The inn was marked, then a trail leading to an X Zachary hadn’t mentioned. Stephen hardly dared hope that X would lead him back to where he wanted to go, but he couldn’t deny the sight of it was unusual. He looked at Peaches.
“What do you think?”
“They left us a small bag of coins as well,” she said. “I think they knew us.”
Stephen was about to make what he was sure would have been a pithy comment about his family connections stretching across the centuries, but he was interrupted by the arrival of someone inside the common room who skidded to a halt. Stephen couldn’t see his face for the hood of his cloak, but it was quite obvious he was staring at them. For all he knew, it was someone from Kenneworth. He felt for Peaches’s hand under the table.
“Can you flee?”
“Definitely,” she said, sounding as nervous as he felt.
He waited until the man had turned aside to speak to the innkeeper before he pulled Peaches up with him and headed out the back door, tossing the bouncer there one of the coins that Peaches pressed into his hand. That pained him to give it up, but he hadn’t had any choice. If giving up a potentially mint-condition medieval artifact meant the difference between freedom and death, he would choose the former.
They didn’t make it as far as he would have liked. In fact, they didn’t even make it to the stables where he would most certainly have poached the first semi-sound horse he could have and galloped off on it. The whisper of steel coming from a sheath behind him had him cursing fluently. He pushed Peaches in front of him, then turned, drawing the knife Patrick MacLeod had trained him never to be without from his boot as he did so.
His opponent looked at him, looked at his knife, then propped his sword up against his shoulder. “Surely you jest.”
Stephen rapidly considered his options. He could throw his blade through his enemy’s heart and flee. He could say nothing and do his best with a knife that was, at close range, completely inadequate to battling what he could see was a well-loved and very well-used sword. Or he could bluster.
He scratched his cheek with the hilt of his knife—the only part of the blade that wasn’t honed to perilous sharpness. “I lost my sword this morning. One makes do when one must, don’t you agree?”
The other man laughed, a sound that would have been reassuring at another time, but this was a time that was far from Stephen’s own and he wasn’t reassured by anything at the moment. And then his foe pushed his hood back off his face.
Stephen felt his mouth fall open. Peaches gasped audibly.
The other man only lifted an eyebrow and looked at them both steadily. “Out for a stroll, are we?”
Stephen revised his idea to take Kendrick to supper and substituted instead a weekend away for Kendrick and his bride whilst he tended their children. That he could understand anything at all was certainly due to his uncle’s help.
“Well,” Stephen managed, “it seemed like a decent afternoon for it.”
His opponent, a blond, rather older version of he himself, resheathed his sword. “I’m not sure your lady shares your enthusiasm. Perhaps I should help you get home before she freezes to death.”
Stephen slipped the knife back down the side of his boot but didn’t take his eyes off the man in front of him. “That is an interesting offer, my lord.”
“Wyckham,” the other man said casually. “Nicholas of Wyckham.”
Stephen wasn’t surprised. His uncle, several generations removed, of course.
“Who are you?” Nicholas of Wyckham asked politely.
“Stephen,” Stephen said. “The Viscount Haulton, if you like.”
“And Baron Etham,” Peaches supplied, her teeth chattering. “If you want to be completely accurate.”
Nicholas of Wyckham smiled at her. “Accuracy, Mistress Alexander, is always my most pressing concern.” He tilted his head and studied her. “I am assuming you are who I think you are, unless you are my brother John’s daughter and not his sister-in-law. I should think not, but it has been at least a score of years since I last saw the lady Tess at my hall.” He shrugged. “Whoever you are, you gave me a bit of a start.”
“I’m Peaches,” she managed. “Tess’s sister.”
Nicholas nodded. “So you are.”
Stephen had his arm around Peaches’s shoulders, so he felt clearly the shiver that went through her. He looked at Nicholas in surprise. “But she and John were just at your hall last month.”
“Were they?” Nicholas asked in surprise. He frowned at Stephen. “Something very strange is going on with the strands of time. How did you get here?”
