A Druid Stone Read online

  A Druid Stone

  MÓRDHA STONE CHRONICLES, BOOK 5

  Kim Allred

  Storm Coast Publishing, LLC

  Contents

  Other Books by Kim Allred

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Thank You For Reading!

  The Heart Stone

  Thank You For Reading!

  Other Books by Kim Allred

  About the Author

  A DRUID STONE

  Mórdha Stone Chronicles, Book 5

  KIM ALLRED

  Published by Storm Coast Publishing, LLC

  Copyright © 2020 by Kim Allred

  Cover Design by Amanda Kelsey of Razzle Dazzle Design

  EPub edition June 2020

  ISBN 978-1-7322411-9-0

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means including electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of the author.

  This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase and additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite e-book retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, incidents, and dialogue are either drawn from the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of the author or publisher.

  Other Books by Kim Allred

  The MÓRDHA STONE CHRONICLES series:

  A Stone in Time - Book 1

  Keeper of Stones - Book 2

  Torc of Stone - Book 3

  A Stone Forgotten - Book 4

  The MASQUERADE CLUB series:

  The Lion & the Gazelle - Book 1

  The Wolf & the Butterfly - Book 2

  The WORLD OF MASQUERADE:

  "The Huntress and the Hawk" (novella)

  For all those we've left behind…

  Time is the coin of your life. It is the only coin you have, and only you can determine how it will be spent.

  Be careful lest you let other people spend it for you.

  Carl Sandburg

  1

  France 1804 - February

  AJ Moore was going to be sick. Passionately and thoroughly ill. The fog swirled around her, its thick white tendrils reaching out like skeletal arms in a horror movie. She doubled over, clenching her middle. Her stomach twisted like someone was squeezing every drop of moisture out of an old dish rag.

  The dead weight of Beckworth—the Viscount of Waverly and deceitful bastard—hung over her left shoulder. Somehow, through the horrible nausea she was aware of his sticky blood staining her shirt.

  She smirked. If she survived the time jump, she'd stab him again, if for no other reason than he irritated her.

  All thoughts vanished as the pain intensified. The brightness of the mist overwhelmed her senses before she fell into blessed darkness.

  When she opened her eyes, disoriented after the jump, the heavy body sprawled across her triggered a claustrophobic attack. She shoved against it until she was able to twist away. She managed to crawl two feet before the remains of her lunch returned. That was when she noticed it was raining—correction—pouring. The vomit disintegrated into a pool of water, turning it into a gray gruel.

  She backed away before she gagged. Water streamed off her forehead, and she scraped the saturated hair from her face.

  Where the hell were they?

  She crawled back to the body and turned it over, hoping he'd drowned in the puddle of mud he lay in. Unfortunately, Beckworth stirred.

  When his eyes fluttered open, she screamed at him. Partly to ensure he could hear her, but also because, short of repeatedly stabbing him in the neck, it was all she could think to do. "What the hell were you thinking? Why did you do that?"

  He either couldn't hear her or didn't care to answer.

  She grabbed his shirt, heedless of the blood still seeping from his wound, and shook him. "Why couldn't you wait? We could have all come back together."

  Tears mixed with rain, and her chest heaved as she cried out her anger and frustration. When it didn't appear Beckworth would answer her, she beat on his chest, then fell back to pull herself together.

  The landscape was difficult to make out through the steady rainfall, yet it seemed familiar. She had expected to arrive in England at the Earl of Hereford's estate. Realization dawned. That would have required Ethan's incantation. The new and improved version from Maire's more recent translations. Instead, Beckworth had interfered and grabbed the Heart Stone she'd foolishly worn around her neck. Although he'd whispered an older incantation, it hadn't mattered. Just the act of him touching his stone with the Heart Stone was enough to carry them back to the location of the torc.

  They must be on the knoll in France, and the only remaining question was the year. At least the monastery would be close—that was something. Full of despair, she sank back in the mud. What would she find when she went to town? Would Ethan and Maire be at the inn as she'd last left them?

  Finn.

  Her heart filled with longing and a deep, aching sense of loss. Less than twenty-four hours ago, they had married and promised never to leave one another. Now he was two hundred years away. Or was he?

