Kohl, Candice - A Twist in Time.txt Read online

  Duke and Duchess must have caught some poor

  creature’s scent, because Judy watched them scurry

  off, side by side, their noses in the damp grass as they

  determinedly tracked something that avoided the fires

  and the revelers.

  “Hey, you mutts! Come back!” she pleaded. But they

  ignored her, and before she knew it, Judy was trailing

  Duke and Duchess instead of walking straight to the

  nearest bonfire.

  It was then she saw it, the looming, crumbling

  edifice, black on black, at the top of the highest rise.

  The meager starlight and crescent moon managed to

  make some of the ragged stones gleam with a creepy

  iridescence, and she recognized them as the ruins of

  Laycock Castle, still impressive in their decay.

  She veered toward the rubble, only vaguely aware

  that all the villagers, the fires, even the hounds, were

  now well behind her. Judy used her flashlight to search

  out the way as she climbed the final crest. She didn’t

  wonder why this pile of old rock intrigued her, why it

  wasn’t Carla leading the way while she herself protested.

  Judy just kept moving forward, upward, unthinking,

  compelled, driven and drawn.

  Duke and Duchess whined. Judy heard their

  whimpering and understood they had ceased tracking

  whatever small creature had caught their attention.

  But they didn’t join her, and after a few more whimpers,

  they fell silent again.

  Directly ahead yawned the open maw that had once

  supported a gate in the now crumbling curtain wall. Judy

  did not pass through it, into what once had been a

  courtyard. Instead, she ambled along the outside of the

  castle’s remains, keeping her flashlight beam on the

  ground. From the corner of her eye, the flickering yellow

  light of a crackling bonfire gave her a point of reference,

  until it abruptly blinked out. Judy stopped cold then and

  spun around as a flash of panic seized her. But though

  she strained to see the fire, the only light she saw was

  the wild slashes her flashlight cut through the air as

  she waved her arm crazily.

  Of a sudden, she became aware of her own

  foolishness, having gone out in the dark to a place no

  one knew she might go. That she had walked so far,

  alone at night, for no good reason except an inexplicable

  whim involving a rock pile, appalled and alarmed her.

  Struggling to reclaim her calm, she slowly realized that

  the big bonfire had not gone out. The blaze had simply

  become hidden from view as the deteriorating wall she’d

  been following got between her and the flames.

  Judy smiled ruefully and shouted, “Duke! Duchess!”

  as glad for the sound of her own voice as she would have

  been if the spaniels had come running. They didn’t

  come, though, so she began retracing her steps,

  intending to find them. But her foot hit a tree root

  jutting from the ground like a menacing snake.

  Faltering, she stumbled backward. The flashlight fell

  from her hand and went out.

  Heart racing again, she dropped to her knees and

  groped the rough, stubby grass with her fingers,

  searching for her handy plastic flashlight. She couldn’t

  find it, and straining to see pained her eyes, for she

  was cloaked in palpable darkness. Since she’d lost sight

  of the bonfire, a cloud had slithered over and shuttered

  the waxing moon. Now scuttling clouds blanketed most

  of the stars as well. With the bonfire beyond her view

  and the flashlight beyond her reach, she may as well

  have been in the bottom of a deep, dark well.

  The wind gusted, swirling leaves and dust that

  tangled her hair. The wind portended rain—a cold,

  needling, wintry rain—and though Judy knew she

  needed to find shelter, she also felt a wild exhilaration

  that held her in place. In fact, she raised her face to

  the sky and opened her arms to the wind. And let herself

  go.

  Rationally, Judy knew she remained kneeling in

  the cold dirt, yet she felt a static charge that warmed

  her wherever her body made contact with the ground.

  Then, impossibly, she began to feel lighter than air.

  She imagined herself a kite that caught the wind and

  flew.

  Madness, it was, but a delightful madness. No toke

  on a joint in her college days had ever proved this heady!

  She loved it, so she ignored her sensible, life-preserving

  instincts, which screeched in a voice like an angry

  crow’s: Get up! Run! Hide! A storm is coming, a bad storm!

  Finally, surrendering to futility, the voice fell silent.

  Judy fell, too, across her carryall. Clutching it to her

  bosom like a pillow, she closed her eyes and drifted. On

  the wings of the wind that eddied about her, she felt

  herself carried off, like Dorothy in the tornado on her

  way to Oz. Giving herself up to the tingling sensation

  that vibrated through her limbs, it seemed as though

  she actually exploded, pieces of herself and her soul

  scattering everywhere, like a sparkling meteor shower.

  After that, she had no sense of being. Like the

  bonfire and the moon and her flashlight, she’d blinked

  out.

