A Rip in the Veil (4 page)

“There’s water there, right?” She pointed at the copse of trees that stood down by the crossroads.

Matthew inclined his head in affirmation. “It’s a small spring, and the water is considered very good.”

“It is? Why?”

“I’m not sure, mayhap because it’s Scottish?” He said it lightly, almost disparagingly, but she could hear he meant it. Alex smiled at his archaic patriotism. But then, she wasn’t Scottish. She was nothing, a mongrel of Swedish and Spanish ancestry raised respectively in Seville, Milwaukee, Stockholm and Edinburgh, their polyglot home full of strays from all over, the occasional Spanish visitor, and a substantially higher amount of Swedish cousins.

“I’ll just go down and wash, okay?”

He nodded and Alex turned to him, inundated by a wave of gut clawing panic.

“You won’t go, will you? I mean, you won’t just leave me here.”

Matthew studied her for a moment before giving his head a slight shake. “Nay, lass, I’ll not leave you behind.”

He ended up having to help Alex down the hill, supporting her as she limped towards the burbling sound. She shivered in her jacket – the wind had a cooler edge today than yesterday. Yesterday? It couldn’t be yesterday, could it? Shit, she didn’t even exist yet, but a quick run of hands down her body assured her that she did.

It was good water; Alex drank, washed hands and face and was doing a rudimentary tooth brushing when a hand closed over her nape, squeezed hard into her flesh. She reared back, ignoring the way her ribs squealed in protest.

“Agh! Let go!” It came out rather muted, given the pressure on her neck. Psychopath! No goat farmer, no monk, this Matthew guy was a raving beast, and now…

“Alexandra Lind, right?” the man holding her said. What? So she had her name tattooed on her nape? And it was definitely not Matthew, because this was a Yank – a horribly strong one at that.

“Do I know you?” She tried to twist loose.

“Indirectly, and now, you little bitch, you’re going to…”

Who was this maniac? She flapped an arm at her unseen attacker, heaved and twisted. Jesus! His fingers dug into the tendons of her neck, and the pain was paralyzing. The water…closer and closer came the surface, and Alex realised he intended to duck her. Drown her? She cried out when he increased the pressure, and then she was underwater. Nightmare. Definitely a nightmare. Nice pebbles. Bubbles, many bubbles. Air. Lovely, lovely air. Alex gulped and gulped, raising a dripping head to stare at Matthew, who was fighting with an unknown man. A grunt, a heave and the man was thrown to land a few feet away. The man screeched at the impact.

“Are you alright?” Matthew asked Alex.

“Yes,” she said shakily.

“Do you know him?” He cocked his head at the groaning shape.

“No.”

“Yes you do!” Two penetrating eyes fixed on her.

Alex shook her head, taking in a battered face, a dirty flannel shirt and jeans that seemed to have burnt off at calf length. He looked awful. The skin on what she could see of his legs was blistered and raw, made even worse by a large flesh wound. But he was here, an undoubtedly modern man – however big an arsehole – and the sight of him had her heart twisting in hope. One person dropping through a time hole she could, with a gigantic stretch of mind, contemplate. Two doing it at the same time was so improbable as to be risible, so obviously this Matthew character was the odd one out, not she. Yes! Not a coma, not a nightmare, just a freak thunderstorm, and poor Matthew needed psychiatric care.

“Who are you?” she asked.

“Don’t give me that! You’ve seen my picture often enough on my homepage.”

“I don’t think you resemble any likeness of yours,” Matthew put in. “You’re somewhat the worse for wear.”

Alex peered at the man. “Sanderson? Oh my God, you’re Diego Sanderson! What on earth are you doing here?”

Sanderson sat up and his hand strayed to his neck, rubbing it. “I could ask you the same, right? What have you been doing? Some spontaneous camping?”

“What do you mean?” she said.

He gave her a piercing look. “Well, you didn’t make it to the meeting, did you?”

“Nor did you, from the looks of it.” And why had he almost killed her just now?

“Yeah I did; but then I went looking for you. No point to the meeting without you, hey? After all, Hector couldn’t care less about this new security setup, no, what Hector wants is you.”

“Hector?”

