Next Time #2
He stood at the edge of the cliffs now, beyond the castle yard proper, and looked down at the waves crashing against the shore below.
He only had two more days but, weariness or no, this time he wished the window would come sooner.
He was feeling far too on edge and that disconcerted him.
He should be thinking of home, his home, in this very place, far into the distant future …
and use his time here in the midst of peace and quiet, to figure out what his next step would be, how he could save what little was left.
A bit of something in his peripheral vision, a scarf, perhaps, caught up in a flap of wind, mercifully snatched his attention away from his chaotic thoughts.
He turned to see a woman carefully picking her way in and around the fallen stones at the base of the tower. It was the woman from this morning.
Was she looking for him?
His heart raced, and it wasn’t with trepidation. “Oh, aye, it’s long past time, indeed, for ye to go,” he murmured to himself.
Before Ailfrid had first successfully taught him how to use the windows, wormholes, and slivers to transverse back to any past time in history, Calum had entered into a pact with the aging, exiled physicist – and himself – to never encroach upon or impact the past in any way.
Ailfrid had warned him that even the smallest action could have a ripple effect down through time that could alter the course of things far greater than he had the power to dabble in.
But, oh … aye, she made him want to dabble …
He watched as she paused when she got to the tower itself, bracing one hand on the rough stones. Then bent in half, quite suddenly, and seemed to convulse.
Calum didn’t stop to think about the pact or the possible consequences of his response, but reacted purely on instinct. He was already at a dead run by the time she collapsed.
Three
There had been a knife of pain, followed by a gripping wave of overwhelming nausea …
then the next thing Abby could remember feeling were strong arms lifting her up, cradling her.
Maybe her time had come already, and this was what it felt like.
After. Weightless and cradled and feeling forever safe.
That wasn’t so bad, she thought. In fact, as afterlives went, it was pretty damn good.
Or maybe this was just transition. Whatever the case, she wasn’t going to waste it debating how she felt about it.
She was simply going to enjoy the sweet haven, the cocoon.
She hadn’t felt so … good, in a very long time.
“Are ye all right, then?”
She tensed at the sound of the deep, masculine voice, rich with that Scottish brogue that had always put a zip in her pulse. Which was, in large part, why the Highlands had been the final destination on her things-to-do-before-I-die list.
“Did ye hit your head when ye stumbled? No, don’t move,” he said, as she tried to pull away. “I have ye. You’re safe.”
Safe, yes. She felt that. Very much that. But where? And with whom?
She didn’t open her eyes. She didn’t want to. Not yet. “I – where am I?”
“Loch Sligachan,” he said. “Gillean Castle.”
Her eyelids fluttered open then. “I’m still here?”
“Aye,” he said, lips quirking. “Where did ye think you’d be?”
She blinked and looked more clearly up at him.
And froze. It was the ghost! So, she was dead after all.
Maybe that was why he’d seemed so … lifelike to her.
She had been destined to join him and hadn’t known that was the plan.
Was she going to haunt the castle as he did, then?
Is that how it worked? Wherever you died was where you were doomed to linger?
Was there some kind of plan for that, too?
Although, at the moment, as she thought about it, she couldn’t really complain. If she had to stay somewhere for all eternity … this wasn’t such a bad start.
He was even more arresting up close. Tanned skin, with lines feathering out from the corners of eyes so bright blue, they looked like crystals lit by the sun. He looked … otherworldly enough. She wondered if that was it, if that was why he seemed to all but glow.
“You feel so real,” she said, only realizing she’d said it out loud when he looked surprised, then a little disconcerted.
“Allow me to help you back to the castle,” he said, his face smoothing into a more impersonal expression. “Perhaps you should call a physitech to take a look. Make sure you haven’t a concussion.”
“Physitech?”
“Erm, doctor. Medical. Someone who tends to the ill and infirm,” he clarified, and she could see the consternation, as if he was reaching for words that he wasn’t familiar with.
But he spoke beautiful English, albeit with a heavy brogue.
