Norman Farandole: The Truth
Rose took a deep, unsteady breath, unable to turn away from Harold's eyes. "It... it's a device... for traveling through time."
Harold blinked. "What?"
She struggled, trying to find a way to explain it that the Dark Ages king would understand. "Imagine that you wake up tomorrow – only it's yesterday again. And everything that happened that day, you see and do all over again." She watched him work it out – he was clever, that was for certain. Then, to seal the deal, she added in a low voice, "I was born in the year nineteen-ninety-two. More than nine hundred years from now."
"Then... why are you here?" he asked, his voice harsh, only half believing.
She shrugged, helpless. "I came back... to save your life."
Harold suddenly stood up straight at that, rearing back to get a good look at this strange little woman. "You speak in nonsense, girl. You 'came back'... from the future... with that?" He stabbed a finger at the Time Jumper on the table, and she nodded. "How?" he speared her.
Rose barked a tiny laugh, halfway to tears, one hand flying to her mouth, before she shook her head and shrugged again. "I don't know! I don't know how it works, or how to program it – how to tell it what to do. All I know is I pushed one button and it brought me here, and now I wait for the light to turn blue, and push another button, and it will take me home." She knew she was talking gibberish as far as he was concerned, but there it was.
Alain had walked around to Rose's other side, and was staring, bewildered and concerned, back and forth between her and the Jumper. "Push what?" he asked, reaching to pick up the device.
"Careful!" Rose cried, automatically starting to reach for it or ward off his hand, she couldn't have said which. Both men reacted strongly to that, and she snatched her hands back and raised them in surrender, saying quickly, "if you touch the wrong thing, it could disappear – and maybe take you with it, and I don't know where or when, or how to get it or you back."
Harold's face showed indecision as to whether she was insane, or the thing on his desk was about to explode. Suddenly Rose thought of a bit of proof – the one thing she could show him. "Look," she said. She reached a single finger, pointing it towards what Jared had called the Recall button. "Just push that button – not any of the others."
"Talk Saxon, woman – 'button'?" Harold demanded, impatient with the string of unfamiliar words.
"Uh – that tiny bump there. It's called a button."
"My lord, let me," Alain broke in. Harold nodded, and his cousin reached in to do what she said, suddenly feeling like he was petting a poisonous snake. He awkwardly pressed on the tiny protuberance indicated, almost expecting to feel a sting in his finger.
Instead, the thing lit up with a strange white light! Both men gasped and flinched away, staring hard, their mouths dropping open.
Rose smothered a snort. "It's not gonna bite you," she reassured them.
Harold leaned over cautiously, peering at the tiny crystal-covered rectangle with the unnatural light. There were tiny black symbols moving across the surface – numerals and letters, and other similar-looking symbols he didn't know. He watched them for a long pause, then blinked in surprise when the light suddenly disappeared again, taking the symbols with it. He pushed the spot (butt-on, he reminded himself) and watched the parade go by again. Then he slowly turned around, leaning his hips against the table and staring down at this strange, strange woman.
"My lord, she's a witch! This is sorcery!" demanded Alain.
"Not sorcery," she replied, "technology." Which didn't help, she realized immediately. "Sorry."
The King had been thinking hard. "So you came to this time from.. when?"
Rose sighed. "Well, when I woke up this morning, it was twenty-twelve." She couldn't believe how much had happened and how far she'd come in those few short hours.
"Twenty... twelve?" Harold asked weakly, working out the numbers. His face showed his disbelief.
She sighed. "Look!" Making a point of what she'd tried to minimize earlier: her clothes, she pulled out her sweater for him to inspect and motioned to her jeans, then worked the short sweater zipper at her neck a couple of times for his widening eyes. Snorting, she reached down and slipped off one trainer and handed it to him. "Look at it!" she urged, and finally he took it – then exclaimed over the utter strangeness of rubber soles, nylon-and-leather uppers, and plastic-tipped laces. Finally he gave it back to her with an air of almost surrender.
Provisionally accepting the proposition, he brought her back on track. "All right. Why are you here, then?"
"I was kidnapped – stolen – by Corvantes – I was telling you the truth. I... I don't know why he did it. But this is the only way I can get back home, now. By saving your life." She knew she was babbling again. "I can't explain why, it just is." She wasn't going to confuse the issue further by bringing up alternate timelines and split points. She'd barely understood Jared's explanation herself.
"So this Corvantes is from the future, as well?" he pounced on the one part that made sense. When she nodded confirmation, he waved a hand back at the Jumper. "Did he make this?"
She started to reply, then stopped, thinking hard. "No... no." He hadn't seemed at all familiar with it. If anyone, the other two men were likely suspects: Jack and Jared. She looked back up at Harold. "He grabbed my arm just as I was pushing the button. I didn't mean to bring him back with me, it just happened." She'd rather hoped that the jumper would leave him behind, even though she knew that's how the goon had brought her along in the first place.
Harold stood up and slowly walked back around the table, settling himself back into his chair, all the while staring at the Jumper. As an afterthought, he waved Alain towards another seat, and his cousin pulled it up the table and sat, too, staring as hard as his King, but at Rose.