“Through a gate at Kenneworth,” Stephen admitted.
“Well, that explains it,” Nicholas said with a snort. “They’re far enough away that they don’t vex me overmuch, but I can say with certainty that I’ve no love for any of their ilk. And their hall is no better than a kennel. I’m not surprised things went awry for you.”
Stephen wasn’t, either, but he saw no point in saying as much.
“I am here to meet two of my sons,” Nicholas continued, “but they are notoriously late. I think we have a few moments for speech, but I’m not sure where would be the safest place. Let’s try the stables, shall we?” He offered Peaches his arm. “How has your sister found the trial of being wed to my brother so far?”
“She’s very happy,” Peaches said with a smile.
“Remind him I vowed to come see to him if that ceases to be the case.” He looked over his shoulder at Stephen. “Coming, Haulton?”
Stephen nodded and followed him.
Within minutes, he and Peaches were sitting on a pile of hay in a relatively warm part of the stable. Peaches hadn’t argued with the blanket put over her legs and tucked under her feet, nor did she seem disinclined to put on the boots Nicholas purchased for her from an enterprising stable lad to take the place of Stephen’s sodden bedroom slippers. Stephen put the boots on her feet, then sat down next to her and looked at his … He took a deep breath. His uncle, as it happened.
“Haulton is a lovely place,” Nicholas remarked casually, rubbing his hands together and blowing on them. “One of my father’s favorite estates, as it happens. Before he passed, my father insisted that Haulton always remain with the heir. Perhaps on the off chance that the heir tired of the family seat.”
“Ah,” Stephen managed.
“You might be surprised,” Nicholas continued, “just how much you look like my father and brother, Robin.” He shot Peaches a look. “Or he might not, eh, Mistress Peaches?”
Peaches smiled. “I don’t think he would be.”
“The current eldest son, is he?”
“The very same.”
“How is the old pile of stones these days?” Nicholas asked.
Stephen realized Nicholas was asking him. “Glorious,” he wheezed.
Nicholas winked at Peaches. “Aye, he is the eldest, isn’t he? Though I daresay anyone who was born within those walls would love it as well. My brother John is the exception, I suppose.”
“He loves it,” Peaches said simply. “He simply loves my sister more.”
Nicholas smiled. “I daresay that is the case. And as long as he is happy, I can’t begrudge him his choices. I understand them, in a way. What do you think of Artane, Mistress Peaches?”
Stephen hardly dared look at her, but he couldn’t resist at least a glance in her direction.
“It belongs in a dream,” she said with a sigh Stephen couldn’t quite decipher. “And Stephen is right about its condition. It is absolutely glorious.”
“Then we should get you both back to it before you freeze out here in the wilderness.” He looked at Stephen. “What have you tried to return home?”
“That useless gate at Kenneworth,” Stephen said with a sigh, “then another very dodgy place near there. Zachary Smith gave me ideas for another place or two.” He felt the map he’d been given burning a hole in his pocket, but he didn’t suppose he should mention it. He had the f
eeling that if Nicholas’s sons—if that’s who they had been—had been in possession of such a thing, they had used it themselves.
He wasn’t sure he wanted to think about what that might mean for any of them.
Nicholas pursed his lips. “I don’t think you would ever make the gate at Kenneworth work for you. It is, as they say, a one-way ticket to the past. As for the others, Zachary would know from firsthand experience which ones were the most useful. Tell me what he told you and we’ll discuss the quickest way home for you. I don’t think your lady will manage too much more walking even if I find a cart to transport you as close as you dare come to your destination.”
Stephen looked at Nicholas seriously. “Thank you, my lord.”
Nicholas smiled. “What is family for, if not to aid you when you come to their time?”
Stephen wondered how much experience Nicholas had with just that sort of thing, but he didn’t dare ask. He simply took one of Peaches’s hands in his own, rubbed it gently to try to warm it, then turned to a discussion of things that belonged in a book of fiction.
