Time Travel Romances Boxed Set (19 page)

The moonlight was spilling through the
window in her chambers and Aurelia pressed against the clear pane
to look. The moon was waxing towards full.

It had been the last new moon before the
Moon of Eostre when Baird attacked Dunhelm, she remembered. And it
was still early spring, she could tell by the growth around
her.

Aurelia guessed that she had slept for at
least seven nights. Which could only mean that the priest had
drugged her.

And that his power to see great buildings
rise from the ground was beyond anything Aurelia had ever seen
before.

But she had bested him in a simple contest
of will. Aurelia rubbed her temple in confusion. Clearly, Julian
had bewitched this wine to prove the strength of his power over
hers.

But he had fallen prey to his own spell. It
was a sign of incredible incompetence. Just like his spell on her
room door.

Though both were odd contrast with the other
signs of his power.

And where had her sire gone?

The moonlight splayed across the tapestry on
the chamber floor, painting an inviting square of silver light.
Aurelia tugged the draperies back and made the square into a large
rectangle.

Aurelia’s second gift was the ability to see
her way most clearly when she beckoned prophetic dreams to her
sleep. On this night, in Bard’s dangerous den, she needed that
gift’s aid more than she ever had in all her days.

Aurelia stood in the rays of the glowing
moon, her flesh bare to its cool light. She closed her eyes and
began to chant the words her mother had taught her from the
cradle.

The chant surrounded and embraced her,
lifting her above the limitations of the earth. Deep in a hidden
corner of her mind, Aurelia reached into a deep well of shadows and
pulled to light the dreaming stone.

Aurelia felt its smoothness as though she
held it within her hands, knew that it was magically wrought of the
spittle of countless snakes. In her mind’s eye, she stroked the
veined red and gray of the stone, and urged its power into
herself.

The stone began to glow. Aurelia felt its
strength build within her, felt the tide rise in her favor, and
smiled with certainty that this night’s dream would be powerful in
its insight.

In the peril confronting her, Aurelia needed
no less. She tipped back her head, stretched her arms wide to
embrace the moon’s silver light, and boldly beckoned to the
Dreaming.

*

Baird tossed restlessly in his sleep. He saw
himself descending the stone stairs, cutting back the thorns as he
had this very morning.

But Baird never dreamed.

Never had, never would. Dreams were for
other people. Even in sleep, a part of his mind pointed out logical
inconsistencies.

But the dream continued, all the same,
apparently unaware that it was unwelcome on this foreign turf.

Baird noticed suddenly that the light was
different than it had been that morning. He saw the flaming torch
held high in his own hand, the golden firelight dancing off every
surface and making intriguing shadows. The night pressed against
him from all sides.

And despite himself, his attention was
snared.

Baird caught a glimpse of a long, full
ostrich feather bobbing in his peripheral vision, and knew it must
adorn his hat. A long sword with an elaborate handguard bumped
against his leg, his feet, when he looked, were shod in high cuffed
leather boots.

He had stepped into a
Three
Musketeers
movie.

The cold shadows of the stairwell rose
higher and higher around him, the damp smell of the underground
chamber filled his nostrils. He looked up, just before ducking
beneath the portal as he had this morning, but was shocked to find
the sky overhead a star-studded bowl.

It had been raining and gray this
morning.

To Baird’s further surprise, the stone
portal before him was slightly ajar. This wasn’t the same at
all.

The dream Baird slipped through doorway
cautiously, blinking in the shadows and shivering in the chill
sheltered within. He stepped forward, slowly at first, holding the
torch this way and that. His hand was on the hilt of his sword.

Baird could see the silhouette of Aurelia’s
sleeping form. She breathed slowly and deeply, the sound a soft
whisper in the dead silence of the well. The lady slumbered like a
corpse, the flickering light giving the impression that her lips
moved ever so slightly.

Baird drew nearer to Aurelia’s side, feeling
the same weird magnetic pull he had experienced this morning. His
heart thundered in his ears with the audacity of what he meant to
do.

