9th Century
We – my dad and I – bring the sacks of food and supplies to Willa, who we find ensconced in a little hut just like the ones that used to stand in the first version of Caistley, before it burned down. I ignore her questions about where the items have come from – the cans of meal replacement drink and the plastic containers of vitamins are clearly not of the world we are in. And because there has always been that unspoken understanding between us that 'the estate' is something much more than an actual estate, she doesn't keep asking them. She knows I mean it and she believes me, she trusts me when I say I brought these things for her and her brother, her husband and her children. I show her how to pull the vitamin capsules apart, explain that the powder should be mixed into food, not too much, that after another summer has passed they won't be of any use anymore.
There's so much to explain. At some point during the explaining I begin to wonder if I haven't brought half of these things in order to spare myself the awkward conversation I fear is coming – the one where Willa and Eadgar ask me why it is I'm leaving them again, to go and live with the people who destroyed their village.
But Willa doesn't need to ask why I'm doing what I'm doing. She knows. So does Eadgar. I'm doing what I'm doing because I have a child, and because I'm in love with his father.
Before we leave, Willa kisses my cheek and ignores the toddler tugging at the bottom of her tunic. "And if he's not there," she says, "the Northman – you'll come back here, won't you Paige?"
I nod, looking at her and Eadgar. "Yes, I will."
***
When my dad and I have made it back to the beach, and I've managed to get my emotions under control, we approach the point where the path leads back into the woods – and back to the tree that could take us back to 2017. I stop when we get to it. To our right, the sea crashes against the rocks as a high wind begins to pick up.
"There it is," I say to my dad, pointing to the path. "That's the way back to the tree. I told Emma you were probably going to stay with me but –"
I stop talking, because if I try to speak even one more word I'm going to break. My dad puts his arm around me and leans down to kiss the top of Eirik's head. My son is asleep again after having his dinner while I explained how to use the pull-tabs on the meal replacement cans to Willa.
I wait for my father to speak, to say something. But he doesn't, not right away. Instead he just keeps walking, his arm slung around my shoulders, right on past the entrance to the path.
"Is this the right direction?" He asks a few minutes later. "North, right? You said we had to head north?"
"So you're – you're – dad, you're –" I say, but I'm barely coherent.
"Yes, Paige," he replies. "I'm staying."
I have questions, I need reassurances, but nothing I'm trying to say is coming out properly because today has been filled with too many goodbyes and I'm terrified my dad, even if he says otherwise right now, is going to come to his senses soon enough. And if he does that, then I'll have another goodbye to add to the list – my own father, my baby son's grandfather. I don't know, if it comes down to that, if I can do it.
My dad looks north, following the coastline with his gaze, and then out over the waves. "If this is a dream," he says, "it's the most realistic dream I've ever had. I can smell the saltwater, I can feel the warmth of the sun on my face."
"It's not a dream," I say, wiping my red, tired eyes one more time.
"As I said," he replies. "I don't think it is. But if it's not a dream – what is it? We could be anywhere right now – the United States, Europe – anywhere. And as for the time, well, how do I know what time it is here? Your friends wore strange clothing, they spoke oddly, but none of this really proves we're not in 2017 anymore, does it?"
I know he's not saying any of this to doubt me or to 'prove' me wrong – he's saying it because, as Emma said, what I claim is happening is technically impossible. And I certainly don't have a technical response to the question of how it is possible.
"I can't tell you why," I tell my dad. "I can't tell you how, either. I can't explain what is, I can just tell you what is. This isn't 2017. It's not the United States. It's the Kingdom of the East Angles, and it's sometime between the years 860 and 880 A.D. – as far as I've been able to work out, anyway. I read up on this place when I was a kid, when it started sinking in that Caistley wasn't the kind of place I was going to be able to find on Google maps."
"The Kingdom of the East Angles? So – England?"
"Well, yes. But 'England' doesn't exist yet – not in the way we think of it, not as one country."
