bed. Although the chatelaine had more than enough status to deserve her own room, she told Polly she preferred to share so she wouldn’t be lonely at night.
“Thank you, ma’am.” Offering her a fake smile didn’t take much, and after glaring at the other maid she pulled on her boots and stalked out.
That ingrate Ian had escaped, but he’d be back again to search for his stupid treasure. When he came in next time she’d catch him and pull off his wings and legs if she had to. Maybe she’d make him watch as she fed parts of him to the pigs, which would eat anything.
That morning Old Eachann assigned her and Rob to prepare the empty beds in the garden for spring planting, which she hated more than picking herbs. Ben had found a way to recover seeds from bird poop, which he now had them plant to see what might grow. She noticed some drooping white flowers clustered in the back corner of one bed, which like the rest of the weeds always grew back every day. Grabbing the bunch, she yanked them out, and saw something that looked like a fat green worm almost as long as her forearm crawling in the dirt.
Polly hated slimy things, and shrieked as she stumbled back, the white flowered weeds falling from her hand and scattering on the dirt.
“What’s the matter, lass?” Rob asked as he hurried over to her.
She pointed at the bed. “There’s a big old worm crawling around in there. I thought you said this place doesn’t have them.”
“’Tisnae any.” Rob went over and brushed aside the weeds to examine the soil. “Here you saw the thing? How big?”
“Yeah, right there. Huge. It probably burrowed under the ground.” Kicking him in his fat ass would only get her in trouble but imagining doing it gave Polly a reason to smirk for a moment. “Stay here and watch out for it. I’ll go get a spade.”
Before he could reply she headed quickly toward the tool shed on the other side of the bailey. Once she was out of Rob’s sight she changed direction and slipped inside the stronghold, hurrying through the back passages to the room where Rob said Ava would be sleeping. She picked up a bucket of kindling along the way and knocked on the door before stepping inside. The room was empty, so she dumped the bucket over by the hearth and went to the armoire, where she figured the agent would keep whatever she had brought in with her.
Inside the pocket of her jacket Polly found a wad of folded papers that included a search warrant and typed notes about all of her dead husbands, with a whole lot of them about the one before Ian. Of course Travars can’t prove a damn thing, she thought as she read through the notes the FBI agent had made. There are no autopsies, no witnesses, and no bodies she can dig up from the ground and have tested. I’m in the clear.
Yet if that were true, how had she gotten a warrant? It had to be because of Billy Portman.
After Billy’s death his older sister Sherrie had e-mailed her and promised to prove she’d killed her brother. Of course, there hadn’t been any evidence, and Polly abandoned that e-mail account just like all the others to cover her tracks. That horrid bitch still may have made up some e-mail to give to the feds.
Polly considered tossing the notes into the hearth to burn, but instead forced herself to tuck them back in the jacket and close the wardrobe. From there she worked her way through the rest of the room, checking for anything that might tell her what Ava had on her. When she found nothing she uttered a small scream and stamped her foot.
You’d better get out of here before she finds you poking around.
Outside in the hall Polly heard footsteps approaching and darted out of sight. When she peeked around the corner she saw Ben Miller checking both sides of the passage before slipping into the guest room. He came out just a few minutes later looking very guilty and headed in the direction of his work room. Intrigued, Polly followed him, stopping only when she saw him speaking with the clan’s war master, who looked aggravated.
So those two are up to no good like me. The thought pleased her, as she’d always wanted something she could use to make Alec her toy. Wouldn’t it be perfect if she could force him into her bed? She wouldn’t even have to work for it, and if he really was gay and couldn’t get it up, she’d just make him go down on her. Maybe she’d do him in front of his boyfriend, wouldn’t that be fun?
Polly watched the war master and Ben go their separate ways before she left, plans coming together in her head as fast as she could think.
H appy to be carrying a weapon again, Ava returned to her room. As she reached for the latch, she noticed the brown thread she’d borrowed from Elspeth. She had wedged it between the door and the jamb and now it was missing. Drawing the dagger Rory had given her, she entered as silently as possible. Although the guest chamber appeared empty, the thread lay on the floor a few inches inside, proving someone had come in while she’d been out. Her sensitive nose picked up a few, faint odors that hadn’t been present before; perhaps more than one person had come in and searched the room. It seemed an odd thing to do, given that all she’d brought with her was the clothes on her back, her weapon and her phone, and the last two were gone.
