Carnelian (20 page)

I took a deep breath and took his hand. I
couldn’t be afraid of the woods forever, and he was my knight in
shining armor. Or would that now be my knight in barely-there kilt?
From all the pictures I had seen of ancient Egyptian men, they
didn’t wear much.

“Just forget about Dee and his rambling,”
Seth suggested, turning us back from my fears and into our
conversation.

“Come on Seth, I just want to know. It can’t
be that bad, and I’d like to know all the possibilities as to why
you were sent to find me. I don’t know anything about your time
beyond what we learn in school. I don’t know who you are or why
you’d be here. Heck, I guess I don’t even know who I am at this
point since I don’t even have a father present in the same time
period. Dee can’t be suggesting something too strange if he has an
idea,” I ranted, slowing down until I stopped walking.

Seth huffed and pulled me closer so that I
couldn’t study him as we walked. “Fine,” he replied. We were
walking again. “Dee agrees with everything you say. He said that
much this morning. His suggestion was that maybe we didn’t need to
know more about each other. Maybe your help was more a physical
help,” Seth cryptically replied.

“Which means?” I asked, trying to get Seth
to spit it out.

“He thinks I’m to get you pregnant, and then
the three of us guys can go back to our time and our lives there,”
Seth spit out. I tripped on my step at his words, and he easily
caught me, despite his and my embarrassment. He set me down on the
log we had to jump over to continue on the path.

“Please don’t take Dee seriously. I’d never
do that to you. I tried to explain that to him, and he just doesn’t
get it,” Seth explained, sitting beside me and taking my hand
again. Seth looked expectantly to me, and I realized he was waiting
for me to say something. I was a bit speechless. It wasn’t every
day that I had a gorgeous guy talking about making babies with me.
It was quite a bit of shock. Babies were not on my radar for at
least another ten years.

“Um, do you think that’s really the reason?”
I replied. I was curious what Seth thought.

“No,” Seth replied quickly. “People
traveling through time normally don’t have feelings for someone out
of their time. That’s why someone like you is rare. Children born
from people falling in love are even rarer. Maybe that’s because
Dee thinks it’s a possibility. But trust me, it isn’t. If I was
just to get you pregnant and leave, why would I feel this,” Seth
asked as his free hand traced a line from my ear down my neck,
leaving tingles in his wake. “What we feel is different. Dee could
never imagine what this feels like. I know it means something
more.” His hand now held my face. The tingles didn’t go away, but I
was used to them after the initial shock. “Dee just wants to go
home, but I don’t plan on going anywhere without you.”

My breath caught. Things changed rapidly
between us. I was getting the feeling any relationship with Seth
would always be full of change. We were from two different times.
That alone was enough for us to have to build bridges between
everything we did. There was something about what he said struck
me. He wasn’t going to go anywhere without me.

Seth was guiding my face to his as he kissed
me. Tingles rolled over my face as our lips met. My heart picked up
pace as I wrapped my arms around his neck while he pulled me
closer.

“I don’t know why the goddess sent me to
you,” Seth said, pulling back just a breath away. “But I’ll be
forever grateful. My eyes were never truly open until I met you.
Even if she decides to pull me away from you tomorrow, I’ll do
everything I can to get back. I can’t imagine a world without you,
and I’ll find a way for us to be together.”

I think I melted into a puddle of goop right
there on that spot. I didn’t like the idea that Seth had to go back
to his home someday, but since he didn’t want to be there and would
fight to get back to me, took away some of the sting of reality. It
was hard to imagine how he would just disappear, but right now he
was here with me. This time was ours.

My phone rang, ruining the moment. Sim was
calling. Seth took my phone and smiled.

“I’ll have her back in five minutes,” Seth
said and hung up right away without waiting for a response. Seth
kissed the top of my nose and stood. He really meant to have me
back in five minutes. I was a bit disappointed. I reluctantly
joined him. I would have rather spent the rest of the day sitting
there together, but we had to get back.

“She has great timing, doesn’t she?” Seth
asked rhetorically. I shook my head. It wasn’t great if you asked
me.

