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Time Knot

John Hunt Publishing Ltd.

Return to the Well

England – about now

Juliette stepped in front of me, her arms wide apart, blocking my path.

"Rhory. No. You can't expect me to believe that. It defies science and it defies common sense. I don't know why you're saying these things."

Behind her the trees of Hammerford Park writhed and rustled in the chill wind. We stood facing each other midway between the bandstand and the old oak. Juliette is my favourite sister. Correction. Juliette is my only sister. Seventeen, brighter than a super-nova and prettier than your average celeb, she remained my older sister and thus terminally irritating.

I tried to explain for the umpteenth time: "But it's true. I can only tell you what I experienced. I wasn't going to share this with you because I knew you wouldn't get it. But you insisted. 'Tell me the truth,' you said. 'No, I'll understand,' you said. So I did. And you don't."

"Would you honestly expect any sane person to believe that under our stupid old bandstand there is an ancient temple?" She pointed at the structure with the green finger of her rainbow-coloured gloves. "And if it is there, which it isn't, but if it is there, that you're the only one who knows about it?"

Juliette turned to face the bandstand, as though expecting me to produce an old temple like a rabbit out of a hat. Her dark hair blew around her face and she pulled her multicoloured woolly hat lower.

"I never said I was the only one who knows about it. It's marked on an old map that Natasha and I found at the Town Hall, and I think that an ancient secret society —"

"You can stop right there." Jules spun back and poked me in the chest. "Save me the ridiculousness of ancient secret societies. You've always had a vivid imagination. In many ways it's quite cute. But now you're going too far."

"Look, Jules, like it or not, there's a tunnel running from the old well in the Wild Wood." I pointed in the general direction beyond the swimming pool enclosure. "And it comes out into the temple. The temple then opens into the storage area under the bandstand. Jeez ..." irritation buzzed through me, "... I walked it only a few weeks ago."

"Okay. The joke's gone on long enough. I don't even know why I've come with you." She thrust her hands into the pockets of her coat. "Frankly, you're making me complicit in your stupid fantasies. You'll be a laughing stock if you tell anyone else. Do you want that?"

"Bleeding heck, just come and look. It'll only take us a few minutes to get to the well, then you can see." I pulled on her arm. "It's quite possible to spot where the tunnel sets off near the metal rungs that go down towards the water. You can even go down and try it yourself."

My sister snorted at that suggestion. We set off in silence under a dark-grey and somewhat threatening sky.

Juliette looked up. "That's all I need. To get soaked while on a wild goose chase."

I glanced over towards the old oak. Its shape had definitely changed since the lightning struck, the night I found the temple. I'd pretty much avoided the park since then and had pretty much avoided thinking through all the implications. I hadn't shared that I'd travelled through time to a crucial moment in world history and prevented a human sacrifice. I hadn't even told Juliette that bit. I'd mentioned that I'd found an old temple beneath the bandstand and how this had helped me connect with the young Egyptian priestess.

A few minutes later we were by the fence that separated the path encircling Hammerford Park from the briars and brambles beyond. Dad had named this bit, with its years of old leaves and fallen branches, the Wild Wood. Last autumn, I'd climbed over with a mate and we'd found an old well hidden amongst the bushes.

The metal fence came up to my chin. I cupped my hands for Juliette's foot to help her climb over and then followed, landing with a crash on leaf-mould and old twigs. Juliette slipped off her small backpack. She extracted a powerful torch and one of Dad's paint-stained screwdrivers.

"So, where is it then?"

"Just over here."

I led the way in, and pulled back some ferns and a spiky branch from a hawthorn bush.

I looked in horror. The whole top of the well had changed. The wooden lid had entirely gone.

"Ha!" said Juliette. "Ha bloody ha. Now you're going to tell me you slipped through six inches of concrete! Just like some teenage priestess slipped through several thousand years of time."

"It wasn't like this ... I mean, just a few weeks ago. It had an old wooden top, held with a few rusty screws. Nat and I unscrewed it and —"

"Spare me, Rhory, spare me. Are you seriously going to tell me that someone just happens to have come along and sealed the top of the well since you went down it? I mean look around." She kicked at some leaves with her foot. "Can you see where a cement mixer sat? Can you see footprints from workmen? Just confess I've caught you in a lie and be man enough to admit it."

I felt sick and a little dizzy. The top of the well was completely sealed by concrete that looked like it had been there for months, if not years. I knelt down and poked around the edge of the brickwork. Something glinted. I eased it out from where it had been half buried. A long rusty screw, with its head partially sheared. The sheared part still sparkled with clean metal. This had to be the screw I'd broken when my cousin Natasha and I opened up the well-top some weeks earlier.

"Look, Jules ..." I said. Then I stopped talking; I'd caught a glimpse of a man's face watching us through the fence, further round the path. Because I was kneeling, he hadn't seen that I could spot him.

