Hunting Memories (27 page)
Authors: Barb Hendee
She looked around the clinical cabin. “This is so different from . . . You should have seen our cabin when we traveled here from the east.”
Eleisha opened her eyes again, seeming relieved at the change of topic. “What was it like?”
“I had a bed and a porcelain basin for water. Embroidered curtains on the window . . . a satin comforter. It was like a little hotel room. Robert, did you ever travel by train in those days?”
“No.”
“Times have changed,” Wade said, also glad to be speaking of more mundane things. “But at least between both cabins we have four bunks.”
He realized he was thirsty, probably feeling dehydration from losing so much blood, and he looked over at Philip. “Would you mind going to the food car and picking up a few bottles of water? And maybe Rose could use a cup of tea?”
“I don’t mind,” Philip answered.
“No,” Robert ordered. “She’s fine for now, and we should stay in these two cabins, keep together with our weapons. Wade, there’s a sink right there if you need water, and a porter will come by in a few hours to take food orders. You can get anything you want then.”
The cabin fell into a tense silence again. Philip pressed his lips together tightly, but he looked uncertain at the same time, as if unsure what he should do.
“Robert,” Wade finally said, and he could not keep the edge from his voice. “I agree we should be cautious, but you don’t make the decisions for any of us. Philip is going to walk out the door and go buy some bottled water and get Rose a cup of tea. He might even get me a ham sandwich. Do you understand?”
Robert’s face betrayed nothing. No hint of emotion crossed his eyes. Then he stepped backward into their second cabin and closed the inner door.
Wade sighed, thinking he might have handled that differently. Philip looked surprised. Eleisha and Rose both looked uncomfortable. But something had to be done.
“You still don’t mind going for the water and tea?” Wade asked Philip.
“No, I don’t mind. I’m bored in here, and this trip will take forever. What will we do when I get back?”
“I’ll think of something.”
The moment Philip slipped out, Eleisha turned toward Wade. “You’re starting to handle him pretty well.”
“I watch you do it enough,” he said.
“What’s wrong? You sent him off over more than just a bottle of water.”
“I think somebody needs to talk to Robert . . . before we get home,” he answered, “I don’t think he’ll listen to me, and Philip would just make things worse.”
Eleisha glanced away. “I know. I’ve been thinking the same thing. I’ll do it.”
Wade was almost embarrassed by the relief he felt. She’d already had a long night, but they had a long way to go, and something had to be done right now. She had a way of making people see reason. It was a gift she never quite recognized.
“Keep Philip out if you can,” she said, standing up.
Rose reached out to touch her arm. “Robert is just following his nature, Eleisha. Remember that.”
“I will, but if we’re all going to live together and look for others to bring in, he’s going to have to understand . . .” Eleisha trailed off. “I’ll go talk to him.”
She knocked softly on the connecting inner door, opened it, and slipped through.
Wade closed it securely behind her and looked around the small cabin that he and Rose now occupied alone. Then he went back to sit with her.
She seemed all right as long as they were locked away by themselves with the window covered. “You should get some rest,” she said.
She sounded sad and a bit lost again, and he remembered that no matter how badly she wanted to begin a new existence with a new purpose, she was still leaving her home of a hundred years. Perhaps he should distract her.
“Rest?” he answered. “I don’t think so. We need to think of some way to entertain Philip. Have you ever seen him when he’s bored? It’s not pretty.” He pulled a deck of cards from his bag. “Do you know how to play poker?”
Julian gripped the steering wheel harder.
He’d rented a new Ford Mustang and pushed the needle past seventy, racing up Interstate 5. The Amtrak schedule lay on the seat between himself and Jasper, who was staring out the window. It had been a quiet trip so far—thankfully.
Before leaving San Francisco, they had taken the time to break into an antique store and steal Jasper a trench coat and his own sword. It was not exactly a quality blade, but it would work.
Once on the road, Jasper had fallen silent. His face was still cut, but he’d stopped bleeding.
Finally, he asked, “What makes you so sure they’re on that train anyway?”
Julian looked into the rearview mirror and into the backseat as he saw the air blur, and Mary appeared.
“You were right,” she said. “I hid behind some shelves near the dining car and Philip walked right past me. They’re on the train.”
Jasper turned from the window and looked at Julian in astonishment—almost respect. “So how far are we going tonight?”
“As far north as we can get before dawn,” Julian answered, glancing down at the Amtrak schedule. “We’ll take cover and sleep out the day. Then we start again. But between all their stops and one layover, they’re on a twenty-two-hour route, and they’ll have to change trains in Eugene tomorrow night. We’ll be waiting.” He paused. “But we need to find some way to keep Robert from getting off inside the station. We need to get him outside. A train yard is a good place, an excellent place, for our needs. It’s full of nooks and shadows.”
“And then what? You just step out and cut his head off?”
Jasper still didn’t understand the difficulty of this or the need to strike from the darkness at the perfect second. But Julian had no doubts now. He had been an unstoppable hunter once, and the memories were all coming back.
* * *
Eleisha slipped into the second cabin to find Robert standing by the window and gazing at the landscape as it raced by. Everything about him looked so hardened, from his lean face to his worn boots. He struck her as lonely yet inaccessible at the same time.
“I’m sorry about that . . . that moment with Wade,” she said. “But we all managed to survive for a long time before meeting you.”
“You’re too young to know anything.”
“Philip and Rose are over two hundred, and I’m not far behind.”
