The Assassin: (Mortal Beloved Time Travel Romance, #2) (7 page)

“My husband has been missing in action for ten months now. Please let him be alive. Send me a message that he will return to me and our children.”
A woman asked.

“Please let the ultrasound show my baby is still alive.”
 

“I beg, please help my mother survive her surgery. I don’t think my heart could take it if she dies. Let the message today be good news. Please.”
 

 
I was bombarded by the voices of people across years that needed help. Desperate souls begged for signs and messages of hope. But through all of those cries for help, one voice captured my attention—
Samuel’s.
 

“Help me, please. I do not know what to do. Please give me a sign,” Samuel said.
 

I had this fragmented vision of him dressed in old-fashioned clothing kneeling on the ground and gazing up at the night sky.
 

“I cannot even begin to guess who I should address my prayers to: a Christian God or the goddesses of our ancestors and the forests. But whatever your given name?” he asked. “I beg you hear my requests. I do not know whom I should trust. Whose life and cause I should support. Both choices are bloody. I am a man but this still frightens me. So much could be lost and so many lives could be changed. Please, just give me a sign.
Send me a message.”

Suddenly, pain pierced my brain like a dagger impaled it. I clutched my hands to my head, hunched forward, and screamed. I swayed, and then stumbled, and fought to maintain my balance while the light ripped out of my body fast as a tornado tearing a house from its foundation.
 

Samuel’s image disappeared like frames from a faulty digital upload. No! I squeezed my eyes shut and wrapped my brain around his essence: he had black hair and hazel eyes, strong cheekbones and muscular arms. He was kind and loving.

I chanted, “Sa. Ta. Na. Ma.
Sa. Ta. Na. Ma.
Sa. Ta. Na. Ma.” I couldn’t feel my physical body, so I held tighter to Samuel’s essence: a memory, a feeling, a glimpse. Just one small piece of him, a glance, a touch between him and me, something we shared somewhere in time…
 

And everything fell away.

~ seven ~

“Nadja!” a man rasped.

My head felt thick, my throat dry, and my body weak as I woke up. The floor beneath me was cold and the air was damp. I fluttered my eyes open—I lay on rough cobblestones in a cellar of sorts. Flickering torches mounted high on the walls provided the only lighting in this narrow, cramped space. I pushed myself to sitting. I felt awful—similar to when I was in the hospital after the first time I time traveled: broken, drugged, and disoriented. I didn’t have a clue where I was.
So much for all the time traveling lessons.

“Nadja,” the man repeated, his breath failing him.
 

I looked around: he lay just feet from me. He was skinny and old, dressed in dirty peasant’s attire, and he writhed in pain on the floor.
 

“What’s wrong? How can I help you?” I placed my palm on his forehead—it was cool and clammy. I didn’t think this was a good sign. “Please tell me what I can do!”

He clamped onto my forearm with his veiny and dirty hand. “Too late: the poison takes me. You drank from my cup and I am happy you survived it. Or you, too, would soon be a cold carcass.” He swiveled his head and coughed, but only managed to spray blood from his mouth onto his sleeve and mine.

I felt scared. “What year is it? Where am I—”
 

“Find Inêz de Castro. Go quickly. Tell her the King means to kill her.” He hacked fiercely and I feared these would be his last breaths.

“Who is Inêz de Castro?” I asked. “Why would the King want to kill her? How do I find her?”

“You are a gypsy, Nadja. We have always been the messengers between royals. Leave now or Inêz will die.”

“But maybe I can help you? Maybe I can find a Healer; send someone—”

But the man convulsed for a few seconds and then stopped. He lay still and silent on the stone floor, his eyes frozen and fixed: he was dead.

~ ~ ~

I careened through narrow passageways, intent on finding Inêz. Apparently this was meant to be my goal as a Messenger in this lifetime:
Find Inêz.
Warn her that the King planned to kill her. Try and keep her alive. Super. Just great.
 

I didn’t have a clue as to who she was, where I was, what year it was, or why the King wanted her dead. And let me tell you something—it’s not easy racing through a dark, dank, ancient castle trying to save someone’s life after you’ve just catapulted through time, been poisoned, and watched a guy die a crappy death on the floor next to you.

