“First, let me introduce the clan.   Please be seated.  Jack Horner, I believe there is a seat back in the corner, if you don’t mind.  Sorry. Only cake.  No Christmas pie.  Christmas was several weeks ago.”  Elizabeth smiled at her own joke which no one else understood.  She cleared her throat. “You may know James and John, my retainers.  Erin is my maid.  You gentlemen will see plenty of her over this next week.  The three big men seated behind are Conner O’Neil, an Irish Catholic, Duncan MacDonald, a royalist, and Stephen Campbell, a covenanter, who you may note are not killing each other.  In this group, there must be peace and petty squabbles are not allowed.”  She pointed at the three men.  Only the Irishman responded.

“You have my word.  I will not bother the Englishmen.”

“All right,” Elizabeth continued.  “The three in front are our guests.  Charles deWindt is Dutch Reformed.  Jean Duchamp is French, Catholic, and works with a few people in Paris.  David Wallace is German and Jewish.”  She paused to let the word Jewish sink in.  “David’s family took the name Wallach, but here in Scotland, Wallace fits better.  All three of these men have either experience in what we are facing, or stories from their parents or grandparents, or both, so they know something of the truth of what we will be facing.  We will leave for Loch Lomond in two days.  You may wish to question these men and hear their tales.”

“None from the Mediterranean, either Iberia or Italy?” Sir Leslie wondered.  The question was not entirely sarcastic.

“I have a small group in Jamaica, another in the Alps, and a group working in Toledo, keeping their eyes open since the 1490s, so they have several generations of watchfulness. I have a couple of small groups in East Asia, in Japan and China.  You get the idea.  Where we are going is not in the history books, and it needs to stay out of the history books.  What we will be doing is not for the public.  I am inviting you men and fully expect your wives to join the most secret society on earth.  You will be my Men in Black.  Eventually, I will have to set up small groups in southeast Asia, India and central Asia, the Middle East, and Africa, north and south, as well as the Americas.”

“But what exactly would you have us do?” Sir Leslie asked, this time without the sarcasm.

Elizabeth fought the urge to grab a piece of cake.  She swallowed and came out with it.  “We will mostly watch and investigate what is strange and unusual.  We will be defending Planet Earth from people—aliens who are not native to this planet.  We will send them away in peace wherever possible.  Some we may have to fight.  Some we may have to call on Cromwell’s New Model Army.”

Jack stood in the back.  He was not the tallest of men, but Elizabeth noticed and paused to let him speak.  “Mister Cromwell mentioned something about that.”  He sat as Elizabeth nodded.

“One of those two times of supposedly saving his life was from the aliens I have dubbed the New Exterminators.”  She paused to get her thoughts in order and decided most questions could wait until tomorrow.  “We will meet here again the same time tomorrow.  You will have questions, and I will answer what I can.  For now, lest you think I am just making things up, or perhaps mad, let me share some evidence.  Erin.”  She reached back and Erin handed her something that the men recognized as a rifle of sorts.  Where Erin got it from, they could not say.  “Please follow me out back.  I would not want to fire this weapon indoors.”

When the men gathered around to watch, they saw a typical target set up some yards away.  It was the kind used for musket practice with which they were all familiar.  Elizabeth said nothing.  When she felt ready, she raised the rifle to her shoulder and spied down what functioned as a sight.  She slowly let her breath out like one used to firing a musket, though the rifle she held had no kick to it.  She squeezed the trigger and a red streak appeared.  It burned a hole through the target before the target exploded.  The metal sheet she had set up behind the target began to melt before she stopped firing.  James and John ran out with buckets of water to douse the flames and cool the metal, and Elizabeth spoke.

“The rifle was taken from the New Exterminators who were banished from this planet and will stay away if they know what is good for them.  Think on it.  Any of you who cannot keep your mouths shut in the general public, or who do not wish to be part of defending the Earth, you must decide now.  You may leave without penalty.  Tomorrow at this time, I will share some information which is not ever to be shared except between you and God in the privacy of your prayers.  Some may feel the need to share in confession, but even there I warn you to guard your tongue.  Once we leave for Loch Lomond, you will be committed for life, and not only you, but you will carefully have to select the next generation to follow after you.  Pray that you may spend your lives in watchfulness and investigating dead ends.  Given communication in this age, you will be mostly on your own for the next two or three hundred years.”

Erin stepped up to whisper.  “Lady.  I hear the children fussing.”

Elizabeth looked up at the second-floor window and nodded.  “Leslie, Sir Winthrop.”  She had to call him twice to get his attention.  He had to close his mouth.  “Jack Horner.  You will have to bunk in the barn with the big men.  No fighting.  Be nice to each other.” she shouted and turned to Leslie.  “Come.  I will take you to your room. We have three rooms that are serving as guest rooms.  DeWindt and Duchamp are sharing one.  David has one.  No one will room with him for fear that they might get Jewish cooties or something stupid.  You get the third.”

