“Did these people actually think Teed was going to rise up out of that tub after being dead for several days? How could anyone possibly take those claims seriously? Especially when he was spouting all of that Hollow Earth nonsense.”
Kiernan starts to say something and then stops, just staring at me for a minute, like he’s weighing something pro and con. Finally, he says, “We need to go on a field trip.”
“What? No!”
“Some things you have to see, love. Me telling you is a poor substitute.” He gets up and goes behind the red curtain tacked up in the opposite corner.
“No,” I say and start to follow him. Then I remember what he said about dressing and undressing behind the curtain and sit back down. “This is a very bad idea, Kiernan. I’m not going anywhere, so you might as well leave on your waiter or maître d’ uniform or whatever it is.”
“Not a waiter. Not a maître d’. If you want to know what I do out at Norumbega, you’ll just have to come see on Saturday.”
“I already said I would, and I will. But I’m not going to this Nuevo . . . whatever you called it.”
He comes out from behind the curtain, tucking the ends of a tan shirt into a pair of brown pants. He gives my clothes a quick scan and shakes his head, apparently dissatisfied with my shorts and tank top. “I’d say to just go in that, since no one will see you, but you’ll freeze.”
“Kiernan, I’m serious. I’m not going.”
“Safe, Kate. It’s totally safe.” He crouches on the floor in front of me and starts to pry up the loose board under his bed.
“You can’t know that. What if someone sees us?”
He pulls out the cloth bag that contains my dress and shoes and puts it in my lap.
“I lived on that farm, Kate. I worked in that stable most days. I know every nook and cranny, every hiding place, because I put all of them to good use. And . . .” He lets out a breath. “We were there in the other timeline. We watched from the loft. No one saw us then; no one will see us now.”
“But that means we’ll run into you, so—”
He shakes his head. “It doesn’t matter that I remember being there with my Kate—although I do remember it vividly. New timeline means if you’re not there, I wasn’t either. You and I will be the only two souls in that loft.”
“Ri-i-ght. But . . .”
He gives me a sly smile. “Isn’t there any way you trust me? I swear on the soul of my father, Durango Montoya—”
“Stop it.” I glare at him. “First, it’s Domingo Montoya. And second . . .”
“Second?” he asks when I don’t finish the sentence.
Second, you’re not the person I want quoting “The Princess Bride” to me. But it would hurt him for me to say that, and I don’t want to hurt him. It’s perfectly natural that Other-Kate shared the things she loved with Kiernan. Just as I did with Trey. And it isn’t fair to hold that against him.
“I don’t need a second reason,” I say, forcing a smile. “The first is enough to count twice.”
He’s giving me that searching look again, like he’s reading my face for hidden clues. He gives up after a few seconds and just stares down at the floor. “Do you honestly think I would ever put you in danger, Kate?”
“No. I know you wouldn’t. If you didn’t believe it was relatively safe, you wouldn’t suggest it. But even if there’s only a teeny, tiny, infinitesimal risk, is it worth it just for a bit of amusement?”
His eyebrows shoot upward. “You think this is for pleasure? Oh, God—no. You’re not going to enjoy this one bit. Neither will I.” He takes my hand and looks up at me. “Can you please just trust me on this one? You need to see this. You need to see firsthand the type of resistance we will face.”
ESTERO, FLORIDA
December 24, 1901, 11:50 p.m.
News flash: the Sunshine State can be freaking cold on a windy December night. The 1905 dress covers almost every inch of skin above the ankle, but it’s thin, and I immediately feel the wind cutting through the fabric. Kiernan told me to crouch low prior to the jump, so the first things I see when I open my eyes are the wooden slats of the floor beneath my feet. Pale yellow light seeps through the spaces between the boards, diffused by a thin layer of straw. Several yards away I see the dimly lit walls of the stable below us. Someone is playing a violin. After a few notes, I recognize the song—“O Holy Night.”
I quickly drop the CHRONOS key into a leather pouch Kiernan gave me and pull the drawstring to close it, tucking the bundle down the front of my shirt. Kiernan is crouched a few feet to my right. He looks at the hay bales on both sides of us, and then he motions for me to follow. I creep toward him, and we inch forward about three yards to the right, squeezing through an opening between the bales of hay. I crawl into the far corner, and Kiernan sits with his back against the hay so that he can watch the ladder.
There’s a window in front of me, and a tiny sliver of moon hangs in the sky, nearly obscured by the clouds. I’m quickly discovering why people say “drafty as a barn,” because the wind whistles around us, and the chill cuts clear to the bone. I pull my arms around my legs and tuck the edges of my skirt underneath me. Kiernan reaches behind the closest bale of hay and pulls out a blanket, which he unfolds and wraps around us. It is a bit musty but wonderfully thick. This seems an odd place for a blanket, however, and how did he know it was there? I give him a little nudge with my elbow, and when he looks at me, I flick my eyes down to the blanket, then back up to him, one eyebrow raised in question.
“It’s . . . I’ve spent some time up here, okay?” he whispers, seeming embarrassed. “The view is a little clearer over to the left of the ladder, but I knew you’d need the blanket.”
I decide not to press the point and definitely not to think about who else might have been under this blanket. It’s bad enough to visualize Kiernan with my other self. I most certainly don’t want a mental image of him up here with Prudence.
The stable below us appears fairly ordinary, but this is based entirely on secondhand experience from stables I’ve seen in movies or on TV. There’s a line of stalls along one wall and a large, open space in the middle, punctuated every twenty feet or so by a vertical support beam. It looks like there might be stalls on this side of the building as well, but I can’t tell from where we’re sitting. Farm implements and horse gear—saddles, bridles, and such—hang from one wall, along with a shelf that holds tongs and some odd-looking tools. Straw covers the ground, and most of the stable is at least partially hidden in the shadows.
Directly beneath us is a brightly lit circle, where a cluster of people are gathered around a white claw-foot tub. A sheet of something—glass, maybe, since it reflects the light from the lanterns—rests on top of the tub, with flowers decorating one end. I can’t see what’s under the glass, and I’m perfectly okay with that.
Seven chairs, draped with white cloth, are arranged in a row just to the left of the tub and are occupied by women of varying ages, similarly dressed, with their hair pulled back into a knot. Beyond the seven chairs, dozens of people, maybe even a hundred or more, extend to the back of the stable. About two-thirds are women and children, and almost everyone is dressed in white. Most are standing, some leaning against support beams, some sitting on hay bales. A few adventurous kids straddle the tops of the low walls separating the stalls.
“The women in front?” Kiernan whispers. “They’re the Seven Sisters of the Planetary Court.”
I nod. I vaguely remember reading something about them in the historical account but can’t recall exactly what their role was in the commune.
When the violinist finishes “O Holy Night,” he launches immediately into “Silent Night,” and several voices join him. A bearded man with reddish-blond hair pulls out a pocket watch and says something to the matronly woman sitting closest to the tub. She stops singing for a moment, then nods as she closes her eyes and continues with the second verse.