“Stay close,” he murmured, leading her towards the center of the village.
The flickering glow from the ruins made eerie shadows dance on Isabelle’s face. Snaffles whimpered and clung closer to her side. “What happened?” she asked in a soft voice.
“A raid,” he replied. “Now we know where those outlaws had been, and why they had all that coin and food.”
Only a handful of people were abroad in the village, those picking through the wreckage of the buildings, or trying to douse the last of the smoldering ashes. They took no notice of him and Isabelle, too shocked by what had befallen them.
Magnus spotted a woman in tattered clothes who was sitting against a charred wall, cradling a small boy in her arms. His body was still and limp against her chest, although he seemed to be breathing. The woman looked up as Magnus and Isabelle approached, her face streaked with tears.
Magnus crouched in front of her and extended his hand towards the boy, looking to the woman for permission. She nodded slowly, her grip on the boy loosening. Gently,Magnus brushed back the boy’s blond hair, revealing an ugly gash on his forehead. It was a cruel wound, deep and angry-looking, but not beyond mending if there was any healing to be had nearby. But from the look of the village, that seemed unlikely.
“That needs cleaning,” Isabelle said, crouching by the boy. “And maybe stitching. Here, I can help.”
To Magnus’s surprise, she shrugged the pack from her back and rooted around inside it, coming out with a small green box with a white cross on the outside. She shrugged and gave a sheepish smile.
“My first aid kit. I was always told I was being over-cautious by bringing it out on a hike. I always replied with, ‘you never know when it might be needed’.” She gave a nervous little laugh. “Never thought this was how I’d be proven right.”
She opened the box and Magnus saw it was filled with lots of odd-looking paraphernalia, much of which was instantly recognizable as not belonging to this time. Magnus looked at the boy’s mother, gauging her reaction, but the woman barely seemed to notice what was going on around her, shock and exhaustion turning her gaze vacant.
Isabelle opened a small packet of white squares and gently began cleaning the boy’s cut with one. “Antiseptic wipes,” she said to Magnus. “I don’t have anything to stitch the cut, but I can put some salve on it and then bandage his head.”
Magnus nodded, glancing around to check nobody was watching this thoroughly un-fifteenthcentury treatment. “Do it.”
The boy began to stir as Isabelle treated his injury, muttering and crying out for his mama. Magnus took this as a good sign. Finally, Isabelle wrapped a clean white bandage around the boy’s head and then rocked back on her heels.
“That’s the best I can do. I’m no doctor, but I think he’ll be okay.” She began packing up her kit, but the boy’s mother suddenly caught her arm.
“Thank ye,” she whispered.
Isabelle started for an instant, but then relaxed and placed her hand over the woman’s. Compassion shone in her hazel eyes. “You’re welcome. Glad I could help.” Giving the woman’s hand a final pat, she began repacking her box and put it back in her pack.
“Yer lad’s skull isnae cracked,” Magnus said to the boy’s mother. “Keep the wound clean with honey and it should heal just fine.”
He turned to Isabelle. “That was well done, lass,” he breathed. “But dinna show that kit of yers to anyone else, aye? There’s no telling how they might react.”
With a sigh, he looked around, his guts clenching with a mixture of guilt and anger at the sight of the half-destroyed village. Too late. He’d been too late.
“What happened here?” he said, fixing his gaze on the boy’s mother. “Tell me everything.”
IZZY WANDERED OFF Afew steps as Magnus talked to the woman. She took in the half-burned village, struggling to comprehend what she was seeing. The place looked like thekind of war-zone you would expect to see on the evening news. People were calling to each other, enquiring after neighbors and friends and beginning to organize the clean-up. Nobody approached her or made any effort to speak to her. Perhaps they were wary of the enormous dog at her side, or perhaps they were just too shocked to bother with another stranger.
She took her phone out of her pocket and dialed the number for the emergency services. But the call didn’t connect and Izzy glared at the screen, willing it to work. It didn’t, of course. There were no phone networks in 1478.
1478. That was the year Magnus claimed this was. And he also claimed that Irene MacAskill had brought her here.
That couldn’t be true. It just couldn’t. Yet the village around her was made of timber-and-thatch houses and the people staggering around the ruins of their home wore clothing similar to Magnus’s.
Ye have traveled through time, lass.
She sank to her knees in the middle of the muddy, ash-covered street. “No, I haven’t,” she whispered, trying to deny what her eyes were telling her. It was surreal, impossible. Yet, here she was amidst the smoky ruins of a 15th-century Scottish village, surrounded by men and women whose horrified faces bore testimony to the reality of their plight.
Snaffles whined, nuzzling into her side. She wrapped her arms around the dog, burying her face into his fur. “It’s not real,” she whispered. “It can’t be...”
“Are ye hurt, lass?” said a female voice.
Izzy blinked and looked up to find a middle-aged couple standing over her. Both looked soot-stained but uninjured,the man ruddy-cheeked and balding, the woman with wild black hair pinned up around her face.
“W...what?”