A gentle gust of wind comes in off the sea and it is as I remember it since childhood at this time of year – warm, salt-laced and seemingly infused with the sunshine that only deigns to fall over this part of the world for any extended length of time during the summer. It's September now, and the days are as ripe and sweet with the summer as the fat, dark berries – the ones that look a little like blackberries – on the bushes.
"I was 5 when I came here for the first time," I say, picking a few of those berries, popping half of them in my mouth and then handing the rest to my dad. "When you're 5, you still believe in Santa Claus. I did, anyway. I'd also just lost my mother. What I mean is that 'impossible' things seemed very possible at that age – probable, even. And I didn't even understand the whole story, then. How could I? I didn't know I was going back in time. For a few years I just thought that there were some place near River Forks where they had very different hygiene standards, and a lack of grocery stores."
My dad chews the berries and looks surprised. "These are delicious. These are – these are the tastiest berries I've ever eaten."
I chuckle. "Yeah, that's one thing about this place. There's not as much food as there is at home – not even close – but what there is tastes a lot better."
Eirik stirs and squawks. He's going to need to be fed again very soon. My dad and I are still standing on the beach, talking. Not heading north. I look at him as he looks down at my son.
"So you'll stay?"
"Of course I'll stay," he replies, as if it's the most obvious answer in the world. "It might have been good for you to warn me that –"
"You would never have come, then!" I interrupt. "You wouldn't have come down to the tree, you would have thought I really was crazy. It's OK, I don't blame you – but it had to be this way."
My father catches my eye, smiling. "I suppose you're right about that. And listen, Paige, it's like I said. I still don't know I'm not dreaming. Part of me still expects to wake up in bed in a few seconds. But it also doesn't matter. If it's a dream, I'm staying with you and Eirik. If it's not a dream, I'm staying with you and Eirik. We need to stick together – it really is the only thing that matters."
We begin to walk north again, after I breastfeed the baby, and I'm trying to calculate in my head how long it's going to take. It took between two and three days to get south to Caistley from the Viking camp. So – three days? Probably two? We can move faster without Willa's small children in tow.
At one point I reach into the small amount of supplies I've kept for my dad and I and take out two tuna sandwiches, handing one to him.
"Mmm," he says approvingly. "This is great. I'm actually really hungry."
I smile. "Yeah, that's another thing about this place. You actually have time to get properly hungry. I don't know why a tuna sandwich tastes nicer after walking, after genuinely being hungry, but it really does."
"What are you going to do," my dad asks as we continue, "if there's not enough? Food, I mean? You said earlier that although it tastes better here, there's not as much. And you're eating for two right now, Paige. What if –"
I swallow a mouthful of tuna sandwich. "It's not like that, Dad. Not for – uh, not for me, anyway. Eirik's father is the Jarl, the leader of the Vikings. He and his family will always have enough to –" I stop talking abruptly when I see the look of pure bewilderment on my dad's face.
"Vikings?" He says, shaking his head as if he's certain he hasn't heard me right. "Paige, did you just – did you say Vikings?!"
I smile, mostly at myself – because I really should have anticipated this reaction – and nod. "Um, yeah. Vikings. That's another reason I've been able to pin down what time period this actually –"
"VIKINGS?!"
I nod again as my dad gives me a look of straight skepticism. "And you better get used to the idea, Dad, because they're going to think you're strange if you react this way when you meet them."
We walk on in silence, tracing the edge of a small bay with our steps as the sun sinks low in the sky and illuminates everything with a golden light.
"We're going to have to find somewhere to sleep soon," I say. But my dad is not thinking about where we're going to sleep.
"So this – this Viking – the King, is he? He's Eirik's –"
"Not King," I reply. "Jarl. It's their word for leader. Eirik is the Jarl."
"The baby's father is the Viking leader, then?"
I nod. "Of this group of Vikings, anyway. Other groups have other Jarls, there isn't one centralized leader for everyone."
"And how did you come to meet this 'Jarl?'"
To our left, at the top of the beach, sand dunes dotted with clumps of grass stretch inland. The sand itself is fine, soft. We could sleep here, out in the open where hopefully the animals that lurk in the woods at night might be less willing to approach?
"Paige?"