"Can we help you?" I shouted. The face vanished.

Juliette swung round to me, the screwdriver in her hand.

"Who are you talking to?"

"Some guy's watching us."

"Yeah, okay, pull the other one, Rhory. No one in their right mind would be out in the park with a sky as dark as this." Juliette looked around, keeping tight hold of the screwdriver. "Come on, let's go. You've been caught out, my dear brother, admit it."

"No, I won't admit anything of the sort. You can ask Natasha. She was here, remember?"

Juliette just shook her head, and put the screwdriver in the backpack. I strode over and took it out again.

"Look. I'm going to prove it."

Vandalism

I crunched across to the metal railings and yanked myself over.

"Oh thanks very much," said Juliette, from the far side of the fence.

She went through the necessary contortions to put the backpack on. I checked up and down the path but couldn't see anyone. Perhaps I'd imagined the face? No. A man had been staring at us.

I ground my teeth and hunched my shoulders as I marched past the Hammerford Baths and up the slope towards the bandstand. I would show Juliette the trapdoor. It led down to the temple. In fact, if she had the courage, we would both go down and explore. I stopped and looked around. Juliette rounded the corner of the swimming pool enclosure about fifty metres behind me. The periphery of the park brooded in gloom, and if anyone was standing in the shadows I wouldn't be able to see them in the half light. I'd a distinct sense someone was watching us. A spot of rain glistened on the sleeve of my jacket. I pulled my scarf tighter around my neck to keep out the chill and marched towards the bandstand once more.

"Bloody hell, Rhory, you've vandalised it."

Juliette pointed at the old door to the storeroom beneath the bandstand. The wood around the lock had splintered where I'd forced it with the screwdriver.

"Look, Jules, just look. The lock on the door is brand new. Isn't it one coincidence too many that the door has a new lock and someone's capped the well, all within six or seven weeks of my using them?"

Juliette frowned: perhaps at the logic of my argument. More likely she disapproved of breaking into the storage room.

I scraped the door across the tarmac and held out my hand. "Give me the torch and I'll show you the trap door."

Juliette opened up her backpack once more and drew out the torch. She looked towards the council offices where most of the windows were lit up. Then she surveyed the path beyond the swings and sandpit. We were alone, as far as we could see.

"Come on, let's be quick, I don't fancy coming up before a magistrate just because you can't tell fantasy from reality."

I ignored that jibe, switched on the torch and flashed the beam around inside. It looked all wrong. It smelt all wrong. Once more I felt like throwing up or smashing something precious. The floor had changed and the storage room reeked of adhesive. Someone had covered the whole area in thick linoleum, with a yellow and brown pattern. The deck chairs stood in neat piles over to the right. Straight ahead, where the trapdoor had been – the trapdoor I had used – the linoleum extended unbroken. Without a sharp knife there would be no way to get to the trapdoor, and without wrecking the whole floor there would be no way to find it.

I came out and kicked the door.

"Ouch."

Juliette took the torch and looked inside.

"We'd better get out of here before someone sees us." Juliette pushed the door back but it stuck six inches short of closing. "God, Rhory, you've bent the hinges." She giggled.

"I don't think so." I held the edge of the door, pulled upwards and kicked it closed at the same time. It slammed home; but splintered wood around the lock remained as evidence of our visit.

Juliette held my eyes for some moments, biting her bottom lip. She shrugged. "C'mon, Bro. We both need a cup of tea."

The man leaned against the wall of the office building at the corner of Suffolk Road. He'd followed the two youngsters back from the park. The kids hadn't spotted him this time. He reached into an inside pocket of his moss-green military-style coat and took out a bulky mobile phone. Across the road three girls came out of the newsagents and their indistinct voices carried over to him. The girls shared sweets as they dodged puddles reflecting the lit windows of the library. A slight drizzle left small glistening droplets on the man's cropped hair.

"Your intel was spot on," said the man into the phone. "They went to both the well and the bandstand at the time you specified." He listened for a moment and nodded. "The sister's a bit of all right." A squawk came from the speaker. "Okay, just sayin'. She's fit and I know where he lives. Do you want me to stiff the lad? It'd be easy to do now I know his house."

He concentrated on the answer, his forehead creased, and then closed down the phone. A car with dipped headlights approached Suffolk Road signalling to turn in. The man pulled up his collar and headed for the main road, keeping his face in the shadows.

Hospital Visit

"Will she die, Dad?" I asked, as we turned into the hospital car park.

"We all die, Rhory," my dad responded, "and she's had a good innings. But for the moment she's just quite ill, so we'll have to hope for the best."

We paid for a parking ticket, parked eventually and located the main entrance to the hospital. The lifts, with brainless graffiti, were off to the right.

"Aunt Bridget doesn't have a private room, but she's not on a big ward either. So there'll be other women in the room. Remember not to stare."