What did you think I had in here?
She studied the floor and followed some grains of dirt trailing from the door to her wardrobe. Inside it her jacket hung slightly askew, and the notes in the pocket crumpled as if quickly shoved back inside. The coverlet on the bed appeared to be sliding toward the back wall, and had likely shifted when the thin mattress had been lifted and lowered. Everything she saw told her the intruder had not cared if she noticed her things in disarray, or perhaps wanted to send her a message.
You don’t want me getting comfortable here, do you?
After looking under the bed and inside everything large enough to hide someone, Ava sheathed the blade and sat down by the banked fire. Being outcast as trailer park trash in childhood made her automatically assume others didn’t like her, and might even be taking hostile actions against her behind her back. In reality the disorder might have been created by a nosy maid. The fact that she didn’t know who had gone through her things upset her, but since she had no way to keep anyone out she’d have to put up with it for now. She’d have to be more careful, too, as anyone could barge right in while she was bathing, changing her clothes or sleeping.
A knock came on the door, and she got up and crossed the room in a few strides to jerk it open. “What?”
“’Twill keep, Agent Travars.” Tasgall bowed and turned as if to leave.
“Wait, please.” She leaned against the doorjamb and pinched the bridge of her nose. “I’m sorry. I’m trying not to throw a hissy fit.” She pushed the door open wider. “Come on in.”
The laird regarded her for a long moment before he nodded and entered, and only then did she see he carried a long T-shaped metal bar, two narrow metal rings and a pouch with tools.
Her heart melted a little. “Is that what I think it is?”
“If you reckon ’tis a door bolt, aye.” He showed her the components. “Might I ask what prodded you toward throwing a hissy fit?”
“You ever seen what a cat does after someone stepped on its tail?” When he nodded she took the thread from her pocket and explained to him what she’d done. “I think someone means to step on mine.”
“You neednae fret that such shall happen again.” Tasgall took a small hammer from the pouch. “Permit me attend to the bolt, and then you may assure you’re safe here.”
Ava wondered if she could ever be out of harm’s way in a place she could never escape, a world where magic had turned the past into a prison, and where a murderess might be hiding. Still, a locking door was better than one anyone could open.
“All right, then,” she said. “Thank you.”
Tasgall went to work, hammering long nails to fasten the rings parallel to each other on the door and the frame, and then slid the bar into the door side ring. He then demonstrated how to lift the bottom end of the T to slide it over into the ring on the frame, which bolted the door shut from inside.
“’Twill rattle against the hinge plate if any attempt enter while you sleep,” the laird said, and thumped the door to create the sound. “One of the clan may break down the door, but ’twill take time for that.”
“Time enough for me to arm myself,” Ava murmured, testing how easily the bar slid out of the frame ring.
“You may choose to flee the chamber as well.” Tasgall went over to her wardrobe, opening the doors and reaching inside.
She went to join him, and her jaw dropped as he opened another door at the back of the cabinet to reveal a dark empty space. “I’ll be. A trap door. Why is this in here?”
“When we built Dun Talamh, raiders regularly attacked highland strongholds,” the laird said. “Our war master insisted on adding hidden passages to permit the clan move through the stronghold unseen.”
Ava peered inside again. “You mean there’s a hallway back in there?”
“Step through, and you’ll find the passage. Go left, and ’twill take you out of the stronghold,” he said, his voice going low and soft.
She leaned in and saw the hidden passage went both ways. “What if I go right?”
“You’ll come to me.” He waited until she straightened and looked at him before he added, “To my bed chamber.”
They watched each other, his eyes as guarded as hers likely were. The way he said that in his deep, husky voice should have been a felony. She couldn’t quite read his expression, but something told her he’d like nothing better than for her to go right. This wasn’t only her problem now, and she wasn’t sure he was resisting the attraction between them as much as she was.