"Oh," I respond. "Yeah, sorry. It's just that I think we should stop here for the night. If we keep going the beach might get rocky and I don't want anyone to fall over a rock in the dark and sprain their ankle. That's something we don't –"
"Are you avoiding my question?"
"No," I reply, pulling the one blanket I kept for us out of the bag, thinking to myself that that is actually exactly what I'm doing. How do you tell your own father that the man you love began the relationship by kidnapping you? The Vikings kidnapped a lot of other people that day, too, but somehow I don't think it's going to matter. "We should get some sleep. We can talk about it in the morning if you want."
My dad grunts a grumpy agreement and I know he isn't going to let the topic slide. The temperature drops as the stars come out, but we keep the blanket mostly over Eirik, who is nestled between us.
I wake throughout the night to feed the baby and gaze up at the bright, countless stars over our heads. I haven't discussed with my father what we will do if Eirik is dead. I haven't even really discussed it with myself. Even thinking of it now, even thinking the word 'dead' in the context of the Viking leader, is almost impossibly difficult. I'm operating on faith, I realize that. And faith is dangerous, especially in such a harsh world. I turn away, both physically and psychologically, curling my body around my son – and delaying, once again, the facing of my own doubts.
***
We wake up bleary-eyed, damp with the dew that has fallen in the night, and in need of the kind of good, hot showers we will likely never have again. I feed Eirik as my dad cuts oranges with his pocketknife and puts together a rudimentary breakfast. When he hands me all four orange segments, and half of his own tuna sandwich, I balk.
"Dad, I –"
"Eat it," he insists, nodding down to the baby. "You need to keep strong so you can keep him strong. I've still got this – " he pats his own not-entirely-flat belly – "to keep me going."
So I take my own sandwich and half of my father's and marvel at how quickly and easily I have forgotten just how it feels to be truly hungry. We need to find the Viking camp soon.
And what if it's gone? What if they've sailed home? What if Eirik is dead?
I push the questions out of my mind. Eirik told me the camp was only the first outpost, that they intended to stay in lands of the East Angles, to move further inland and up and down the coasts. It wasn't just an invasion, he told me – it was a settlement. So it has to be there, still. He has to be there.
My father and I walk all day and into the evening. At one point we come to what might be the same place I had to swim, with Willa and her children in tow, around the marshland. At this time of year, though, it's just dry enough to be passable, and we manage to cross it on foot. The next day, as we get going again at dawn, we say little. Our bellies aren't empty exactly, but they're not full either. The worry is beginning to set in – are we ever going to get there? What if we're going the wrong way? Even though I know we're not going the wrong way, what if we can't find the Viking camp? And my dad, who doesn't even have the reassurance of knowing the place is real, is having his own doubts, I can feel it.
"It think it took three days," I tell him as the morning sun rises in the sky and begins to offer the first real warmth of the day. "About three days, anyway, to get back to Caistley from the Viking camp."
I'm trying to offer reassurance – and not just to him.
He nods. We're talking less now, due to fatigue and hunger. Our sentences are shorter, more efficient. A few minutes later he speaks again. "You were going to tell me how you met him. The Viking Jarl."
"Yeah," I reply. "I was. Next time we rest, I'll tell you, OK? I'm warning you though, it's kind of a long story." I can feel my dad staring at me. Eventually I look up to meet his worried eyes. "What? Dad, I promise I will tell –"
"It's not that, Paige," he replies, waving away my protest. "It's – well, look at you. You're out of breath. You've just had a baby! For God's sake, what are we doing here?! We hardly have any food left and –"
I drop to my knees suddenly, dragging my dad down with me. He's still talking. "What? Paige, are you listening to –"
"Dad!" I whisper. "Be quiet!"
There are two men further up the beach, I've just spotted them. They're only about forty feet away, and they're walking in our direction.
After the split second it takes my brain to register this basic information I notice something else – the men aren't dressed in the plain tunics I associate with the East Anglian peasants. No, they're in leathers. One has a sword strapped to his waist and the other carries an axe in one hand. Vikings.
