The Dark Highlander

Page 77

Chloe wasn’t stupid. She knew she wasn’t dreaming. A part of her had acknowledged it last night or she wouldn’t have fainted. That, in a strange way, seemed proof itself: a dreaming mind fainting from the “reality” of its own dream? An already unconscious mind slipping into unconsciousness? She could get tangled up in that thought if she pondered it too long.
Upon awakening this morning, she’d wandered the upper floor, scurrying down corridors, peeking into chambers and out windows, piecing together bits of information. She’d touched, peered, shaken, even broken a few minor things that she’d deemed replaceable as part of her examination.
All of it, the textures and scents and tastes were simply too tangible to be a figment of her unconscious mind. Furthermore, dreams had narrow focuses; they didn’t come complete with periphery guards and servants going about duties she’d never conceived of, beyond the windows.
She was in Maggie MacKeltar’s castle … but not quite that castle. There were additions missing, an entire wing not yet constructed. Furniture that hadn’t been there yesterday, more furniture that was missing today, to say nothing of all the new people! To all appearances—impossible though it was to fathom—it was Maggie’s castle nearly five centuries ago.
“Aren’t you going to introduce me?” She slid Dageus’s mug back and glanced curiously at the older, fortyish woman. She couldn’t be his mother, she mused, unless she’d had him incredibly young, even for medieval times. Dressed in a lapis gown similar to her own, the lovely woman had a gently faded but timeless beauty. Her ash-blond hair was swept up in an intricate plait, with fringy bangs wisping about her face, rather like Gwen’s, Chloe thought.
“ ’Tis your dream, lass. Make up her name yourself,” Dageus said, watching her with a mocking expression.
He knew she knew. Damn the man.
“Oh, Dageus,” Chloe sighed, slumping in her chair, “what did you do to me? I thought you were just a wealthy, eccentric womanizer. Well, I also thought you were a thief for a while,” she muttered, “and a kidnapper, but I didn’t think—”
“Would you like to see the library, lass?” he offered, his dark eyes glittering.
Chloe narrowed her eyes. “You think it’s going to be that easy? Show the girl a few impressive books and she’ll think it’s all right that you somehow yanked her back in time?” Sadly, she mused, he might be onto something, because the instant he’d said “library” her heart rate had quickened. A zillion questions perched on the tip of her tongue, but she couldn’t yet bring herself to talk about reality as if it were real.
“All right, then. Let’s go to the stones. I’ll send you back this very moment.” He pushed himself to his feet and she got her first look at him from the waist down. Snug black leather trews encased his powerful hips and thighs. Holy cow. Her mouth went dry. There was an impossible-to-ignore bulge in them.
“Wait just a—” Silvan began, but stopped abruptly at Dageus’s warning look.
“You know you’re not dreaming,” Dageus said flatly.
Chloe forced herself to tear her gaze away from his lower body and pursed her lips.
“Then come. I’ll send you back.” Dageus gestured impatiently at her.
Chloe remained seated. She wasn’t going anywhere. “Are you saying that you could send me back any time?”
“Aye, lass. ’Tis naught more than a bit of physics your century hasn’t yet stumbled upon for themselves.” His tone was detached, as if discussing nothing of any more significance than a new bit of twenty-first century technology. “Though from what I read while in your time,” he continued, “I’d wager it won’t be much longer.” When she made no reply, he said, “Chloe, Druids have long possessed more knowledge of archeoastronomy and sacred mathematics than anyone. Did you truly believe yours was the most advanced civilization ever to have existed? That none came before? Consider the Romans and the subsequent Dark Ages. Think you Rome was the first great civilization to rise and fall? Knowledge has repeatedly been gained and lost, to be one day regained again. Druids have merely managed to hold onto their lore through the dark times.”
A plausible, albeit mind-boggling possibility, she conceded silently. It certainly explained the purpose of all those mysterious stone monuments that stumped modern man, many of them constructed as early as 3500 B.C.E. Historians couldn’t even agree on how the ancient monuments had been built. Was it conceivable that thousands of years ago a race or tribe had lived that had achieved an advanced understanding of physics, necessary to both construct those “devices” and use them?