CHAPTER ONE

“We believe he is dead, faithful squire,” Queen Olivia pronounced in grand, dramatic fashion. “The tournament belongs to our favorite, Sir Reginald.”

“You are right as always, Your Majesty.” The Master at Arms used one foot to push the Black Knight’s head down when he tried to stand up after being forced from his horse during the joust.

The crowd on Sir Reginald’s side of the field roared its approval. The other side booed, of course. This was Renaissance Village, after all. A faithful replica of an English Renaissance town where one could expect to find fairies flitting about, William Shakespeare creating odes, and strong knights competing in rugged jousts. Or so the flyers from the parent company which owned three other Villages said.

 “Sir Reginald,” the queen trilled as the handsome knight kissed her hand, “you truly know the meaning of a good knight kiss.”

The crowd laughed at the queen’s double entendre. I waited impatiently at the side of the hay covered dirt field, flipping a swath of sweaty brown hair from my forehead. Late June wasn’t the best time to dress in Renaissance costumes, especially in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, but that was part of the show.

No one in the crowd paid any attention as I bent down to help the Black Knight aka my brother, Tony, to his feet. They were all watching Sir Reginald depart the jousting field accompanied by the queen and her court. Queen Olivia was in a flirtatious mood, bending close to her favorite and slapping her fan at one of her ladies-in-waiting when she came too near.

Considering the king already knew about the queen’s recent brief affair with Sir Reginald and the fact that the lady-in-question was actually the handsome knight’s wife, I knew there were fireworks to come.

It wasn’t unusual. Fortunately, it was difficult for the crowd to tell the difference between what was real and what was play acting for the people who lived and worked at the year round Renaissance Faire. They were dazzled by the actors who came from high school and college drama departments across the state to keep up with crowds during the summer months when visitor traffic was at its height.

Last year, Queen Olivia punched King Harold so hard he fell off the royal dais. The crowd laughed, not realizing Livy had actually caught Harry fondling one of the flower ladies who walked through the Village selling her wares . . . of one kind or another.

“Looks like Harry and Livy are at it again.” Tony clanked as he walked toward the stables. “I don’t know how they stay together. Or why, for that matter.”

I fell in beside him. “That’s easy. Where else would they find a sweet job like this?”

He laughed, causing his horse to snort. “Don’t make it sound like it’s all that much to lose. If I ever get enough money together, I’m going to Vegas. This place gives me the creeps sometimes. It’s unnatural to live stuck in the past, especially when it’s not even your past.”

“Then why are you still here, besides the fact that you owe me a hundred dollars?” I hoped he’d get the hint and give me my money. He’d owed it to me for more than a month and it wasn’t like I was rolling in cash. I’m just a thirty-something assistant professor who likes to spend her summers at Renaissance Village. “You’ve been jousting here since you got out of college. You could get on a bus tomorrow for $49.50 and try your luck at the slots you’re always talking about. What’s stopping you?”

The smile on Tony’s face died. He took off his gauntlets. “You know, Jessie, you have an evil way with words. I have to change. I’ll see you later.”

He reminded me so much of the father we’d only seen a few times a year when we were growing up. He always came home to ask mom for money when one of his schemes didn’t pay off.

Despite being twins, Tony had managed to come out handsome, brown-eyed, and useless, like my dad. Fortunately, I looked more like my mother. At least I had her nose, her blue eyes and her ambition. I wish I had her height as well. She was medium height while Tony and I towered at six feet. That’s not a bad height for a man. It’s not a bad height for a woman, if you’re a supermodel. For an ordinary woman, it means no heels and a little slouching.

“Before you go, could you let me have that money?” I hated to sound heartless, but I didn’t like living on crackers and Pepsi. The Village only paid once a month. And I wasn’t going to break into my savings.

Tony gave me the look. That meant he couldn’t believe I was asking him for money at a time when he was feeling sorry for himself.

Too bad. He always did this and I always gave in. I was going to stand my ground.

He took two dollars out of the pocket of his jeans and put it in my hand. This was accompanied by a lot of clanking as he reached beneath his armor. “I hope that helps you out. It’s all I’ve got left.”

I looked at the money and I looked at my stupid brother. Then I gave him the money back. “I want that hundred dollars out of your next paycheck.”

Last summer, Tony spent all his money on a volunteer student from Georgia State University who played a Rapunzel-type character whose bodice never stayed closed. This summer wasn’t starting out any better.

I loved my brother but I wish I’d never brought him to the Village. It was my sanctuary from the modern world. I’d spent every summer here since I was in high school. But I wasn’t going to let him push me into leaving, especially since I’d decided during the school year at USC-C to work on my Masters degree in history.