Ava didn’t want to tell him off, but she should make her outlook on that clear to him. “Should I get a bolt for the trap door, too?”
“If ’tis your wish, aye.” He didn’t sound disappointed. “Mayhap ’tis wise.”
All the things Tasgall wasn’t saying hung in the air, like words that would come to her in her dreams. Ava’s senses became suddenly and almost painfully acute. She stood a foot away from the laird, and yet the heat of his body caressed hers as if he’d already put his hands on her. He’d discarded his furs before coming to her room, and seeing the smooth pale skin that showed through the lacing on the front of his tunic made her mouth go dry. The soap they used here should have made him stink of lye; instead he had a warm, almost sweet scent that seemed heady and luxurious. Did he bathe in wine and cream? Probably not.
What am I doing?
The laird reached out, catching a wisp of hair that had gotten caught on her lips and smoothed it back. “You neednae ever fear me, Ava.”
“I don’t.” It was almost the truth.
She liked Tasgall, and suspected they’d work together well. She also respected him for what he had to manage, being in charge of all this and dealing with all the folks from the past as well as the future. He was the kind of man who had a big heart but a cool head, and put everyone else’s needs before his own. Chris, she suspected, would have liked him, too.
That said, if the laird touched her again she’d be touching him back—this man from the twelfth century, who wasn’t even entirely human, whom she’d known for all of a minute. A stranger who knew nothing about her, where she came from, or her commitment to her future.
That damn near terrified her.
“Tell me what next you wish do,” Tasgall prompted, giving her something else to focus on.
“Let’s work on getting me up to speed on this spell trap.” Ava needed to get her head clear, and her job always did that. Dun Talamh was, in fact, a mass missing persons case as well as a dangerous trap that needed to be shut down. “Once I understand what you do, then I can begin investigating the particulars of this place, and figure out how we all might get out of here.”
“I shall take you to meet Ben,” the laird said, moving so quickly away from her she suspected she’d offended him.
As they walked through the passages toward the healer’s workshop, Ava casually studied everyone they passed and noted how they reacted to Tasgall. All of the clansmen showed proper deference by stepping aside and bowing, while the guards already at their posts inclined their heads. They glanced at her but didn’t make a big deal of it. The McKeran were curious but also knew how to control their curiosity.
The female servants performed a kind of trotting bob when they saw the laird, many smiling and a few giggling. Collectively they resembled a rabid Tasgall fan girl club. Nearly all of them ignored Ava as if she weren’t even there, but one or two darted unpleasant glances her way. That took her straight back to high school, when kids with rich parents had made her life hell while she’d kept her head down and tried to dodge the worst. She’d always been the one to end up in the dean’s office anyway.
Come on and mess with me now, Ava thought as she smiled at one of the girls glowering at her. I can kick your butt five ways to Sunday.
As they passed, the male vassals tapped their fingers against their brows, but would then stop or trip and stare at her without blinking. Their mouths hung open and they couldn’t seem to get on with whatever they’d been fixing to do, Ava thought. Like they’d never seen a woman before her. While she was flattered, she knew she wasn’t that pretty.
“Have I got dirt on my face?” she asked Tasgall, who gave her a sideways look. “All these fellows are gawking at me something fierce.”
“At the beginning of every cycle our mortal vassals hold a binding ceremony, during which time they may change their husbands or wives. They’ve many customs concerning that, and a lottery for the daring as well. Doubtless they wonder if you’ll join the ritual and agree to wed one of them. The marriage lasts only a year.” He chuckled at her reaction. “’Tisnae required of you, naturally.”
“Best not be.” Although many of the clan’s servants were handsome enough, the thought of being forced to marry one of them made her angry. Then she thought of how the clansmen had regarded her, stoic but almost wistful, too. “Do you and your brothers get involved in this annual marriage business?”
“Never. Even in our own time, the McKeran took lovers, but never wives.” He still smiled, but the amusement had left his eyes. “Some of our female vassals dinnae wish to marry, and instead offer themselves to the clansmen they admire. Many of the outsider women choose to love McKeran as well, too.”
