Page 8 of Time of the Druid (Stones of Scotland #7)

Chapter 8

N orah was almost out of poison, and she’d still got nowhere close to achieving her goal.

“Damn it,” she muttered, staring at the pathetic cluster of herbs spread out on the blanket of her bed. A few brittle leaves, a stem or two, the last scraps of something once dangerous. It looked more like the makings of a weak herbal tea than a weapon.

How could she pull this off when she’d left everything behind? This was all Edmondson’s fault. Not only had he dumped this ridiculous mission on her without warning, but he hadn’t even told her how the time machine would get her this far into the past. No destination programming, no calibration notes, not even a hint of how he’d altered the settings. Just one smug smile, a golden compass, and a suicide mission.

She was a specialist. She’d been trained for years in the art of subtlety, deception, and assassination. But even specialists had tools. Even specialists needed preparation. Now she was stranded in the distant past, surrounded by people who might burn her for witchcraft if they found out what she was doing, and she didn’t even have a decent dose of nightshade to her name.

“Norah?”

She turned to see Jack’s head peeking around the door of their guesthouse. The poor man had been sleeping outside every night, wrapped in a rough blanket under the eaves, to preserve the fiction of Norah’s respectability. He insisted he didn’t mind, but Norah still felt bad every time she saw him trying to brush leaves out of his hair.

“What is it?” she asked, speaking a little more sharply than she might have in better circumstances.

He slipped into the room, glancing back over his shoulder, then tugged the language chip out of his ear. Norah followed suit, fingers working the tiny device loose from behind her own.

“This is pointless, Norah,” he said in English, his voice so low that no one outside would even know they were speaking. “You’re out of poison, and Matthew Edmondson is a tougher target than anyone can handle alone. Let’s head back home, pull ourselves together, and then try again.”

If only he knew how tempting his words were. Norah didn’t want to be here. She didn’t want to be doing this. Everything about this mission made her skin crawl. She wasn’t some loyal assassin anymore. She was just a woman with no other way out.

“I don’t know if Edmondson will let us travel back,” she said uncomfortably. “Not until I’ve done what I need to do.”

“He’s hardly monitoring that compass every second,” Jack scoffed. “It works when it works. Let’s go. Every minute we spend here is a minute wasted. Or worse.”

“Why are you so keen to leave already?” Norah asked, folding her arms. She didn’t want to push Jack too hard, but she needed time—needed something . “It’s not like you to give up on a mission.”

Jack’s brows lowered, his jaw tightening.

“You know I’ve seen a lot of dangerous things,” he said. “But there’s something about these druids that makes my hair stand on end. They’re uncanny, that’s what they are, and I don’t like it. I told you, I’ve tangled with them before. We’re not safe here. If Matthew reveals who we really are, we’ll be in trouble. Serious trouble.”

“Missing your guns?” Norah asked, forcing a smile.

Jack didn’t return it. His expression stayed deadly serious, and Norah felt her own grin fade. Her chest tightened.

“Jack, you have to believe me when I say that we can’t go home yet,” she said. “I have to make this work. It’s literally a matter of life and death.”

He looked at her for a long moment, and then his eyes flicked to the herbs still scattered across her blanket.

“And how do you intend to achieve it with those few pathetic little leaves?” he asked, his tone flat. “You could barely poison an ant with that lot.”

“It’ll slow me down,” Norah admitted. “But I can find more. You know I can. There should be plenty of toxic plants in the forest, and I know what I’m looking for. It might take a few days, but I can find something that will work.”

“Something that can kill quickly and cause minimal suspicion?” Jack asked, clearly unconvinced.

Norah shrugged, but her heart wasn’t in it.

“You said yourself, we can be gone as soon as we know the poison’s working. Doesn’t have to be neat.”

She tried to sound practical, detached. But the image of Matthew—blue-eyed, calm, with that old kindness still hiding behind his questions—rose up again in her mind. The thought of him convulsing in the dirt, choking on her brew, made her stomach twist. She pressed her palm against her thigh, refusing to let herself feel.

Back down now and Edmondson will crush you like he crushed that dog.

Assassins couldn’t afford to have feelings.

“I can do this,” she said, more quietly. “I just need you to trust me and support me.”

Jack sighed. It wasn’t an annoyed sigh—it was heavy, tired, reluctant. He sank onto the edge of her bed, one hand scrubbing over his face.

“I don’t like this, Norah. I don’t like it one bit. But you know I’ll always have your back.”

Norah managed a smile, though her throat felt tight. What a mess this was. Poor Jack didn’t deserve to get dragged into it, but he made his own choices. Norah had no idea why he worked for Edmondson, and she’d never asked. Maybe she was afraid of the answer.

“We can stay, then?”

“We can stay,” Jack confirmed. “But only for one more attempt. No getting things wrong this time, you hear? That’s the new rule.”

Norah managed another watery smile.

“You and your rules,” she said softly. “Alright. Only once more. I’ll take my time and plan it properly. No more mistakes.”

“Good,” Jack said, a little more firmly this time. Then he exhaled slowly. “I don’t like that it’s the Edmondson boy, either. I was always fond of him. But if the boss needs him gone, he’s got to go.”

Norah nodded. Wasn’t that always the way? Somehow, whatever it took, Edmondson always got what he wanted. He played people like pieces on a board, shaped them like clay, twisted their lives around until they no longer recognised their own reflections. He wore down their edges and filled the gaps with loyalty and fear. And Norah had let him do it to her. Time and time again.

Norah had no business questioning what Edmondson wanted. No business deciding who lived and who died. She’d tried once, a long time ago, to believe she still had a choice. That maybe the life she led wasn’t the one written in stone. But the older she got, the more she saw the lie in that. She did what she was told. She carried out her missions. She survived .

She was exactly what Edmondson had made her. She had the blood on her hands to prove it.

And that would never change.