“I most certainly have,” Deryn replied. “And they most certainly are real. In fact, I saw one only a few weeks ago. She walks here and there disguised as an old woman but she’s really one of the Seelie Fae, the fair-folk who are friends to humankind. Be careful if ye ever meet her because she might just tell ye yer future. Her name is Irene MacAskill.”
Maddy went cold all over, as though an icicle had been trailed along her spine. If she thought she’d been shocked before, now she suddenly felt as though she was falling down a deep, dark hole.
Her name is Irene MacAskill.
Craig started another story, but Maddy no longer heard the words. She heard nothing but the roaring in her ears and the thundering of her heart. Irene MacAskill. That was the woman who had accosted her outside Rory’s school right before Rodric had grabbed him.
Irene MacAskill was a Fae? No. Not possible. There were no such things as fairies and ghouls and ghosts and all that rubbish.Really, Maddy?she asked herself.You mean like there’s no such thing as time-travel?
“Are ye sure ye are all right?” Darla asked her. “Ye’ve gone as white as a sheet.”
“I’m fine,” Maddy said, shooting to her feet. “I’ll collect the dishes.”
She moved in a stupor, barely aware of what she was doing. Deryn’s words kept going through her head. 1449. Irene MacAskill. Fae.
Time-travel was real? Magic was real? This was all insane.
A while later it was with a numb kind of detachment that she bid goodbye to Darla, Craig and their children and stood at the door with Rory and waved them off, plastering a smile onto herface. In an almost dream-like trance, she helped Deryn to clean the dishes and put them away and then check on the animals. Deryn, obviously noticing her discomfort, asked her what was wrong several times, but she put him off, telling him she was just tired and he accepted this explanation. She could hardly tell him the truth, could she?
Yeah, I’m just a little freaked out because I’m actually from the twenty-first century and I’ve just learned that I’ve traveled through time, and it might have been a fairy that brought me here.
She put Rory to bed early and followed his example, bidding Deryn goodnight and then lying down on the bed next to the sleeping boy. Round and round and round went her thoughts, becoming more and more tangled each time.
What had Irene MacAskill said to her?Yer choice is coming. It will be a difficult one, my dear. Perhaps the most difficult of all. I would alter it if I could but I canna interfere, only offer choices.
What had Irene meant by that? Had she been trying to warn her about Rodric? Had sheknownwhat was about to happen? And what did she mean by choices?
Maddy lay awake, staring up at the ceiling as the moon rose, casting moonlight through the window and lighting everything in an eerie glow. Through the gaps in the shutters, she could see the highlands stretching out, ethereal and beautiful in the moonlight.
But notmyhighlands, she thought.I don’t belong here. This is not my place.
Deryn claimed the Fae had magic. Was that how she’d got here? And if so, could it send her home again?
Maddy had no answers to any of these questions, so she lay awake all night, staring at the ceiling until finally, after hours oflistening to her circling thoughts, she realized what she had to do.
It was still dark when she heard Deryn get up from his spot by the fire and leave the cottage to go check on the animals. As soon as she heard the door shut behind him, she rose, dug her clothes from the trunk, tossed her cell phone on the bed ready to be put in her pocket, then got dressed. When this was done, she roused Rory.
“Come on, sweetie. We’ve got to go.”
He moaned and rolled over.
“Hurry up,” she said, her voice a little sterner. “You’ll be late for school.”
That still didn’t work. She’d have to carry him. She lifted him out of bed, propped him on her hip, and snuck into the living room. She lifted the door latch and slipped out.
It was cold and her breath plumed in the air before her as she took a moment to look around. The farmyard was empty, but she could hear Deryn moving around in the barn. To the east, the faintest sliver of pink light was creeping along the horizon. Good. As the sun rose, it would light her way.
She set out. Rory barely stirred but slept with his chin resting on her shoulder. By the time she’d gone a hundred meters, her arms were already aching, but she didn’t slow. An urgency burned within her, a fiery, desperate need that drove all rational thought from her head.
I’ve traveled through time. Oh, my God! I need to get home! I have to get home.
Deryn had shown her his maps when he had been trying to plot a route to Fortrose and she had memorized those maps in the same way she memorized her architect’s plans. She knew where to find what she was looking for and at this early hour she hoped there would be nobody about.
Anguish twisted her stomach as she thought of Deryn and how she was leaving without even saying goodbye, but this was better for all of them. She could not tell him the truth. Who knew how he would react to that? And she could not stay here. Not anymore.
She walked due south as best she could tell, following an animal trail until she reached the slope that would lead out of the hidden valley. As she stepped under the thick canopy of the trees that cloaked the valley’s slope, she turned and took one last look at Deryn’s little croft. Loss punched her in the stomach with such force that she almost staggered, almost turned around and went back, but common sense reasserted itself.
Goodbye, Deryn.
