Keeper of the Black Stones (57 page)

R
eis' touch kept me from moving forward, but it was Dresden's voice that brought me back to reality, sending a chill down my spine in the process.

“Doctor, how very kind of you to join us,” he said, his voice low and menacing.

I pulled my eyes from the stone and looked beyond it. There, in front of the wagon, stood Dresden. Sloan stood behind him, his face impassive. Katherine trembled in front of them, Dresden's hand around her throat and a modern handgun pressed to her temple. Her eyes, wide and frightened, found mine and cleared for a moment. She was unharmed, but well and truly trapped by the gun at her head. And she was too far away for me to reach her easily.

My eyes flew to Dresden's face, my heart contorting with anger. He saw the emotion in my eyes and smiled mockingly.

“I believe, given your hurried pace and this girl's word, that the stone is ready to open,” he said quietly. “Am I correct in this assumption?” His eyes slid to Doc, and then back to me.

I looked at my watch; he was right–we had less than a minute before the stone opened. The second hand was ticking down the last minute now, every second pounding through my bones like a drum. Fifty-nine … fifty-eight … fifty-seven…

“Tell me I'm right!” Dresden screamed, pressing the gun tightly to Katherine's temple. She cried out in pain, and my head jerked toward them.

“Yes, you're right!” I shouted. “Now let her go!”

Dresden smiled and shook his head. “Do you think I'm a fool, boy? The moment I release her, your man will shoot me. And then–most likely–my son. No, I think she will come with me, while you and your little friends will be left here, at the mercy of my men.”

I choked, surprised. He thought to escape
and
take Katherine with him? Behind us, his men hammered on the doors of the church, shouting. We were running out of time.

Dresden read the thoughts as the crossed my face and nodded, absolutely sure of himself. “Yes, you are trapped, and you
will
die. Now, where will this stone take me? WHERE?”

“I don't know,” I gasped, watching in horror.

“When will it open?”

“In less than twenty seconds,” I shot back. I glanced down to find the stone glowing faintly, its symbols taking on a life of their own, and studied them carefully, allowing their message into my brain. Suddenly I paused, seeing something I hadn't expected. Something that didn't quite belong. My eyes flew back to Dresden, hoping he hadn't seen this mistake.

He was looking at me closely, no doubt trying to decide whether I was telling the truth, but he hadn't seen my lapse in focus. He'd already made up his mind.

“Move!” he yelled, turning suddenly to Sloan and pushing him onto the stone. He shoved Katherine down next to the boy and slammed the nose of the pistol into her forehead. She cried out again, but stayed upright, her eyes seeking mine in panic.

Reis raised his weapon and leveled it on Dresden. “Let the girl go, or I shoot!” he shouted.

“Shoot me and the girl dies,” Dresden snarled.

“Reis, don't!” I shouted, reaching out to stop him. Dresden wasn't bluffing–he was ready to shoot Katherine if he needed to, to get away. And I
wasn't willing to see her die. The symbols were rising from the stone now, beginning their dance around the perimeter. A soft glow illuminated the area above the stone, and the humming increased to a dull roar.

The door behind us shattered as Dresden's soldiers made their way through, and I turned to see them running down the aisle toward us, brandishing their swords and pikes.

“What do we do?” Tatiana muttered.

“We're done for,” Paul answered, his voice dramatically tragic.

I turned back toward the stone, my breath gone, to keep an eye on Dresden. But Sloan, Katherine, and he were already gone. Shocked, I checked my watch; the stone was still beating in my head, waiting to make our trip, and the watch was still ticking. Our window hadn't closed yet.

“Onto the stone!” I screamed, pushing Tatiana and Paul roughly forward.

“What are you doing?” Doc shouted. “The window has already opened and closed! Dresden is gone!”

“Don't ask questions!” I screamed back. “Just get on!”

I heard shots from Reis' gun, and felt the stone beneath my knees, its call echoing through my mind. The screams of men circled the air as Reis, Doc, Paul, and Tatiana tumbled on around me, knocking the air out of my lungs. The five of us rushed to pull our limbs onto the stone and then…

48

I
have no recollection of my second trip through the stones.

We arrived home in a jumble of arms and legs, still thrown together in our haphazard pile on its surface. I opened my eyes and shoved Tatiana's hair out of my face to see rough concrete blocks around us, connected to the concrete floor and wooden ceiling of our garden shed.

Home. We were home.

The comfort of that thought lasted about seven seconds. Then the memories came flooding back and I groaned. My head hurt at the thought of the things we'd done and seen over the past three days, and that horrendous buzzing wasn't helping.

Buzzing, I realized suddenly. Still? Shouldn't it be done now that the jump was finished? I looked down to see that the stone was still glowing, the symbols rising in their dance again.

“Off!” I shrieked, shoving at the bodies around me. “Everyone off the stone! Now!” I shot up, pushing and kicking in my panic. The jump wasn't over, not by a long shot. This stone was still open, or was about to open again, in which case we'd be thrown right back into the ribbon of time.

We had to move. Fast.

“Off!” I screamed, frustrated at the sluggish reactions of my group. I kicked one shin and pushed at someone's back. “The stone is going to open another window! Unless you want to take another trip, I suggest you
move
!” I shouted.

