When Fate Dictates (31 page)

I got up off the bed and followed him into
the room. It had the largest tub I had ever seen, with metal pipes
coming up out of the top. Simon pushed a lever and water started to
flow from the pipe. He reached into the tub and pushed a black
stopper into a hole in the tub. “Stop the water, Simon, there will
be water all over the room.” I cried.

“Corran, will you please calm down. Come, put
your hand in the water?” he said.

I did as he asked and to my amazement found
that it was warm.

“Now that is magic. Where do you think the
fire is that heats the water?”

He shook his head. “No, lass, not magic, just
very clever.

“Now, would you like to bathe?” he said.

“Bathe? Is that what the tub is for?”

“Aye, I should imagine so. Just take the
stopper out when you are done and the water should drain away
through that hole.”

In the time that it took me to bathe, Simon
had learned that the strange black object in the room was called a
television and I learned, within a very short time of returning to
the room, that this television had taken over his life.

“Don’t you think that we should be trying to
find out how to get home?” I asked eventually.

“Aye, we can talk about that over our meal.
The man downstairs said that it should be up in about an hour,
which we are fast approaching.”

“Right, so in the meantime, we sit and watch
people going about their lives on a strange object we don’t
understand, when we have no idea what to do about our own life?” I
snapped.

He nodded. “Aye, I guess we do,” he
replied.

Thankfully, a knock at the door interrupted
what I was about to say and Simon rose from his seat in front of
the television and moved toward the door.

“Room service,” said a cheery young man. I
watched through the gap in the door as he removed two trays from a
silver cart and handed one of them to Simon.

“Thank you,” Simon said, taking one tray off
the young man and handing him some coins from his pocket. I moved
behind Simon and took the tray off him, freeing his hands to take
the other tray and a bottle of wine from the young man.

“Thank you sir; I hope you enjoy your meal,”
the cheerful lad said, returning his attention to his silver
cart.

Placing the trays on the table by the
television, I pulled up another chair. “This all looks very nice,”
I said, as the glorious aroma of freshly cooked beef filled the
room.

“Aye, it sounded nice too. Would you like
some wine?”

“Yes please.”

Simon lifted the bottle and looked curiously
at it, running his fingers over its top. “Just one problem,” he
said.

“Oh aye, what would that be?” I asked.

“I have no idea how to get into it.”

“Well, I am happy to work on opening the
bottle after we have eaten,” I said, feeling the cramp of hunger
pulling at my stomach.

“Aye,” he said, sitting himself on the chair
by the television and lifting the knife. “This is a fine piece of
beef. Life may be different in these times but I am very pleased to
find out that a piece of beef is still beef.”

When the meal was finished, I lifted the
bottle of wine off the table and made for the door.

“What are you doing?” Simon asked, taking his
eyes off the television, momentarily.

“I am going downstairs to ask someone how to
open it,” I replied.

“Oh, right,” he said, but I was not sure he
had heard me over the noise of the television.

“Are you absolutely sure those people can’t
see us?” I asked, pushing the door open.

“Aye, I have told you, Corran, only we can
see them.”

“Well that doesn’t seem very fair to me,” I
said, disappearing through the door.

I didn’t mind that the man in the room
downstairs looked sideways at me when I asked him how to the open
the bottle, I didn’t even mind that he laughed as I walked away,
but what I did mind was that I had to drink the wine with only my
thoughts for company. The television had consumed Simon’s attention
to such a point that even the mention of Duncan raised little more
than his eyebrows. Eventually, worn out with worry and fear, I
climbed into bed alone and when I awoke sometime in the night, it
was to find that I was still alone in the bed. My mind mulled over
the day’s events and I tried desperately to figure out what had
brought us to this time and how to get home. The only sensible
conclusion I could reach was that the crystal was in some way
connected to where we were and that meant that the crystal could
get us home.

