A half-laugh. ‘Absolutely nothing. I’m making conversation, Pax, to save me from screaming into the void. Play along, please.’
Great. Now I felt guilty. ‘Pretty boring really. Live in York, teach chemistry at a local school, Mum lives down south, Dad is trying crofting on one of the small islands off the coast. There’s nothing really to know.’
‘Anyone else going to miss you?’
‘Only my brother,’ I said, and then wondered if he was trying to find out if I had a Significant Other, only a bit more tactfully than I’d tried it on him. ‘I was engaged, but we split up a few weeks ago. We’d just outgrown each other,’ I added as my mind was flooded with images of Jack, bored and restless and wanting to go out and be a young couple; none of which was concomitant with marking, lesson prep or target setting.
‘A few weeks ago, three hundred and maybe a few more years ahead.’
‘Yes, thanks for pointing that out.’ But I couldn’t keep away from the topic he’d begun to raise. ‘Do you seriously think there might be some kind of purpose to us being here?’
Lachlan made a movement. I couldn’t see well enough in this sieved moonlight to tell what it was – it could have been a shrug or a headshake. ‘I’ve no idea. But, and I haven’t said this to the others, so don’t breathe a word, please, I’ve got a feeling that there must be. A feeling almost as if… I was brought here deliberately.’ The shadow of a frown creased what I could see of his face.
I turned so that I could look at him directly, rather than sideways on. ‘So you think this is all aboutyou?’
‘No, no, listen. I was just outside the keep when the storm came in. Literally, by the doorway there.’ He pointed in some vague direction beyond the wall. ‘And I’d started on my way down the steps when Mal, David and Kaylinn came tearing across the grass and kind of piled in after me. But, you see, they weren’t supposed to be here. All the other diggers had gone back to the campsite and it was only because Mal had found something he thought might be a Pictish carved stone that they stayed.’
‘Doesn’t that make the whole process sound a bit – inept?’ I rubbed at an ankle. Something bitey had clearly not found us as invisible as almost everything else, and twenty-first-century blood seemed just as nourishing as the eighteenth-century variety. ‘And what on earth would we be here for, anyway?’
‘Oh, I don’t know.’ Lachlan sounded tired again now. ‘I’m thinking aloud here, Pax, you understand. It’s a wee bit lonely when the guys there think I’m in charge because I’m that bit older, and they’re looking to me to guide them through all this. I’m floundering around as much as they are, truly.’ He watched me scratch my ankle for a moment. ‘I’m terrified,’ he went on. ‘Scared and out of my depth and trying to hold it together as much as anyone else. But if we start going to pieces then there’s no hope at all, is there?’ Now I got the edges of a smile and he pointed to my leg. ‘Jeannie grows chamomile out in the garden over yon,’ he said, sounding more conversational. ‘Rub a bit on, it stops the itching.’
I gave him a slightly weak smile. His unasked-for confidences, while flattering, made me realise that even Lachlan was flailing around as much as the rest of us, which was not a comforting thought. ‘Thank you, I’ll try that,’ I said. ‘As soon as I find out what chamomile looks like.’
Lachlan laughed quietly. ‘One of the others will show you. But don’t get caught picking it. Poor Jeannie has enough to putup with without worrying that her herbs have been possessed.’ He started to get to his feet and held out a hand to help me up. ‘I suppose we just have to watch and wait,’ he went on. ‘If there is something behind us being here it will show itself sooner or later.’
‘And if there isn’t?’ I’d begun to look thoughtfully at the bucket of water. I was thirsty and the back of my neck felt sweaty.
‘Then we wait anyway.’ His voice fell away for a second. ‘Nothing else we can do. I’m away back to my bed, even if young Mal is snoring fit to wake the castle. Are you coming?’
‘I’ll follow you up,’ I said, realising that this sounded domesticated and twee, as though we were a couple heading up for the night after turning off the TV. ‘I want a drink first.’
‘The garderobe is on the next floor,’ he said. ‘Hole in the wall behind the tapestry.’
‘Thank you,’ I said tartly.
‘There’s some sheep’s wool in a bag next to…’
‘Stop it.’ I was laughing now. ‘I reallydojust want a drink.’ As well as time to think, I didn’t add as Lachlan waved a farewell and scuffled back to the staircase. Were wereallyhere for a reason? And what on earth could that be? I mean, surely we couldn’t change time, could we? I’d always thought if I could go back in time I’d be doing something involving the winning Lottery numbers. I couldn’t evenrememberlast week’s Lottery numbers and it wouldn’t do me any good even if I could, unless I was prepared to sit it out for a really,reallylong time.
I drank some water, which tasted slightly salty but cold and refreshing, then I splashed my face and gave my armpits a furtive scrub and stumbled my way back up through the dark walls to the itchy warmth of the bed, where Kaylinn was mumbling to herself in her sleep.
7
This time I dreamed of the sea. I was standing on a beach and I could see Dunaire Castle in the background as I walked away from it, with the sea bobbing at my ankles in a swirl of surf. It was one of those dreams that feels as though it means something important. A dream where every move and thought seems laden with allegorical detail, where, if you paid enough attention, the solution to your problems would become apparent. Instead, I woke up with an overwhelming desire to go for a swim when Mal exploded into our bedroom from the staircase.
‘Incoming!’ he shouted. ‘We’ve got action!’
Kaylinn and I sat up blearily, stared at each other for a second while memory returned, and then at Mal.
‘What?’ she asked, combing her hair with her fingers.
‘There are people! Coming to the castle! People and horses and baggage and all sorts, it looks as though the boss might be back.’
Kaylinn was clearly still half asleep. ‘Bruce Springsteen?’
‘Just look.’
We climbed out of bed and shuffled to the window, where we peered out between the slats at a transformed scene below.It looked as though a country fair had come to town – there were horses everywhere, and dogs; large carts filled with sacks and with a few cows tied by rope halters to the back. There was a vaguely agricultural smell on the air that drifted in. The small black terrier that had growled at us last night was barking itself hoarse as it tackled the large dogs that milled around getting under the horses’ hooves. Cows mooed, carts creaked, people shouted and occasionally laughed. It all looked horribly, improbablyreal.
