Seeds of Time (19 page)

Hamish shifted in his saddle. His tone was condescending. “Aye, yer spy has told ye well, Sir William. With ye dead and gone, and no male heir, it will fall to the Lady Eleanor to look after Ainslie Castle until she produces a son. I plan to marry her and help her with both projects.”

Darrell remembered Eleanor's blushing face from the previous day, and Hamish's plans snapped into place in her mind so clearly they almost clicked. She shook her head.
I have to hand it to you, Hamish,
she thought.
You certainly don't think small.

Sir William stood very still, but from her position behind him, Darrell watched his hands flex. “I'm afraid yer plans are spoiled then, lad,” said the large man quietly. “For I have returned from my journey and plan to take my place at the head of the Laird's table.”

Hamish sneered and gazed over the water. “Looks to be a terrible storm brewing ... dangerous waters out
there. When the Laird's body is found washed up on shore, I don't think there will be much argument if the captain of the guard helps console the Lady Eleanor in her great loss.” He returned his gaze to Sir William. “Look behind me, old man. Ye may have yer spy, but ye have been gone a long time. The loyalty of the castle guard now rests with their captain.”

Luke stepped forward. “I am no spy, Hamish. It is ye who are the traitor against yer Laird.” He raised his voice. “Who will stand with me, and fight for Sir William against this traitor?”

Hamish didn't even glance at the crowd of mounted men. He turned his gaze on Darrell.

“Don't think I have forgotten ye either, lassie.” He grimaced as though a bad taste had crossed his tongue and gestured to one of the soldiers. “Jacob, that girl has been nothing but trouble. Seize her!”

“Not under my command!” Sir William's voice rose to a roar. “Who's with me?” He reached behind his shoulder and drew out an enormous broadsword. Luke jumped to his side and suddenly all the soldiers had blades in their hands. Sir William swung his sword at Hamish and the fight was on.

The air rang with blows as soldier turned against soldier. Several horses screamed, and Darrell, terrified, stepped backwards into the cave. From the relative safety of the cave, she watched the battle unfold outside. It
was hard to tell who was winning, or even who was fighting for whom, as by this time all the men were hard at it, and the slash and clang of metal against metal was deafening. Her heart pounded and her head rang with the noise.

The handle of the knife was warm in her palm, and she shifted it uneasily from hand to hand. Darrell glimpsed a rock shelf near the cave entrance. In the dim light she could see a niche where the rock levelled out to form a ledge almost two metres above the ground. Perhaps she could hide the knife in there, as she most certainly could do nothing else with it. Peeking over, she could see the ledge was tucked in behind a dark face of rock. It held a threadbare roll of rough cloth and a few scraps of dried fish.

Suddenly a man leaped in the entrance and pushed past Darrell. She staggered back to see that it was Luke's father. He thrust his hand into the bundle and pulled out a short sword. Blood ran down one side of his face, but he was grinning.

“Been through too much to get back here to give up now,” he said. “Tis enough to make a man feel young again,” he added and jumped back out the cave opening.

The battle outside seemed to be ebbing, judging from the noise. The clamour was dying down, with fewer ringing blows being struck. Darrell willed herself to be calm. She took a step toward the entrance to peek
outside when she was thrust back against the wall of the cave by a small form.

“I thought ye might be in here, lass.” Hamish grabbed Darrell by the arm.

She struggled to push him away. “I thought you were fighting your Laird?”

Hamish grinned and his teeth looked brown and broken in the dim light. “He went down in the first sortie, lassie.” With strength that belied his size, he pinned her to the wall with one hand and pulled up one of his leggings. A broad white scar bloomed on the back of one calf. “I believe I have a score to settle with ye, miss.”

He swung around and held his bloody sword to her throat.

Without a second's thought, Darrell slashed at the hand holding her arm with the slim blade that she still held. Hamish cried out and dropped her arm. Realizing she was free, she plunged deeper into the cave. A brown blur surged through the door and to Darrell's side, and together she and Delaney flew into the black recesses of the cave.