He moved toward her, and the tense expression on his face eased a bit. “Rose told me that until just recently you’ve spent your entire existence taking care of Julian’s father.”
She nodded. “Yes, but I didn’t mind. I loved William.”
“That’s why you’re so different, not like one of us at all.”
In spite of everything they’d been through tonight, she couldn’t help smiling. “Maggie used to say that all the time.”
“Maggie?”
“Philip’s lover when he was first turned. Then he turned her, too.”
His jaw tightened, and his eyes clouded with anger again. “Oh, her.” He walked back to the window.
Eleisha worried that she might never understand him, but she had come in here for a reason. “We’re glad to have you with us, but you need to stop behaving as if you make our decisions. Can you do that?”
He nodded once without looking at her and then said, “I know you can’t help what you are, but you don’t understand anything. There are laws we have to exist by . . . that we did exist by. Julian’s maker, Angelo Travare, broke two of those laws, and a nightmare started that hasn’t stopped.”
“What are you saying?”
He dipped his head, looking so unhappy that she felt sorry for him.
“I don’t know how to tell you,” he whispered. “I don’t think I could make you understand.”
Words were not certainly Robert’s strength, but he seemed desperate to convey the meanings of these “laws.” She was drained and tired, and dawn was still hours away. The last thing she wanted to do was share consciousness with Robert. But once home, she wanted them all to be able to start moving forward—and that would take mutual understanding.
Reluctantly, she sat down on the floor. “Close the window shutter. You don’t have to tell me anything. Just show me. Take me back.”
He frowned. “Take you back?”
“Don’t you know how to share memories?” she asked, puzzled. “You must. We’ve all shared our memories, even Rose. Come sit here. You just think back, and I’ll follow inside your head.”
Still uncertain, he sat on the floor in front of her. “I just focus on a memory and you can see it?”
How could he not know this? He was five hundred years old.
“Yes, go back as far as you need to go.”
“I only need to show you one.”
“All right,” she answered. To the best of her experience, none of them had ever shown each other a single memory—as the flow always started in one point and just continued until it finished or somebody managed to pull away.
“Just relax and think back,” she said, closing her eyes.
She reached out for his thoughts, stretching her consciousness into his.
Think back
, she projected.
As far back as you need
.
, she projected.
As far back as you need
.
She felt a moment of panic inside him as her consciousness meshed with his, and then his memories began to surface, and then she lost awareness of herself, falling into his past.
chapter 12
Robert
Robert Brighton cared nothing for titles or power—or even for family. His grandfather had been a soldier, his father had been a soldier, and he never considered any other life than following the same path.
He didn’t mind the simple designation “man-at-arms,” and he was loyal to the lord he served.
In the year 1514, his lord, Thomas Howard, was named Earl of Surrey. And Robert, at the age of twenty-three, had already been in his service for five years. He rejoiced in his lord’s success.
By this point he had followed Thomas Howard into wars with Spain and Scotland, and he liked traveling from one battle to the next.
The course of his life simply followed that of his lord’s, and this was comfortable, with a natural kind of flow that Robert desired. His left arm was broken once and his nose twice, but he always healed enough to fight again. He did not think into the future. He preferred living day to day, and the earl made certain the needs of his closest men were always met. Robert had little to consider besides loyalty, courage, and following orders—and he excelled at all three.
The earl’s first wife died of consumption, but Robert had barely been aware of her existence. He was almost equally unaware when his lord had remarried in 1513 to Elizabeth Stafford, daughter to the third Duke of Buckingham.
A man-at-arms like Robert would hardly be included in the wedding party, and he and his lord were rarely at home. He’d seen Elizabeth a few times, but she was barely sixteen at the time of the marriage. Later, he wished he had taken more note of the event, as it came to shatter the course of his life.
After the Battle of Flodden Field in Scotland, to Robert’s disappointment, his lord began growing interested in the political arena, and they spent more and more time at court in Eltham or Lambeth Palace—wherever the king was residing. Robert hated inactivity, and there was little for him to do. But he enjoyed those weeks when the court made preparations to “move,” and then the hordes of Henry VIII’s household took to the roads for a short journey.
Always acting as guard to his own lord, Robert liked the traveling and the break in monotony.
There were brief stints when the earl took time to rejoin his new wife, either at court or their seat at Arundel Castle in Sussex or their family home at Kenninghall, Norfolk. As a result they had a son named Henry and a daughter named Mary, but again, Robert barely noticed these domestic happenings.
Then, in 1520, his lord was given the thankless task of “putting Ireland in order,” and Robert rejoiced once more. The following year they fought in France. They were merciless, burning all of Morlaix. After this, Robert hoped the earl would not be recalled home, and he got his wish. They were sent back to Scotland, killing men and ravaging lands, and Robert felt nothing but respect for his lord.
Then . . . in 1524, Thomas Howard’s father died, and so he became the third Duke of Norfolk. As a reward, he was allowed to go and live in his own house in Kenninghall. At first, Robert thought little of this. By this point, he was thirty-three years old and quite resigned to going wherever his lord went.
Upon arriving at Kenninghall, Robert found out that he was to live inside the manor, as head of the household guard. This appointment honored him. He was placed in charge of the watch, arranging schedules and making certain his instructions were maintained.
He sometimes worried about missing the traveling and the fighting, but perhaps it would not be so bad to oversee the Kenninghall watch. His lord had a young son who would soon need training, and there seemed to be plenty to keep a man like Robert occupied.
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