  ***

  Judy woke in a fog. Not only was her mind muddled,

  but the air glistened with a heavy, swirling mist

  It took her a minute to orient herself, and then she

  began to recall the previous evening in heart-rending

  fragments. With a start, she sat up, stretched her arms

  and legs, and began surveying them for damage. Her

  sweater and the knees of her leggings looked a little

  dirty, but she saw no bloodstains. Everything, from her

  fingers to toes, flexed without pain.

  Obviously, she hadn’t hurt herself. So why had she

  stayed outdoors all night? A rational person—especially

  one who’d refused to go to Girl Scout Camp because she

  would have to sleep in a tent—simply didn’t do that sort

  of thing, not in the rain!

  Again, she glanced down and fingered the fabric of

  her clothes. They felt a bit damp on the surface, but no

  more than she could blame on the fog and the morning

  dew. She was far from soaked through, as she should

  have been had she lain without cover in a pounding

  rainstorm.

  It hadn’t rained, then, despite the clouds and the

  wind she recalled. What the hell had happened?

  A queer feeling fluttered in her belly, a sensation

  akin to panic. Something was wrong, very wrong.

  “Damn,” she muttered beneath her breath. Carla

  had to be worried sick. By now the poor thing had probably

  organized a search party.

  Judy pushed herself to her feet. As she rose, she

  grabbed her flashlight and dropped it into her tote.

  Immediately, she headed in the direction she’d come,

  slipping on the slick, dewy grass as she hurried to return

  to Wixcomb and Laycock Inn.

  She glanced up. The sun hung low, a small, white />
  circle in a colorless sky glowing like a dim light bulb.

  As a celestial beacon, it proved a pitiful guide. She would

  have to trust her internal compass to find her way.

  The trek back seemed interminably long—longer

  than the expedition out. Odd. Usually return trips felt

  shorter than the original traveling time. At least, Judy

  consoled herself, the haze seemed to be burning off as

  the sun continued to rise. There were only little tendrils

  of ground fog when she reached Wixcomb’s main street.

  Except it wasn’t any kind of street, and the town

  could not be Wixcomb.

  Judy halted, staring with awe and a sinking feeling

  at the buildings lining the rutted dirt track. None were

  quaint or sturdy stucco and timber. These weren’t shops,

  either, only dwellings—huts, actually—made of...what

  did they call it? Daub-and-wattle. They even sported

  thatched roofs.

  “I’m dreaming,” she told herself firmly as she

  watched people coming and going. “I’m still in bed at

  Laycock Inn. I never went for a walk last night. I never

  climbed the hill or saw the bonfires. Pretty soon, I’m

  going to wake up. When I do, I’m going to laugh.”

  She felt no urge to laugh right now. Despite assuring

  herself figments of her own imagination couldn’t see

  her if she did not wish them to, she pressed hard against

  the wall of a cottage at her back. Boy, her imagination

  had slipped into overdrive! All the town’s people appeared

  to be dressed in costumes. They wore tunics, the men’s

  belted, the women’s flowing free. Some wore hoods so

  deep, Judy couldn’t see their profiles when they passed

  her.

  She had the bizarre notion she stood on a movie

  set, that she’d arrived on location for the filming of

  Braveheart. But Braveheart had been made years ago,

  and this was England, not Ireland, where they had filmed

  the Scottish tale. Of course, somebody could be making

  another period movie. Kenneth Branagh did it all the

  time.

  This wasn’t a movie set, though. Judy had no

  explanation for what she saw, but she knew a movie

  set couldn’t be the answer.

  “I’m dreaming, I’m dreaming, I’m dreaming,” she

  muttered like a mantra as she flattened herself against

  the wall. An unexpected, sharp pain interrupted her

  chant. “Ow!” she cried, drawing her hand forward to

  examine it.

  Something sharp had gouged her palm as she

  pressed it against the mud wall. It had pierced her skin

  deeply enough to draw blood. Could you bleed in a dream?

  she wondered, sucking the tiny wound.

  As she fretted, a woman with two small, dirty

  children clinging to her skirts stopped directly before

  her. Scowling, the stranger stared at Judy with

  narrowed eyes. “Who you be?” she demanded.

  “I—I—”

  Frightened as a hare, she pushed herself off the wall

  and sprinted up the road, away from town. She’d been

  seen. No one should have seen her, not in a dream! But

  that woman had. And she’d bled, too. Judy paused when

  she had run far enough to grow winded, and examined

  her injured palm again. God in heaven, you couldn’t

  hurt yourself inside a dream, could you?

  She might not be dreaming after all. She might be

  awake. But she wasn’t where she should have been—

  in her room at the inn or, more rightly, in her New

  York City apartment. Where in God’s name was she?

  Not Wixcomb.

