Jillian Chantal

This week, the word we writers of Tuesday Tales have chosen to use is hot. I’m still sharing my time travel story. We find the hero visiting with a man of magic he’s heard about. He wants answers to what has happened to him.

Be sure to check out the other tales here.

Pembroke sat in the overly-hot, dark room deep in the woods. He thought he might be like one of the young ladies of his acquaintance and have an attack of the vapors. It was almost unbearably warm. He wished he could take off some item of clothing to give himself some relief.

Finding his way to this cabin had been difficult. He’d had to be subtle yet daring in order to learn the correct person to speak with. And now here he sat in front of a wizened old man who had such wrinkled skin Pembroke was sure he was over a hundred years old. The man’s complexion was an odd color as well. Almost as if he’d eaten too many green vegetables in that hundred years.

“And you say you ended up in the year 1788?” the man asked.

“That was what I was told and I also was led to a fine library where I was allowed to read many volumes and learned things about our time.”

“Like what?”

“For one thing, I learned how the house of Stuart will eventually fall and become the house of Hanover.”

“Hanover? Never heard of a Hanover. And this came to pass when?”

“I can’t recall the date right now. That was never my strong suit.” Pembroke gave a little laugh. “But what I really want to learn is if this was really possible. That such a thing could happen to a man.”

“It happened to you. How do you explain it otherwise?”

“Perhaps I fell into some kind of deep sleep after the battle and imagined it all. It seemed so very real but could it have been all in my head?”

“Didn’t you say you brought that cloak back with you? The one you set on the chair beside my door? How would you have gotten that in a dream? Or your armor? Where would it have gone?”

“Maybe someone found me asleep and took it. Left the cloak as a trade?” Pembroke didn’t believe that but he wanted to know what this man who’d been recommended to him thought.

“No garment that fine would be given to someone who wasn’t even aware he was being robbed. And make no mistake, if some person was able to divest you of your armor while you slept, that person would’ve been one of great daring and hardly one to pay for what he took.”

“You make many good points but you’ve yet to tell me if a man can travel through time.” Pembroke wipe his brow. He’d soon have to walk outside if he didn’t want to fall on the floor. How could the man even breathe?

“It would be my belief that you have done so, Mr. Pembroke Burroughs.”

“How do you know my name?” Pembroke had not introduced himself and the man who told him how to get here had surely not come on ahead and told this man anything as Pembroke hadn’t told him his name either.

This was becoming stranger by the moment. Pembroke now truly believed this man had some magical abilities. How else could he know Pembroke’s identity? “How is it you ken who I am? Did someone apprise you of my possible visit as I made my way here? He knew in his heart of hearts that couldn’t be as he’d told no one for his own safety.