She considered just how many women she’d seen so far at the castle. “Are there enough girls for all the boys?”
Tasgall shook his head. “We’ve only one lady for every twenty men. ’Tis why we permit the women do the choosing, and punish any males who squabble over them. We’re fortunate in that many of our females enjoy regularly taking different lovers, and the clan and our male vassals accept such.”
They came to a hall that curved up with a series of steps into a tower. Halfway up she heard banging, clanking and other mechanical noises, faintly at first but that grew louder the higher they went. Finally, the laird stopped at a set of double doors and pulled them open.
“Ben’s workroom,” he said, gesturing for her to proceed.
Inside Ava saw wind-up machines, gadgets and all manner of strange devices crowding the interior of the tower room. Many of the creations had been left running, and their whirs, clanks and hums combined in a cacophony of noise. It seemed bizarre to see so many things in one place that appeared so technologically advanced, but the closer she looked she saw she was wrong. Most of the mechanical devices seemed quite primitive, often carved entirely from wood, and depended on engineering that had been made obsolete by the industrial age.
Then there were things she simply couldn’t understand no matter how hard she stared at them.
Above her head something that resembled enormous glass globes fitted with hovering rectangles of polished metal funneled and reflected sunlight down from the roof to illuminate a half-dozen work benches. All of the tables had been crowded with crude tools and works in progress. A small garden grew vertically on one wall, watered by a trickle from a small cloud that had been tied like a balloon to a torch bracket. The run-off from the garden streaked through a series of ducts in the floor to empty into a bubbling cauldron over a stone bowl filled with coals that lay inset in the floor, and fed its steam to the leashed cloud.
“Ben,” the laird called over the din. “Come out here and meet our newest arrival.”
A tall man with a head of thick, bright orange curls stood up behind one of the benches. He looked from Tasgall to Ava and gave them an infectious grin.
“Fair morning, my lord. Farlan mentioned we had a new addition, and then I had to collect all the gossip, of course.” He hurried over to them, pausing to step over some wooden boxes and adjust some of the bubbling crocks on the way. After bowing to Tasgall he said, “The grapevine says that you’re Agent Ava Travars, FBI. I’m Benedict Miller, MD.”
“It was nice to hear that you were alive, Dr. Miller.” She shook his hand and then gazed around them. “You got a lot going on here.”
“In a place where no one gets sick, injuries heal overnight and no one can die, it’s best for a doctor to stay busy,” he admitted. “We outsiders tend to get into hobbies in a big way. If you’re into quilting, our chatelaine teaches a class every week. I’ve gone a bit steampunk, obviously, but I always loved tinkering with things as a boy. You should meet our carpenter, Brysen. In addition to the parts I need he carves the most perfect miniature animals, all by hand.”
Someone called for Tasgall from the passage, and he murmured an apology before leaving. Ava watched him go, and the room became a little less interesting without him in it.
I have got to stop crushing on that man before I act like a fool and do something I can’t take back.
“If you’ll come into the next room, it’s a little quieter,” the doctor said, and led her through an open doorway into what looked like a library. “Sit and I’ll brew some tea. Technically a tisane, since there is no tea in the pocket universe, but it’s a good substitute. I’m working on a coffee replacement, too, but it’s slow going. Have you had a chance to look around the place yet?”
“Some.” As she sat down by a pretty little table built from rainbow-colored wood, Ava detected a slight British accent ghosting his words. He seemed relaxed and happy enough, although all the things out in the other room worried her a little. Steam punk, he’d called it, but he had a cloud on a leash and a literal garden wall. “How have you been doing here, Dr. Miller?”
“Call me Ben, please.” He poured the brew into two cups that resembled the tea kind from the outside world. “I’m okay. Living out a few of my fantasies, obviously. I played Dungeons & Dragons in medical school, so I really loved getting trapped in a medieval time loop dimension with a sentient castle.”
Ava didn’t know what he meant by sentient but decided to let that pass. “Looks like you do a decent tea party, too.”
“I’m an unabashed Anglophile.” He carried over a tray with the cups and a plate of what looked like shortbread. “These are made with oat flour, which we’re not able to grind very finely, but they’re pretty good. I know my work room is a bit chaotic. You’re worried I’m turning into a mad scientist, right?”