She could hear Hamish shout behind her, calling for a torch, but she ran on, blindly, in the dark. Guided only by the feel of the wall under her hand, which was raw from the rough surface, she fled into the darkness, Delaney at her heels.

Darrell's leg was in excruciating pain. The wooden peg, though bound tightly, had no flexibility and pounded brutally into her leg as she ran. A rock caught her foot and, unable to keep her balance, she felt herself falling. A memory of another fateful fall in another world rose up from deep within and told her to roll her head and legs in a ball. She hit the ground very hard, jarring one shoulder painfully, slid on the sand, and crashed against the rock wall of the cave.

Another shout echoed behind her, and she flailed in the dark, feeling Delaney at her side and trying to get up. As her right hand groped for purchase on the wall, she was flooded with a sudden realization. There was a vicious yank on her arm, and she was gone.

Her head was spinning, pounding, whirling. Darrell curled up into a ball and, eyes tightly closed, forced herself to breathe evenly. She slipped one of the mints from her pocket into her mouth. The spinning slowed, and as the hot, sweet taste of peppermint filled her mouth, the sick feeling in her stomach eased. She clasped her arms around her knees, almost weeping with relief. Apart from the sore leg and shoulder, this was definitely an improvement over the last trip. And she knew there would be at least one more trip to come. She swallowed.

Her friends were lost, behind more than a rock wall in a cave. They were stranded in time.

This sick thought propelled Darrell to her feet. Though her heart still pounded with fear, the lingering pain forced her to limp slowly to the entrance of the cave. Her leg was throbbing, although it was certainly easier to
walk in her comfortable prosthesis than with a wooden peg strapped to her leg. Nauseated with fear and confusion, she sat down to take stock near the cave entrance, where evening light flooded in through the rock.

Looking around, she saw that for the first time after a journey there was no sign of Delaney. Still, she didn't have time to worry about him at present. The priority right now was to go back in time to find Brodie and Kate, and she knew she had to do so quickly. Every minute she was here meant much more time lost in the compressed world of the past.

Hurry ... hurry ... make a decision
...

This was crazy. She tried to stop her mind from whirling and to catch her breath.

This time I need to be better prepared
, she thought grimly. Darrell scrambled to her feet and slipped through the crevice.

The run up the beach seemed to last forever, though the pain in her leg had started to slide to the back of her mind, edged out by the fear for Brodie and Kate that tore at her gut. Her mind gnawed at the problem — find Brodie and Kate, get them back to the cave. And what about Hamish?

The gravel crunched underfoot as at last she turned onto the winding path up the cliffs to the school. Her breath was coming in ragged gasps. She crept upstairs, anxious to avoid anyone, and grabbed a few essentials
from her room. The seconds sped past as she applied an extra layer of padding and, fingers fumbling, re-adjusted her prosthesis snugly. She slipped down the corridor to a room near the stairs, having to hide in a doorway only once to avoid a student coming out of the bathroom. One item left.

Darrell peered through the door of the darkened library. When she saw that the place was deserted, she slipped inside and ran straight to the personal health section. Darrell read rapidly through the titles on the shelf and selected a book. There would be room for only one. Quietly, she stepped through the door of the small library, closed it behind her softly, and headed for the stairs.

“Darrell! There you are.”

Darrell's heart sank into her boots. She turned around, slowly.

“Hi, Lily.”

Lily came bounding up, talking a mile a minute. The only words Darrell could make out were “Conrad” and “police.”

“Wait a minute, wait a minute, Lily. I'm in kind of a hurry. Could we talk later on?”

“NO, Darrell! I have to speak to you now.”

Darrell sighed and glanced impatiently at her watch. Time had become her adversary and it seemed to be flying on wings of lightning. She rubbed her eyes and cut Lily off again.

“Stop a minute, Lily, will you? I am dealing with something here that is like life and death — no, really it's more important than life and death. I will listen to what you have to say, but I can only give you three minutes. I'm not kidding. THREE MINUTES! Now tell me the problem.”

Lily shook her head. “Darrell, you are always so dramatic. Life and death, my foot.” She blushed suddenly. “Oh, sorry, Darrell.”