I was woken by the ringing of a strange bell
noise on the table beside the bed. I sat up with a start, rubbing
my eyes to clear the sleep from them. The first thing I noticed was
that the television was still making noises and the second thing
was the fact that Simon had an odd object, which appeared to be
made out of ivory or bone, held to his ear. And he was talking to
it.

“Simon what on earth are you doing?” I asked,
staring at him.

He raised his finger to his lips, “Shh, I am
busy.”

“Have you gone mad with sitting here watching
that television all night?” I barked reaching across to him.

He moved the object from his ear and placed
it onto some sort of cradle, also seemingly made of ivory or
bone.

“I was on the phone, ordering us some
breakfast,” he said, with no small degree of triumph in his
voice.

“On the what?”

“The phone, Corran, that thing that I just
had to my ear. It’s called a telephone and people use it to talk to
one another. See, if I push these numbers in the right order then a
lady downstairs hears a ringing and picks up her phone. I called a
few minutes ago but the kitchen was not open yet, so the lady said
she would get someone to call me back when they opened.”

I shook my head. “I have no idea what you are
on about, Simon, and I don’t really care. I want to go home and I
want us to discuss how we are going to do that now,” I shouted,
becoming slightly hysterical.

“Yes, I thought you might and I have given it
some thought.”

“What, you mean you managed to do something
other than play with these infernal toys?”

“Fine, if you want to be like that, we won’t
discuss it,” he said, turning his attention back to the
television.

I grabbed for my dress and headed into the
room with the tub, downing the last of the wine left in mug from
last night as I did.

I heard a knock on the door and assumed it
was the food Simon had ordered but was in no rush to leave the room
I was in. With the door closed on the world, I found myself
mindlessly playing with the pipes that filled the tub with water.
It was a very strange world, and although it was nice to bathe in
the large warm tub last night, I could see little else that pleased
me.

A knock on the door shook me from my
thoughts. “Your breakfast, Corran,” Simon called through the locked
door. I supposed it was time to face him again and slowly moved
back into the room with the bed and television.

“Do you want some?” he asked, holding a knife
with a sausage speared on the end of it up.

I shook my head. “No, I had enough food last
night to last me a week.”

“Your loss,” he said, reaching over to the
other plate and scraping its contents onto his own.

“Please, Simon, can we talk about getting
home?” I asked, sitting on the end of the bed and staring blankly
into the large looking glass in front of me.

“Aye, if you have a mind to be civil,” he
replied, taking a massive bite of the sausage.

“Do you ever stop eating?” I asked.

“The food is very good here, Corran, you
should try some.”

“Perhaps,” I whispered.

“Now I reckon us being here has something to
do with this crystal,” he said, moving his hand to his pocket.

“No!” I screamed, “Leave it where it is,
Simon.”

He froze, staring bewildered at me,
“Why?”

“Because your mother told us to leave it
alone until we knew how to use it. You didn’t listen to her then
and look what happened? Please, let’s just try and figure out how
we got here and how to get home before we do anything else we might
regret.”

“Aye, you might be right.”

I sighed with relief as he moved his hand
back to the knife and continued to shovel chunks of thin bacon and
sausage into his mouth.

“Do you think it could have had anything to
do with the light of the candle reflecting off the crystal?” I
asked.

“I don’t know Corran, but it could have. I
did think I saw a thin silver thread connect the crystal and the
flame, just before the room started to spin and we ended up
here.”

“Aye, I saw that as well. But what made it
bring us here and how can we make it take us home?” I asked.

“That is what we are going to have to work
out.”

“And if we can’t?” I whispered.

******

The morning had broken, gray and dull and
even the sound of birdsong was missing from the air as we made our
way across the river and into the city. The big, magic carts
whirled past us, leaving a smell so heavy and distinct that its
taste lingered in the back of my throat. I coughed, as if I had
inhaled the fumes from fire.

“Are you alright, Corran?” he asked, holding
tightly onto my hand.

