Chapter 39
Blackfriars Wood, Wealdshire. Monday 25 May 1998
'Over here,' Misty directed. 'The power source isn't far away.'
Misty and Shadow were in Blackfriars Wood looking for the place where she was sure that several sacred paths intersected. Shadow had never questioned Misty's strange talents and powers and ideas. He just accepted them as being perfectly normal — for her. If she said she could see sprites in every tree, rock and stream — fine — just so long as he didn't see them. He had enough headaches in the real world without having to worry about manifestations from the world of the paranormal.
'It doesn't look anything special,' he said, looking towards where Misty had pointed.
'Why should it?' she retorted. 'The 'specialness' of a place is not in how it appears but in how it is.'
'Yeah, point taken. I just meant that some places have stone circles or standing stones or whatever.'
'Yes, you're right. But remember that stones are easily removed. The ancients would bust a gut heaving damn great rocks and boulders to sacred places — and then the not-so-ancients would come along and nick them to use as building materials for houses or walls.'
Misty stopped. 'This is it,' she whispered. 'Just here. Can you feel it?'
Shadow wasn't sure what he was supposed to feel but, whatever it was, he was sure he couldn't. 'Uh . . . no. I don't think so. What should I be feeling exactly?'
'Difficult to explain. A sort of vibration. It's like something is flowing up out of the ground into my body. I feel as if I'm glowing. There's a gold light all around me.'
Shadow saw no gold lights around either Misty or himself — but he did see something strange. Bloody hell! he thought, her hair is moving.
Although there was scarcely any breeze, Misty's hair was slowly moving outwards. It was getting fluffier as if she had dried it with a hairdrier. Now it was moving upwards. Did she know? She had her eyes closed. Her long, black hair was now reaching upwards towards the sky — just as if she was hanging upside down. He didn't know how long they had been standing there. Was it a minute or was it an hour? Time seemed to have disappeared. Maybe he could feel something magical here after all, but what it was he could never have put into words. When Misty eventually opened her eyes, and her hair tumbled back over her shoulders, Shadow felt both relieved that everything seemed to be back to normal, and disappointed that the experience had ended.
Misty smiled. 'Still say you felt nothing?'
'Well . . . there was something. I dunno what it was, mind. Sort of . . . well, let's just say I felt something. And I certainly saw something. Your hair was standing on end.'
Misty ran her fingers through her hair. 'That doesn't happen often, but it's pretty impressive when it does, eh?'
'You can say that again.'
Misty moved away from the spot and looked back at it. 'You were right — it doesn't look much. But it's one of the most potent centres I've ever come across. Quite a find. Are you in a hurry to get back, or can we take a walk through the wood?'
'Fine by me. Which way do you want to go?'
Misty held out her hands as if feeling for invisible energy fields. 'Let's go this way,' she suggested.
They had walked only a short distance when they heard some voices — youthful, cheerful voices. Without thinking, both Shadow and Misty ducked behind a tree and then wondered why they had done so. They peered out and saw a pair of teenagers, a boy and a girl, pushing their mountain bikes towards the spot where Misty and Shadow had had their experience.
'I wonder what they're doing,' whispered Shadow. 'They seem to be going to that exact spot.'
'Keep watching. Something is going to happen.'
Something happened all right.
They disappeared.
Shadow rubbed his eyes. He looked at Misty. Why wasn't she showing any surprise? Why wasn't she saying, 'That's impossible!' Maybe it was perfectly normal in Misty's world. But in Shadow's world it was far from normal.
'They vanished! Didn't they?' He seized Misty's arms. 'Tell me I didn't imagine that. Two perfectly normal- looking kids just walked to that spot, stood still for a moment, and then disappeared into thin air.'
A little smile played on Misty's lips. 'I think that's a fairly accurate assessment of what happened. Shall we walk over there? Come on.'
Misty led the way with Shadow reluctantly following. He wasn't sure he liked Misty's paranormal world where kids cheerfully vanished in front of his eyes. It just wasn't — well, normal.
'This is the spot all right.' Misty crouched down and felt the ground. 'Nothing. No energy at all. It's as if those kids just exhausted the battery. It'll take a while to replenish itself. The energy will flow in along the paths until the power point is fully charged. Wait! There's something happening. I think they may be coming back. Let's wait just over there.'
They walked backwards away from the spot, their eyes glued to it all the time.
They didn't have long to wait.
There was no clap of thunder, no crackle from psychic energy fields, no gradual fading from one dimension to another — just two kids suddenly appearing out of nowhere. If they were the same two who had vanished a minute or two earlier — something must have happened to them. They had been transformed from two happy-go-lucky, smartly-dressed teenagers into a pair of dishevelled individuals who looked as if they were staggering home in the early hours of the morning from an all-night rave. Both were soaking wet — so much so that their clothes were sticking to them — and they were streaked with mud, the boy in particular. He looked as if he'd taken a tumble from his bike and landed in a muddy puddle. That wasn't all. The boy looked so groggy that the girl — who was so much like him that she must be his sister, if not his twin sister — was having to support him. He was holding his hand to his eyes — shielding them from the light. And the girl was blinking hard as well, as if she had emerged from a dark cellar into bright sunlight. There was something missing. The boy had had something strapped to the back of his bike before. It wasn't there now.
Misty squeezed Shadow's hand and whispered, 'Don't say anything. Wait a bit and leave it to me.'