“He dislikes untidy ends, my dear Hector. And he hates it when his plans backfire – like they did in Italy some years ago. But you know all about that, right?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Her brain was trying to make some sense of what he was saying. He knew about Italy? And who was Hector? The name tugged at her brain cells, an insistent niggling that yes, she did know this name. Oh my God; that Hector!

“
No me mientas
! Don’t lie! Ángel disappeared down there, and Hector wants to know how.” He lunged at her, was blocked by Matthew

“Who?” She half closed her eyes at the memory of Ángel. No, she wasn’t going to think about him. She ducked her head to avoid the pale blue eyes fixed on her with apparent dislike. Without a word, Matthew hunched down beside her, placing himself between her and Sanderson. Alex exhaled.

Sanderson’s eyes stuck on Matthew, travelling up and down the worn linen shirt, the woollen breeches and the heavy leather belt. His eyes widened, his mouth fell open, he cleared his throat and gawked some more, his Adam’s apple bobbing like a cork.

“Where the hell am I?” he said. “Where have I ended up?”

Matthew regarded him, mouth pursed. “Am I to assume you don’t know what year it is?”

“As per Matthew here, it’s 1658,” Alex said. She very much wanted Sanderson to break out in contemptuous laughter, but instead he groaned, a long string of dejected ‘no’s’ bursting from him.

“He must be wrong,” Alex hissed in an undertone, throwing a look at Matthew, who was presently studying the southern road.

“You think?” Sanderson gave her a despairing look and shook his head, effectively killing the flaring hope she’d felt at the sight of him.

Matthew came over to her, brows pulled into a worried frown. “We’re in danger here.”

Alex got to her feet and scanned the surrounding landscape; heather, more heather, even more heather. Nothing that looked in anyway sinister. Insects buzzed, leaves rustled, the water trickled across its pebbled beds – all in all quite peaceful. Matthew put a hand on her arm, pointing in the direction of flashing reflections and an accompanying cloud of dust. Still a mile or so off, she calculated, squinting as she tried to count the reflections.

“Soldiers.” His fingers sank into her flesh. “I have to go. Will you be coming with me?”

“What about him?” Alex inclined her head at Sanderson. Not that she wanted him anywhere close – not after those comments about Italy and Ángel – but she still had to ask.

“Can you walk?” Matthew asked him.

“No, not with this.” Sanderson waved a hand at his leg.

“Best you hide then.” Matthew pointed at a huge stand of brambles. Sanderson gave him an incredulous look.

“In there? And what do you think I am? A knight in armour?”

Matthew’s mouth twitched. “I see no other alternative. Here, I’ll hold up the lower branches for you as you crawl in.” Sanderson scooted into the hiding place, cursing when he pricked himself on the thorns.

“Do you know how to get back?” Alex hissed just as they turned away.

“Get back where?” Sanderson hissed back, a dark shape barely discernible against the undergrowth.

“To our time – you know, cars, TVs, appliances…”

“No. I have no idea. I don’t think you can. You’re stuck here, forever, just like I am.” He exhaled unsteadily, and Alex felt her heart do yet another acrobatic manoeuvre in her chest – this time out of fear, not hope.

“There must be a way back!”

“Yeah, right. People leap back and forth through time on a regular basis.” He eyed her with dislike. “This is your fault. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for you.”

*

Matthew dragged a limping Alex back up the hill. Her head throbbed, and round and round echoed Ángel, a small knot forming in the pit of her stomach. On purpose she hadn’t thought about him for nearly three years, and she wasn’t going to think about him now. Ha! Liar, liar, pants on fire. The damned man popped up in her head far too often – like every time she saw her son. Isaac. Alex blinked, gasped. Isaac. Her knees buckled, her feet stumbled to the point that it was difficult to move, let alone keep up with Matthew’s punishing pace.

“The cave, let’s just hide in there.” Her ribs were killing her, every breath an agony.

“Won’t help if they have dogs.” He heaved her in front of him up the hillside, darted into the cave to retrieve his bundle, and then he pushed on upwards, half carrying Alex across the uneven ground.

At the top they stopped to look down. Below them stretched the road, the crossroads, and the small copse of trees in which Sanderson lay hidden. They dropped flat on their stomachs, and she felt as you do when you play hide and seek, wanting to giggle with nerves.