A wave of nausea overtook me. I stopped in my tracks, hunched forward, and heaved bile onto the floor. Lovely. But my position allowed me to really notice my attire for the first time. I was dressed in a simple, long, flowing skirt with a cinched waist and a peasant-styled top, like from the 70s that wasn’t super modest, but not totally trampy either.
 

I heard the clip-clop of heavy footsteps as someone approached me in the passageway. “Girl! Are you not supposed to be serving the nobles at the banquet in the grand hall? What are you doing down here in the cellars?” A middle-aged woman approximately sixty pounds heavier than I but dressed in similar attire, asked.

“I was looking for the medicinals for a nobleman’s… headache,” I said. “Thank you. The grand hall is… so…grand. I’m new and I got a little lost. Pray tell—do I turn right at the next passageway or left?”

“Go straight, climb three flights of stairs, walk through the kitchen into the foyer which leads to the grand hall. I cannot believe you do not remember all this from your orientation. You were given an orientation before you came to work at King Afonso the Fourth’s palace, yes?”

“Of course,” I bowed my head. “Thank you for your kindness, my lady.”

She guffawed and passed me. “ A Lady now, am I? The help nowadays…”

~ ~ ~

I passed through the kitchen where servants chopped up roasted chickens and heaped pig’s knuckles next to slices of beef, pork, and potatoes onto enormous platters.
 

“I need to find Inêz de Castro,” I said. “Is she here?” I asked a sweaty, middle-aged man, wielding a large carving knife.

He regarded me oddly. “No. Lady Inêz hardly ever attends these events.” He dropped his cleaver and handed me two pitchers filled with dark amber liquid. “Hurry up! They are an unruly bunch tonight. The quicker we help get them drunk as sows, the better.” He returned to carving the pig.

“Do you know where I can find Inêz?”
 

He paused—holding the large, bloody knife in the air.
 
“Why don’t you go ask the King, or a few of his advisors,” he said. “She is so very popular with them.”

~ ~ ~

I lugged the enormous pitchers as I entered the grand hall which was, indeed, pretty grand. It was the size of a small ballroom at a decent hotel in downtown Chicago. Thick stone columns supported its towering domed ceiling.
 

A few musicians played old-fashioned music with fancy string instruments in a corner of the room. There were dozens of long, narrow, wooden tables filled with dishes of food. Men of all ages and a few women dressed in clothes much finer than mine laughed, chatted, and flirted. They raised glasses, devoured the food, and seemed to be enjoying the party. Servants—such as myself—brought them platters of food including roasted pigs with their heads still attached to their bodies.

I’d figured out who I was in this time period: a gypsy servant girl in a medieval palace, with a king who supposedly wanted to kill some Lady named Inêz. Hurrah for me, I’d already passed a few hurdles: I time-traveled—although not very consciously, I’d woken up next to a guy who was
dying,
and yet minutes later I was still functioning. At least I wasn’t collapsed on the ground, a freaking basket case, like the first time I traveled. Heck, if I was back in present day Chicago, either Ryan, Aaron, or Chaka would be giving me high fives and fist bumps right about now as they congratulated me on my success.
 

I made my way around tables refilling goblets and tankards. A few folks appeared friendly and asked me how my evening was. I bowed my head slightly, attempted to curtsey, made small talk, and then asked them if they knew where I could find Inêz: I had a message for her. But each time I inquired about her—everyone looked away, and either ignored, or dismissed me.
 

Until one slightly tipsy nobleman dressed in a colored ruffled shirt took me by the arm, pulled me to him and whispered into my ear. “The more you inquire about Inêz de Castro, the more unwanted attention you bring to yourself. The Lady is not a welcome guest in this palace. She is tolerated only when Prince Pedro accompanies her. Since the Prince is away on a hunting trip, I suspect Inêz stays with their children, like she always does, at their home.”

“Oh, thank you,” I said. “How far is their home from here?”

He regarded me oddly. “A half hour.”

“By foot or by horse?” I whispered.

“By horse. You know how to ride?” He arched an eyebrow.

“I’m not very good at it.”

“You are a gypsy, yes?”

I nodded.
 

“Gypsies are magical, when they are not being accused of stealing or witchcraft. If I were you, I would dress your pretty face with a smile, return to serving the nobles, and hope that none of them remembered you were the servant girl who was inquiring about Inêz.”

