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

  “Don’t you shout at me, you jerk! You nearly killed

  me! How dare you race around like that? In another

  few seconds, you’d be in the village. There are people

  there, even children. I don’t think the rest of your troupe

  would take kindly to being trampled by you and your

  damned—” She paused to breathe and glanced again at

  the animal. It was obviously, very obviously, as male as

  its rider. “—stallion!” she resumed. “And what if you

  had paying patrons? If you injured any tourists who’d

  come to gawk at your quaint medieval village, the

  lawsuits would put you all out of work! Did you ever think

  of that?”

  She glared at him, forehead furrowed, hands

  clenched into fists. He stared back at her as though

  she’d just beamed down from a spaceship. How dare he?

  He was in the wrong, not she—the arrogant, reckless

  prima donna!

  He kicked his stallion’s flanks, and the animal

  moved even closer to Judy. The beast’s nostrils flared

  and his eyes—at least the one she could see—showed a

  great deal of white. But Judy held her ground bravely.

  This was nothing compared to having the half-ton animal

  charging her at forty miles an hour.

  “Who are you?” the man asked. “From whence do

  you come?”

  “America. And Americans don’t put up with the kind

  of crap you just pulled.”

  He pulled a face. “America?” he repeated,

  emphasizing the wrong syllables and making the word

  sound odd, foreign.

  “Yes. America. Don’t act like you’ve never heard of

  it.”

  “I have not heard of it.”

  Judy took a deep breath. She had to remember he

  was immersed in his role. These people were perverse,

  the whole lot of them. Couldn’t step out of character for

  a second, just like the suspects in one of those murder

  mystery weekends she’d attended with friends at a

  Catskills resort.

  “Forget about America,” Judy said, suspecting it

  would prove futile to try to make him acknowledge the

  year as 1998, not 1298. “I suppose Columbus hasn’t

  discovered it yet, that’s why you haven’t heard of it. How

  about Wixcomb? Ever heard of Wixcomb? Nice little town

  somewhere around here. While I’m visiting England,

  that’s where I’m staying.”

  The young man screwed his well-shaped mouth to

  the side, letting his skepticism show. For an instant,

  that mouth seemed familiar to Judy.

  But before she could sort it out, she reacted to his

  sarcastic query, “Are you blind?”

  “No,” she replied. “But you’re rude!”

  “’Tis there.” He pointed.

  Judy looked back down the beaten path to the fake,

  historical hamlet populated by actors in period garb.

  “This isn’t funny,” she ground out slowly. “I want to

  know where Wixcomb, the real Wixcomb, is. I got turned

  around last night, and now I have to get back. Where is

  it?”

  “Are you deaf? ’Tis there, as I said.” He narrowed

  his gaze contemptuously.

  “I’m neither deaf nor blind, and it’s not there!”

  Frustration and impatience made Judy’s eyes well with

  tears. “If that’s Wixcomb, it’s a re-creation of what

  Wixcomb might have been a few hundred years ago. I

  want the real one, the modern one!”

  She felt like giggling hysterically. Yesterday, she

  would never have described Wixcomb as modern. Then,

  before this cretin actor could drive her to madness by

  insisting the nearby cluster of thatch-roofed cottages

  was the town she sought, Judy added, “I’m staying at

  Laycock Inn. I have to get back to Laycock Inn. I have a

  friend waiting for me there.”

  “Laycock?” he repeated, swinging his leg over the

  stallion’s neck and dropping effortlessly to the ground.

  “Yes, Laycock,” she assured him wearily. “Listen, I

  know my accent must sound as strange to you as yours

  does to me, but we both speak the queen’s English, don’t

  we? You do understand what I’m asking?”

  “The queen?”

  He stepped close and peered curiously into her face.

  They were nearly eye-to-eye as Judy returned his gaze,

  aware, peripherally, that he was even better looking up

  close. If this guy ever gave up role-playing in the English

  countryside and auditioned for movies, Brad Pitt and

  Tom Cruise would have to watch their backs. He had

  thick, dark hair and even darker brown eyes that drooped

  a bit at the outside corners. He looked either sleepy or

  sated, as though he’d just awakened or just been laid.

  But he was a kid, no more than early twenty.

  something, at least a half dozen years her junior. Judy

  hadn’t time for the nonsense he was putting her

  through. Damn it all! He could stop acting long enough

  to give her directions to Wixcomb—the Wixcomb, not this

  replica constructed for tourists.

  “Forget the queen. I’m telling you I have to return to

  Laycock Inn. Is it that way?”

  She raised her hand and pointed. For the first time

  since feeling the rumble of pounding hooves

  reverberating under her feet, she faced the hills she

  had recently descended. At the top of the highest, most

  distant rise, the mists had lifted to reveal a sight that

  nearly stole her breath away: a castle surrounded by a

  crenelated wall. It looked in perfect condition, not the

  least bit rotting or crumbling.