"Oh, Dad!" I responded, as the lift whisked us up towards the fourth floor. "She asked to see me though?" "Yes. She made a point of it when she talked to Uncle Adam. He called and said she wanted to see both of us if we could make it."

We walked down a long corridor with wards on either side, looking for the correct room. An aroma, like that from our medical cabinet at home, wafted around. My right shoe squeaked each time I stepped on the rubberised floor. I stopped and looked in turn at the soles of both shoes. They appeared identical.

"Come on, Rhory, stop faffing around."

When we went in I thought Dad had made a mistake. I couldn't see Aunt Bridget. One woman sat up in bed watching the TV. She had on a bright pink top that clashed with her orange-coloured hair. One massive lady faced away from us. The third couldn't have been much older than Juliette and had her eyes closed with her iPod earphones blotting out the world. I looked more carefully at number four by the window. She looked back, her face gaunt, lined, and framed with grey hair that spilled all over her pillow. Above her, a bag of clear fluid connected to her thin arm through a plastic tube. She nodded.

"Hello, Bridget," said my dad. "We've brought the statutory grapes. I hope you like them."

"Well if I don't, Angus, the nurses certainly do." She smiled slightly. "And –" she pointed towards the teenage girl, with her head nodding in time to a silent beat – "I've friends here who eat all my extras." She caught my gaze. "Hello, Rhory. Good of you to come. I know visiting poorly relatives isn't the nicest way to spend your Sunday."

"Hello, Auntie," I mumbled, unsure how to talk to a sick great aunt. "How are you?" My gut tensed at the stupidity of my question.

Aunt Bridget smiled. "Oh you know, comme ci, comme ga. Now why don't you sit at the end of the bed ... and Angus –" she extended a thin finger – "you take this chair after pulling the curtains around us a bit. Let's pretend at least that we have privacy."

Auntie and Dad caught up on family news. I stood up and peered through the metal frame window. Opposite, the white building needed a lick of paint over its rusty stains. In the quadrangle below people walked around in dressing gowns. Some smoked.

I reflected on what had happened the day before, and who it was who'd sealed off the old temple. I felt a complete prune having sworn I could show Juliette where the temple was and failing so miserably.

"You're in a dream, Rhory."

"Oh, sorry, Auntie." I looked around and couldn't see my dad anywhere.

"I sent your dad on an errand. Ciggies and another Sunday paper. I've already read this one from page one to page one hundred." She indicated the mangled heap of newspaper on the floor by the wall. She dropped her voice. "Rhory, basically I needed some time alone with you. Come, dear, sit down."

I nodded, not knowing quite what to say.

"Move a bit closer so I don't have to shout," she said, and I eased my way further up the bed. "That's better."

She leaned forward, grimacing and reaching out to touch my cheek with her finger. Her pale eyes held mine. "You're a good boy. A brave boy. I know much of what you've done, or rather ..." She cleared her throat, and taking a beige plastic beaker from the side cabinet, took a sip of water. "Or rather, I've seen what you've done."

She must have clocked my puzzlement.

"Rhory, as I approach my own death things that were once hidden have become clear." She smiled once more and nodded a few times. "You, more than most, will know that death is largely illusory. And you, now, must know that time operates quite differently from the way most people believe." She coughed and her eyes watered. I passed her the cup of water. "In my own way I've been able to follow parts of your adventure. Sometimes I've had vivid dreams and sometimes I've been on great voyages myself. My death, which is coming quite soon now, is only another part of the journey."

A sob rose up from nowhere and my eyes filled with tears.

"Now, Rhory, we don't have time for sentimentality. Listen carefully. You will go to my house and collect your ancestor's journal, the one I told you about. It will be okay for you to read it, now that you are underway, as it were. You may have to get parts translated because I guess you don't speak ancient Greek, even though you've been to ancient Greece." She chuckled at her own joke and started to cough again. I poured more water from a jug by the bed into the beaker. Dad's car keys lay on the bedside cabinet.

"Thanks, dear. Now, where was I? Oh yes. Look, we need to cut a few corners. I don't know if this will work but we'll see. Before your dad comes back."

She handed me the plastic cup and I placed it by the jug.

"Here, hold both of my hands," said my aunt.

She moved her left arm with care, holding the drip tube with her right hand to prevent it snagging on anything. She stretched out both her thin hands, with their veins and brown splodges. I held them in mine and felt the bones under the paper-thin skin.

"Close your eyes, Rhory, dear."

At first nothing happened at all. The faint noise from the iPod continued and a murmuring that might have been the TV on an imperfect mute. Outside a nurse called to a colleague. When the silence descended it fell like a thick soft blanket. I floated in a dark space, full of light that I couldn't see. I moved forward as though someone pulled my arms.

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Excerpted from Time Knot by M.C. Morison. Copyright © 2016 M.C. Morison. Excerpted by permission of John Hunt Publishing Ltd..
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