  “I got turned around,” Judy decided. She spun about,

  gazing again at the strangely dressed people, the odd

  little huts, and the assorted animals barking, pecking

  and rooting in the dirt. “I walked beyond the old castle

  ruins,” she recalled, concluding, “I came down the wrong

  hill in the fog. This isn’t Wixcomb, it’s—”

  The Renaissance Fair. That’s what it was, or at least,

  that’s what it was like. That Old English fair in the

  States, where all the performers dressed in period

  costume, and they sold roasted pig instead of pizza by

  the slice, and actors dressed as knights jousted before

  their medieval “king.”

  What a fool she’d been! That woman who’d

  approached her had simply been wondering why a tourist

  had come visiting the fair so early in the day. They

  weren’t open yet. The ticket booth was neither set up

  nor manned. Judy hadn’t paid her entrance fee, and

  she obviously didn’t belong among the performers.

  Well, she’d go right back and ask for directions to

  Wixcomb. She couldn’t have strayed too far.

  With new determination, Judy walked the several

  yards that brought her back to the edge of the village. A

  man eyed her suspiciously as she approached, but

  instead of ducking for cover, she stepped directly up to

  him.

  “Excuse me,” she said, “but I seem to be lost. Could

  you tell me the way to Wixcomb?”

  He stumbled backward warily. “Wixcomb?” he

  repeated.

  “Yes. I’m from New York, but I’m staying in Wixcomb.

  Could you tell me how to get back there?”

  “Wixcomb,” he said again, spreading his arms and

  gesturing to the left and the right. Then, looking her up

  and down once more, he dashed off and insinuated

  himself among several people clustered in a group. He

  spoke to them in low tones, and they all looked at her

  with obvious disapproval.

  “Damn.” What was that all about? She’d only asked

  for directions. Why wouldn’t he tell her? Why were the

  others looking at her so oddly?

  Because this place wasn’t like the Renaissance

  Fair—it was like Plymouth Plantation, another

  American tourist attraction. Judy had gone to the town

  near Plymouth Rock on a class trip years ago. She

  recalled the “villagers” lived on site and toiled at the

  same sort of tasks the original settlers had. Not only

  did they dress in period costume, they spoke “period”

  English. Rather annoyingly, they purposely ignored the

  tourists and any evidence of modern life so that visitors

  felt as though they’d stepped back in time.

  Judy remembered something else: Mrs. Haversham

  had said people stayed at Laycock Inn when they came

  to poke about the castle ruins and “the other.” Maybe

  this was the other!

  Shifting her tote from her right shoulder to her left,

  she set out again from the theatrical recreation of an

  old English village. Geez, she found herself thinking

  testily, didn’t they have enough authentically ancient

  things in Britain that they shouldn’t feel compelled to

  recreate more? First, the Globe Theatre in London and

  now, this village. The Brits were definitely mad. And

  rude. But if nobody would break character long enough

  to assist her, she’d help herself. Now that the mist

  seemed to be dissipated, she’d hike back up th
e hills

  and on past the castle ruins. On the far side, she’d make

  her way down again. At last, she’d be in Wixcomb.

  Veering off the dirt road, Judy hadn’t yet looked

  around to get her bearings when she felt more than

  heard a large horse pounding toward her. Turning

  slightly toward the rolling hills she’d recently descended,

  she saw a massively huge beast hurtling toward her as

  though its rider intended to trample her into the ground.

  Instinct should have propelled her to leap out of the

  way, but Judy froze. In the split second it took for the

  animal to reach her, she had no time to be afraid, only

  astounded. She expected soon to find herself either dead

  or grievously injured.

  Somehow, at the last possible moment, the rider

  steered his horse away from Judy. When beast and man

  swerved, they came so dangerously close, she caught

  the scent of horse sweat in her nostrils. Yet she

  remained on her feet, swaying only a little, and watched,

  transfixed, as the man reined in his mount and then

  walked it back in her direction.

  Her numb incredulity dissolved, a hot, pulsing rage

  replacing it. God Almighty! He was one of them, a

  thespian, a player, a re-enactor, whatever the villagers

  called themselves! No doubt he claimed the role of

  leading man, because he was obviously young and good-

  looking. Also, he alone wore the clothes of a king, not a

  peasant. What the heck—did he think he was a king?

  Judy opened her mouth to berate the idiot actor

  who’d nearly ridden her down, when he opened his

  mouth and swore venomously. At least, she thought he

  cursed her. Judging from his angry glower and the

  thunderous tone of his voice, he didn’t seem to be

  inquiring about the weather. But she couldn’t be sure,

  because he spoke French.

  Judy knew she hadn’t wandered that far afield. She’d

  have remembered taking the Chunnel. “Speak English!”

  she demanded, muttering a choice expletive of her own

  beneath her breath.

  “By all the saints, what did you think you were

  doing?”

  Okay. He’d switched to English—at least Judy

  presumed he had. She caught a few familiar words. But

  he had an accent as thick as the morning’s mist. And

  it didn’t matter what he said to her. She had plenty she

  wanted to say to him.