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“HOW UNBEARABLY rude,” Shirlyn mumbled under her breath.
She sat behind me so I couldn’t see her face, but I would have bet good money that her freckled nose was twitching up a storm. Two of the security guards attached cables from their yellow and black Estrel-Flyers to our tan and white Estrel-Flyer. Then they pulled us along with them to the tower. The rest of the fleet surrounded us. I shook my head. We were just three non-violent teenagers. It was complete overkill.
Two arched doorways opened. The entire fleet of Estrel-Flyers passed through. As we entered, my jaw dropped. The inside of the tower extended forever forward rather than upward. The walls on either side of us were a gleaming white, lined with white doors with silver doorknobs. By the time we stopped, I’d counted over forty doorknobs.
A guard from one of the Estrel-Flyers attached to ours helped Shirlyn, Romaso and me dismount and then motioned for two more guards to join us. Each of us was assigned our own guard and led to a separate room. My guard was tall with gray hair and a thick moustache. His face was stern, but his dark eyes were bright and curious.
I caught a glimpse of Shirlyn’s scowl of indignation and Romaso’s almond-shaped eyes, now overly stretched into circles, before I walked through the doorway that my guard had opened for me. I felt the regret of having dragged them with me all over again. The small room was bright white like the hallway even though there were no lamps or windows, not that I expected the black sky outside would have provided any sunlight. Two dark wooden chairs sat facing each other on top of royal blue carpeting. There wasn’t any other furniture. After my guard closed the door behind us he sat down in one of the chairs.
“Please take a seat,” he said. His voice was authoritative but not unkind.
After I sat down, I looked up at the guard.
“Is your name Calla Winston?”
“Yes,” I answered. Shirlyn had told him that much already.
“From where are you visiting us, Miss Winston?”
That was a very good question. I’d been all over the place in the last month. I decided to answer with where I’d lived the longest. “I grew up in central Massachusetts.”
“That is in the United States, America, correct?”
“Yes.”
“From when are you visiting us, Miss Winston?”
I shifted in my seat. This guy was just full of good questions. “I am from the twenty-first century.”
The guard nodded. “How is it that you appeared here today with Miss Shirlyn Hall?” His eyes were warm but wary. He knew something was up.
I sighed as I tried to figure out the shortest way of providing my very complicated answer. Then I took a deep breath. “I met Shirlyn and Romaso in my travels. We all came here together from the Halls’ estate in Folkestone, England. We’re here to visit Shirlyn’s cousin, Valcas.” I’d intentionally left out anything about the chase, hoping that Shirlyn and Romaso would do the same.
“From when is the Miss Shirlyn Hall who came here with you today?”
“The twentieth century.”
The guard nodded again.
“From when and where is the Mr. Romaso Bredani who came here with you today?”
“He’s from seventeenth-century Venice,” I answered.
The guard looked at me thoughtfully as if he was calculating something in his head. His eyes widened slightly before he regained his composure. “How is it that you were able to bring not only one but two silhouettes from different time periods here with you?”
“Excuse me?” I asked. I hadn’t the slightest clue what a silhouette was.
“From what you’ve told me, both Miss Hall and Mr. Bredani existed in time periods before yours. Therefore you must have traveled to their pasts. Is that correct?”
“Yes, that’s true.” I shifted in my chair again. He must have figured out that I’d brought Shirlyn and Romaso with me. “What’s a silhouette?”
The guard looked at me and shook his head in disbelief. “A silhouette is a copy of an individual’s past version that is taken out of that individual’s past and transported somewhere else.”
I felt guilty and it must have showed. Just as I was about to spill my guts about the chase and how Shirlyn and Romaso got dragged here with me, the guard hastily added, “Do not worry, Miss Winston. There’s nothing wrong with bringing silhouettes into the tower. We will just need to notify anyone who Miss Hall and Mr. Bredani may encounter so as to minimize confusion. Thank you for answering my questions, Miss Winston. I will show you to a guest suite where you can rest while I consult with the other guardsmen.”
“You’re welcome,” I replied, faintly relieved.
The guard led me back through the white hallway past several more doors and opened another door that contained a room where I found Shirlyn sitting inside waiting for me.
“Can you believe this, Calla?” she cried. “I can’t even remember when I’ve been so horribly abused.”
I took off my shoes and fell facedown, exhausted, onto an ivory pillow bed. “I’m so sorry. Did they ask you a lot of questions too?”
“That’s not what I meant. Granted, that formality was taken grossly overboard. What I want to know is why we’re not in the main house. One of the servants told me that we are offsite, in a guest suite.” Shirlyn sat with her arms crossed, evidently irritated.
I turned on my side to face Shirlyn, propping up my head with my hand. “Is that all? There isn’t anything else bothering you about this place?”
“Valcas should have properly greeted us by now. When he visited the estate with Aunt Sable and Uncle Jim, they were all given the finest rooms in the East Wing. No one here even asked if we would like refreshments. Since we haven’t eaten anything since tea, I demanded that we be served dinner.”
“Will Valcas be joining us?”
“He’d better be.”
“And Romaso?”
“The poor dear is trying to get himself ready in another room down the hall.”
“Get ready for what? Dinner?”
“Apparently we’re not presentable,” Shirlyn sighed. “Our attire is laid out in the adjoining room.”
I stifled a laugh as I dragged myself out of the bed and walked into the next room. Two floor-length gowns were spread out across another pillow bed. How had any of this made Shirlyn so upset? I’d worried that the interrogation would lead to some type of beheading, yet here she was upset about staying in a guest suite and having to dress up for dinner.
Once dressed, Shirlyn, Romaso and I followed a male servant to where we would be having dinner. Shirlyn’s copper gown was a little baggy on her, but the shade matched her coloring beautifully. Streams of ribbon stretched from her bracelet cuffs to her shoulder straps. My gown was silver and of a similar style, but worn with an attached shawl rather than sleeves. Romaso sported a black suit with a red silk tie which would have looked great on him had he not looked so uncomfortable.
“We’re walking all the way to the main house?” Shirlyn asked anxiously.
“Yes, Miss Hall,” said the servant as he led us through the long white hallway.