The Inscription by Pam Binder Read Free Book Online Page B

“Salmon were left cooling in the loch. Una bid me fetch them for the laird’s table.”
    He returned her smile; a toothy grin on a smooth face. She relaxed and watched him walk over to the levers that controlled the gate. It creaked open. Not wanting to wait in case the young man changed his mind, she ducked under the gate when it was only half open and hurried to the shore.
    Her long dress weighed her down. She struggled to keep from losing her balance over the narrow path. Lachlan and Angus had talked about Mary, Queen of Scots, and Elizabeth I. Amber remembered a tour at Holyrood House she’d taken with Aunt Dora. The guide had told them about Mary’s marriage to Lord Darnley and her pregnancy. So, if she had her time line straight, Lord Darnley was still alive and Mary hadn’t been imprisoned by Elizabeth as yet. The year must be about 1566. She stumbled on an exposed root, but caught herself before she fell. Somehow she had slipped four hundred years into the past.
    There was no doubt she was looking at Loch Ness, and no questions that Urquhart stood behind her: tall powerful and intact. It was no longer the crumbling ruins of the twentieth century. She’d spent her summers as a guide on a tour bus, showing visitors this very spot. She knew the castle’s history, knew the date it was first battered by the English and the MacDonalds and knew the year it was blown up to prevent it from serving as a Jacobite base.
    The sun was going down behind the rolling hills as she made her way carefully to the shore. If she’d somehow passed into another century when she fell into the water, could she return the same way? Or would it not work a second time? The sensation returned, of bone-numbing water and the searing panic she’d felt when she nearly drowned. She remembered Lachlan pulling her toward warmth and safety. Would she have returned to her own time if he hadn’t been there? Or would she have simply died? And why was she here to begin with? She rubbed her temples.
    She tried to calm her mind and stop die racing questions by looking out over the gray waters of the loch. The air felt as though it was charged with electricity. The undeniable fact was that she had traveled to another time. The way she saw it, she had two choices. Get hysterical, or stay rational and find a way back.
    A third choice surfaced. She considered it. If there was no way back, and she had to stay here, she would have to make a life for herself. Her family would think she had drowned and would go on about their lives. Her throat tightened. There would be no way to let them know she was all right, or for her to know how they were doing.
    Amber sat down on a large rock near the shore. She felt warm tears on her cheeks. What would happen to her aunt? And her brother, David? She brushed the moisture from her face. He would have to take care of Aunt Dora. Her students? Tears started again. They’d hire a new teacher. An empty feeling grew in the pit of her stomach.
    Footsteps crunched over the loose rock-strewn path behind her and she turned toward the sound. It was Lachlan.
    He stood beside her and gazed toward the water. “The loch draws you. I, too, feel its pull.” He paused. “Or is there another reason that drives you to seek the solitude?”
    He was closer to the truth than she wanted to face. She did not like people getting too close. As a child she had ridden her bicycle to Urquhart at every opportunity. It was a beautiful place.
    “I just need some fresh air.”
    “Aye, I felt the same. But I fear the pull these waters have on you will draw you once again to their depths. And next time I may not be there to carry you to safety.”
    She looked at him and felt an icy shiver. It was as though he’d read her thoughts. But there was something else. She saw concern in his eyes and didn’t feel smothered by it.
    “I promise to jump in only when you are around.”
    Amber thought she saw die briefest hint of a smile cross his face, but when