Page 17 of The Dragon Ring
Cottia must have read my mind, because she trotted off into a corner and returned with a leather bucket. It smelled a bit, but was empty, thank goodness. I took it with a sigh and waited for her to go out. She didn’t.
I could see I’d have to lay down the law, which would be a step in the right direction, even if it was only about the toilet.
“I’m the Lady Guinevere,” I said, thinking how odd that sounded. “I don’t use this bucket with anyone watching me. Good night.”
It worked. She departed, taking my clothes with her. Left alone at last, I managed a much needed wee. That was so good. I hadn’t had one since the morning. I returned the bucket to its shadowy corner and put one of the rugs off the floor over the top of it, to stop its smell permeating the chamber.
The torches guttered, and their light began to fade. I crossed to the bed and climbed onto it. I would have liked another wash and my electric toothbrush and dental floss and moisturizer, but I felt too tired to search for anything that might suffice to take their place. Snuggling down, I pulled the thick blankets and furs up to my chin. Someone had taken the trouble to put a wrapped hot stone in the bed. I put my cold feet on it and lay back, looking up at the smoke-blackened thatch where the torchlight danced across the rafters.
The sounds from the Great Hall diminished as everyone departed for their own beds. The clatter of dishes, the growl of a dog, and the muffled sounds of conversation came to me through the wall. Rolling onto my side, I closed my eyes.
Something rustled in the far corner of the room. For a fleeting moment I thought of mice, or, even worse, rats. Then came a familiar sound. A cat meowed in the dark shadows and running footsteps sounded, followed by a soft thump as the cat jumped onto the end of the bed. Confident of its reception, the cat walked up the covers to settle itself down next to me. It began to purr.
I stroked its sleek fur, and the purring went up a gear. A lump rose into my throat, my thoughts going to my own cat, Socks. I swallowed the lump, and the leaden weight transferred itself to my chest. I had to think about something else or I was going to break down and cry. How odd that thoughts of my cat had made me feel like that, and not thoughts of Nathan. Was I missing Socks more than him? Was I, perish the thought, actually half enjoying the adventure of all this?
Nathan’s face rose before me in the darkness, the floppy fringe that overhung his sea grey eyes, and the infectious grin that had been the first thing to attract me to him at university. He’d have missed me for sure by now and would have called the police. They’d look at my abandoned backpack and the empty urn and think I’d been abducted. And they’d be right, because I certainly had, but nothing they could possibly do was ever going to find me. I was lost, unreachable in a time long forgotten, with people who’d been dry bones for hundreds of years.
A terrifying thought occurred to me. What if I never did get back and had to live out my life here in the past? In Nathan’s time, I would still be here, somewhere. But I’d just be bones, as dry as everyone else’s from the Dark Ages. I would be as long dead as Arthur and Merlin.
The lead weight in my stomach became a gaping hollow, and a tear oozed out of the corner of my eye and made its way down my cheek. I wouldn’t think about that. It would do me no good to dwell on it. I needed to concentrate on how to get back to Nathan, but that was easier said than done.
I had to face the fact that he was fifteen hundred years away, quite unaware of my whereabouts. If I never got back, my disappearance would be one of those unsolved mysteries sometimes shown on documentary channels.The woman who disappeared on Glastonbury Tor, leaving no trace but her abandoned hat and backpack.
Nathan would mourn me for a while, maybe for a long time, but he’d get over it eventually, and he’d go on with his life and forget about me. People did get over loss, even the inexplicable loss of a missing person. In time, he’d meet someone else, marry, have the children I should have had with him, grow old with her.
But what would happen to me? Stuck here in the Dark Ages, I probably wouldn’t make old bones, that’s what. Merlin wanted me to marry his Arthur, and unless I could find out how I’d got here, and with it how to get back, I couldn’t see an easy way out of that.
I was as vulnerable as if I’d been dumped on Mars. I had nobody to help me and no knowledge of the land I found myself lost in. If I did have to marry Arthur, there was no contraception, and no health care. If I got pregnant, which would probably be inevitable, then I’d be taking potluck as to whether I’d survive a delivery. I might be safe for a while, thanks to my contraceptive injection which I’d only had a booster for a few weeks ago, but at some point the effects would wear off and I’d be at risk. Not to mention the horrible thought of sex with a man I didn’t know.
But I was getting a long way ahead of myself. Arthur wasn’t even here. I had time before he returned to persuade Merlin to take me back to the Tor and up to the stones. Once there, I could use the ring to take me home. If only I could convince him.
I wouldn’t think about that now. I rolled onto my side, cuddling the cat, who seemed more than satisfied by the arrangement. I needed sleep. I’d feel better in the morning, and I could get to work on Merlin straight away. I might be back at the Tor by tomorrow lunchtime if I played my cards right.
Chapter Six
Iwoke upwith a hangover. For a moment, before opening my eyes, I forgot what had happened and reached out for Nathan. Then a cockerel crowed, and realization swept over me.
A waft of air blew chill on my face, and morning light filtered in where the thatch met the top of the wall. The torches had died and the cat had gone. Off hunting probably. There was bound to be a lot for a cat to catch in a place like this.
I rolled onto my back and stared up at the rafters disappearing into the gloom above my head. Would my body clock that awoke me at half-past six every morning have functioned now I’d slid backwards in time?
I felt warm and comfortable in the big bed, but now I was properly awake and fully rested, curiosity, which hadn’t hit me yesterday, consumed me. The inquisitive scholarly part of me I’d inherited from my father took over from the awestruck girl of last night. I pushed back the covers and got out of bed, my bare feet sinking into a thick fur rug. My mouth felt gummy and sour. I badly needed to brush my teeth.
Cottia had put my dress from the previous evening on one of the chests, but I couldn’t put it on by myself because of the lacing up the back.
I dumped it on the floor and opened the chest to find it satisfyingly full of clothes, all neatly folded and interspersed with the dried herbs I’d smelled on my dress. They were men’s clothes, as you’d expect in a man’s bedroom. Much more useful than a dress and probably a lot easier to get into without help.
I found myself a pair of trousers and a tunic and put them on. The trousers were much too long. I pulled them up as far as they’d go and did up the drawstring waist to keep them up, but was still left with a concertina effect around my ankles. Further investigation produced some long leather thongs and, after pulling on my boot socks and boots, I proceeded to cross garter my lower legs with them in a satisfactory way that kept the spare trouser legs under control. The owner of these clothes must be a fair bit taller than I was. Arthur, of course. I put him out of my mind. His tunic went on over my undershirt and I cinched it round my waist with a thick leather belt. That was better.
Now I had clothes on it dawned on me that I was starving, as well as a little hungover. That wine had been very strong. Coffee was what I needed, and failing that, as it undoubtedly would, water, lots of it.
I was just heading to the door into the Great Hall when one of the doors I’d not yet explored opened, and Cottia came in. She came to a halt, her mouth a round O of astonishment as she took in my clothes. But it wasn’t her face that interested me, it was the steaming bowl in her hands.
She put it down on the table and stepped back, arms folded in a look of belligerence. “I brought ye some breakfast,” she said. “And came to get ye dressed.” Between the lines it was easy to read her true meaning– dressed like a prospective princess.
I ignored the second part of her sentence. “What is it?”
Some very stodgy porridge with melting honey dribbled over its contours had been dolloped into the bowl. I picked the bowl and the proffered wooden spoon up and prised some off.