Suddenly Harold speared her again with a piercing look. "Save my life, little witch? How?" He took a sudden breath. "If you're from the future, you know what is going to happen here, don't you? It will have been the past, for you."
She took a deep breath. "I don't know the details, just the broad facts. My lord... William is coming."
He waved, dismissively. "Tell me something I don't know. Of course he is. So is Hardrata. And probably my brother, as well."
"Yes, and they'll get here first. They're going to invade in the north, near York, in September. William is going to wait until they've landed, then come invade here in the south while you're up dealing with them."
Harold had sat straight up, his eyes wide. "You know this? For certain?" She nodded. "So they are working together?"
Rose shrugged. "I don't know that. All I know is that William's invasion is second."
He stared a moment longer, then his eyes narrowed. "This doesn't get my life saved."
She puffed out a breath. "All I know... is that... if William wins, and you die, I can't ever get home. I can only do that if you win, and he dies." She licked her lips, and repeated, "All I know is that you have to keep your men – your army – together, both before the battle, and especially during it. You must... Keep them together, my lord."
It was Harold's turn to puff, half derisive, half rueful. "Too late," he told her. "I already sent my housecarls home to bring in their harvests. I couldn't keep them here any longer."
"Can't you bring them back?" she almost wailed.
His eyes narrowed, deep in plans, and slowly nodded. "When it's time." A sharp glance: "September?" and she nodded back. Another check: "York?" and another silent confirmation.
He leaned back again, chewing thoughtfully on a thumbnail, staring at the Jumper. One eyebrow quirked, and he gave Rose a tight smile. "So I guess Corvantes isn't one of William's spies after all?"
She grimaced. "Not yet." At his surprised look, she went on. "I wouldn't put it past him to go over." Realizing she was going to have to explain that one, she sighed. "The only way he can get home from here – now, is if William wins. And he gets this back, of course," she added, gesturing at the Jumper.
"Well, we don't want that, do we? So you're competing against each other now?"
Rose gave a tiny rueful smile and nodded, not liking that proposition at all, but realizing its truth.
Harold turned thoughtful again. "Alain... change of plans. Double – no, triple the guard on his door, and station men above on the deck. Then, in the morning, take him out beyond the hill – and execute him. I don't want it done on board; the men are jumpy enough as it is. But he's far too dangerous to leave alive, even in captivity."
"Aye, my lord," came the calm response.
Rose, struck hard by how casually they proposed killing a man they'd only just met, suddenly realized she was in a life-or-death struggle. Swallowing hard, she dropped her eyes to her hands folded in her lap. Well, did you think you were here for a picnic, kid?
"My lord, what will you do now?" Alain was asking.
King Harold leaned forward, plans falling into place almost visibly behind his eyes. A wolfish smile slowly crossed his lips. "This... this will work." Suddenly the decision was made, and he began snapping out orders. "Alain, you will stay here, in command of the fleet. You may have to let some of the ships go, but keep as many as you can patrolling the channel. I'm going north, to raise the army around York and meet Harald Hardrata and dear Brother Tostig. When William finally sails, don't try to engage him on the water, you won't have the men or ships. Just watch him. The minute he lands, you do two things: one, send the message to me, and two, recall the housecarls from their fields. I'll be on my way the moment I get your message. Keep an eye on him, try to contain him, and we'll meet him together on my return. And take him."
He smiled at Rose, who was staring at him openmouthed. "And we'll keep the men together in battle, don't worry. We will not be divided or flanked."
"And what of her, my lord?" Alain asked.
"Can you ride a horse, little witch?" Harold was amused by his own nickname for her, no longer in any fear of her supposed abilities.
She shook her head.
"Then you'll have to stay here. We ride very hard and very fast, for many miles. Alain, I am placing her under your protection." His voice made it a transfer of his sacred duty. "However..." He gave her a significant look, then began gathering the Jumper back up in its cloth wrapping, careful not to nudge the little "buttons", and wrapped it in another cloth snatched from the floor (it looked like a shirt) for even more padding. "I'm taking this with me. Just so you don't get any ideas." Standing suddenly and turning to one side, he placed the little bundle gently into a small wooden casket – Rose caught a glimpse of gold and jewels within before he closed the lid and locked it with a key hanging around his neck.
As he turned back, coming to stand regally straight behind the table, Alain jumped up, as well, and Rose followed suit. Alain still looked worried, but Harold smiled at him. "Don't worry, cousin. We can do this. Don't you see? This little witch has brought us the key." Leaning across the table, he placed a hand on Alain's shoulder. "Hold the coast for me, cousin, and keep close watch. When I return, it will be to victory!"
Alain reached up to grasp Harold's forearm, smiling back, won over yet again by his magnetic King, as always. "To victory, my lord!"
When both men glanced at her, their smiles open and welcoming, a bit of the fear that had clamped Rose's heart in ice all morning seeped away, and she smiled back. "To victory!" she joined the verbal toast. To going home.