“Do you and Dee go way back?” I asked,
changing the subject as we walked.

“Yes. Our families have always been
together. We both grew up learning how to take over for our fathers
in the military.” Seth took my hand as we walked.

“And you’re a chariot fighter person?” I
asked. If Dee was the driver, there was only one spot left on the
chariot.

Seth laughed at my description. “Yes, that
was my job.”

“Isn’t that a dangerous job?” I hated to
think of his real life in the past. Unlike his life here where he
couldn’t be killed, there he could. It seemed likely he was not
going to live a long life in that reality.

“Ahh, but the rush,” Seth exclaimed. “Can
you imagine being behind horses galloping at full speed toward the
enemy when you have the advantage? Hard to hit a moving target?”
His eyes twinkled. I couldn’t imagine it, but he was. “Dangerous?
Yes, but any military position is dangerous. It goes with the job.
If you’re good at it, then you don’t need to worry.”

“And you are good at it?” I asked. I
couldn’t help but worry. Someday he would be back there.

“The best,” Seth replied. We had made it to
the dorms. “That’s the reason I was promoted right before we left.
I lead the chariots brigade now.” Seth shook his head. “It sounds
strange to say that. I know the moment I leave here, I’ll go right
back to that life, but still it sounds strange.” It was strange to
think that the goddess would send him back to that dangerous life,
no matter how safe Seth made it sound. I wanted to keep him here in
the now.

“Any advice for today, oh great military
leader?” I asked. Seth walked me up the stairs to my room. I paused
at my room door and turned to face him.

“The key to capture the flag is a
well-placed flag,” Seth answered, leaning down until we were nose
to nose.

“Thanks, genius,” I replied with a huff. His
lips met mine, pressing me against the door and causing my heart to
race again. I sighed as he pulled back.

Seth chuckled and bent down to be by my ear
as he spoke. “Good luck today,” he said softly, tickling my neck
with kisses before he pulled away.

Seth walked down the hallway before I went
into my room. Sim was standing just inside the doorway as I passed
her. She pretended to be mad, tapping her foot, but she was
excited.

“I have no idea what he did to make you
forgive him, but I want to know. How is lover boy? Did he finely
win you over with his well-defined muscles?” Sim asked. “Decided
hotness was a good reason for forgiveness?” I forgot that Sim
believed I was still mad at Seth. Forty-eight hours was not much
time, yet my whole world was different now.

“Or maybe his rescuing me from some
rapists/possible murders was a good reason?” I answered, sitting on
my bed and throwing my stuff on the floor. Sim instantly dropped to
the bed across from me in shock, and I told her about the past two
days, leaving out the stuff about time travel and the goddess. She
had lots of questions, and we kept talking for hours. We talked
through lunch and right up to meeting for CRUSH, which we were late
to.

When we got to CRUSH, everyone was already
broken up into their groups. Our group was by far the smallest as
most of our players chose not to show up, expecting to forfeit
again this year. Our team leader Chris was in the middle of the
group, discussing the strategy with someone else. I reached for the
rules from someone and looked them over quickly. Each team was
allowed up to eighteen players. We had only ten with Sim and me
included.

“Did we decide on something?” I asked Chris
as the group broke up a bit and people were in conversations with
their neighbors.

“No. Will still wants to use the library
even though we were told we can’t go in buildings,” Chris
complained. “We probably should just save ourselves the time and
hand the flag over to someone else. They’re all going to target us
first.”

“I have a plan,” I said quietly for only him
and Sim to hear. “But you’re just going to have to trust me.”

“Like a good plan with the races?” Sim
asked.

“Read the rules again,” I said. Sim took the
sheet from me. She read it over and handed it back confused. “As
long as you understand them too, we should be fine.”

“And the plan is?” Chris asked.

“I don’t want to tell everyone as they might
accidentally give it away. Only Sim will know, and then we will
each go different ways. That way she can’t accidentally give it
away.” Chris shook his head. I was using the only way I knew how to
get away with my plan. I wouldn’t tell them. “The base part is that
we’re going to pretend to use your plan. Sim is going to climb up
and put the flag in the tree for us. You have one picked out,
right?”