It was several hours past sunset when Stephen stood on the side of the road with Peaches and listened to a cart rumble away, its very unsettled but well-paid driver apparently quite happy to leave them behind.
“Did you want to stay longer?”
Stephen started in surprise. “Stay longer?” he asked. He looked at her. “Whatever for?”
“For research purposes, I suppose.” She paused, then took a deep breath. “I wouldn’t mind.”
He looked at her bedraggled self and shook his head. “I think even if we were suitably dressed and outfitted, we’ve made a long enough visit for now.” He rubbed his hands together in a futile attempt to warm them. “I’m not sure I would want to stay longer than that. Certainly not in our current straits.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” she said with a bit of a smile. “I’m sure you would dredge up a few useful somethings from all that research.”
He shook his head. “I look too much like my ancestors to attain any sort of respectable position with a noble house, and I have no means of joining a guild even if they would let me in. And while I was looking for work, what would you do?”
“I’m not sure I want to think about that.”
“Neither do I,” he said seriously, “which is why we will trot home as quickly as we’re able.”
“Will we make it this time, do you think?”
“Nicholas seemed to think so.”
She shivered. “That was weird.”
“Very,” he agreed.
She held out a bag. “He told me to give this to you. I guess you can add it to what the boys gave you.”
Stephen felt it, then smiled to himself. “I imagine it’s just the change from his pocket.”
“He said something to that effect.”
He had a final look around, then took her hand. “We’ll examine it all after we’ve gotten home.” He looked at the gate he could see shimmering ten feet in front of them. “Shall we?”
She nodded and followed him into the future.
Chapter 15
Peaches looked up at Kenneworth rising up in front of her, still shrouded in mist, but looking not nearly as friendly as it had however many days ago it had been when she’d first seen it. At the moment, she just couldn’t remember how long it had been. It felt like forever.
She wasn’t sure this was how the fairy tale was supposed to end.
“I believe we need a course change.”
She looked up at Stephen de Piaget standing next to her. He was back to looking at her gravely. His terribly handsome face was covered in dirt that sweat had carved trails through, and he was looking a bit scruffy. But he had saved her life with a very blunt Kenneworth ceremonial sword and gotten her home. She couldn’t ask for more than that.
“Course change?” she managed, her voice cracking on the words. “What sort?”
“Well,” he said seriously, “I’m not sure how it would look if we were to waltz into Kenneworth’s library dressed as we are, apologize for ruining his useless sword, and request baths.”
Peaches managed to nod. “He wouldn’t understand.”
“He would call the police and have us committed,” Stephen said with a snort. “And in my case, quite happily.”
She didn’t want to credit David with that kind of vindictiveness, but she was beginning to suspect she had misjudged quite a few things. She nodded, though it hurt her to do so. The next time she went to medieval England, she was going to run into better people at the beginning of her trip and make sure she had better shoes, though the slippers Stephen had brought her and the boots Nicholas had gotten for her had certainly saved her a raging case of frostbite.
She cleared her throat uncomfortably. “I have clothes in my room that I don’t really want to leave behind.” She couldn’t bring herself to say that she wanted them because David had bought them. Not after everything Stephen had done for her.
“I’ll have Humphreys fetch your clothes out for you, if that suits. As for the rest, I think we need a good cover story.”
Peaches was too exhausted to offer an opinion. “Whatever you think best.”
“Are you allowing me to herd you, Miss Alexander?”
She looked up at him quickly, but he was only watching her solemnly. “Yes, my lord Haulton, I am,” she said, “especially if that herding includes being in a modern contraption where I don’t have to use my feet any longer.”
“That I think I can manage.” He paused. “Shall I carry—”
“No,” she said quickly. “I’m fine. It isn’t that far.”
Stephen didn’t pick her up, but he did offer her his arm. She hardly hesitated before she took it, yawned, and walked with him across frozen ground, all the way to Kenneworth’s garage.