I’ve learned a new skill at Renaissance Village each year since I finished college.. I apprenticed with Master Archer Simmons last summer and even made my own bow and arrows. I won two of the three archery tournaments after spending all of my time immersed in the subject.

Simmons commended me for my effort and asked me to work with him this year. But I’d made my decision about my doctorate. I’d put it off long enough. It was difficult choosing a subject, but now I felt comfortable with my decision.

I’d already started working on my thesis which I hoped would become a publishable document some day. I’ve titled it, PROLIFERATION OF Medieval Crafts in Modern Times. And what better place to do my research than Renaissance Village?

About twenty of my students were there already. I saw two of them working at the elephant and camel ride helping kids on and off the nervous animals. It didn’t look like much fun and I was sure they wouldn’t last long.

Most were only there for a few weeks. Some might decide to stay for the summer. The pay wasn’t great, but they got a free room from the Village and several credits for my history class when it was over.

As I came around the corner of the jousting bleachers, I saw Tony kissing one of the fairies. I knew my two dollars would go into buying her something. She was pretty and fragile looking. The type of woman Tony always chose.

I walked through the Village from the jousting field past shops, eateries, taverns and games. There were plenty of opportunities for apprenticeships with more than one hundred craftsmen in the Village. I probably wouldn’t need to research all of them for my thesis, but it gave me a wide range of crafts to choose from.

Beth Daniels at Stylish Frocks was an excellent seamstress who’d created all the costumes, including the dragon, for the Village. The costume shop was close to the castle where a weekly feast was held by the king and queen. Livy liked to change clothes frequently and it was easier for Beth to be close to her.

Master Archer Simmons waved to me from his shop, The Feathered Shaft. I smiled and waved back. I planned to include my time with him last summer in my thesis. The clock maker’s shop, The Hands of Time, was full of people. I walked around the customers who had spilled out into the street. Clock making was on my list too.

Most of the Village was actually façade created to look old. It was built on what was left of the old Air Force base and studded with cobblestone streets. The heart of the Village was along both sides of the main runway with the jousting arena on one end. Shops and places to eat surrounded the castle which was built around the old traffic control tower. It took up both sides of the King’s Highway.

The jousting field blocked the street and effectively ended the Village. Parking surrounded the wall that separated it from the rest of the world. The true purpose of the wall (never mind that most Renaissance towns had one) was to keep people out who didn’t have tickets.

Sometimes it didn’t work very well. There were too many people. Every day, the cobblestone King’s Highway became a crowded thoroughfare with carriages, horses, the occasional cow, and thousands of pedestrians. It had to be difficult to keep track of all that, but I guessed they managed. The paychecks came at the end of each month.

No one wore watches and I missed my cell phone almost as much as I missed my computer during the day while I was in character. Unfortunately I didn’t need any of those devices to tell me I was running late by the time I reached the basket shop, Wicked Weaves. I always ran late when I was with Tony.

“Where have you been?” Mary asked as she made change for another basket sale.

I was her apprentice this summer which meant she could have me do almost anything. Most of the time, she had me taking care of the shop so she could weave.

“Sorry.” I took the basket from her and smiled at the customer.

“You been houndin’ that boy again?” Mary laughed and shook her head that was wrapped in a bright orange scarf. “You can’t make him something he ain’t.”

“Wow.” The petite woman in the purple fairy wings gazed at us in awe. “Did you learn that while you were weaving this basket?”

“That’s right,” Mary agreed. “That’s why them baskets are so pricey. You get all of that with each one.”

I finished the sale while Mary picked up her pipe and walked outside.

Mary Shift was a Gullah basket weaver from Mt. Pleasant, near Charleston. Not strictly speaking a Renaissance basket weaver, although African baskets have been woven for much longer. She was a tiny, bird-like woman who made me feel like I should carry her around with me. I was sure she’d fit on one of my shoulders.

She could have been any age. She had an air of the ancient about her, but her skin was as smooth and dark as a mocha latte. There was a mystery about her past. I felt sure other people in the Village knew what it was, but they were busy protecting their own secrets.

A few more customers wandered into the shop, picked up baskets of all shapes and sizes then put most of them down again. Mary was right about them being pricey. But everything at the Village came with sticker shock. I supposed visitors were paying for the ambiance of walking through another time.

It was a little frustrating to me that I had to wait on customers. I’d spent months collecting information on basket weaving. I’d woven a dozen baskets before I got here. I was supposed to sit beside Mary and learn the things books couldn’t teach me. But there I was, a month into summer break, and still hadn’t learned any of Mary’s techniques. The only thing I’d learned was how to make change from a hundred dollar bill and punch VISA card numbers really fast.

