Taken by Angeline Fortin (great books of all time TXT) 📗

It was some minutes later before what Laird had said finally sank in.

Her eyes popped open, searching his face as her heart began to flutter a rhythmically, sickly.  “Wait.  Did you say Ford Castle?  Laird!” she shook him urgently as she scrambled to her feet.  “Ford Castle.  Is that what you said?”

“Aye, lass.  What of it?”

“I thought you said King James planned on invading England through Newcastle?  Isn’t that what you said?  I’d never been there.  Hell, I probably wouldn’t have recognized it now if I had.  But we’re nowhere near there, are we?”

“Nay, Surrey’s forces were gathering to the east at Dunbar so James decided to cross at Coldstream.  What is it, lass?  Ye look faint.”

That’s because she was.  She hadn’t recognized any of the castles the Scots army had defeated in the past week.  Wark she had never even heard of.  Oh, the other names, Norham and Etal, might have rung a distant bell but many of the dozens of castles on the Scottish Borders and Northumberland were nothing but ruins in her time.   Hardly anything for a tourist to see.

She hadn’t recognized this last one either.  Not because it was a ruin in the future but because, like Dunskirk, the castle itself looked nothing like the one she knew from the twenty-first century.

But she recognized the name.  Ford Castle didn’t just ring a bell; it set off a peal of church bells.

Scarlett’s mind thundered as her pulse rate skyrocketed.  Shutting her eyes tightly, she pressed her fingers to her throbbing temples.  No!  She had to be wrong!  “What day is it?”

“Lass, what is it?” he asked, concern clouding his eyes as he caught her hand and tugged gently.

Her eyes flew open, filled with anguish. “The date.  What is the date?”

Laird rose to his feet as her agitation extended to him.  “’Tis the fifth day of September.”

“The year,” she demanded urgently.

“’Tis the year of our Lord fifteen hundred and thirteen,” he said slowly and ironically echoed Rhys’s concern from weeks past.  “I hope that dinnae come as a surprise for ye, lass.”

1513!  Oh, what a fool she was!  Why hadn’t she listened before?  Why hadn’t she paid more attention?  How could she have been so stupid?  Half-truths and misconceptions.  A world that looked nothing like the one she knew.  She hadn’t been able to recognize the path they were taking.

Well, she recognized it well enough now.

“Lass?  Scarlett?”  Laird’s fingers trailed across her jaw as if his touch might calm the anxiety building in her, but Scarlett was very afraid there would be nothing that could.  Not now.  “What is it?”

Scarlett struggled to find the right words in the sudden vacuum of her mind.  Words to make him understand.  To make him believe.

Pushing away from him, she paced anxiously to the open tent flap and back again.  Too much of her life had gotten out of control because she hadn’t spoken up.  She couldn’t let that happen now.

But panic was gurgling up inside of her.  She couldn’t make a rational argument in such a state.  Ugh, could she make one at all?  Was there one he could possibly believe?

“Scarlett, what’s amiss?”  His strong hands closed over her shoulders, turning her to face him.

“Everything.  You cannot fight this war, Laird,” she said carefully, tilting her head back to look at him. He was so precious to her.  She couldn’t let this happen.  She had to find a way.  “You must find a way to stop it. Talk to King James.  Tell him he must draw back.”

Laird frowned warily. “Yer talking nonsense, lass.  Why would the King want to withdraw?”

She squeezed his hand, trying to convey some of her urgency and none of her panic.  Becoming hysterical wouldn’t garner a bit of faith.  “Because you are going to lose this war, Laird.  You are going to be utterly defeated,” she told him, remembering that detailed oil painting from the exhibit at Dunskirk of the Battle of Flodden.  So much red.  “You need to tell the King and make him withdraw.”

“Och, lass, tell him what?  That ye’ve had a flight of fancy?  A premonition?” There was concern in his eyes but it wasn’t for the war ahead.  It was for her.  “Och, lass, how can I do that?  He’ll no’ believe it.”

Because Laird didn’t believe it.  Scarlett took a breath.  How could she make him understand?  His knuckles traced a path along her jaw before he tweaked her chin and tilted her head back.

“Ye worry for naught, lass,” he said soothingly.  “We hae far more men than anticipated, lass.  More than thirty thousand men already and even more still arriving each day.  Henry fights in France wi’ his regular army.  Our spies tell us, Surrey has no’ more than twenty thousand.  I admit to ha’ing my own doubts aboot this.  But there is nae way we can lose with those odds. We will outnumber our enemy.”

Scarlett drew in a deep breath.  “It won’t matter, Laird.  It won’t be enough.  Now I want you to listen to me carefully.  Because I’m about to tell you what will really happen.”

“Lass…”

“No, hear me out.  Please,” she begged, pushing him back into the chair and dropping to her knees before him.  Relief swept through her when Laird settled back in the chair.  He was doubtful but at least he was listening.

“There’s going to be another battle.  A big one on the ninth of the month.”

“Ye dinnae ken what yer saying, lass.”

Scarlett sighed in exasperation.  “I ken that just a couple of miles away is a field where you plan on fighting the English army.  And I ken you are going to lose.  Talk to King James.  Tell him he must draw back.”

“Lass…”

“No, hear me out.”  Scarlett gripping his knees, rotating her thumbs.  The words were slow in coming; she kept hoping some inspiration would hit her.  That some vague fact from a quickly thumbed through brochure would pop into her mind.

The brochure!

Running to her trunk, she dug through the depths until she found her purse.