Page 169 of Long Live the King

“Lady Mairead is going to be so mad, Da wrote all over the book. You want to see, Isla?”

She nodded.

Jack banged his hands. “Eee! Eee!”

Archie flipped the page and pointed. Isla said, “Haggis!”

Haggis ran in from his spot by the fireplace with his tail wagging. Archie said, with so much excitement, “Want to go see Da, boy?”

It made me laugh and cry the way Haggis rushed around the room looking for Da.

Isla clapped.

Archie said, “And here’s three horses, that’s Dràgon, Thor, and my horse, Mario.”

He flipped a couple more pages. “There’s a PlayStation controller, some forks, why are there forks?”

I shrugged. “Maybe they don’t have forks, wow.”

Archie said, “Weird, that’s... really weird.” He flipped the page. “And a drawing of a man.... I don’t know.”

I said, “I think that’s Chef Zach.”

Isla clapped again.

Archie showed me the first page, a sun, and my husband’s writing: Tis dawn, we are beginning.

And I clapped. And my children beamed up at me and I said, “I am so excited, who wants to go see Da?”

Everyone said, “Me!” And I threw my arms around them and hugged them close.

“Okay,” I wiped my eyes and climbed out of the bed. “We have to pack, we have to tell everyone.”

Archie shoved his feet into shoes. “Let’s go tell everyone!” We all peed first, and Isla and I put on our shoes.

My lady’s maid helped me pull a bodice on and I wrapped a plaid around my shoulders, while Archie was begging to go, but I didn’t want to miss anything. Then we all rushed from the room and down the hall. We passed Hayley’s room first, and banged, then barged in. Archie said, “Aunt Hayley! Uncle Fraoch sent a message, he wants us to come!”

She said, “But he’s okay, right? Everyone is okay?”

Archie nodded. He showed her the page. She said, “Let me guess: He wants me to bring him a fishing pole?”

Archie said, “Yep! We’re going to tell everyone!”

We left Hayley’s room and continued down the corridor. Zach stuck his head out from his room, Ben rushed out. I said, “Magnus sent a message, he wants us to come!”

Zach said, “To the thirteenth century?”

“We can all talk about it over breakfast.”

Quentin’s door opened, “What’s up?”

“Magnus wants us all to come!”

“Awesome, good, alright.” He ran his hand over his hair. “What time is it?”

Archie yelled, “It’s dawn! It’s a new beginning!”

We went down the corridor and down the steps to James’s room. We knocked quietly, he stuck his head out, his hair was sticking out everywhere. Over his shoulder I could see Sophie walking with the baby on her shoulder, soothing him. He said, “Baby was up a lot.”

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