“Children?”  Leslie asked.

“Young Robert is six.  Bridget is nearly four.  That is what she will say.  Nearly four.”

“Makes you sound human enough.  But say, how did you ever get mixed up in this strange adventure?  And now I am afraid to ask what may be happening at Lake Lomond.”

“Loch,” Elizabeth said.  “Tomorrow.”

When tomorrow arrived, Elizabeth introduced the men to the Kairos.  She made Sir Leslie and Jack Horner hold her hands in an age-old tradition, and traded places with the Contessa Catherine of Aragon.  Leslie let go and shrieked.  Several men made noise. Jack held on because he promised, but he seriously began to sweat.

Catherine told about how in 1470, a servant of the Masters broadcasted a message into space.  That took some explaining, but basically the message invited aliens to come and invade the earth.  “That message is still echoing among the stars,” she said.  “It is time humanity had a group of people prepared for that.”

She changed to Hans and told some things about his day, including his experiments in chocolate.  He changed to Captain Hawk who winked at Charles DeWindt and spoke some in Dutch.  He confessed to being the Flying Dutchman and then told them about the spiders on Hispaniola.  He scared their stockings off, as any good pirate would in telling such a tale.  Elizabeth was not happy, but he said he did not want the men to misunderstand what they were signing up for.

When Elizabeth came back, she introduced Erin once again.  The men all said what a lovely young woman she was.  Then Elizabeth removed Erin’s glamour and reintroduced her as her elf maid.  Erin folded her hands in front of her dress, looked at the floor, and her face turned pink while her pointed ears turned red.  Elizabeth restored Erin’s glamour of humanity fairly quickly and was pleased to see no one jumped up and ran from the room, screaming.

“I have had the grace to have several elf maids over the millennia, all volunteers, and all lovely.  And I love Erin, dearly, so you men better treat her right or you will have to answer to Captain Hawk, or worse.”

“And I love my lady,” Erin whispered.  “Even when you embarrass me.”

“Millennia?” Sir Leslie could not resist the question.

“Yes,” Elizabeth said, but did not stop to properly answer him.  Instead, she looked up.  “Heather.  Please come down and sit on my shoulder.”  They all saw a streak of light come from the ceiling.  It hid in Elizabeth’s hair and Duncan and Stephen both spouted.

“A wee one.”

“Don’t usually see them until I’ve had a keg.”

“I should have said that,” Conner the Irishman protested while rubbing his beard, and all three men laughed.

Elizabeth was not finished.  “Lord Roan.  You have a report.”

Another fairy fluttered down and put his back to the men.  Then he surprised them all when he got big and looked like a well-dressed Lord.  He reported.  “The Wolv has got free.”

###

“It looks miserable out there,” Lincoln said.  “Can’t we just wait until Spring?”

People ignored him.

Angus set them up with three men who were merchants in fine woolen tartans.  Ewan and William Mackenzie and Graeme Grant would take the coastal road all the way to Perth.  They had two wagons full.  One for the Duncan clan, and the other had kilts for Hay, Lindsay, and Macduff.  The plan was four days to Aberdeen and three more to Perth.

“Three more days from there, through Stirling to Edinburgh,” Katie said.  “I checked the map.”

“That is nearly two weeks just to reach the Kairos,” Lockhart said, sounding like Lincoln complaining.  “I hope it is not another two weeks to the time gate.”

“We might move faster, but in this weather, it is not recommended, and who knows what weather obstacles we may encounter.”   Katie tried to be reasonable.

“Weather obstacles is what I am talking about,” Lincoln griped.

“I like all the travel and all the places we have been,” Nanette said.  “I never imagined doing that sort of thing before.  Taking a steamship to Rome was the most exotic and unexpected thing I ever did.”

Tony countered her thought.  “The thing is, the closer we get to home, the more impatient the men are becoming.”

“Amen to that,” Decker said.

Elder Stow added, “Ditto.”

“I agree with my sister,” Sukki protested.  “I am learning so much about history—about being human.  Lincoln lets me read about the places after we leave, and he is so nice to help me with some of the words.”  Lincoln shrugged.

“I love the adventure of it all,” Nanette agreed.

“If it wasn’t so cold,” Lincoln mumbled.

“The same guy who complained about Cuba being so hot,” Lockhart said.

“I would never retire to Florida,” Lincoln admitted.

Ewan stepped up as Katie finished the conversation.  “Ready to go?”

“William and Graeme have the wagons,” Ewan said.  “We are ready.”

“Lead on, Macduff,” Lockhart said.  “I always wanted to say that.”

“Ha,” Katie said, without laughing, and they headed out into the cold and wet.”