Awaken the Highland Warrior

It could be she wasn’t scared because she was the one who’d brought them here. He looked around the room, relieved it was simple, with no newfangled devices. He’d seen enough modern inventions to make him wish he was still in the time vault. Automobiles and airplanes and buildings that reached the sky. He touched his pocket where he kept the phone she’d insisted he have, claiming someone could talk to him on it from the other side of the world. If anyone knew he was alive.

The quest for knowledge and convenience in this time was alarming. Nothing was left unexplored. There was some machine or apparatus to do anything a person might want. It seemed to him people had more need for things now, and less for each other. If this generation knew what evil walked among them, their technology wouldn’t be so prized. If he didn’t find Druan, all the knowledge and all the gadgets in the world wouldn’t save them.

Faelan started for the door, when he heard a squeak. One end of the board he stood on had risen. He kneeled and lifted the plank, peering underneath. A piece of paper was tucked next to a small box. He picked the paper up, and a necklace fell to the floor, a tarnished silver cross. The bottom tip was notched, like a key. He turned it over and saw an emblem on the back. It looked familiar, but he couldn’t think why. The paper was more disturbing, written in a child’s hand. Dear Shiny Man. Thank you for sending my protector to keep the monster away. It was unsigned. Was this a child’s game, or was the monster real? Demons weren’t the only monsters out there. Humans could be evil, as well. There was nothing lower than someone who preyed on a woman or child. A painful memory seeped in. He pushed it back and concentrated on matters at hand.

The letter might not be Bree’s. Many children would have lived here over the decades. He examined the small box, and heard something move inside. Did the cross open it? There wasn’t a lock, not even a lid. He’d wager Ian could open it. His brother loved puzzles and secrets. Holding the necklace, Faelan went to find Bree.

She was bent over the bed, removing the muddy sheets, her skirt revealing more leg than he’d seen on a woman dressed. In his time, that is. He’d seen things downright scandalous in this one. A rush of heat settled in his loins. She hadn’t heard him. She raised the edge of the mattress, and he heard her gasp. Moving quietly, as all warriors learned in their youth, he eased back, watching to see if she’d take the key. He couldn’t risk it falling into the wrong hands. She pulled it out, and he reached for his dirk. Pish. She still had it. Muttering to herself, she replaced the key and dropped the mattress. He’d have to find a better hiding place, and he’d have to keep a closer eye on her. That would be hell, he thought, rubbing the ache between his legs.

He started to leave, but she turned and saw him. If he hadn’t been so disturbed by her legs and her discovery of the hidden key, he’d have done the decent thing and covered his groin.

“I’m going to take a walk, see if I recognize anything,” he said. He needed to find out how he’d gotten here and what part she played in this game.

***

Bree slid the apple pie in the oven, then stirred the beef stew simmering on the stove. If this didn’t loosen his tongue, nothing would. She glimpsed something outside the window. Faelan was headed toward the dig. This was her chance. She grabbed her camera and ran out the back door. Opening the iron gate, she hurried through the graveyard, stopping just long enough to pick up the piece of broken gravestone she’d used to prop open the crypt door last night. She didn’t know who Orenda was or why she’d been buried here, but Bree had used part of her gravestone so many times she felt she owed the woman a debt.

She passed Rosalie Wood and her stillborn baby, resisting the urge to stop and pull a lone weed that dared grow against the aged stone. Her great-great-great-grandfather Samuel had buried his wife and child together. Isabel had been only eleven when her mother and newborn sister died. When Frederick built the house, he put it near the graveyard, so Isabel wouldn’t have to walk far to tend the grave.

Bree couldn’t tend her sister’s grave. She’d been cremated. Perhaps that was why she felt so connected to Isabel. They’d both lost a baby sister. What would it have been like having someone to play with, to share her thoughts and dreams?

Other than her twin, all her family members who’d died were here. Samuel, Isabel, Frederick, her father, grandmother, and Aunt Layla. They would be nothing but bones now and a few scraps of cloth, but Faelan, who’d been buried with them before she was born, was bursting with life, eating all her food, and lusting after her with every glance. He’d been here all her life, every summer she visited. When she was a toddler chasing butterflies. Sixteen and heartbroken because her first love thought she was weird. And a few months ago, when she ran to her grandmother’s to escape Russell.

Would Faelan leave when he found his family? Bree’s chest felt tight, like her bra was too small. But wasn’t that her plan, to find out who he was and get him back where he belonged?

She set Orenda’s stone against the crypt door. “I’ll put it back again, I promise.” Bree followed Faelan’s muddy tracks to the burial vault. She picked up the shovel, placed the square tip against the stone covering, and pushed. Wood cracked as stone scraped against stone, exactly how she’d imagined it sounded when the angels opened Jesus’s tomb. Finally the time vault stood uncovered for the second time in more than a century and a half.

***

Faelan passed the archeologist’s holes, continuing until he came to a withered pine. He touched the deformed trunk and remembered standing a few yards away when lightning struck. This was the field where Druan had ridden up, the trees where Faelan had hidden the time vault. They were taller now, some bare, some gone.

The earth had aged, but not him.

He didn’t know what happened to Druan’s disease. Maybe the other demons played some part in it. And his brothers, what of them? He’d dreamed of Tavis last night. Faelan looked at the sky, tracking the waning sun. He needed to get back. Demons preferred the dead of night, still he wanted Bree safely away before then. Until he knew otherwise, he had to assume she was innocent, but getting her to leave would be a fight. Tomorrow he’d check the place where the body had been found and secure the crypt. If anyone discovered the time vault’s secret, human or demon, the clan was doomed. He turned and retraced his steps back to the house. When he neared the graveyard, his stomach dropped. The crypt door stood open.

Chapter 7

In the light of day, the time vault was as breathtaking as when she’d first seen it. Wood inlay adorned metal etched with symbols as far as she could see, like a sarcophagus. A polished gemstone was set in each corner. Green jasper. Was that what she’d glimpsed inside? She was dying to inspect the interior, but opening it would be too dangerous. A streak of dried mud smeared the front edge, and she imagined Faelan being dragged there unconscious. Or worse, awake. Who had stood over him, turning the disk, stealing his family, his life?

Bree raised the camera, and a shadow rose from the floor, obscuring the vault. A low growl came from behind her. She turned. A figure loomed in the door of the crypt, blocking the light. The darkness lengthened and grew as it came closer. She opened her mouth to scream.

“What the hell are you doing?”