“Not many remember. They’re too busy surviving with Ronald taking everything they own to maintain his own good life. I’m wandering, aren’t I? You should tell them about breaking your arm, tell them you remember little Philip. He was darker haired than you, two years younger. Had the same blue eyes you have. You’d never convince them for a second if you didn’t have those oceans in your eyes, I can tell you that.
“What else? You had started lessons in Latin and writing before you went missing. You could write out the alphabet and proudly used to do it for me back then. You know your parents names, right?”
Jessica shook her head.
“Cam and Rachel. Cam’s much like Eddard here, huge and built for smashing down walls but with a smile on him bigger than his temper.”
“I dinnae have a temper,” Eddard said.
“Not so much anymore.”
“Hold on,” Jessica said. “Where am I supposed to have been all these years?”
“Tell them the truth. You don’t know.”
“I don’t know? They’ll never believe that.”
“One look in your eyes and they’ll know you’re Morag. Now drink up and get gone. I’ve fishing to do if I’m going to eat tonight.”
“Is that enough?” Eddard asked when Morag beckoned him over to the corner. “Does she need to ken anything else?”
Angela took Eddard’s hands in her own, squeezing them tightly and lowering her voice. “She is Morag. You get her to the castle and let fate do the rest. You both have a journey to make now and you have been chosen to make it. Take her to the abbot.”
Chapter Six
Jessica had a nagging feeling that maybe this wasn’t a dream after all. Something about it was too real.
Her imagination wasn’t that good. The grass felt so wet against her trousers, the air fresher than any she’d ever known. Not only that but she had a strange sensation of deja vu, as if she’d been here before but that was impossible.
Was she going mad? A tall muscular Highlander like something out of a dream. Long hair, red tartan baldric across his chest. She must be going mad.
Eddard seemed to think so. He said as much before he began marching off in front of her, the rises and falls of the island nothing to him, his pace was constant. She kept slipping on rabbit holes and hidden roots that seemed to lay at perfect ankle breaking height.
Why couldn’t he stick to the paths? There were plenty of proper tracks around and yet he was ignoring them all, walking in a perfectly straight line like he was a Roman road, not a person.
He infuriated her but she had no choice but to stick with him. Even if she was going mad, she could see the value of his plan. What choice did she have but to go along with it? It wasn’t like she’d be around long enough to deal with the consequences of the truth coming out.
The Laird and Lady would find out sooner or later that she wasn’t really their daughter and she wanted to be a long way from here when that happened, ideally about eight hundred years from here.
The thought made her smile. The future. Did she really think she’d traveled back in time? The very idea was insane.
Her hand brushed against a tree trunk as they passed through a copse of oak. It felt so real. As far as she could tell there were two possibilities, neither of which were ideal.
One, she was really here. The laws of time and space were as realistic as a daytime soap opera. She had actually traveled back in time to the thirteenth century and she was about to go visit the abbot of an abbey on an island in medieval Scotland. In many ways, that was pretty cool. Insane, but cool.
The other alternative was this was a dream. That was a more comfortable thought but she couldn’t shake the nagging feeling that this was real. It was all real.
She decided to try and not worry about it. The conclusion was the same either way. She needed to get the key and get home. Do that and whether she was awake or asleep, she would get back home.
The idea had taken on a talismanic quality in her head. It was like the Holy Grail shining out from the top of a castle keep. Get the key and get home. She would not countenance the idea that it might not work, that either she might not get the key or it might not unlock the door to her time. Focus on being Morag. That was what mattered.
What were her parents names? Rachel and Cam. A brother too. Philip. Dark hair. Little brother or big brother? She was already forgetting. She would just have to bluff her way through any tough questions.
It wouldn’t be that hard. She was a private investigator. She was used to lying when she needed to in order to solve a case. It never felt good but sometimes you had to do what you had to do.
And what she had to do was pee.
She ducked down behind a tall clump of bushes. This would be the turning point. Whenever she needed to pee in a dream, she always woke up desperate for the bathroom. Some people jolted awake after falling from a great height. Not her. It was always peeing.