  Slowly, Judy dragged her eyes back to the matinee

  idol beside her. Meeting her gaze, he said simply,

  “Laycock.”

  Swallowing with a throat that felt as though it were

  lined with sandpaper, she asked, “Laycock Castle?”

  “Nay. ’Tis merely a keep, though a substantial one.”

  Thank God! Judy smiled weakly and began, “I

  thought—for a moment, I thought—”

  But she couldn’t admit what she had thought, not to

  this perverse stranger. She could barely admit to herself

  that, for a second, she’d entertained the very real fear

  that the town to her left and the fortress above were the

  selfsame Wixcomb and Laycock Castle she’d been

  seeking.

  “Some, though,” the actor continued, “call it Laycock

  Castle.”

  Judy refused to faint, though blacking out seemed

  like a really comforting thing to do. She had surely

  fainted last night, and look at the consequences. Not

  again. No way.

  “I am Lord Laycock.”

  “What?” She snapped her head around to study his

  face again. He wasn’t Lord Laycock, not Carla’s Lord

  Laycock. They were both dark, in hair color and

  complexion, and they shared a similar, athletic build.

  But this guy was too young, and with those bedroom

  eyes, he was definitely too handsome.

  “Andrew of Laycock,” he elaborated. “Son of Thomas

  and Lady Ardith, brother of Robin and Elfred.”
/>
  “I—I met a Lord Laycock yesterday,” Judy told him,

  aware she was beginning to babble. “I never caught his

  first name. I’d guess he was in his thirties.”

  “There are no other Lords of Laycock except for my

  sire, my brothers, and me. None of us encountered you

  yesterday. Had we, we would have spoken of it.”

  Judy recalled another fragment of information she

  had gleaned yesterday. The Laycock manor house had

  stood empty for some years until Carla’s Lord Laycock

  inherited the place and turned it into an inn. Mrs.

  Haversham had said there were no other surviving

  Laycocks except for “his lordship.” No sires or sons, just

  the one computer guru.

  “Behold!” Andrew pointed, and Judy followed the line

  of his extended arm. Emerging from beneath the iron-

  toothed gate in the wall came two riders, decked out

  like Knights of the Round Table. “My brothers,” he

  announced.

  By then, Judy’s heart, if not her head, suspected

  they were not actors. Neither the princely fellow beside

  her nor the peasants in town. Yet they had to be! Her

  mind warred with her intuition until, looking around,

  she found herself distracted by something else alarming.

  The landscape didn’t look autumnal. The leaves hadn’t

  turned, the grass was neither brittle nor yellow. Quite

  the contrary, the trees in the vicinity appeared to be

  budding, and wild flowers dotted the high ground.

  “Tell me something,” she whispered, holding herself

  stiff, knees locked, hands clenched. “Is it springtime?”

  “Aye.”

  She swallowed hard. “And the year...?”

  “’Tis the sixteenth year of King John’s reign.”

  Judy was no history buff, but in the extended

  company of Carla Whittaker, she’d acquired, by

  osmosis, a few random facts. A particular scrap of

  information leapt to the fore of her mind now: Only one

  King John had ever ruled England, and he’d succeeded

  his brother, Richard Lionheart, in 1199. That meant

  the early morning sunshine warming the English soil

  beneath her feet did so on a spring day in 1215!

  She might easily have protested, calling Andrew a

  liar. But Judy said nothing, watching mutely while the

  pair of horsemen trotted down the slopes directly toward

  her. As the sound of shod hooves crescendoed, she gave

  up resisting.

  She fainted.

  Three

  As Judy came to, her heart seized in fright. This

  time the world wasn’t just upside down, she was, too. It

  took a few seconds to orient herself, but she finally

  realized that Andrew of Laycock had slung her over his

  shoulder, like a sack of potatoes, and set off on his horse.

  Though Andrew’s arm gripped her thighs, holding her

  securely, the rigid bone in his squared shoulder was

  ramming her belly with every hard, bouncing stride the

  horse took.

  “Let—” Oof. “Me—“ Oof. “Down!” she demanded,

  pounding her balled fist against his back.

  Andrew ignored both her assault and her command,

  yet as they rode beneath a portcullis’ iron spikes, Judy

  was glad he did. The brothers Laycock rode too fast, too

  hard, to have made her dismount and landing anything

  but treacherous.

  Suddenly, however, Andrew did halt. Belatedly and

  quite abruptly, he acceded to Judy’s wishes. Sliding her

  off his shoulder, he grabbed her waist and set her down

  without warning. It seemed to Judy that he let go while

  her feet still dangled a few feet from the ground, because

  she landed hard, her knees buckled, and she had to

  brace herself, hands in the dirt, to keep from tumbling

  onto her backside. Robin and Elfred—Judy didn’t know

  who was who—watched her with expressions of curious

  disdain as she pushed herself upright. Neither offered

  assistance.