“Seems like you’re keeping busier than you can manage,” she said gently.
“You’re right. The first month I was here I just drove myself crazy trying to get back to the real world. Our world,” he corrected himself. “This dimension is real, too, at least to the people trapped here. I just couldn’t believe there was no way out. There isn’t, if you want to save yourself a lot of time and a whole mountain of frustration looking for one.”
“I’m not in a hurry to leave just yet.” Although she was tempted to tell him about Marianne James, he might run his mouth to others. She didn’t want to give the black widow any notice that someone had come in looking for her. “Tasgall said you counsel some of the newcomers.”
“Yeah, I considered becoming a shrink before I chose pediatrics. The longer you’re here, the more you’ll need someone to talk to, trust me. That’s really all I do: lend them an ear and let them vent.” He picked up a cookie and dunked it in his tea before taking a bite. “Have you met Alfie yet? He’s the first one who got caught in the trap, way back in the thirteenth century, when the clans got together to hunt down and exterminate the last of the Viking raiders in the highlands. He’s also my assistant.”
“Is he a Viking or a Viking hunter?” She couldn’t imagine that.
“Ever the man paints me the raider.” A short, pale-haired man dressed in a heavy apron over his dark tunic and trousers came in lugging a large wooden crate. “I’m neither, my lady.” He bowed to Ava before dropping the crate at Ben’s feet. “All you wished from the old heap, Healer.”
“Attaboy, Alfie,” the other man said, grinning.
To her the Viking said, “My name’s no’ Alfie, Agent Travars. ’Tis Ulf. My sire and kin died during a raid when I was but a lad and left me in the hands of the clan they attacked.”
Ava winced. “Sorry to hear that, Mr. Ulf.”
“Och, ’twasnae what you reckon. The laird’s wife found much favor with me and raised me as her own son. She’d lost all her own bairns to sweating sickness. ’Tis why I’m near as Scots as the McKeran.” He grinned, showing beautiful white teeth. “I’d gone into the forest to shoot a deer for her birthday meal when I blundered into a gang of facking Viking hunters.” He flicked his fingers at his white-blonde hair and pale blue eyes. “I suspected they’d end me no matter what I said, so I ran into the old castle ruins to hide from them. Only I ran too far, and here I remain.”
He spoke of being separated from his adopted family and everything he’d known as if it were meaningless, but his pale eyes shadowed and his voice dropped an octave. Being torn away from his time, Ava thought, must seem worse than being hunted.
“Tomorrow you must bring me all you find restored, so I may match them,” Ben said as he rummaged through the box’s contents. Ava could see he’d gone tense, as if Ulf had reminded him of his past. “You can go now.” To her he said, “I’m planning to compare the rubble that reappears in the morning to what Alfie removed, piece by piece. Assuming it does reappear, but of course it always does.”
His use of the wrong name again made Ava give the other man a quick glance, but he shrugged and bent over to speak to her in a softer voice.
“If you find yourself in need of a lover, my lady, you may visit my chamber at the end of the passage to the tower,” Ulf said, his pale eyes warming. “I’d happily oblige you, any night you have need.”
He winked at her before he left, almost as if to indicate he was joking.
“I think he might still be part raider,” she said, and chuckled.
“He’s serious about the offer, you know,” Ben said as he looked through the contents of the crate. “You should be flattered, too, because the man is extremely finicky about women. Every year when the clan holds the binding ceremony, which is basically a mass divorce and remarriage festival, all the maids try to choose him. He always refuses every one of them.”
She wondered if the healer was jealous of his assistant. “Maybe this year they’ll choose you instead.”
“I’m not much for flings, actually.” He looked over as the laird came through from the work room. “My lord, would you care for some brew? It’s a fresh pot.”
“No’ today, Healer, my thanks.” He regarded Ava. “Darro and some of the men bid me help them search for some vassals gone missing. Would you care to join us?”
Ava had the immediate sense that things were worse than he’d let on. And how could anyone go missing in this place when there was no way to escape it? “Be glad to.”