Aurelia lay undisturbed as Baird reached her
side. The musty smell of the chamber enveloped him, the sweetly
familiar perfume of Aurelia’s flesh rose to tease his nostrils. He
held the torch high, eying the way her delicate hands were folded
across her chest and felt the satisfaction of a man who had reached
his goal.

What goal?

Gemdelovely Gemdelee. Should her true love
kiss her, his bride she will be.

The strange phrase made Baird toss and turn
in his sleep, as though he would tear free of his mind’s games.

But the dream-Baird was undeterred. His hand
came to rest on the stone beside her hip. Baird had the same sense
of powerlessness he had felt this morning. He was startled to see
his hand garbed with heavy green leather and lace spilling from his
sleeve. In his mind’s eye, he bent over the sleeping woman, his
heart racing.

He was going to kiss her.

Baird’s attention fixed on the shadowed
silhouette of her sculpted lips. His mouth was only a finger’s
breadth from hers when a bellow erupted immediately behind him.

Baird straightened with alarm. He pivoted on
his heel and saw the flash of the knife just before he was struck.
Baird dropped the torch with a cry and hauled his own sword from
its scabbard, too late to make a difference.

A searing pain erupted in his chest. Baird
looked down in disbelief, the torch still burning fitfully from the
stone floor.

A knife with an ornately chased grip was
buried to its hilt between Baird’s ribs.

And his own blood ran in a dark, sleek
current to puddle on the stone floor. A clatter of footsteps
betrayed his attackers’ flight, then there was no sound beyond the
lady’s faint breath and his own labored breathing.

A strangled cry broke from Baird’s lips,
then he roared in mingled pain and disappointment. He tried to run
toward daylight and assistance, but his legs refused to support
him.

Baird fell to his knees and fought to crawl
out of the well, but without success. His limp fingers touched
growing pool of blood as though he could not believe it was his
own. The room began to fade to black from all sides.

He had failed.

Again.

*

No!

Baird sat up bolt upright in his bed,
shaking from head to toe. The sweat was running down his back in a
cold river. His heart hammered, his breathing was labored and his
fingers rose instinctively to touch the burning of his lethal
wound.

But there was no raged hole in his chest,
much less an ornate knife.

Baird swallowed his fear with difficulty. He
ran his fingers across his unblemished flesh and breathed a ragged
sigh.

There was no knife. He had not been
attacked.

He wasn’t dying.

He wasn’t even bleeding. Baird took a deep,
steadying breath and heard it rattle out of his lungs.

He was in his room, alone, safe in his new
hotel.

And outside his windows, the moonlight toyed
with the incessant waves of the sea.

Baird couldn’t help rising from his bed.
There was no way he would sleep now. He shoved a hand through his
hair, drawn to the window by some force he could not explain. His
gaze sought the shadows shrouding the steps he had only cleared
this morning.

Nothing moved on the resort grounds. Baird
could see the outlines of the briars and barely detect the shadow
of the descending stairs.

Baird hadn’t known Aurelia was there this
morning - he couldn’t have known she was there. He had just wanted
to uncover Dunhelm’s secrets because Dunhelm was old. And he had
found a gorgeous if unbalanced woman that even now he felt
compelled to protect.

Mr. Responsibility, that was Baird.

Baird had always loved the challenge of
untangling a mystery - and Aurelia was an enigma and a half. His
interest in her was perfectly logical, if he thought it through.
She was beautiful and beguiling, a double whammy for a red-blooded
man who loved mysteries. Baird almost believed his own
explanation.

He looked to tangled sheets on the bed and
swallowed awkwardly.

Almost.

Baird tasted again the agony of his failure
and couldn’t explain its source, much less his certainty that it
was not the first time he had been here.

Oddly enough, Baird’s gut demanded that he
go to Aurelia right now and make sure that she was all right. It
made no sense at all. She would be asleep!

As he should be.