  Ethan still had a stone. They never discussed Maire's updated incantations, but Ethan would have the translation to follow the Heart Stone. AJ had no idea how accurate the travel would be or the timing. It could take months for them to connect, assuming they arrived in the same time period.

  Distorted mumbling drew her attention back to her current dilemma.

  "You."

  She crawled over and rose to her knees so she could stare down at him.

  "You." His head rolled from side to side. He paused after each word, waiting for his labored breathing to subside. "You," he attempted for the third time. He heaved and almost gagged. A line of spittle formed at the corner of his mouth, and even scrunched in pain, his soaking-wet face was beautifully handsome. His norma
lly cornflower-blue eyes were dulled, his face pasty as he forced out the word, "Stabbed." He sucked air but couldn't seem to squeak out the next word.

  "Me," AJ finished for him. "You stabbed me. Is that what you're trying to croak out?" When his half-crazed eyes rolled to her, she nodded, her eyes narrowing, her voice laced with controlled rage. "Yes. I did. And I've a mind to stab you again. So lie still while I think."

  There were dozens of reasons to stab him. For kidnapping her months ago. For holding Maire hostage for two years. For torturing Finn when he was held in the duke's dungeons. For blindly following them back to the future. For stalking her and then kidnapping her again. Hell, he deserved to be stabbed just for being an asshole.

  She considered the real reason she'd stabbed him. In those last few seconds before the fog claimed them from the inn parking lot, she'd remembered Finn having difficulty after their jump back to the future. He'd been injured from torture before they'd left. Though he'd mostly healed, Finn had mentioned that injuries made the travel more difficult. Finn had floated in and out of delirium for hours upon their return. It required an entire day before he could hobble around the bedroom, and three days to fully recover.

  Beckworth had confessed to being unconscious for two days after the sisters had found him. His injury, the first time she'd stabbed his shoulder, also hadn't healed before he was pulled into the vortex of her jump home with Finn. The two days of Beckworth's stupor might have been from medication the sisters had given him, but AJ didn't think so.

  Tired of being wet, she scanned the area. The bushes were closer than the trees and would be sufficient for her plan. She pulled herself up, but a brief bout of nausea made her stagger. After gaining her balance, and with several false starts, she used Beckworth's partial moments of awareness to aid their movement across the clearing. She tucked him into the underbrush. The ground wasn't entirely dry, but it provided some reprieve from the torrential rain. She discovered the backpack during their long crawl. Beckworth must have grabbed it as he raced to get away from the inn with her in tow. She pulled the pack from him and pushed her arms through the straps, allowing it to fall against her back.

  If her suspicions were correct and they were in France, she had some options. The only question was the year. Based on the rain and the leafless trees, it was winter or maybe early spring. Then she remembered the possibility of war and groaned.

  Beckworth had passed out again. She left him as he lay. It was doubtful anyone was walking about in this weather. She considered stabbing him again, just to be sure he wouldn't wander off, or maybe just because. Instead, she stood, kicked decayed leaves over his legs to cover him, and turned toward the direction of town.

  She followed the trail until she reached the main street. The docks were to her left and Guerin's Inn to her right, just as she remembered it.

  She was almost to the inn when she noticed the first soldiers. Two of them leaned against a building. If they spotted her, they didn't care, but it confirmed one thing—it was no longer 1802—and England's war with Napoleon was alive and well.

  When she knocked at the back door of the inn, she tried to remember the innkeeper's name. She didn't remember anyone calling him Guerin.

  The door opened, and a gruff voice spoke in French. She panicked. She could only guess what the innkeeper thought of the drowned rat that stood before him. No words came to her; she didn't know French. Everyone had spoken English the last she'd been there. If they were at war, it made sense that French would be the first words spoken.

  She stood, struggling for what to say, when the man grabbed her by the arms and dragged her in. He yelled, "Sofi." AJ almost cried with relief. Sofi was the innkeeper's wife.

  Before she knew it, she was pushed into a chair in front of the kitchen fires. A minute later, a blanket was thrown over her drenched summer blouse and jeans. She shivered. Another minute later, a towel fell over her shoulders. Another was wrapped around her head as someone vigorously rubbed her hair in what she assumed was an attempt to dry it.

