Hands, a knee, and a hip took the brunt of the hard impact, pain lighting me up. I bit my lip to prevent an outcry while the outside of my ankle throbbed with fire. Seconds passed, and a choking lump in my throat threatened to break free; but I rejected my helplessness, refusing to give the sob its needed release. At least I couldn’t hurt myself any further, sitting here alone in the dark.
As if it had been decided I’d been tortured enough, the cloud cover thinned, letting the moon’s glow shine through. Shapes emerged from the dark abyss of nothingness, giving once-cloaked surroundings shaded dimensions of black and gray.
I shifted my weight slowly to the other hip, examining my injuries. The heels of both hands were scraped and bruised, my knee flexed well enough to operate, and my bruised hip would survive. The ankle concerned me, though. Burning pain within my boot told me it had begun to swell. Tight lipped, I whimpered, giving it a full rotation. Satisfied I’d suffered only a sprain, I methodically used every ounce of balance I had and stood with the least amount of weight possible on the damaged joint.
Determined to exploit the small window of light the night sky had granted, I limped over to a tree, found a manageable dead branch, and swept forest litter into a pile under the canopy. The father–daughter camping trips we’d taken on my dad’s summers off taught their far-reaching lessons. Thankfully, bugs and small creatures didn’t freak me out. Well, not much, anyway, since more important issues . . . like survival . . . forced trivial matters away.
I settled onto my makeshift bed, elevating my foot, wide-awake since I’d only been up a few hours of my day. I wondered what Iain would think when he realized I’d gone missing. Actually, he wouldn’t think anything for days, since he’d left the castle to find his guardsmen.
No one would even discover my absence there until well after morning had come here, wherever . . . and whenever . . . here happened to be.
CHAPTER Thirteen
Highlands of Scotland—Ancient Reign of the Picts
I tossed a white flag at restless sleep, blinking at gloaming’s grayish sky, accepting what I’d been fighting: the Universe had undisclosed plans for me far beyond my humble archaeology-grad-student existence. Tired, hurt, and undeniably alone, I sat up on the leaf-litter bed. Earth spun into another day, forcing her inhabitants to do the same. Dawn marked the start of a new chapter in a story I’d thought had already ended in my happily ever after.
What a fool I’d been.
How naïve the human race had become, myself included. Like most of society, I’d thought I had a solid grasp of the real world. But in the pulse of a heartbeat, the rogue wave of a new paradigm crashed upon the rocky outcropping of my life, scattering accepted principles into a million effervescent bubbles, each one bursting with every thought I’d known to be true.
Twice in as many weeks I’d struggled with assumptions about what defined my reality, but thought-driven insomnia had crystallized the details of my situation. At the exact moment I’d believed my mind warp had settled in Iain’s time, supernatural forces had hurled me to a more ancient Scotland, where blue-painted Picts ruled the land.
Although I hadn’t any clue of the exact era, my brief exposure to the natives suggested the medieval Highland home I’d come to love, and the man I’d fallen in love with, existed more than a millennium beyond where I sat. I took a deep breath. Tenacity to survive long enough to find a way home became the only thing saving me from funneling down into a whirlpool of self-pity.
My immediate goal remained protection from men looking to kill me. I couldn’t pinpoint how I knew they hunted me with any rational explanation. I just knew. Like a divining rod pointed to a strong source of water, I knew escape remained ahead . . . danger stalked behind.
Once I no longer felt threatened, I would figure out a way back to the cave—back to the box. That I’d taken flight into the midnight darkness hadn’t escaped notice of my clearer-thinking head. Directionally challenged from birth, I prayed a new skill had developed overnight.
I carefully stood, shifting my weight onto my good leg as every other muscle and tendon screamed in simultaneous protest about the strenuous pace I’d forced on them. Tears sprang to my eyes, the physical pain twanging my mental anguish, but I took several more deep breaths, willing the hair-trigger anxiety to go away. My slowing heartbeats joined the cacophony of birdsongs, squirrel chitters, and cricket chirps—happy, normal sounds indicating no alarm had been tripped. Confident that I remained alone in my section of untamed wilderness, I hobbled across the damp leaf-litter carpet, inhaling sweet botanical scents as I sought the most camouflaged path, leading . . . somewhere indeterminate.
Thank God for small things, like wearing my twenty-first-century boots. I wiggled my toes, confirming the swelling hadn’t constricted the blood flow, but I still gritted my teeth in pain with every step as I shuffled along. To make matters worse, my thirteenth-century dress snagged at every thorny, thick-brushed opportunity. I steadfastly gathered every bit of torn fabric and fibers which would’ve been gift-wrapped breadcrumbs for my pursuers. A desire not to fall again also topped my new list of “Wisdom Gained in the Light of Day.”
Where the hell am I going? I sighed.
Sun’s first light illuminated the dark undercanopy with narrow golden beams. Logical thoughts crept in, highlighting the gravity of my situation.
He is predator—I am prey.
He is native—I am foreigner.
The traitorous distractions chiseled at my resolve, yet my realist side couldn’t discount the tremendous odds against me. The man chasing after me like the wind blowing through the trees knew the challenging terrain. I did not.
“Great. He probably knows where I’m headed better than I do.” Talking out loud might not have been the wisest action but, absent friendly voices, the sound of my own soothed me.
In the loneliness of my surroundings, my heart ached. I needed to get back to Iain. How would he find me? How would he know I wasn’t merely missing in his time, but that I’d been lost somewhere in time? The box clearly continued to be an open gateway, and in my panic-induced marathon, I’d created a vast amount of distance between me and my only route back home.
My pace eased, along with every thought bouncing around in my head. With my endless mental chatter, I’d failed to listen to any telltale animal sounds and hadn’t noticed the terrain change.
A glade opened ahead. Low bands of sunlight streamed between sparse tree trunks to the east, lending an ethereal quality to the spacious clearing. The visual serenity stopped me cold, and I drank in the beauty of nature’s living masterpiece. Large insects flew through the rays of light, flashing iridescence with their wingbeats. A brook babbled on the far side of the open space, its banks teeming with wildlife drinking their fill. Heads popped up in succession as they took note of my presence.
Captivated by the scene, I held still, my eyes wide but my mouth firmly shut against flying insects. The animals moved toward me as if entranced. A deer, two hares, a beaver, and several species of birds walked, waddled, and flitted closer and closer to my dumbfounded self.
Had I been dropped right onto the screen of a Disney animation? Unless I’d missed the memo, forest creatures didn’t hang out together, greeting newcomers. Since I hadn’t eaten anything in nearly a day, I figured it had to be an inhaled hallucinogen, like pollen molecules floating in the air. An odd, heavy calm washed over me as the animals came within touching distance and stopped.