I swallowed hard on my impatience with the imperfect summer. I waited until the shop was empty and went to join Mary on the back steps where she wove most of her work. I stopped before I went outside when I heard the sound of muffled voices.

Peeking around the corner of the door, I saw a black man with a grizzled gray head and a black suit that looked like it was made in the 1920’s. He was bent close to Mary, talking fast in what I’d come to recognize as the Gullah language. Some of it I understood since it sounded like Pidgin English. Some of the words might as well have been Martian.

Mary shook her head and moved her hands furiously in and out of the basket she was working. I was surprised it didn’t catch fire. The man was obviously making her uncomfortable.

I stepped out of the door and coughed loudly. Sometimes I have a tendency to butt in where I’m not necessarily welcome. It had gotten me in trouble before. It didn’t seem to be something I could control, like biting my nails.

The man looked up and stared at me in a way as dismissive as if he’d actually said, get out of here. He made a gesture to Mary then stalked away. He was quickly lost in the sea of pedestrians.

“Who was that?” I tried to push my black linen skirt down to keep it from poofing up when I sat beside her.

“Who?” She exhaled smoke from her corncob pipe.

“The man who was just here.” If she didn’t want me to know who he was, she’d have to say so. I wasn’t good at hints.

“He went away. Don’t fool with him. Help me with this basket. My old eyes don’t see so good.”

I’d spent the last month with this woman. She could see a grain of salt on a sandy beach. I wanted to help her, but I wanted to know what was going on too.

Mary had the bottom of the coiled basket started with a big knot right in the middle. There were even-lengths of the sweetgrass she went to harvest each week woven with pine needles, a nice rust colored contrast to the yellow sweetgrass. I inhaled its unique smell, like vanilla and fresh air tinged with pine.

“You might have to wet the palm to sew it.” She watched me as I started weaving the coil she’d begun around the knot at the bottom of the basket. “I think this one is for eggs. We’ll make it not so tall and wider at the base.”

“Have you collected eggs with a basket like this before?” I hoped to sidetrack her attention then go back to the strange man’s identity.

“Many times. They’re good for collecting turtle eggs.”

I stopped and stared at her. “You didn’t eat turtle eggs, did you?”

She laughed, a thousand small lines fanning out from her eyes, telling of a thousand things she’d seen and done in her life. “Yes. We ate what we found to eat. Sometimes there wasn’t so much fish or the crab basket was empty. You do what you have to do to survive.”

I coiled one end of the sweetgrass into the smallest possible ring around the knot, holding the grass and pine together with one hand while I pushed the palm under and over with the bone and pulled it tight.

I was a little reluctant to use the ‘bone’ when Mary first showed it to me. It was smooth and polished by years, maybe a century, of weaving baskets.

She laughed at me when she saw the look on my face. I still didn’t take the tool from her when she held it out. “See? It’s only an old spoon my great-grandmother found on the beach. See the little rose on the handle? She took off the bowl and used the end. You children today are too worried about everything.”

This wasn’t like weaving the other baskets I’d practiced before meeting Mary. The grass was more supple than reed and harder to hold in place even though it was braided. The palm leaf was stiff and held the grass well, but also managed to cut my fingers a few times.

“There.” Mary nodded and puffed smoke. “You’re doin’ fine. If you could only learn to keep better track of time and leave that boy alone, you’d be ready to sell your own baskets.”

I put another stitch in, catching the beginning of a new bunch of grass and pulling it tight. “Who was that man, Mary? Why was he threatening you?”

“Let it go,” she urged. “Look, you left out a piece of grass and your hand is bleeding. Let me take that. You go and clean up. Fetch me more tobacco from the shelf and put a bandage on that hand.”

Mary was the original whip-cracking boss. She might’ve been small and vulnerable in some ways, but she was as tough as that palm leaf. Those shiny black eyes that reminded me of dark diamonds saw everything. She didn’t mind telling me either.

There were two more customers in the shop. I cleaned my hand and bandaged it while they browsed. One of them, a heavy set woman in a long, green velvet gown whose breasts were almost pushed out of her bodice, asked me about the weaving. “Is it true no two baskets are ever the same?”

“That’s right. In fact, master basket weavers have distinct styles that are never duplicated by anyone outside the family or group of weavers. Some of them, like this one,” I showed her a large, oval basket, “made by our master weaver, have a pattern handed down for hundreds of years.”