Shadow was more than happy to leave all the talking to Misty. He didn't have a clue how you spoke to ghosts, spectres, spirits or whatever these manifestations were. And even if he did — he wasn't sure that he wanted to. Talking of spirits, wasn't that booze that he could smell? Had these two been off to an orgy in the underworld?
When the two teenagers had stopped blinking and hiding their eyes, the girl asked the boy how he was feeling.
'Gross,' he rasped. 'Remind me to stay off Tudor ale when we next go to a feast at Tatscombe H—'
His voice dried up when he saw that they were not alone.
Misty stepped forward and held up her hands to show that she meant no harm.
'Hey Josie!' the boy complained. 'Have you screwed up and brought us back to the wrong time?'
'Hush, Chris. Leave this to me. Let me do the talking.'
Her words fell on deaf ears. 'Hey you,' Chris spluttered, trying to focus his eyes on Misty. 'Excuse me . . . can you tell me the year?' and started giggling. 'Josie . . . did you hear that? Instead of asking what time it was . . . I asked if she could tell me what the year was.'
'I'm sorry about my brother,' Josie said, looking very agitated. 'He accidentally had too much to drink.'
'It washunt an acshident,' Chris slurred. 'I had to drink ale 'cos the water wasn't fit to drink in 1517. Or washit 1715?
Josie shook her brother. 'Shut up, idiot,' she hissed through gritted teeth.'
Misty noticed the bracelet on the girl's wrist. To her it seemed to glow. She slowly extended a hand towards the bracelet and sought permission in the girl's eyes. The girl nodded, almost imperceptibly. Misty rested her hand on the gold band and knew, immediately, that this was a talisman of extraordinary power. She smiled at the girl. Her smile was returned.
Shadow felt that a solemn ritual was being performed before his eyes, but the solemnity was disturbed somewhat when the boy suddenly whipped round, lurched away a few feet and proceeded to dump the contents of his stomach onto the ground. Shadow rolled his eyes upwards and went off to see to the invalid.
As Josie looked deeply into the dark eyes, she felt as if the girl was inside her head. It wasn't a brutal intrusion but more a gentle caress, an understanding, a sharing — something she would never be able to put into words. 'You know, don't you?' Josie heard herself saying.
The dark-haired girl wriggled her eyebrows mischievously and nodded. 'Yes, I know. I know that this talisman,' — she gently squeezed Josie's wrist above the bracelet — 'has the power to take you where few others have been. I would guess that it has taken you into the past. Am I right?'
'Yes,' was all that Josie could say. She felt a little out of her depth. Who was this girl? How could she know about the bracelet? How could she know that it allowed people to travel through time? Was meeting her a part of the grand plan that they all seemed to be part of? Was she the girl that Aunt Alice had spoken of?
'My name is Misty. And that is Shadow looking after . . . your brother?'
'Yes, he's my embarrassing brother. I'm Josie. He's Chris. How do you know about the bracelet?'
Misty shrugged and held her hands out, palms upwards. 'I just do. Call it ESP if you like.'
Before Josie could ask any more questions, the tranquillity of the scene was disturbed by a loud groan. Chris staggered back to where the girls were and announced that he was never going to drink again.
'It wasn't his fault really,' Josie said. 'Where we were, the only drinks were alcoholic. I don't think he realised how much he was being affected. Neither of us are used to drinking — apart from an occasional glass of wine.'
'And where were you drinking?' asked Shadow dubiously, doubting whether the answer would fit neatly into his concept of normality.
'Tatscombe Hall,' Josie told him.
Shadow looked relieved. That reply was perfectly acceptable, as long as he could throw away the memory of the amazing disappearing act that these kids had performed just now.
'In 1517,' Josie added.
Shadow couldn't stop himself laughing. 'I give up,' he said. 'There's obviously a conspiracy here to either do my head in so badly that I want to jump off a bridge or . . . to turn my whole world upside down. I used to think that things were the way they looked — but I'm beginning to realise that they're anything but that.' He slapped the back of his neck, squeezed his eyes shut and grimaced. 'Just tell me one thing — all of you — are you saying that people can travel through time?'
'I don't know about 'people',' Chris said, now looking slightly less near death, 'but we can.'
'I need to sit down,' Shadow groaned. 'If I'm going to accept all of this — I need you to tell me everything. Can you do that? Are you willing to tell me everything?'
Chris and Josie gave each other what-do-you-think looks. 'Okay,' they said.
'But not now,' added Josie, 'if you don't mind. We've just had a heavy night and we need to grab some sleep for a few hours. We could meet you later, if you like.'
'Uh . . . okay,' said Shadow hesitantly, worried that if the kids failed to turn up he would never find out if he had been the butt of an elaborate hoax. 'Can you come to us?'
'Where do we find you?' asked Chris.
'Puck's Dell,' Shadow replied. 'Have you heard of it?'
'Yeah. Course we have,' Chris told him. 'So you're road protesters. Great. Actually, we were thinking of coming to visit you. We're sort of coming round to the idea that you guys have got it right. When you've seen how vast The Great Wood used to be — you kind of realise how important it is to make sure that the little bit that's left isn't destroyed.'
Misty and Shadow smiled. 'We're there most of the time,' Misty said. 'Drop in any whenever you like.'
Shadow wagged a finger at the twins. 'I think we ought to give you two a lift home. You don't look as if you'll make it on your own.'