  “Where’s my tote?” she demanded, slapping the dust

  from her hands. She felt a bit anxious, fearing that

  Andrew had left her bag behind in the road where

  someone could make off with her laptop, gadgets and

  personal necessities. But she was far more angry with

  these men, whoever they were, whatever their time,

  for daring to make off with her. Why, they had all but

  kidnapped her! Yet, in light of her bizarre and

  unfathomable circumstances, Judy decided it might be

  prudent not to get in their faces, New Yorker-style. So,

  instead of voicing her outrage over their treatment of

  her, she merely demanded, albeit testily, “Where did

  you leave my tote?”

  “Eh?” He squinted, appearing confused. Then he

  muttered, nodded and gestured to one of his supposed

  brothers. That one produced the black nylon carryall

  and tossed it to Andrew.

  “This satchel, do you mean?” He dangled it from the

  strap, allowing it to swing, and examined both sides. “I

  have it here,” he told her. “Now, come.”

  “It’s mine!” Judy tried to grab it from him.

  “For the moment, ’tis mine.” He tucked it under one

  arm, in the manner boys always carry their schoolbooks.

  With his free hand, he gave Judy a forceful nudge in

  the small of her back. “Inside with you,” he commanded.

  She had no choice. She went inside.

  Climbing a tall, cement staircase, they passed

  through an entryway and stepped into a cavernous,

  stone-walled chamber. The hard floor had been strewn

  with grass, and a cluster of high-backed chairs were

  arranged beside a fire pit. Pushing her much harder

  than Andrew had, one of the other knights urged Judy

  toward the chairs. He muttered something she

  presumed meant, “sit,” so she sat.

  Servants shuffled into the room, brief conversations

  ensued, then the servants hurried off. Within a minute,

  though, the men were given pewter mugs. When the

  servant seemed to hesitate in front of Judy, she grabbed

  the remaining mug he’d been holding and held it up

  pointedly, until he filled her cup with the same beverage

  he provided the others. Judy sniffed and sipped. Wine.

  Not bad, but a little strong for this early in the day. Well,

  not this particular day. Nothing could be strong enough.

  Andrew and his cohorts also drank, but they

  remained standing. They moved about, gesticulating—

  frequently pointing at Judy.

  She chose not to watch them, not to listen. It wasn’t

  as though she could understand a word they said. The

  men all spoke French, which Judy suspected was not

  the French she’d suffered through for two years in high

  school. Their French sounded as strange as Andrew’s

  English. The difference was, she could at least

  comprehend his English. The Laycocks’ French would

  have been beyond her scope even if she’d passed her

  foreign language class with better than a “C.”

  Instead, Judy emptied her cup, waggled it discreetly,

  and smiled e
ncouragingly when the servant came to

  attend her. When her mug had been refilled, she tippled

  and looked around idly. This room, a true “great hall,”

  dwarfed Laycock Inn’s main chamber. The ceiling

  loomed high, and what passed for windows were merely

  chinks in the stones with no glass of any sort to bar the

  elements. Which proved a good thing, since the fire

  blazing in the pit, along with the flaming wall torches

  that attempted to ward off the chill and the gloom,

  smoked horribly. Were it not for those narrow slits, the

  smoke would have had nowhere to go.

  Judy noticed decorative tapestries and banners

  hanging on the walls, as well as weapons on display—

  broadswords, shields, maces, and implements she could

  not name and prayed she’d never know the business

  end of. On a raised platform at one end of the enormous

  chamber, sat a long, plank table and several more carved

  chairs. When she craned her neck, she glimpsed, in a

  corner behind her, the lower stone steps of a staircase

  that spilled out onto the floor.

  Two springer spaniels suddenly bounded through the

  archway near the keep’s front entrance. Judy had a

  start. For a second, she thought they might be Duke

  and Duchess. If only they’d been! If only they’d bounded

  over the hills last night, hot on her trail. Then

  everything that had happened to her this morning would

  be somehow explainable, and she’d prove that the people

  she had encountered were merely cruel, stubbornly

  holding to their oaths to live and behave as though this

  year were nearer the last millennium than the pending

  one.

  But the dogs weren’t Duke and Duchess—they had

  long tails, and one had a scar on his side where no fur

  grew. When they leapt at one of Andrew’s compatriots,

  he spoke to them familiarly. The dogs understood his

  command better than Judy could, for they promptly sank

  back on their haunches, awaiting further instructions.

  The three men then turned as one, compelling Judy

  to look at them as they strode toward her chair and

  halted. Without doubt, these men were brothers, so they

  could not possibly be performers unless they were a

  family of actors like the Baldwin boys. One had Andrew’s

  eyes but a lighter complexion and sandy-colored hair

  and beard. The other had blue eyes, but everything else