The woman nodded, suitably impressed. “I’ve heard you can keep them outside too.”

“Because of the grasses and palm they’re sewn with, they can get wet without any problem.”

She was convinced and bought two $400 baskets. The skinny woman with her looked around, but didn’t buy anything.

“Jessie!” I didn’t have time to turn around before I was lifted completely off my feet. Not an easy trick for someone my size.

I’d been waiting a month to hear that voice. I stared into the familiar face, looking for any changes since last summer. “Chase! I was wondering where you were!”

“I was visiting my family in Arizona. Are you working at Wicked Weaves this year?”

Chase Manhattan (a humorous family name) looked as healthy and alive as always. He was six foot eight, 260 pounds of energy. He reminded me of a pirate with his long brown braid and one gold earring.

Chase had lived at the Village for the last five years. He told me once he’d played every sport imaginable in college, but had a soft spot for history. I found out later, by snooping around, that he took unimaginable crap for not latching on to a pro team of some kind and buying a new Ferrari.

He was intelligent, well-spoken, handsome and charismatic. He was also the Bailiff for the Village which meant he was kind of chief of security and circuit court judge rolled into one. He was appointed (hired) by the king and queen. Adventure Land, the owners of the Village, appointed Livy and Harry the same way. They’d been the company’s top sales people.

Unfortunately, it meant Chase was as bad as my brother. He was content to live here and had no real ambition for his life. It was the only thing that kept me from throwing myself on him every time I saw him. Me, and half the other women in the Village. I wouldn’t let myself be involved with someone like that.

Thinking about it was almost as good as taking a cold shower. “I’m working, Chase. Put me down.”

“Sorry.” He set me back on my feet and managed to look apologetic. “I just got here and you were the first person I saw.”

As though that explained everything.

A large group of visitors entered the shop. They were dressed in heavy medieval clothing, leather and velvet; even though the Weather Channel said it would be in the nineties. These were the diehard medieval fantasy visitors. Not everyone gave up modern clothing to come here.

A few of them carried real bows and swords. The only restriction on weapons in the Village was that they had to be something you could’ve owned in the 1500’s. No visitor could carry a modern gun.

I let them look around as I talked to Chase. “I’m working as Mary Shift’s apprentice making baskets.”

“Excellent! I could use a basket at the dungeon. Maybe you could make one for me.”

I took his remark in stride. Anyone who wears a size 12 shoe, even though it’s a size 12 narrow, has to be realistic. Men who looked like Chase didn’t date women who looked like me. Not that I wanted to date him. He was like my brother. I repeated the mantra over and over to protect myself.

“It’s good to see you, Jessie. You should come visit more often during the year.” He smiled at me and his braid fell across his shoulder. “Meeting every summer like this is hard on my love life.”

I laughed. I’m sure I was supposed to. Chase was a flirt. I told myself that to keep from being a slobbering mess around him. I’ve known him for so long, but I still don’t know much about him. “What are you doing? Have you seen any thieves or scoundrels today?”

Chase looked down at his tight jeans and the t-shirt covering what I knew to be his washboard abs. “I’m looking for a costume right now. They seem to be in short supply this summer. I think we have extra workers.”

I sighed and stared at the ceiling behind his head. “I hear the wizard has two apprentices this year.” That was brilliant, Jessie.

The sound of trumpets, heralding the king or queen, or both, taking a royal turn through the Village, interrupted us. There was no way either one of us were going anywhere for a few minutes. A royal stroll came complete with either gentlemen or ladies-in-waiting and other courtiers, sometimes even a jester, minstrel or two.

That meant hundreds of people with cameras lined up to take their pictures. Both the king and queen were camera pigs who couldn’t resist having their picture taken. They could pose for hours.

So I was stuck with Chase who smiled at me and continued to make polite conversation. The visitors in the shop quit fondling the baskets and rushed to the big windows that faced the street to see what was going on. I couldn’t leave the shop with them there.

I glanced toward the back stairs, hoping Mary might decide to come in and watch the spectacle of the royal couple getting free lemonade from the shop next door. But I didn’t see her at the back door. She was too smart and experienced for that.

“I think the Livy’s put on a few pounds,” Chase observed. “Either that or she needs a new royal corset tightener.”

“I’m sure she’d be glad to let you have that position.”

“I don’t think so.” He straightened my shawl. “I’m busy looking at baskets.”

Before I could answer, a sharp screech came from beside Lolly’s Lemonade Shoppe. I ran out the back door and saw Livy collapse to her knees. “We do believe this man is dead,” she said. “Someone fetch our smelling salts.”