ONE

CHERITON, HAMPSHIRE – 27thth March 2008

The heavens opened and Sarah Young groaned as the raindrops hit the roof of her tent making little pattering noises which seemed to get louder and louder by the second. Not that she minded of course, she was sheltered and warm and that was good enough for her. It just meant that every time she wanted to use the toilet she would have to trudge half way across a muddy field. But that came with being in the Sealed Knot, one had to be prepared for wet weather and stupidly hot days, often both at the same time. Smiling to herself, she ran a hand through her soggy blonde hair and began to sort out her kit, placing it on her sleeping matt ready to change into. It was cold, and so she thought it a good idea to change into the seventeenth century military gear before going up onto guard duty. The thick woolen coat kept the cold out quite easily. Then, slowly and steadily she began to get into the gear, beginning with the hose and breeches, tying the legs with the red ties. Then her white shirt and green Tilliers jacket. Finally she put her open latchets on, followed by her floppy hat with its side pinned up with a musket pin. She knew without having to look at herself in a mirror that she looked good, that she looked smart. She would even better during the battle tomorrow, when she had her musket by her side.

With a smile, she unzipped her tent and stepped out into the rain. Wrinkling her nose, she began to walk her way towards the gate guard box, where a fire was blazing and sending sparks into the night. Already she could see that there was a group of people stood around there, laughing and having a few drinks. All of them were in kit, in keeping with the theme of the weekend.

"Hey Sarah!"

The high pitched northern accent of Charlotte Green floated across the muddy campsite as she trudged her way towards the makeshift guardhouse, and she couldn't help but smile. Charlotte, or Omar as she was better known had been a good friend since she had first joined the Sealed Knot, and had helped her immensely with preparing for her musket test.

"Hey guys," she said with a smile, slipping in by the fire and warming her hands

"Glad to see you got here all right. Good journey?"

She nodded at Paul Wilson, who was busy smoking a cigarette, "Yeah, the roads were pretty grim but you know me…I managed."

He nodded and went silent again, puffing away on his cigarette. She followed his example, reaching into the pocket of her breeches and pulling out a packet of Marlboros and sparking up. She inhaled deeply, glancing around the small crowd on guard duty. A bottle of port was being passed around, which she happily took her swig before passing it to the left. Conversation was good, they laughed and for the first time in a long time, Sarah felt like she belonged. The past few weeks had been a bad time in general involving messing her life up at university, messing up relationships and going through bouts of serious depression. The only thing that had gotten her through was being in the sealed knot, surrounded by good people and the fact that she had just passed her musket test just made things all the better. The people in Henry Tilliers Regiment, reenactors of the English civil war, were her family.

"Sarah?"

She jumped, sending cigarette ash all down her jacket, "Wha…?"

Omar giggled, "We were just talking about something that you might like seeing as you're an archaeology student."

"Ok, hit me"

Omar grinned, "How do you think we would react if, as a regiment, we were transported to 1644?"

She blinked, "Wow…that's a tough one…"

She let her mind wander, imagining what her reaction would be if she ended up slap bang in the middle of a battlefield with just a musket to protect her, "I think we'd all be shit scared. Imagine, finding yourself in the middle of a battle, with real guns and real pikes and the danger of death on you at every single moment. What we do is play act, we play at war, I really don't think we could handle being in a real battle…"

There was a murmer of agreement from the surrounding crowd and even Richard Pearce, the commanding officer who was most likely to disagree, was nodding his head. Yet she knew there was a counter argument being thrown her way, and when it hit her she knew exactly who spoke the words.

"Bollocks. We may play at war but as a regiment we've got the fighting spirit that so often lacked during the civil war. Plus, we know how to use the muskets properly. We'd kick arse."

They came from luke, the regiments ladies man and general argumentative idiot who could, at times, be lovely. The only problem for Sarah was, that he was her ex and one of the ones who had sent her spiraling out of control. She shook her head, "That's just it, do we know how to use the muskets properly? The armies back then had the full on experience of using one everyday, with real musket balls, not just wadding. Our block uses them once in a blue mood and even then we just use them as clubs mainly…the real royalist army would certainly show us a thing or two. At least if we went there we could see what mistakes we're making as a society I suppose…"

She lapsed into silence, listening as they laughed and joked about what they would do in such a situation. Wenches were mentioned copious times, as was alcohol yet she couldn't laugh with them. She knew that if they were magically transported back there, then they would be in for a serious shock and it would be very likely that they wouldn't survive. She looked up and caught luke looking at her with those cold blue eyes. She shuddered to herself, trying not to remember the time they spent together, yet could not help but look back at him. She knew he was mocking her.

Turning on her heel, she muttered her goodnight wishes to everyone and stalked back to the campsite, determined to be away from those cold, cold eyes. Yet as she crawled her way back into her tent, the memory of those cold as ice blue eyes faded into images of a musket block clad all in green. She smelt fresh gunpowder mixed with blood, and as she sat down atop of her sleeping bag she saw the dead. So many dead. Faces she knew and loved, faces of her friends. And as she lay down to go to sleep, the last thing she saw was her own face, black eyes staring up at a dark sky, a musket still smoking in her cold, dead hands.