Baird paced the length of the room and back.
What had Aurelia been doing in that well? How had she gotten in
there, without disturbing the briars? There must be another
entrance…

But Baird knew he had seen no other entry
point to the stone chamber. He looked to the right, pressing his
hot face against the cool glass, knowing her room was three doors
down. But he couldn’t see Aurelia’s room from this vantage point.
Of course not! The wing was built perfectly straight.

Gemdelovely Gemdelee. Should her true love
kiss her, his bride she will be.

Bride. Baird wasn’t the marrying kind, he
knew that without a doubt. Only one other woman had kept him awake
nights with desire, one other woman with plans for marriage.

And that had been nothing compared to this.
Maybe that was what had prompted his nightmare.

Maybe he shouldn’t have had so much
Chianti.

*

Aurelia sat up in her room and watched the
moon climb higher as she puzzled over what she had witnessed.

Why had the dream come from another’s
perspective?

Whose perspective had it been? Who had come
to her while she slept? Why did she feel he had come more than
once? If only he had awakened her and she could have witnessed the
truth!

And what did the name Gemdelovely Gemdelee
have to do with anything at all?

Aurelia frowned. The Dreaming was supposed
to provide clarity, not more questions. It was clear there was more
at work here than she had guessed.

Her head ached with the aftermath of the
wine’s enchantment and Aurelia could think no more. What she needed
was a good night’s sleep, for morning would undoubtedly bring some
answers her way.

Perhaps there would be something better to
eat in Bard’s hall than there had been on this night. Reassured at
the prospect, Aurelia burrowed beneath the duvet and was asleep as
soon as her head hit the pillow.

*

Baird was feeling far from his best the next
morning.

Chianti had more of a bite than he
remembered. That was the only possible explanation for his
headache. It certainly couldn’t have anything to do with his
nightmare.

Or his restlessness afterwards.

It was indicative of how he was feeling that
Elizabeth’s coffee didn’t taste half bad. There is nothing more
frightening to someone who relies on a good cup of java to start
their engine than the thin instant coffee offered in Britain.

Baird sipped and struggled not to groan.

What he needed was a couple of aspirin.

“
There you are, Mr.
Beauforte!” Elizabeth erupted from the little nook that she had
made her own with a perkiness that Baird could not have returned to
save his life.

Elizabeth was a woman in her mid-fifties
whose hips showed a livelong love of simple hearty food and whose
laugh lines indicated her merry good nature.

She was also as much of a morning person as
Baird was not. Elizabeth reminded him of his fifth foster
mother.

“
Nothing like a good hot
breakfast to get a man going in the morning!” she declared
cheerfully and bustled about, setting the table with alarming
efficiency.

Even watching her made his headache
worse.

Baird shoved his hand through his hair as
Elizabeth fixed him with a bright eye. “Will you starting with
oatmeal this morning, Mr. Beauforte?”

“
No, not today, Elizabeth.
Maybe just the coffee…”

“
Mr. Beauforte! Why, you
can’t be eating so poorly in my kitchen, even if it is only my
kitchen for a wee while.” Elizabeth waved off any potential
objection before it could be uttered and trotted back to her lair.
“You just sit right there and I’ll have a fine Scottish breakfast
ready for you in no time at all.”

Baird sipped grimly and true to her word,
Elizabeth was back in record time. With a flourish, she slid a
plate loaded to overflowing with eggs, bacon and sausages onto
table in front of him. Baird eyed the three eggs and what looked
like half a pound of meat with doubt.

Never mind the six slices of wafer thin
toast.

His stomach rolled in protest, but he knew
that anything less than cleaning the plate would hurt Elizabeth’s
feelings. Even though she was paid, it was awfully good of
Elizabeth to come all the way up here every morning, just to fix
breakfast for himself and Julian.

“
You’re sure you’re not
wanting oatmeal this morning, Mr. Beauforte?” Elizabeth asked, her
ruddy face wreathed with concern.

“
No, really, Elizabeth,
this is more than enough.” Baird patted his abdomen and smiled.
“I’m not usually a big breakfast eater.”

She looked unconvinced. “First meal of the
day, Mr. Beauforte, and the most important of the lot. You should
see Talorc put the sausages away.”