The Temporal Knights (82 page)

“Major Thane,” the older woman said, stammering a little. She was clearly nervous about something, which filled Matt with unease. “I am Admiral Kowalik. I welcome you aboard the UIA Sovereignty. This,” she said with a slight bow and a gesture toward the younger woman, “is Princess Ewen, direct descendant of Eve.”

No one said a word.

“Yes,” the Admiral added, “the direct descendant of your daughter, Eve.”

“Greetings,” Ewen said. Her voice had the high pitch of a young girl and a strange accent Matt could not place.

“Your mission here has been accomplished Major. Thanks to your brave crew, the Skawp Queen is dead. The species is no longer a threat to human beings. It is because of you and your contemporaries that we are now a temporal species.”

Matt shook his head, trying to think, while Murphy, Æthelgifu and Ellyn just sat stunned, very thankful to be alive. Oldalf, over his fussiness, was now smiling up at the screen like a seasoned diplomat. He cooed loudly and then became distracted by his mother’s nose. He grabbed at it, squeezing with his little fingers as Ellyn absently pulled away from his chubby grip. The large face of the Admiral smiled down at the baby, which gave the adults a few seconds to think.

“How...how did you advance so quickly?” Matt asked, confused. He expected General Peebles, Doctor Rice and Robertson to make great strides on Earth, but never in his wildest imagination did he expect them to advance quickly enough for someone to meet them at the Skawp’s planet.

The Admiral smiled at his puzzled expression, knowing there would be a great deal more confusion for these four historic people before they would finally adapt and accept.

“It was not so fast...General Peebles and the first of the Temporal Knights did great things, but we come from the future, nearly sixty-three hundred years after that first jump. We have traveled back from the year 7132, from what we call the Coltri Era. We have come back to reinforce the gains made by our people. We’ve come back to help you, to teach you. The Skawps and the other aggressive species in the galaxy are no longer a threat to us. We control Space…we are the true masters of the multiverse. We are the Temporal Knights, the Keepers of Time.”

Still no one said a word.

“Permission to come aboard Major,” the Admiral asked with a soft smile. “There are many people here very anxious to meet you and the rest of your crew.”

Matt blinked for a moment while Murphy raised his eyebrows and shrugged. Giffu nodded emphatically and Ellyn just smiled.

“To help ‘nd to teach.
Yah, where have I heard that before,” Ellyn said and rose slowly to stand by her husband. He slipped his arm around her and looked back up at the Admiral.

“Granted,” he said and they heard the seal to the doors break with a hiss. As one, they moved to the ramp that led down into the ship, the wonderful ship that had traveled from their long and enduring future.

Epilogue

General Stephen Peebles rolled over in bed to find his new wife propped up against the ornate oak headboard. The thick wool blankets were tucked around her waist; her hair was disheveled from sleep and her breasts were pleasantly exposed. She was gazing down at a computer tablet, reading, but glanced over at her husband and smiled. Peebles breath caught in his throat. His wife, Æthelf
læ
d, daughter to King Alfred and the Lady of Mercia, was uncommonly beautiful, no matter what the age.

“Good morn, sleepy,” F
læ
d teased then leaned over and kissed her new husband on the forehead and then promptly went back to her reading. A moment later she glanced down again, and smiled once more. “Tired?” She asked playfully, they’d spent much of the previous night, their wedding night, getting to know one another better.

Peebles smiled and nodded. “Exhausted,” he admitted and nuzzled her rib cage. F
læ
d giggled and shooed him away.

“Tis said here that Jupiter is eleven times the size of our earth,” she stated and turned the tablet his way. On the screen was a comparison picture of the relative sizes of the planets. “Ye think me sister saw Jupiter on her way?” She asked, missing Giffu, who’d been gone now nearly a year.

Peebles pulled himself up and sat next to his new love. “I’m not sure…perhaps,” he began but was interrupted by a loud knock at the door.

“General…sorry to intrude,” a muffled voice called from beyond the door.

F
læ
d gasped, dropped the tablet and yanked the covers up over her chest, but Peebles flipped them back down as he hopped from the bed completely naked.

“Give me a minute,” the General called out and started to dress. F
læ
d watched with a great degree of interest as her husband pulled on his clothes. He was well built and handsome for his age and much slimmer than her late husband. She found she liked his body very much.

F
læ
d ducked down and pulled the covers to her chin, her cheeks glowing as he pulled open the door.

“What is it?” Peebles asked, obviously annoyed.

“Er…” Major Hersey began, amused and slightly embarrassed. “We’ve detected a large force moving in our direction across the Salisbury Plains.”