A man sprang to his feet from where he’d been sitting in front of a small space heater. Polite words were halfway out of his mouth before his mouth caught up with what he was seeing. His mouth was already half open, but it fell fully open and stayed there.
“Ah,” he wheezed.
“Got lost on the moors,” Stephen said smoothly. “It’s amazing the adventures you can have this time of year.”
The man gurgled.
Stephen smiled pleasantly. “If you’ll fetch me my keys, my good man, we’ll be on our way.”
Keys were fetched, and nothing more was said. Peaches didn’t dare look at the servant who was still gaping at them as if they’d just walked out of his worst nightmare.
“But, you look … unwell,” the man protested.
“Not to worry,” Stephen said easily. “Let me tell you what happened and ease your mind.”
Peaches was happy to listen to Stephen invent a very interesting story about Miss Alexander having suffered a blow to the head that had rendered her temporarily disoriented. He himself had been out for a walk before he’d proceeded with his plans to leave early the day before and been lucky enough to stumble upon her. He had considered courses of action and decided that it was best to get her as quickly as possible to his father’s personal physician. Given that Artane wasn’t unreachable in good time, they would make for his father’s hall and would the man be so good as to report the same to His Grace?
The man nodded weakly and signaled for a helper to come open the bay doors for Stephen. He made Stephen a shaky bow then departed on his mission to inform any concerned parties of the return of Lord Haulton and his maiden in distress.
Peaches wondered, absently, how easily David had been talked out of worrying about her. She didn’t think she could ask Stephen for the complete set of details. One thing was certain: if Irene had anything to say about it, no search party had been sent out.
She limped with Stephen over to his Mercedes, watched him open the door, then hesitated. She looked inside, then at him.
“I’m not sure I can ruin this side of your car, too.”
“We’ll send it out to be cleaned later,” he said wit
h a weary smile. “And it is just a car, Miss Alexander.”
She realized then that he’d never called her by her given name. She supposed the moment for asking him if he ever intended to was not the present moment. She looked inside his car one last time, considered the condition of his coat, then sighed. Her alternatives were either walking to Sedgwick or going inside to beg a ride. She turned and backed into the seat, then leaned over to look at boots that belonged in a museum.
Stephen squatted down in front of her and studied her feet for a moment or two in silence. He looked up at her. “I think I should take them off.”
“Only if you have a bag to stash them in,” she managed. “Think of all that medieval dirt caked on them. For all you know, there might be some sort of artifact hiding in it.”
“You, Miss Alexander,” he said seriously, “just might make a formidable scholar of all things medieval.”
“Actually, I’m just afraid of what is left of my feet. I’m not sure I want them touching your car’s carpet.”
He came as close to smiling as he had since they’d returned to their proper time. “Somehow, I doubt that. Let’s see if we can pull, gently.”
She didn’t holler, she didn’t gulp, but she felt tears begin to run down her cheeks. It wasn’t so much that her feet hurt her as it was that she was so happy to know that her future footwear choices weren’t going to be limited to worn, smelly boots. Well, that and she was extraordinarily glad she was back in her proper place in time. She was never, ever going to step on another gate through time.
Stephen unearthed a tissue from the glove box and handed it to her. She was busy wiping her face as he tucked a blanket around her legs and feet after she’d shifted to put herself fully into his car. She was fairly sure the thing was cashmere and found it in her to wonder if the man had any other favorites amongst finely knitted fabrics. Tweaking him about it, though, was completely beyond her.
He buckled her in, then shut her door.
Peaches started to shiver, which she supposed was a good thing. A moment later Stephen climbed into his side of the car and closed the door. He dug a cell phone out of the glove box in front of her, though he didn’t use it. He simply turned the car on and drove out into the courtyard. Peaches could see the back door of the house opening, but Stephen didn’t stop to find out who was coming to see them. He wasted no time in speeding away from the house, something she agreed with completely. She had smelled rather strongly of wet sheep the last time she’d made a grand entrance at Kenneworth House, but that was nothing compared to what she smelled like at present.