  "Miss Moore. Is that you?" Sofi's worried question made AJ sigh in relief. They remembered her.

  She nodded and pushed the woman's hands away so she could look up. Husband and wife stared down at her before glancing at each other.

  "This is a very dangerous time to have returned. It looks like you swam across the channel." The innkeeper shook his head and wiped flour from his hands. He'd been baking bread. That explained the heavenly aroma that filled her nose and made her stomach grumble.

  "I can explain. But first, I have a large favor to ask." She spoke slowly, watching their anxious expressions. When the pair glanced at each other again, AJ added, "And I can pay you."

  An hour later, Beckworth lay on a bed in the smallest room the inn had available, a fire blazing in the hearth.

  AJ huddled in front of another fire in an adjacent room. Her clothes hung over the back of a chair positioned close to the hearth, next to her shoes and socks drying on the heated stones. Sofi had loaned her a dress, and though it was short at the ankles and arms, the rest fit well enough. Beckworth's backpack perched next to her on the couch as she slowly sifted through the contents.

  Her concerns about finances were immediately relieved when she found the silver coins and jewelry they'd planned to return to the sisters. She'd save what she could, but her survival came first. She never met the sisters and didn't know why they'd taken in Beckworth, but everyone paid for the risks of their decisions. She would require transport to England, and with the war the innkeeper confirmed had begun last summer, the price would be high.

  Her second request of Henri Guerin, the innkeeper, after retrieving Beckworth, was to send a message to Sebastian at the monastery. He promised to send someone as soon as the rain let up. All she could do was wait.

  She'd expected to see several soldiers at the inn, but there were only three. Henri said the soldiers rotated their visits to the inns. Two dozen troops stayed in the barracks by the dock at any given time. Most of them preferred the inn across the street, which Henri was grateful for. Soldiers discouraged customers.

  Feeling secure for the moment, she stared into the fire and considered her plight. If Finn and Ethan had followed her through the vortex, they should have arrived in France and shouldn't be too far from town. Not that anything had been written on how the stones worked. It was all trial and error. Her greatest fear was them landing in the middle of French soldiers. The one thing she hated most about this time period was no cell phones. Communication with England could take weeks, and with the war, possibly months.

  Her mind raced with possibilities until a headache crept up her neck and pounded at the back of her skull. She couldn't jump back home without the proper incantation. She'd written it on a piece of paper that she'd stuffed in her duffel. The one she'd left in the library at home. Finn had asked her to memorize the words, but the ability to correctly pronounce the Celtic words without the instructions eluded her. Sebastian had the translations and could reconstruct the incantation. For now, she had a different mission. Find Maire. The best place to start would be Hereford. When Ethan and Finn arrived, that would be their destination. She was certain of it.

  She closed her eyes, unable to focus. A short nap and she'd be good as new.

  When a soft tapping from the door woke her, she groaned at her body's stiffness. She pulled the dagger strapped to her leg. When the knob began to turn, she scurried to stand behind the door before it opened. Was Beckworth awake? She couldn't imagine him knocking. And the soldiers had ignored her when she'd run downstairs earlier for hot water.

  A figure emerged, and she swung the dagger to bring the hilt down on the stranger's head. She pulled back at the last minute. The figure, shrouded under a familiar hooded cloak, was her height but with a larger girth.

  When the man turned, AJ almost leaped into his arms.

  Instead, when Sebastian stared at her with his whimsical smile, she slumped into his arms with a sob of relief.

&nbs
p; 2

  "Your hands are cold, child." Sebastian rubbed her hands, then guided her to the sofa. "Sit. I've asked the innkeeper to bring hot tea and something for you to eat."

  AJ followed him without question. She could use something to warm her. As good as it was to see the monk, she couldn't dispel the inner chill that clung to her.

  Once seated in front of the fire, Sebastian lowered his hood and held her gaze for a long moment before nodding. "I had a feeling I'd not seen the last of you."

  AJ laughed. "Has The Book of Stones given you a glimpse into the future, or have you been playing with the stones?" She said it in jest, but the monk's curious gaze made her wonder if she wasn't far from the truth.

  "All in good time. Perhaps you should start with the man in the other room." He lifted an eyebrow. "The one tied to the bed."

  She smirked. "You know about him."