I look at my father. He looks back at me. Are these Vikings with Eirik? Are they from that camp? Are there even any other camps? Their footsteps and chatter get closer and I can see my dad is thinking exactly what I'm thinking – the thing that almost every human being thinks when danger approaches: run.
And just as my rational mind is attempting to remind me that neither of us is in any condition to run – we're hungry, we're tired, and one of us has a baby strapped to her chest – my son chooses that moment to let out a sudden loud cry. Instantly, the men stop.
For a few seconds there is nothing, and then one of them asks the other if it's an animal they've just heard.
"That's no animal," comes the response. "That's a baby."
"Didn't the Jarl say she might have a baby with –"
The Vikings don't finish their conversation, because they've seen us. They're on us almost right away, looking down as my dad and I cower beneath them and I clutch my son tightly to my chest.
"Who's this then?" The larger one asks, and I realize to my dismay that I don't recognize either one of them. "What village are you from?"
The smaller one, the one with the axe, is studying me. "Look at her," he says, as his eyes take in my features. "The Jarl said she had long dark hair like this – and her teeth – girl, open your mouth."
I open my mouth. And then, making some effort to keep the fear out of my voice, I speak.
"I'm Paige," I say, getting to my feet and helping my dad up after me. "And if the Jarl you speak of is Eirik, then I believe I am the one you're looking for."
The moment they understand who I am, when they hear their Jarl's name trip off my tongue, their body language changes completely. They both become respectful, almost bashful, and they step a few paces back so as not to seem so menacing.
"Lady," the one with the sword says, "the Jarl has been searching for you for four moons – every three days he sends fresh men south, to walk the coastline. That's what we're doing now. Tell me, is this the child he speaks of? Is this my Jarl's child?"
Even in the few minutes it takes for the Vikings to begin treating me the respect I had come to get used to during my earlier stay in the encampment, I feel my own esteem returning to me. I am not Paige Renner, undergraduate student, single mom and probable crazy person here. Here, I am Paige, wife-to-be of the Jarl, mother of his son. And the fact that the two Vikings speak of the Jarl in the present tense has not missed me.
Still, I must be sure. "It is," I confirm. "And before you continue with your questions you must tell me of the Jarl himself – when I left he was very sick, I was going to find some healing plants to –"
"The sickness faded," the axe-wielding Viking replies. "Everyone thought it was the end, even the healers said that all they could do was ease his pain. But that night, after you left, the fever lifted."
"Valhalla will wait many years now, for the Jarl to sit at the feast," says his companion.
"So he's alive?" I ask, hardly daring to believe it. "He's – he's fine? What about –"
"His arm is still healing," the Viking. "There is stiffness in it still, but it fades with the herbs the healers apply to it every night. The Jarl is the strongest man in the world – even with one arm tied behind his back he could beat a whole pack of the King's men."
Somehow I doubt that, but I don't say it out loud. And not to spare the Jarl's dignity, either. No – the reason I don't speak is because I can't. He's alive. I stumble in the soft sand, sobbing. Baby Eirik wakes at the sound of his mother's cries and I hand him to my father.
Why am I sobbing? Relief. And underneath the relief, underneath the emotion, something else. Confirmation. I knew he was alive. Did I know he was alive? Or does it just feel like it in this moment, as I am told he is? I can't tell. And I suppose it doesn't matter. All that matters is that Eirik is still here, still flesh and blood and bone. I look up at my father.
Nothing can hurt us now, I want to say. I don't say it, because I still haven't told him the story of Eirik and I want to do that first, but I know it in my heart. Eirik is alive. And as long as he's alive, we – myself, my son and my father – are safe.
The Vikings tell us their names – the larger of the two if Ivor, and the smaller is Fridleif. They are new to Eirik's personal guard, both of them 19. They offer us food – fermented milk from the water-skin, chunks of cheese, the heavy dark bread whose taste on my tongue makes it so my nose believes itself to be smelling the scent of wood-smoke in the roundhouse.
My dad and I eat. And then we eat some more. And after we eat, we sleep under the dappled light at the edge of the woods, guarded by Ivor and Fridleif, who say we are a few hours walk from the Viking encampment.