Perhaps it was merely cultural. Skye was far to the north and west in the Highlands, and she knew that, in many places, Gaelic was still the native tongue and treasured amongst the long-timers.
But … what, exactly did that make him?
Then she realized what he was saying. Ghost or no, he was acting as if she’d just fallen and hit her head. Not like she’d crossed over. But how did that explain him being here and feeling so … solid? And warm, she noted. And strong. Not at all apparition-like, given she was apparently still mortal.
“I’m okay,” she said, ignoring the whopper of a lie that was. For the purposes of needing him, she was fine. “You can let me go.”
She started to move but, once again, he stilled her movement by tightening his arms around her. “Let’s take this slowly, aye?”
“Aye,” she echoed, closing her eyes against the return of the vicious pinch of a headache, knowing the worst of it would subside in a moment or two.
Back to the dull, throbbing ache that was always there.
She tried to hold on to the pleasure of what it had felt like to be pain free for those blissful first moments when she’d first felt his arms around her.
He waited until she opened her eyes again, and nodded, before very slowly pushing to a stand himself, taking her with him, but holding her pressed against his chest the entire time. “Tell me if the pain comes back.”
“I’m – okay,” she said, meaning it this time, though the assessment had nothing to do with her health concerns.
He was tall. Much taller than her five-and-a-half feet.
Her face was pressed against the soft, billowing linen she’d spied him wearing earlier that morning, and his arms felt incredibly good wrapped around her.
The throb in her head seemed to diminish the more she breathed him in.
“Who are you,” she murmured, trying not to burrow her face in the warm heat of him, and failing rather spectacularly.
She couldn’t seem to make herself care enough to pull away, though. And he didn’t seem to mind, so …
“Calum,” he said, offering nothing more. “Come on then, let’s get you out of this damp, chilly wind.” But, instead of slowly supporting her to her feet, he scooped her up fully into his arms.
“Wait,” she said, knowing she should, though, admittedly, her heart wasn’t exactly in the protest.
“I dinnae think ye should be walking about quite yet.” He didn’t wait for a response, but merely turned and began carefully manoeuvring through the tumble of stone and rock.
“I—” She was forced to break off when her headache seized again.
“Let’s get you inside,” he said, frowning now, sounding very concerned.
She could have told him that he needn’t worry.
It wasn’t like she was going to get better.
Instead, she merely dipped her chin in a single nod, closed her eyes, and pressed her cheek once again against the soft linen as she instinctively sought solace.
Even more surprising was that she found it in the steady rhythm of his heart.
She paid little attention to where he was going, though was vaguely surprised to feel them climbing so soon.
Had he crossed the courtyard so quickly?
She concentrated on getting a grip on the throb in her head and trusted him to do the rest. It was bad enough that she was playing the swooning maiden to his gallant rescuer.
In a perfect world, she’d have been bold and daring, and it would have been her vivacious demeanour and infectious laughter that would have captured his attentions.
But her world was far from perfect. And she’d long since accepted that. So … she’d take what she could get and be happy with the serendipitous pleasure of it while it lasted.
She was thankful he appeared to be taking her to her room on the inn side of the castle without stopping to inform anyone of her little setback.
Of course, he’d seen her at her window that morning, so he would know exactly where her room was.
She had been torn over whether to tell the innkeeper about her …
situation, not wanting to burden anyone unnecessarily if anything were to happen to her sooner than she’d anticipated.
In the end, she’d chosen not to. She really didn’t want to be the object of pity or concern, and if something happened … well, it happened.
She hadn’t realized she was clinging to him, hand fisted in his shirt, until he bent to put her down on the bed. Only … She blinked her eyes open and looked around. This wasn’t her room! She squirmed, but he immediately tightened his hold.
“It’s okay. We’re in the tower, but ye have nothing to worry for. I thought it best not to alarm anyone or create a scene. Unless of course ye dinnae mind them all seeing ye being carted up to your loft by a strange man.”