That got people going. I tumbled off the stone, followed closely by Reis, Tatiana, Doc, and Paul, and we turned to watch the stone, breathless.

After a few moments of watching, though, the glow faded and the stone closed. It was over. We were safe … for now. I choked out a laugh, relieved.

“How did you know?” Paul asked, glancing at me.

“About what?”

“About the stone taking Dresden away, and then still bringing us home.”

I shook my head in awe. “It didn't close after Dresden left like it should have. It stayed open, and told me that we could trust it.”

No one answered, though we all took another long, hard look at the stone in front of us. It had gone quiet now, like none of this had actually happened, and I swallowed heavily. How long before it opened again, and pulled us all back in?

“Well, I think I could use a good shower,” Reis said finally, laughing. I joined in the laughter, then stopped abruptly when the rest of my memory returned.

“What's wrong?” Tatiana asked, noticing my silence.

I shook my head as I looked at her. “I've just remembered,” I answered slowly. “Dresden. He escaped, and he took Katherine with him.”

Tatiana's joyful expression changed as quickly as mine had. She stood up and dusted herself off briskly. “Right, well that means we have to find them, doesn't it? So how exactly are we going to go about doing that? I don't see that we have any options.”

Paul shook his head, his face pale. “We can't. It's not exactly like we know where they went.”

“I know exactly where they went,” I said slowly, glancing back at the stone.

“How?” Paul asked. “You told Dresden you couldn't tell.”

“I lied. I saw where they were going as soon as the stone opened the window.”

“So where did they go?” Tatiana asked quietly. When I didn't answer, she asked again. “Jason, where did that man take Katherine?”

I took a deep breath, then looked up at my friends, already dreading what lay ahead of us. We couldn't let him get away, it wasn't even an option. That didn't mean that I was looking forward to going after him. “Germany, 1939. He went to join the Nazis.”

To say I took creative license in writing this book would be an enormous understatement. I have, however, to the best of my ability, tried to introduce historical fact to the story where I deemed it appropriate. As my editor said again and again and again, ‘story first, history second.' What this means, in my interpretation, is that I had to tell Jason's story the way Jason wanted it told (and we all know who controls that process–the characters), within the confines of historical truth.

Complicated, I know. So here's the truth of the story.

The War of the Roses, depending on which historian you listen to, lasted from 1455 to 1499. As the book shows, of course, the Battle of Bosworth all but ended the war in 1485, with the demise of Richard III (on the York side of things). After his death, Henry Tudor dealt with small York revolts and plots for several years. Henry VIII (his son) even dealt with a couple of nasty York-ish cousins. Nothing ever came of it.

I'm not going to delve into all of the family ties here, so let's go with the shorter version. The War of the Roses featured the Yorks (Richard III, symbolized by the white rose) against the Lancasters (Henry Tudor, symbolized by the red rose). Before Henry, other Lancasters had been carrying the flag for the family. Both Yorks and Lancasters descended from one man–King Edward III. Hence the shared belief that they deserved the crown more than the other guys.

Henry Tudor was actually related to King Henry VI's family, but was in exile in France up until our story begins.

When his (French-backed) army landed in Wales in the summer of 1485, they marched inland across England, collecting English allies as they went. Henry and the Earl of Oxford had expected stronger support from local lords, as was promised to them before they set sail from France.
Unfortunately, many of the lords who had promised men and gold months before suddenly forgot their previous agreements. It didn't matter as much as it could have, since many lords did the same thing to Richard III. In other words, politicians were as nasty and deceitful then as they are today (some things never change).

The Earl of Oxford, as well as Henry Tudor, Richard III, the Earls of Northumberland and Norfolk, and the Stanley brothers, were real historical figures. The Earl of Oxford lived to be over seventy years old, and passed away in 1513 (impressive when you consider that the average life span at that time was less than forty-five years). However, John de Vere, Earl of Oxford, was only in his mid-forties when he confronted Richard's army on Ambion Hill. Still not young by any stretch of the imagination, but not as old as I portrayed him to be. In this spot, it was convenient for me to take a small creative license. (Or was that actually Doc in his guise as the Earl, acting for a man who had died years earlier? I suppose we'll never know.)

Upon reading about the (real) Earl's exploits as a soldier and leader, one has to doubt whether the Battle of Bosworth would have gone Henry's way if the Earl didn't exist. I took full advantage of this in the book, and added to it where I could.

I also told the truth about Lord Stanley. Within the confines of the story, of course. Dresden never kidnapped Lord Stanley's brother. Richard III did, however, hold Lord Stanley's son prisoner at the time of the battle, with the idea that Stanley's army would assist Richard. Richard must have hoped, at least, that Lord Stanley would refrain from joining Henry Tudor's army once the battle began. This, of course, was a double-edged sword. Stanley hesitated at the start of the battle, and certainly took his time making his decision, but ended his hesitation with the famous (and real) line “I have more sons!” It would not win the man ‘father of the year' honors, but it meant that he came down on Henry's side, perhaps changing the course of history. It certainly shows that living in the fifteenth century was not for the faint of heart.