“You’re a runaway, aren’t you?” Very unnecessary question, it didn’t exactly take an Einstein to work that one out. He nodded but didn’t elucidate further, his right fist clenched round the handle of his knife. Dirk or dagger would be a more correct term, she thought, eyeing the twelve inch length of steel with respect. Alex dug into her jeans, searching for her pocketknife, but instead her hand closed on her phone and she pulled it out. The display blinked into life, and three bars appeared on the left hand side, indicating connectivity. It made the hairs on Alex’s arm stand up straight.

“What?” She sat up. Matthew pushed her back down with an angry frown. Alex looked at the display, and yes, the three bars were still there. But how? Ignoring Matthew’s glaring eyes she dialled John’s number, jerking back at the static that coursed into her ear. Of course not, she snorted to herself, how could that possibly work? Matthew studied the mobile, his brows raised in an inverted ‘v’.

“What’s this?” He extended a finger to poke at it.

“It’s a phone, you use it to talk to people that are far away.”

He stared at her, flickers of fear and incomprehension darting through his eyes. Light hazel, she noted, much more green than brown, with small golden flecks in them. He widened them under her open inspection and covered her hand, giving it a little squeeze.

“You have to tell me the truth, lass, because there’s more to this than meets the eye.”

“I don’t think I know the truth, but I’ll tell you what I know. And you’ll tell me.”

“About what?” he hedged, and his eyes went an even lighter shade of green.

“About why you’re a runaway.”

“Aye.” His hand tightened on hers in warning and they watched as a swarm of men appeared on the road below.

They did have dogs, a whole pack of dogs that bayed loudly, all of them scrabbling in the direction of the little grove of alders.

“Sanderson!” she raised herself on her arms, only to be brutally pushed back down. “They’ll find him.” They already had, and she watched him being pulled from his hiding place, his voice loud as he protested at their rough handling.

“Let me go.” She twisted under Matthew’s hard grasp. “I have to help him. Look! They’re hitting him.” Alex filled her lungs with air to call out, surprised into gasping by the pain in her side. Matthew clamped his hand over her mouth and pushed her flat against the ground.

“If they find me they’ll drag me back in chains. I’m never going back, you hear? Never!” His voice was tinged with desperation. Alex struggled, but he easily held her still. “If I let go, will you promise to be quiet?” he whispered in her ear.

The bloody hell she would. She had to help Sanderson, however much a potential lowlife he might be. He was one like her, flung down unaware into a new and frightening existence, and maybe they could help each other find some way back, even if he didn’t seem to think so. Back to normality and a life where the road in front of her was paved instead of being a dirt track. She tried to heave against him, attempting to buck him off. He was hurting her, his hand pinching tight around her mouth. Alex tried to bite him, wanting to open her mouth and yell until the soldiers found them. They could cart this huge oaf away into captivity for all she cared.

“Like that, is it?” Matthew rolled on top of her. Alex could barely breathe, protesting squeaks escaping from under his hard hand.

*

She refused to speak to him once he let her go, shrugging off his helping hand when they made their way back down to the cave. Her ribs hurt like hell after his ungentle treatment, and she was still clutching her phone, the other hand stuffed into her pocket. He’d let her raise her head enough to see when they took Sanderson away, his agonised screams as he was dragged across the ground echoing in the wind.

Alex brushed a hand across her face, blinking back on tears that made her vision blur. She didn’t want to be here, please let her wake up, please let this be a dream! She frowned down at her phone and texted a message to John. “
In the cave
,” she wrote. Maybe he could somehow push himself through time to find her. When Alex pressed the send button, the phone surged with pulsating energy, red-hot against her skin, and she dropped it with a muffled expletive. Matthew bent down and picked it up, handing it to her before he busied himself coaxing life back into the little fire.

“I’m sorry that I had to hurt you, but there was nothing we could do for him.” A tremor ran through him as he stared off towards the south. “But there was plenty they could do to me.”

The thought obviously had him sick with fear, so Alex gave him a nod and sat down, stretching her legs in front of her. Her brain was turning somersaults, and she’d managed to scratch the scab on the forehead open, a trickle of blood oozing its way downwards. She was exhausted and very, very hungry. Never get back, Sanderson had said, there was no way back. Oh God; she bit down hard on her lower lip to stop herself from bawling. Isaac wouldn’t even remember her, growing up alone in the world without father or mother.