Rachel Harris: A Tale of Two Centuries

He is supposed to love me back.

Lorenzo clears his throat, and I know he is waiting for me to meet his gaze. With burning tears threatening to escape, I compel my eyes to open.

He places a gentle hand on my shoulder. “Alessandra, Matteo and Novella are married.”

The click-clack of footsteps on the cobblestone road muffles my sobs. After pleading with Lorenzo not to follow, I make my faltering escape from the piazza, away from the prying eyes of Mama’s friends and the smirk of triumph on Novella’s contemptuous face. Tearing through the streets of my beloved city, my gaze blurred, I pray my feet will somehow find their way home. And as my eyes alight on the familiar four-story, tan stone building, my knees nearly buckle in gratitude. Fate may not have ruled in my favor in matters of the heart, but it appears to have taken pity on my sense of navigation.

My toe catches on the cracked stone floor, and I stagger through the arched opening of our courtyard. I set myself to rights and press on, the quiet solitude of the garden beckoning me onward, and sink to my knees in a corner covered in shadow. But today, the darkened retreat does not soothe. The scent of fragrant flowers and the melodic bubbling of the nearby fountain do nothing to ease the stabbing pain of Matteo’s betrayal.

I still cannot bring myself to believe it. Months of secret assignations and declarations cannot end in such a way. Surely I must be in the midst of a nightmare. At any moment I will wake up, get ready again, and leave to meet Matteo, where he will whisper words of our future and how much he loves me.

I blink rapidly, but nothing changes.

With a trembling hand, I wipe at relentless tears. I cannot help but think that Cat would be stronger. In my place, she would have stormed across the crowded piazza, flung a cutting remark at Novella, and demanded an explanation from Matteo. Then she would have kicked him.

The image of my near betrothed’s eyes popping out of his head eases my spirits a little, and I hiccup a laugh. Cat had been a storm of unquenchable strength, challenging the rest of us to either match her in vivacity or be left in the dust.

But alas, I am not my dear cousin.

In Cat’s world, in the future, a girl is free to live with passion and blatant disregard for propriety. She can ignore the rules of etiquette and society and follow her dreams—even when they led her here, five hundred years into the past. Fate, mixed with a little gypsy magic, granted Cat the opportunity to experience the impossible. She glimpsed another way of life and, for a short while, was given rest from the worries of her own.

Crumpling to the ground, for once not caring if my surcoat gets soiled, I close my eyes and let fresh tears fall onto the damp earth beneath my cheek. “How I long for a gypsy adventure of my own.”

As I lay there, unmoving, willing the world to end, a faint tinkling sound rings near my ear, yanking me from my despair.

A slow shiver creeps from the base of my spine. It quickly gains speed before bursting across the rest of my body. My eyes spring open to branches and petals dancing around me in a sudden breeze, a few snapping and fluttering away as the winds grow stronger. Ribbons of my auburn hair blow across my eyes. I clamber to my feet, fighting against the abrupt gust stealing my breath, and hold down the hem of my gown. The wind shoves me forward, and the storm swallows my shriek.

Then, as suddenly as it began, everything stops.

When I find my voice, I ask the stillness, “What, in Signore’s name, was that ?”

Unsurprisingly, the now calm and quiet courtyard does not reply.

Glancing down, I brush away the debris clinging to my surcoat—but the sharp crack of a twig behind me causes me to freeze.

“ Buna ziua , Alessandra.”

I spin around, and my gaze lands on a girl near my age. Her long raven hair is unruly and tousled, her costume one of bright-colored skirts and sheer veils. Her arms are bare, as is a slice of bronzed skin around her midsection. I avert my eyes as a whisper of a memory taunts the edges of my mind.

How does she know my name?

A small smile, unnatural and amiss on an otherwise somber face, plays upon the girl’s mouth as she says, “The stars have heard your plea.”

“Reyna.”

The whispered name passes my lips as recognition slams into me. I shake my head, unable to comprehend what my eyes are seeing. For months after Cat’s return to the future, I imagined the young gypsy appearing before me. I held tight to the belief that one day she would come back, perchance with a message or sign from the future. A clue as to how my fun-loving cousin is doing or, selfishly, to grant me a magical adventure of my own. And now she is here. Standing a mere foot away, no longer in the drab servant frock she wore during her stay but looking just as she did that brief moment I last saw her, when Cat followed her into a mysterious green tent and disappeared from my life.

Reyna’s magnetic gaze twinkles as she takes a step back and waves her arm in the air, sending the dozen bracelets wrapped around her slender wrist clanking in unison. Poised like one of Michelangelo’s statues, she hitches a pointed sable brow heavenward as if waiting for a response to an unasked question. Confused, I shift my gaze beyond her…and my breath seizes.

There stands that same green tent—the portal that sent Cat home.

I jerk my gaze back to my cousin’s gypsy girl , a wild stirring of hope building in my veins. She nods, and her feigned smile turns devious. Then she disappears inside and crooks a finger through the open flap for me to follow.

My previously halted breath escapes in an audible whoosh .

All of the servants are upstairs. Mama is traveling as companion to Patience on her journey to London, and Father is returning from visiting my uncle in Venice. My brother Cipriano, the one person who could truly dissuade me from such a course, is in Milan, having left a few short months after my cousin. There is no one here to stop me. I am depressingly alone, even more so now than this morning.

The chance to be as audacious as my fearless cousin, even if it is just for a moment, propels me forward. I fly across the cracked stone ground, throw back the folds, and boldly enter the darkened space.

But once the canvas doors seal closed behind me, apprehension dawns. Darkness is everywhere.

I lift my palm an inch from my nose and cannot see it. The only thing I can see is a curved path of sporadic candlelight, seemingly with no end. The reassuring fountain from the courtyard no longer bubbles, and the harsh sound of my labored breathing escalates to fill the void.

A word my cousin taught me from the future springs to mind: creeptastic.

Taking a trembling step, I tentatively call out, “Reyna?”

I squint, then widen my eyes, lean forward then back away, hoping to see the space before me better. But my efforts do nothing to illuminate my surroundings. Or to comfort me. I take another step, and a cool hand closes around my wrist.

“Ahh!”

“Chavaia .” The low, rough hiss in my ear sends my already galloping heart into my throat. “First you must remove your slippers.”

My slippers? Pressing a palm against my chest, I glance down at my feet.

It is not right for a lady to walk barefoot—a suitor could see her ankles. Since Reyna masqueraded as a servant in my home during Cat’s stay, she would know the rules of propriety, but a glance at her shadowed yet stern expression confirms she does not care.

I yank my bottom lip between my teeth and gnaw like a rabbit. My head rocks back and forth, the vexing tug of war beginning again between what I want to do and what I know I should do.