“Wot?” F
læ
d asked with alarm, but remained safely hidden beneath the covers.

“How large?”
Peebles asked as he quickly tucked his shirt into his pants.

“A thousand men or so…all on horseback,” Hersey reported, suppressing a smile. He was very happy for his commanding officer. It was good to have a wife, and he would know; he’d been married to Hester now for nearly five months…five perfect months.

Peebles noticed the smirk and smiled. “Give me a minute,” he said and closed the door in the Major’s face.

Æthelf
læ
d immediately jumped from the bed, completely nude and apparently uncaring. Peebles froze and stared at her pale, perfect body that was lit only by the morning sunlight and grinned. She was absolutely glorious.

“Stare all ye like, but help me tie this,” she snapped, though she was well pleased by his attentions. Her belly was not as flat as it once was, but she was still trim and her breasts were bigger for the babes she’d had. It was nice to know she could still command the eyes of men…or
at least this man. She slipped on her shift and turned her back on her husband and pulled on her undergarments while he did the ties at her neck.

“You’re beautiful,” he whispered into her ear and wrapped his arms around her waist. She smiled.

“Aye, so are ye, now release me so I canna dress properly.”

Reluctantly he did as she asked and ran his fingers through his thinning hair. Patiently he waited for her to get ready for the day, quietly amazed at how quickly she brushed through her thick black hair and then pinned in up. Within ten minutes they walked to the door and pulled it open.

“Lemay?” Peebles asked Hersey as they emerged.

“In the west hall with Alfred.”

Peebles nodded. “Does the King have any idea who might be leading the force?”

“A thousand men ahorsed,” Æthelf
læ
d spouted a bit alarmed, but she had no answers. There was no one in all of lower Angland that could put such an army in the field. Vikings perhaps, but her father and husband had spent the last year driving Guthrum from East Anglia, so it could not be him, certainly not this far south. And then the Skawps came to mind and she blurted out her fears.

Hersey laughed but Peebles only smiled. “Not on horseback,” he told her as they hurried through the halls of Maiden Castle.

The King, his eldest son and heir, Edward, Asser his advisor, Colonel Lemay and the Queen were already present. They all smiled indulgently at the newlyweds.

“I apologize for interrupting,” Alfred said, his eyes moving from his daughter to the General and back, twinkling all the while. Æthelf
læ
d blushed slightly and her mother, Ealhswith, could instantly tell that the night went very well for F
læ
d, and she was happy.

The General however, was all business at the moment.
“How far away?”

“Fifteen miles,” Lemay replied. “Garraty spotted them with a bug.”

“How in the hell did they get so close?” Peebles asked though he didn’t really expect an answer. He didn’t get one. Everyone in the room shrugged. It didn’t seem possible. The approaching force was far from any shoreline and would have had to travel quite a ways across open country to get to their current position.

“I have me men preparing to ride,” Alfred stated though he could only manage about eight hundred horseman at present.

Peebles nodded. “Let’s take a couple of hummers,” he ordered Lemay. After the campaign to free East Anglia they were now on strict gasoline rationing even though Robertson had managed to build several operating distillation columns for refining oil. They worked, but the process was agonizingly slow.

An hour later they were off, Æthelf
læ
d riding next to her husband, insisting on coming along. The General didn’t argue too much, knowing that his new wife was headstrong and accustomed to getting her way, plus she was becoming quite the shot with a pistol. With the hummers and the M60’s along, he didn’t expect too much trouble, though he would rather not disperse the intruders throughout the countryside.

They traveled slowly to the west, following the main road until they reached the open spaces of the plains and then they set out across county.

“Corporal Garraty, do you still have a fix on their location?”

“Yes Sir…approximately nine miles due west of your current position,” the Corporal replied and it was a testament to how much the locals had grown that no one wondered how Garraty was able to supply such information or just where he was located.

At the moment the Corporal was positioned a couple of miles to the northwest in the little town of Andover, where the General had set up a small garrison to watch over the western plains.

“They’re moving slowly your direction and seem to be in no real hurry,” Garraty reported.

“Roger,” Peebles replied and they set out across the plains, moving no faster than the horses could easily manage. They’d traveled several miles before the General spotted the bug circling near the horizon to the west.

“Target three miles and closing,” Garraty reported, “still moving slowly.”

Ten minutes later they topped a rise and spotted a small group of horsemen, perhaps twenty in all, riding their way. Farther back there was a very long column of horsemen lined up, two by two. At the moment they were still and waiting, but even from a distance the General was impressed. The formation was obviously very disciplined, with no stragglers, and through magnification Peebles could clearly see that most wore identical uniforms.