“Do you think this city has a strange smell
about it?” I replied.

“Aye, I suppose it does but it is cleaner
than it used to be.”

“What sort of magic do you suppose makes
those carts move so fast?” I asked, watching as another one sped by
us.

“I don’t think it’s magic, Corran, but clever
ideas by man. They’re called cars not carts.”

“Where have you found this out?” I asked,
casting him a suspicious look.

“The television, it is a very useful object.
We can use it to find our way in this world.”

“Oh, the television, I should have guessed,”
I scoffed, sarcastically.

“Don’t mock it, Corran. It can teach us
everything we need to know.”

“Mmm...” I replied, unconvinced, “But can it
tell us how to get home?”

He stopped walking and turned to face me.

“Look, Corran, you seem to think that I have
no interest in getting us home. That is not true. Yes, I find this
new place exciting and I would be lying if I said I were not
intrigued with it but, like you, I am frightened and, like you, I
am worried about Duncan and Eilidh. If I knew how to take us home,
I would, but I simply don’t and until I figure out how to take us
home, we need to survive where we are.”

My eyes filled with tears of fear and
sadness. “I hate it here, Simon. What if we never find out how to
get home?”

“I will work it out, lass. But at least in
this world there is no Angus.”

I smiled, despite my pain. “Aye, at least
there is that.”

“Come on, we have a job to go to,” he said,
taking my hand and leading me back onto the street.

A calm silence filled the air of the yard as
we turned off Stonegate and headed toward Barley Hall. Had it not
been for the structural differences, it would almost have been
possible to believe that we were back in our own time. I closed my
eyes as we stopped in front of the great door of the Hall,
recalling the life we had once lived in this place. But then the
magic was broken and the voice of Rose drew me from the dream.

“Good morning,” she beamed. It had not been
necessary to see her face to know that it held an enormous cheery
grin. “Simon, I gather from your accent that you are from the
Highlands?”

“Aye, why do you ask?” Simon replied.

“My fiancé is an antiques dealer, here in
York. He is also from the Highlands.”

I held my breath steady, realizing things
were about to become difficult.

“Oh aye, and where in the Highlands does your
man come from?” Simon asked his voice as calm as if he were asking
directions to the nearest tavern.

“Err, I can’t actually remember, sorry, but
it’s somewhere in the Highlands. Anyway, I wanted to show you this.
He goes away a lot, on business, you know?” she said, moving toward
a counter at the far end of the room, “Ah, here it is,” she
muttered as her head disappeared behind the counter.

I looked across at Simon and raised my
eyebrows, he shrugged as we moved closer to the girl. Her head
reappeared as she pulled herself up and placed the object in
question on the top of a pile of papers. “Here you go. He said it
was quite valuable and I have to agree, given the excellent
condition it is in. It’s not often you come across a 17th century
object that is this well preserved.”

Instinctively I put my hand out to touch his
arm. The color drained from his face and his eyes shone dangerously
against his placid skin. “What did you say your fiancé’s name was?”
Simon said his voice deep and menacing.

“Oh, it’s Angus, Angus Campbell. You may have
heard of him, he is very well known in York. He is an excellent
antiques dealer. Not another that can match him on the quality of
his stock. I really don’t know how he manages it. Everything in his
shop is in such excellent condition,” she boasted.

“Rose, where is your fiancé now?” I asked,
softly.

“Oh, he is away again, he left last night. He
does that a lot, but as he says, it takes great patience and travel
to acquire the objects he sells.”

“Do you know where he has gone?” Simon
asked.

She shook her head. “No, he never really
says. I am a bit anxious this time though. Last time he came back,
when he brought me this dirk actually, he was involved in an
accident and got shot in the shoulder with an old pistol. He was in
hospital for nearly a week with the injury. It’s a dangerous world,
antique dealing.”

“Aye, it sounds it,” replied Simon, “do you
mind if I have a closer look at the dirk?” he asked.