The Time Traveler's Christmas - Amy Jarecki Page 0,25
devil? Now ye’re up here, are ye in a hurry to climb down again?”
“No,” Lachlan said over his shoulder, quickening his pace. “I thought you were a warrior?”
“What does that have to do with running?”
“Everything.” Lachlan chuckled to himself until he ran past the towers and the abbey came into view. After skidding in the snow, he stopped himself by wrapping his arms around a stone merlon before he slipped through a crenel and broke his neck.
“Holy shit,” he mumbled while a clammy chill coursed down the outside of his limbs. Before him emerged no abbey he’d ever seen. There wasn’t only a west tower, a twin eastern tower jutted toward the sky looking just as impenetrable, while two crossings cut through the nave in a double cruciform layout. Black smoke spewed from dozens of chimneys. The cathedral’s slate roof was fully intact. Not one, but many cloisters surrounded stone buildings with pointed roofs, lightly dusted with the morning’s snow.
“What is this, ye say? Holy shit?” asked Hamish.
Lachlan stood dumbstruck. “Shite,” he corrected while staring at the abbey.
Bloody fucking hell, this isn’t possible.
The guard laughed. “Ye do have a sense of humor, aye? Well, I say a man hasna been to the borders if he hasna seen Kelso. ’Tis the grandest of the border abbeys.”
“I’ll take your word for it.” In the past few days, Lachlan had tried to convince himself he was among a mob of zealots and he’d play along with their game until he figured a way home. But this? He surveyed the entire scene. Roxburgh Castle didn’t exist in the twenty-first century except for a pile of rubble. Kelso Abbey was but a single-tower relic. When he was a lad, his mother had dragged him to enough old ruins for him to know nothing this authentic existed—not even Torwood Castle—restored by his mum—possessed this kind of expansive detail. How the hell could it? Everything Lachlan saw was medieval. He scanned the horizon. Not a bloody power line or wind turbine in sight. No cell towers, no contrails, and no car parks. No cars for that matter. No paved roads he could see either, aside from a stone bridge with three arches.
Hell, that could have been built by the Romans for all I know.
“Well, I reckon ye’ve had long enough up here. The wind’s blowing a gale.”
Lachlan blinked. “I’ve only just begun my workout.”
“Your what?”
Ignoring Hamish, he started to run. Jesus, he needed to think. If he truly was in the fourteenth century, how the hell was he going to return to his time? Christ, if he didn’t find a way home soon, Angela would end up with everything. And when the hell was this band of medieval Scots planning to give him his freedom? He hadn’t even committed a crime. All he’d done was fight off a few barbarians to save Christina and for that they’d been treating him like a dog. He’d thought to go along with them until he figured out a plan. But for the love of God, he was in the fucking fourteenth century.
What the hell was he going to do now? Rounding a corner, he pulled the medallion out from under his sweatshirt and held it in his fist.
Send me home, goddamn you.
He ran a few more laps, concentrating on things from home. Mum. His dojo. His partner, Jason. His car. Uncle Walter’s flat. The spare room—the last place he remembered being before he awoke to this nightmare.
He ran past Hamish who’d quit two laps ago, clutching at his chest. “You’re not a runner?”
“I’m a cavalry man,” the warrior wheezed. “Running’s for pikemen.”
“I disagree.” Lachlan increased his pace. In his estimation, a lap had to be a half-mile or more. He could run around the wall-walk all day. Let Hamish stand there and freeze.
After a couple more laps, the guard gave up and fell into step behind him. “I think ye’ve lost your mind.” Hamish had already started gasping for air.
“Why’s that?” Lachlan asked, barely winded.
“’Cause ye push yourself like ye’re heading for the Crusades.”
“I push myself because if I don’t, I’ll grow soft and lazy.”
“What’s wrong with that?”
“I feel better when I’m fit.”
“Aye, but isna this a wee bit extreme? I think it looks like the sky’s brewing up another snowstorm any moment now.”
Lachlan glanced over his shoulder. “Are you cold?”
“Bloody oath, I’m freezing me cods.”
“You’re already soft, Hamish.” Lachlan pointed to the river. “I could swim to the far shore right now if necessary.”