The General frowned. “It’s obviously a professional force…hell they’re all wearing the same uniform.”

“Negative,” Lemay replied from the second hummer. “Most of the small group approaching are dressed…hell, they’re dressed like modern civilians!”

Peebles immediately increased the magnification on his helmet and turned his attention to the approaching group, sure enough a handful of riders were dressed in blue jeans…they were definitely not locals.

“Interesting,” the General whispered and leaned out the window and passed along their findings to King Alfred, who frowned.

“Who could they be?” He asked.
“Mayhap more from yor lands?”

“I don’t know,” Peebles replied. “Anyone see any weapons.”

“Lances and swords,” Lemay called out. “I don’t see any guns at all.”

“Sadao, Jefferies?”

“Negative,” the two answered, one right after the other.

“All right.
Well at least they’re out gunned, let’s see what they want,” Peebles said and their group slowly moved toward the approaching horsemen. Once they reached the strange group of riders, Alfred’s horseman spread out to cover just as many as possible, with the two hummers taking up center position.

“Easy now…let’s just talk,” the General said quietly over the GBF. He stepped slowly out his vehicle and turned to face the small group of newcomers. A moment later Æthelf
læ
d was standing confidently at his side. Peebles took a moment to glance down at her. He smiled, but suddenly wished she was safely back in Winchester.

A young man, near the front of the strange group, obviously of Middle Eastern decent, dismounted and the rest of his group followed his example. Peebles took a moment to study them. There were four men in modern dress; two tall, fit men and one that looked like he could be an American Indian. Alongside there were three women; one had an American look while the youngest looked a bit Hispanic. She was lovely and gazed back at Peebles with wide, excited eyes. And finally there was the exotic beauty on the right. She was absolutely gorgeous, though
of some unknown nationality. There were no guns visible among the group, but several, including the stunning woman in blue jeans, were wearing swords strapped to their waists.

“Who
be these strangers?” Alfred asked as he climbed from his horse, curious that there were four women in the lead group, and three were wearing swords. Sir Gospatrick and Sir Ædwin dismounted as well, gawking openly as they moved to their King’s side.

Peebles shrugged. “You’re American,” Peebles said to the large man standing next to the young man who dismounted first. The man was clearly a professional…military probably, but perhaps a police officer. Lemay exited his hummer and moved to the General’s side, clearly intrigued.

“I am,” the man answered, “and you?”

Peebles nodded and took one small step forward and held up his hand in greeting. “My name is General Stephen Peebles…this is King Alfred of Wessex….or King Alfred the Great to you.”

The man’s mouth dropped open, utterly stunned, and then the young man next to him started to laugh.

“Galen, where in the…where have you taken us?”
The American woman whispered, though it was loud enough in the silence for everyone to hear.

“Earth,” the young man answered and briefly hugged the beautiful Hispanic girl who stood at his side. They smiled at each other happily for a moment and then the young man named Galen moved to the woman who asked the question.

“Don’t be afraid mother,” he said, though clearly they were not related. Galen then made a sweeping motion that encompassed all they could see. “This is Earth. This is home and I’m absolutely positive that this is the best of all possible worlds,” he added with a laugh.

Peebles frowned and took another step forward as the woman looked over and studied Alfred closely.

“But please don’t worry. If you don’t like it,” Galen added with a mischievous wink, “there are so, so many more.”

“Who are you people?” The General asked and took one more step forward and was surprised when Æthelf
læ
d slipped her hand into his. She’d remained steadfastly by his side.

The young man turned to Peebles. “I’m Galen Dawkins,” he answered with a smile, “and this is my mother Christine.”

Peebles nodded and glanced to the large man who first spoke.

“Cord Armstrong,” the man said. “Formerly NSA,” he explained.

“How did you get here?” Peebles asked. “How did you escape the Skawps?”

But before anyone could answer Corporal Jefferies shifted the M60 he was manning slightly in the direction of the group. In a flash, faster than thought, the young Hispanic woman drew both swords on her hips and streaked across the distance and kicked Jefferies in the right temple. At first no one was even aware that she’d moved; one second she was standing by the young man called Galen and the next she was on top of the hummer looming over the Corporal and pushing the M60 away from Galen.

“Ho!” Sir Gospatrick yelled and started to pull his sword. An instant later he was on his back and a sword was resting easily against Sir Ædwin’s throat. Ædwin swallowed nervously, he hadn’t even seen the gorgeous, older woman move, but despite the danger he found himself staring at her profile. She was exotic and utterly lovely.