Nevermore. Maureen Child

tearing at her hair with cold, tenacious fingers. She experienced the twist of terror gripping the long-dead men.

      Helplessness choked her as she was forced to admit once again that there was nothing she could do to alter the vision flooding her. No way she could help these men, ease their fears. Inhaling deeply, she tipped her head back to see men climbing the rigging, hurrying to furl the sails before they could be shredded. She watched others slide and skid across the wet deck, screaming for help and shouting to God.

      Then he stepped into her line of vision. Tall, with shoulders broad enough to land an airplane on, he wore brown leather pants, a long-sleeved white shirt and knee-high black boots. His dark brown hair was tied at the nape of his neck and hung to the middle of his back. His dark eyes swept the deck and he shouted orders as he moved with sure steps toward the railing. He leaned into the wind, squinting into the fury of the storm, as if trying to gauge the danger they faced.

      There was no fear in his expression, just a nerveless acceptance. She didn’t need to see the ivory-handled knife strapped to his hip to know that he was the owner of the knife she still held with a grip that made her fingers ache. Yet there it was, gleaming new and bright in the darkness. Existing both in the past and the present where Erin stood in an antique store in Maine.

      “¡Manolo,” he shouted into the wind, grabbed a length of rope off the railing and glared at a smaller man sliding across the deck, “venido aquí!”

      The man rushed toward him.

      “Lleve la cuerda el arco de la nave.”

      “Sí, sí, Señor Santos,” the short man shouted, then took the rope from Santos and ran with it down the length of the ship.

      Santos. His name was Santos, Erin thought, completely caught up in the man and his world as they all fought together to stave off death. His energy was so strongly imprinted on the knife, it was as if it was charged with his very soul, giving her a clearer glimpse of the past than she’d ever experienced before.

      Erin wished suddenly that she could speak Spanish. That she could understand what everyone—okay, mostly Santos—was saying. But as her vision swirled around her and the men on the boats dropped to their knees to pray to a God who clearly wasn’t listening, she knew it wouldn’t matter. Whatever Santos had been—his time was gone.

      And knowing that this really amazing-looking man was no more than a memory tore at Erin in a way she hadn’t expected. She felt as though she should be mourning him—though he stood not a foot away from her, alive and strong and magnificent.

      He turned then and seemed to look right at her. His dark eyes flickered with shock and he took a step toward her. “¿Qué?”

      “No,” Erin whispered and swallowed hard. “That’s impossible. You can’t see me. The visions only work one way.”

      “¿Cuales son usted?” he asked, still staring at her as though she’d dropped from heaven and she supposed that’s what it must have looked like to him.

      But how could it look like anything to him? How was he seeing her? How was a connection bridged through the centuries? And what the hell was he saying to her?

      “This can’t be happening,” she said and took a step back, shaking her head as though the action alone would convince her that none of this was taking place.

      “¿Cómo usted consiguió aquí?” he demanded and the strength of his voice carried over the fury of the storm. He was a man used to giving orders and seeing them obeyed.

      She couldn’t give him what he wanted. She had no idea what he was saying. And just for a moment, Erin felt a punch of disappointment and grief so fierce, it shook her to her soul.

      He was real. Alive. More alive than any other vision she’d known. And yet, in her time, his bones had gone to dust long before she was even born, and that knowledge filled her with a sense of emptiness that threatened to swallow her as surely as the ocean was trying to swallow the ship of the past.

      “You really can see me.”

      His dark eyes narrowed on her. “¿Está usted un ángel?”

      God, why hadn’t she taken Spanish instead of French in high school?

      The ship bucked and rolled with a wave that crashed into the side of the hull, sending icy cold water spraying over the deck. “¿Qué usted desean?”

      Weird. And shocking.

      Almost as shocking as seeing another man come up behind him and pull the bone-handled knife from Santos’s belt.

      “Santos, look out!” She shouted it, but it was already too late.

      Distracted, he had no time to prevent the other man from stabbing the bone-handled knife up and into his back. Santos howled in fury and pain—glaring at Erin as if this were all her fault.

      She could do nothing for him, even as the attacker, clutching the bloodied knife, backed away, shouting, “¡Para el honor de mi reina!”

      Erin reached for Santos, though she knew it was useless and while she stood, a helpless observer, locked in the past, a rogue wave swept up over the side of the ship, plucked Santos from the deck and dragged him down beneath the surface of the black, churning water.

      Erin dragged air into her lungs and fought the threat of tears that shuddered through her along with a profound sense of loss.

      But before she could drop the knife, another vision erupted in her mind, sending her on a roller-coaster ride of blurred colors, blaring sounds and jolting emotions.

      Santos again. His hair was shorter, though still clubbed at the back of his neck, his ponytail only reaching his shoulders now. He wore black pants, scuffed black boots and a long black coat that spun around his long legs as he moved with the grace of a stalking panther.

      She stared hard at the scene unfolding before her as the man she’d watch die moments ago fought an opponent like a master swordsman. His long blade slashing at a smaller, quicker man with flames in his eyes, Santos laughed, throwing his head back, enjoying this fight, thrilling to the challenge, the danger.

      She felt his joy in the battle, and his complete confidence in his abilities and wanted to laugh with him. But what was happening? What were her visions showing her? They’d never been this disjointed before. Never showed her a man dying only to show him alive and well and…she looked around and caught sight of a small green and white sign…in San Diego?

      Erin stood on a modern city street and tried to make sense of what she was seeing. It couldn’t be true. He’d died centuries before. Yet here he was now, in this time. Her time. Healthy. Alive.

      His dark eyes were the same. His features were harsher, sterner, but still, it was him. The man she’d seen on the sailing ship. The man who had reached across a chasm of centuries to connect with her at the moment of his death.

      The man she’d seen stabbed and drowned.

      “Another day, Guardian!” The small man screamed in rage, and then the sword fight ended in a blurring shift of color and light and then Santos was alone under the hazy yellow glow of a streetlamp.

      “Cowardly demon,” Santos muttered, sliding his sword into the scabbard he wore beneath his long black coat. “Shifting to escape a battle. Does no one have honor anymore?”

      “Demon?” Erin whispered, wondering what the hell he was talking about.

      Santos whirled around, instinctively pulling a knife from his belt and dropping into a crouch as his long black coat swirled out around him. He scowled, narrowed his gaze and stared directly into Erin’s eyes, as he had before during the storm on the ship.

      Impossible, but again he seemed to be staring right at her.

      “You?” This time, he spoke English. Rising slowly, he kept his knife at his side in a tight fist and took a step toward her. “Who the hell