“Oh,” I said. “Thanks. What’s your name, kind sir?”

He winked at me. “Your knight who is barely able to fit into his armor. Lord Geoffrey of Oporto.”

“Thank you, Lord Geoffrey of Oporto.”

“Be gone with you, pretty. Serve more ale to the drunken nobles.” He winked at me and sighed. “God help me, I remember when I was as pretty as you.”

I hoisted my pitchers, turned around, and regarded the crowd. This was basically my first gig as a waitress. How could I better serve? More importantly—how could I get out of here and find Inêz—especially now that I knew she was simply a half hour ride away.

A large, sweaty guy with a scruffy beard wearing a stained shirt that strained over his potbelly gestured to me from a table several yards away. “I’m thirsty, girl. Come here. Now.”

I edged my way through the crowd toward him. “More ale, sir?”
 

He nodded.

I leaned down to refill his glass but he yanked me onto his lap. “Hey!” I dropped my pitchers and they clattered off the floor spilling the liquor onto my clothes and soaking the hem of my dress.
 

His corpulent hands pinched and groped me, and he stuck his fat, soggy tongue in my mouth.
 

“Ew!” I sputtered and tried to push him away.

“Feisty little thing, aren’t you?”

I smacked him, but he just held me tighter, and twisted one hand around a clump of my hair. “I think I have just discovered the best part of tonight’s celebration,” he said. “Is it possible there is a virgin left in our fair land?” The men at his table roared with laughter.

I took the opportunity to bite his forearm and he growled, but only tightened his grip on me. “Let me go!”
 

Suddenly, someone dumped a tankard of ale on his head that unfortunately doused me as well.

“Let the girl go, Lord Martim.”
 

Oh, God. A familiar voice. A voice that belonged to someone I longed for. Someone I loved
.

Samuel.

~ eight ~

I looked up into Samuel’s face and almost lost it. “Samuel!” His strong cheekbones, his hazel eyes with a glint of gold, his very black hair that curled in unruly forms down his neck and brushed his shirt—he was my Samuel and I would remember him in any lifetime.

His eyes narrowed and he tilted his head and peered at me. “Do we know each other?”

“Of course we do,” I hissed. “1675—King Philip’s War—I mean present day Chicago. You go to Loyola and I go to Preston Academy…It’s me, Madeline…”

“What do you think you are doing, you slippery weasel,” Lord Martim shook ale from his head like a wet dog, and then threw a sloppy punch at Samuel’s face.
 

He ducked. “I am sorry, my Lord. I noticed that your wife, the Lady of Coimbra, watches your antics from her table, not that many yards away. I fear she does not appear pleased.”

Furrows creased the Lady of Coimbra’s middle-aged forehead and red blotches erupted onto her cheeks. If looks could kill, I as well as her husband would most likely be dead on that drenched palace floor right about now.
 

Lord Martim harrumphed. “Well, then I must thank you, Lord De Rocha. That woman’s wrath could turn me to stone.” He turned away from us.

“Have we been introduced?” Samuel cocked his head and peered at me strangely. “What is your name?”

I gazed into his eyes as I realized he had no idea who I was. None. I might have been a wadded up napkin that he just rescued from being gulped down by a mongrel dog. Tears welled and I tried to blink them back.
 

“My name is… Nadja. Yes, we’ve met before: at parties and places—so very similar to this.” I waved my hand at the festivities unfolding around me.
 

“Leave!” Lord Martim grunted. “My wife, Her Lady of Sublime Happiness is headed in our direction.”

“Come on, Nadja.” Samuel beckoned.

~ ~ ~

I followed him out of the grand hall into a corridor that was beautiful, but not as grand. And we were alone. Great, ’cause I could no longer hold back my tears.

“Why are you crying? Did that arrogant swine hurt you worse than what I witnessed?” he asked and wiped my tears away with his fingers.

How could I tell him why I was really crying? How could I tell him that just a few months ago, he was declaring his eternal love for me, “Madeline Blackford.” But now I was simply a stranger in his eyes, and even worse—a gypsy, a servant—a person considered far beneath his status. “No,” I said. “It was simply what you witnessed. Is he that foul with every girl?”