Darrell rolled her eyes. “Like I haven't heard
that
one before.” She looked at her watch. “Two minutes,” she said, threateningly.

“Okay, okay, I'll only take one. I just wanted to know if that Conrad Kennedy has been bothering you again lately.”

“No,” said Darrell, slowly. “Why?”

“Because it seems that every time I'm out for a swim in the bay, he's there, driving his boat up and down. He has nearly run over me a couple of times and I am ready to report him to the police.”

“Did you tell your swim coach?”

“Yeah, and she's going to report him on Monday to the office. I just wondered if you wanted to add anything to the report.”

Darrell thought about the white plastic boxes filled with CDs and computer parts. With Brodie and Kate gone, Conrad suddenly seemed a lot less important.

She started down the stairs. “I'll talk to you about it tomorrow,” she promised Lily.
If there is a tomorrow,
she added, silently. “If you want information to give to the police, I'll be able to tell you some more about it then.”

Lily stopped on the staircase and watched Darrell run down the hallway. “Okay, Darrell. I'll talk to you about it then.” As Darrell sped down, she heard Lily's voice echoing, exasperated, down the stairwell. “For an artist, you sure don't sit still very often!”

Darrell checked her watch. It had been a little more than an hour since she had sat in the entrance to the cave. With the strange way that time seemed to compress in the past, who knew how long Brodie and Kate had been on their own at Ainslie Castle? Darrell groaned to herself. It could have been days. Her heart dropped into her shoes.
I hope I'll still have friends by the time I make it back,
she thought grimly.

Darrell crept down the back hall toward the garden. The door cracked open in the sooty night, and she slipped quickly through. Darkness had become her ally, and she wanted no eyes to follow her this night.

The sky was heavy and dark and the air was dense with humidity. In the garden, the air felt dead, and Darrell could smell a storm coming. The waves lapped
the beach lazily, as though too thick and oily to travel with any conviction.

Against the obsidian sky, Darrell slipped down the path to the beach. The going was difficult, and she was forced to move more slowly than she wanted. When she finally felt the rocky surface change to sand, she began to run. She flew down the beach, avoiding the waterline and keeping to the hard packed sand. Once, she glanced behind as she ran towards the enormous boulders that marched down to meet the water. Was there a light, high up on the cliffs behind? It was extinguished so quickly she doubted her own eyes. She stopped to listen, and then continued her quick, cautious pace toward the rocks.

As she neared the shelter of the place where the cliffs met the sea, a tangle of voices rose up from the water near the boulders that lined the far side of the beach. The voices travelled, muffled through the damp air. Darrell started, then threw caution aside and ran blindly toward the rock wall. Reaching it, she clung for a moment to the rocky cliff face, trying to catch her breath. A stitch burned in her side, and in spite of the new padding she had applied, her leg was on fire.

She could see the boat clearly now, almost up onto the beach. What she could not see was who was on board. She hoped that the moonless night would shroud her presence from whoever was steering the vessel.
Panting, she slipped inside the crevice and disappeared from sight.

Darkness wrapped itself around her like water, filling her senses. It swam around her body, wrapped its silky tendrils around her face, and blinded her completely. The sound of the sea was in her ears and she could smell and taste it; she could even feel its salt on her skin. But the dark was her ocean now, and she felt close to drowning. The inky blackness swallowed everything, making sound and taste muted and distant.

Gasping for breath, she dropped to her knees on the sandy floor of the cave. She shivered in the cool air and waved her fingers helplessly in front of her face. Not until her palm brushed her nose could she tell that her hand was there, and she closed her eyes in despair. Eyes open or closed, it didn't matter.

All that mattered right now was silence and speed. She had to find her way back to her friends. She had to do it in darkness. She had to do it in silence. Any sound she made now could betray her presence to the people outside, and all would be lost. Her friends would be gone. No one else knew where they were. No one. And the voices outside were getting closer.

She heard a cry of triumph and a hard, spiteful laugh. Conrad's voice rang out as clearly as though he were standing beside her.