“Yes, but how is that a plan?” Chris
asked.

Sim rolled her eyes. “Just trust her. She
has all sorts of creative plans. Did you see her time in the races?
She even beat most of the guys, and you can’t tell me it was due to
strength.” I made a sad face like her comment hurt my feelings. Sim
held up my arm to show Chris the lack of muscle. She was true about
that.

“Fine, I’ll give you that much,” Chris
replied. He handed us the wadded-up flag. “Do your crazy plan and
maybe this year we won’t come in last place.”

“Can we get the equipment too?” I asked.
Chris handed us the bag of left over red bandanas that matched our
flag color, and he gave each of us a water gun filled with
something red. “Sim, let’s get these bandanas on first, and I’ll
let you both in a little on our plan.”

Sim and I walked a little away from our
group and sat down with the bag of bandanas and the flag. Sim set
the flag aside and reached in the bag. I reached over and shook the
bag of bandanas out over the flag.

“Mari,” Sim began to complain, but stopped
when I smiled and nodded at her. “Part of the plan?” she whispered,
and I nodded again.

“Just follow along,” I replied back even
quieter than her.

I reached to the bottom of the pile and
tucked the flag into a bandana. I rolled it discreetly and Sim took
a bandana before following suit. After the flag was mostly wrapped,
I turned to Sim.

“Can you tie mine on, and I’ll get yours?”
No one around us even paid attention, but I had to keep going as
normal as possible. Sim reached over and took mine. She began to
tie it on my arm like everyone else’s.

“Now the rules stated that the flag must
show, right?” I asked, hinting that she had to leave part of the
flag out. It wouldn’t matter since the flag color matched perfectly
with the bandanas. With it wrapped inside the bandana, you couldn’t
even notice it was two pieces, and they didn’t match on the
edge.

“Yep, correct,” Sim replied, tugging on the
flag’s corner a bit. “We can’t completely hide it.”

“Here, let me get yours,” I added after Sim
was done. “Chris?” I waved him over to the ground after we had our
bandanas on. Sim grabbed a bandana and wadded it up in her hands to
cover the bandana print in the middle of it.

“Do we have any more people showing up?” I
asked, pointing to the left over bandanas.

“No, this is it. So little faith in our team
after last year.” Chris sat down beside us. “Then what do you need
me to do?”

“Once we get out to the real tree, Sim will
climb up and place the flag,” I said, pointing to Sim. She shook
her fake flag. “After that, we will use these in other trees
near-by to throw off the seekers. We place guards around all the
fake trees, but not the real one.” Chris raised his eyebrows. “The
key is we can’t tell people they are guarding the fake ones or they
will give it away.”

“That just might work,” he said.

“And the secret is, we need to keep the real
tree unknown to everyone. Only you, me, and Sim can know where it
is. Once we get the fakes up also, we tell each group to guard
them. You’ll be left with the real flag, and Sim and I’ll do our
best to get the other teams flags before you lose ours.” Chris
nodded along. He liked my fake plan. I knew that even that way we
were still too far outnumbered to win, but Chris wasn’t looking for
a win. He just didn’t want to be in last place.

Teams around us began to move off to their
spots. Chris stood and nodded to us.

“Everyone, follow us,” Chris said, leading
us to the trees behind the dorms. “Group one go with Mari and Sim,”
Chris ordered.

The two called out followed us. We walked
not more than a hundred feet away from the group and found a tree
Sim could climb. She was up it in not time, hiding a fake flag.

“We’re going on the offensive. You are to
stay here and guard the flag. Find a good hiding spot. When we take
prisoners, it will be right where the group is now. That way they
can’t see you guys and the flag,” I told them before Sim and I
hurried back to the main group.

“Group two, Ken and Alex, you can go with
them now and they will tell you what to do once you’re in there,”
Chris added as two guys that could pass as twins with their dark
hard and perfectly wrinkle free t-shirts followed us.

This time we went off to the other
direction. We placed the flag in a lower bush. The red flag
actually fit nice in the red fall foliage.