A dying woman travels through time to significant points in her life, but things are not as she remembers them. Accompanied by a handsome young stranger and her childhood cat, the fate of both past and future now lies in her aged hands.

Trigger warning and spoiler: This chapter was written long before the recent tragic flood in Texas. I promise the floodwaters in these pages, though dramatic, will not turn out to be life-threatening.

Sylvan raced down the steep path, slipping on the incline, then rising again only to slip once more. Finally she made it to the rocky outcrops of the river shore. Sure enough, there was Brie sitting in a loaf position on a small protuberance of rock beside a stunted alder tree. How could she have forgotten her beloved cat?

Brie looked up with trusting eyes, and Sylvan felt a sob rise in her throat. As she pitched across the rough stones, the roar of the approaching waters grew louder. If she didn’t hurry, Brie wouldn’t be the only one to get swept away.

She was almost there when she stumbled, catching her left foot in a crack in the granite. She went down hard, hitting her elbow and twisting her ankle. Her cry of pain cut short as she realized the implications of what she had done. The ankle was sprained—she knew that without moving. Yet she had to move. Brie’s life depended on it.

White lightning danced across her inner eyes in rhythm to her heartbeat, the pain hot and pounding. Through it, she saw Brie advancing toward her.

“You were supposed to save me,” said the cat. “Not the other way around.”

“I’m sorry,” Sylvan panted. “I don’t think I can walk. You go…”

“Get off your ass,” Brie commanded with an added yowl to make her point. “Do you want to die before the Work is finished?”

Sylvan remembered Aron saying something about work, that his wound wouldn’t heal until the work was done. But what did that have to do with her? Aron was long gone.

What work? she wanted to ask the know-it-all cat, but the thunder of the oncoming deluge now rivaled that of a volcanic eruption, the explosion of bombs. Sylvan knew she had little time. Certainly none for conversation.

She pushed herself up, favoring the twisted ankle but could put no weight on it. The torrent was nearly upon them, the deafening whitewater shunting down the gorge with the ferocity of an avalanche. She felt a sharp pain in her good ankle and looked down to see ribbons of red where Brie’s needle claws had swiped her.

“Brie?” But the cat was already bounding away, up the hill to safety.

Then Sylvan was behind her, the ankle forgotten. No, she didn’t want to die.

The two made it to high ground just as the torrent hit. At its forefront, shaped like feline kelpies, were blue-white billows of froth. Sylvan paused to watch with awe as the phenomenon passed.

The roar dwindled and was gone, leaving only natural sounds—the liquid warble of swallows darting across the sky for their evening meal, the whisper of the wind in the tops of the firs. The water settled into a sweet little stream with rapids in the shallows and azure pools where it ran deep. A frog chirped. Chipmunks chittered back and forth. A school of rainbow trout darted upstream. It was as if the odd dry spell had never happened.

The pain was returning to Sylvan’s ankle, and her elbow was swollen and throbbing. Despite the serenity, she felt miserable, the in-the-moment desolation of a lost child. But she was a child, wasn’t she? Another of those pesky time transformations had returned her body to that of an eight-year-old. Her mind, however, remained the same, and she muttered under her breath, “Hoh, boy.” Then she began to cry.

“Come on,” said Brie. “We need to go.”

“I want to see Anna,” Sylvan whimpered. She picked up the cat and began to hobble toward the cabin. “Anna will make it all better.”

But there was something wrong with that plan. She couldn’t put a finger on it until she came around the corner of the old cottage and saw the green door. The place, so warm and open a moment ago, was now shut tight and padlocked. Spider webs hung from the hinges as if no one had been there for a very long time.

“No!” she whimpered, sinking down onto the steps.

“Your Anna’s gone,” said Brie. “As we must be.”

Chapter 13. OLD WOUNDS, coming next Saturday.

Only three chapters to go!

For the complete story up until now, look here.