Page 10 of Beyond Dreams

“Last week she was swallowed by the sea and then returned without her life, closer to where you’ll be going. Nae far from Thallane.”

“Drowned? Last week?” Holly repeated, a wild alarm building rapidly. “She only died last week? And here I am wearing her clothes?” She’d been unceremoniously stuffed into a blue velvet dress with gold braid trim, the gown being too long for her and way too tight in the chest. “Oh, my God. This just gets more bizarre, and frankly it seems very cruel. Jeez, her brother and family haven’t even had time to mourn her—”

“Nae much to mourn,” Sidheag had said. “Ceri lived and died in the same manner, recklessly. Nae one ever thought she’d find a good end.”

Sidheag had promptly changed the subject, pointing out the village below, at the base of the mountain, where lived all thosemovie extras—tenants, servants, and laborers of the MacHeth, and where some of the soldiers of their army lived.

“Ye’ll see sheep on the hills sometimes,” Sidheag had said, “but mostly they stay below. And all the farming is done down there as well, such as it is. MacHeths nae ever did ken their arse from a spade.”

At the bottom of the small mountain were fields of crops, but not anything in scale that could have rivaled the farmland of Pennsylvania. But yes, all the persons working those fields and all the tools and machinery being used appeared archaic.

Aside from that lone stroll out of doors, if Holly were allowed to leave that prison room, most of her time had been spent in the great hall. That long room appeared as any twenty-first century castle tour had suggested it might, large and cavernous but then dimly lit and smelling vaguely of many unpleasant things, none of which she wished to precisely identify.

When she’d expressed a need on her first day here for the bathroom, Sidheag herself had shown her to the garderobe. Having gone on numerous tours of castles and ruins in Scotland, the idea of the toilet built into an outer wall was not exactly foreign to her; however, the ruins of garderobes she’d visited were old enough and so few of them intact that she hadn’t given any thought to what an existing one would smell like. Holly had nearly gagged inside the narrow space, nauseated by the...freshness of this one, which the vent to the slush pile below did not alleviate. Never before had she been so grateful to have incorporated squats into her workout more than a year ago. She’d been able to get the job done without touching a single stone in that cubby hole. She’d since insisted on a chamber pot, which had proven only marginally better.

Today, she was inside her bedroom prison and was being primped and primed for her wedding, currently soaking in a surprisingly glorious bath. The wooden tub was round and not terribly comfortable—she couldn’t slouch and relax as she’d like—but her bath attendants had added scented oil to the heated water, and this was now the first pleasure Holly had known since coming to this time. Somewhat of a pleasure anyway, since she wasn’t used to being assisted with her bath and undressed by other women. Thank God she didn’t really have any body issues and thus her apprehension stemmed mostly from having help for something she could quite easily do by herself.

Her wedding.

She still hadn’t wrapped her head around that. In fact, she was convinced she was only able to cling to sanity, being able to think and breathe and speak at all, merely because she hadn’t fully processed it, or more aptly, she still partly believed nothing was real. It just couldn’t be. Nothing made sense.

But if marry some medieval chief she had to do to get back to her own life in her own time, then marry she would.

It wasn’t real, the wedding, not any part of this, a bit of her still regularly maintained. She just had to go with the flow until she was pulled from this dream. Or this alternate reality, whatever the hell it was. Obviously, she wouldn’t be stuck here forever.

Would she?

Pushing aside dread, Holly addressed the ever-hovering Sidheag from her bath. “Tell me again why I have to marry this guy and how that helps me?”

Possibly, the old woman rolled her eyes with more frequency than even Holly did these days.

“I’ve said, have I nae, to elicit peace between the MacHeths and MacQuillans. Ceri was promised to the MacQuillan chief but now she’s dead. But Hugh had been warned by the northern mormaer nae to...och, what’s the phrase your kind uses? Ah, there it is—nae to fuck it up.”

Ignoring the old woman’s surprising use of foul language, Holly asked, “But how does that help me?”

“Ye canna get home from here, is all I know,” Sidheag said, another galling response, since it explained nothing.

“Honestly, Sidheag, I get the feeling not only are you purposefully withholding things from me,” Holly accused, “but that half of what you say might not actually be true.”

“So ye’ve said,” Sidheag remarked dryly. Holly had reproached her similarly many times over two days. “But that is the truth, if ye do nothing or remain here cowering, ye will nae get home.”

“What is this MacQuillan guy like?”

A shrug was the response to this. And then Sidheag changed the subject. “They’ve packed up a trunk with yer léines and—”

“Ceri’s stuff, you mean,” Holly inserted.

The witch continued as if Holly hadn’t interrupted. “Made what alterations they could in so short a time. Ye must remember ye are Ceri. Ye were born here but were sent off to the nunnery several—”

The door banged open then. Holly gasped and sat up straight, crossing her arms over her chest when she saw Ceri’s brother, Wedast, enter the room.

“Oh, my God,” she cried. “Get out! You can’t just barge in like this!”

He didn’t understand or he didn’t care, the latter probably truer since there should have been no mistaking the outrage in her expression or tone.

Sidheag moved with more speed than Holly had previously noted, crossing the room from where she’d stood by the windows to stand between Wedast and Holly in the tub near the fire. She shouted something at Wedast as well, thrusting her frail arm out toward the door. Wedast talked right over her, speaking rapidly and pointing a finger in Holly’s general direction. At first he seemed to believe nothing amiss with barging in on hissisterin her bath, which rather made Holly cringe, but then his gaze landed on her naked shoulder, and he stopped speaking. He blinked twice, his dull eyes showing a bit of sudden absorption as he let them wander downward, compelling Holly to cover her breasts with her arms and hands.

Holly felt his penetrating, leering gaze so thoroughly it was as if he’d touched her. Anger and a fresh fear tangled in her stomach. “Get out!” Holly yelled again, disgusted by his ogling for how it made her skin crawl.

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