The tale of William Wallace

5th August 1305
Sir William Wallace is captured near Glasgow because the Scottish knight John de Menteith betrayed his trust, as he was not loyal to the Scots but to Edward the King of England. Wallace is on his way to London, to be tried for treason and for atrocities against civilians in war, "sparing neither age nor sex, monk nor nun." He will be crowned with a garland of oak to show everyone that he was the king of outlaws. His response to the treason charge was. "I could not be a traitor to Edward, for I was never his subject." Since Wallace didn’t see Edwards as rightful king, in his eyes John Balliol is the rightful king on England.

The verdict of his trail is the execution of Sir William Wallace on the 23 August 1305. He will be stripped naked and dragged through the city at the heels of a horse to the Elms at Smithfield. He will be hanged, drawn and quartered — strangled by hanging but released while he was still alive, castrated, eviscerated and his bowels burnt before him, beheaded, then cut into four parts. His preserved head (dipped in tar) will be placed on a pike atop London Bridge.

10^th June 2012

Leo woke up early this Sunday he didn’t had anything good to do and he had just finished last night the book about midwifery written in the time of Henry 8th it was interesting and some people would have called it disgusting, but he thought it was interesting. Liam took a shower, got dressed and went on his way to the Coffeeshop.

“Morning. Large hot black coffee, drink here.” He grumbled to the pretty blonde barista, not that he noticed it. He took his coffee and a small satin bag. “It’s a free gift, because today is the hundredths day we are open.

“Fine.”

Leo went to the table at the window, it was one of those long high tables facing the window. Leo was staring into nothingness while he sipped at his coffee. The street of Nashville was busy, but he barely noticed it. Until suddenly the people outside the window went blurry he tried to get up from the chair but his body was paralyzed. Until he suddenly felt the chair disappear under him and he fell, but not on the floor of the Coffeeshop, no he landed on the ground somewhere outside it was a warm day and behind him was a forest and in the distance he saw a city, e city like in the books about the history.

“What the… is this here?”

22^nd August 1305

10th June 2012

When Willow entered the small coffee shop, her phone started to ring. Three weeks ago her summer break had officially started, and she always came home over the summer. The University of Tennessee was not too far from Nashville, so of course she often went home for weekends and holidays. Truth was, she liked being at home. Although she was the ‘baby’ of the family and the only girl, she enjoyed spending her time with her two older brothers and she was very close to her father, so there was no reason why she shouldn’t come home over the long summer break.
“Yeah?” Willow answered her phone while she stood in line. One of her friends from college had called her. “What? Shut up! No way! Are you serious? No, he didn’t say that, that’s crazy!” As soon as Willow was on her phone it was hard to get her attention, she usually tended to blend out everything and everyone around her, so she didn’t notice that the blonde woman behind the counter waited for her to place her order.
“No fucking way! He really said that? Give me a break!”

“Ehm…Miss?”

“And what did you say? Yes…okay…oh, wait, does she know about it?”

“Miss?” The blonde woman gave Willow a sign, and she finally noticed that she was next.

“Oh…a cappuccino please.” Willow turned back to the phone. “No, I was talking to someone else. Anyway, where were we? Oh, yes, totally! No, I didn’t…”

“Here.” The other woman handed her a little satin bag with her cappuccino.

“What’s that? I didn’t order this…thingy”, Willow said. “Oh no, Rachel, I wasn’t talking to you!”

“It’s a gift, for our hundredth open day and-“

“Okay, thanks!” Willow handed her the money, grabbed both her cappuccino and the satin bag and sat down in a corner of the coffee shop. “Anyway, you were saying?” While she held the phone pressed to her left ear she used her right hand to open the satin bag and got out a strange-looking watch. That same moment everything around her started to blur. “Whoa, what the hell is going on here?” Suddenly the environment around her changed, the coffee shop vanished and got replaced by a…forest?
What. The. Hell?
Willow held her breath for a moment. She had still the phone pressed against her ear. “Eh…Rachel?” No answer. She looked down and saw her phone had turned completely black. “Shit!” She turned slightly, wondering if she was in some sort of dream. “Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me! Am I getting punk’d?”

22nd August 1305

Leo heard a female voice not far from him in the forest, he followed it and saw this blonde small girl swearing like a trooper. She looked just as out of place as he did.

“I don’t think you are there are nowhere any cameras.” Leo said calmly. “But there is a town maybe a day marsh from here. I think we find answers there. Even though I think we need to get a change of clothes.”

Leo was maybe as freaked as the girl but he was already thinking of a plan how to deal with the situation.

Willow startled when she suddenly heard a deep voice behind her. She almost jumped around and saw a young man a few feet away from her. He was very tall and muscular, and without a question extremely handsome, but that didn’t change the fact that he just scared the hell out of her. He didn’t even introduce himself, he said something about no cameras and changing clothes.
Changing clothes? Where? Did he seriously expect her she would get changed in front of him, what kind of creep was that guy?

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on, mister!” Willow took a large step back, holding her phone as if it could protect her in case he attacked her. “You want me to get undressed in front of you?”

There was not one emotion on his face, it was completely blank. “No”, he replied dryly.

“Okay, good…” She nodded, still no idea what she had gotten herself into. “Because I may not be armed or anything but I can…I can seriously…kick.”
I can seriously kick? Oh man…
“I mean, I know how to do…karate and stuff.”
Yes, I did one year of karate when I was six years old.
“Anyway, just saying that I know how to defend myself…” She cleared her throat while the guy still didn’t show any reaction. “What is this place?”

“A forest.”

“Oh really, I had no idea!”, she snapped. Suddenly a thought popped into her head and she eyed the strange man suspiciously. “Did you kidnap me?”

There seemed a tiny bit of confusion on his face. “What?”

“Oh, you totally did! I have no idea how…you probably did some voodoo shit on me or something. Or you put something in my cappuccino, some heavy drug, and then you dragged me here. That’s how you must have done it…”

“I did nothing of that sort”, he said coldly.

“Oh yeah, sure! You know that you commit a crime by kidnapping me, right? I can call the police…in fact, I’m going to do that right now.” She looked at her phone which was still completely black. Damn. Truth was, she had no idea if he really ‘kidnapped’ her. Just a minute ago she was in that coffee shop, and now she was in a freaking forest. She just couldn’t explain what just happened to her. Willow took a deep breath and looked up from her phone. “Who are you anyway?”

Leo stared at the girl, was she for real? Yeah he wasn’t happy either about the situation but he didn’t think that she had anything to do with it. “I actually don’t think your phone works here, because if I’m not mistaken we are not in a time your phone will work. And it’s wasn’t me that kidnapped you, we both got taken against our will.”

Leo turned around and walked slowly back out of the forest. “It is not safe here. You better come Missy I don’t want you to get raped by some outlaws.”

Leo stopped when he noticed that the blonde wasn’t following him. “My name is Leo Grailstone. Move along, we shouldn’t stay. It’s dangerous.”

Now there was someone who really knew how to be charming. Really. Charming.
Willow still refused to follow him, she first wanted to know what had happened to them before she would follow a complete- and undeniably grumpy- stranger.
“What do you mean ‘we’re not in a time my phone will work’? This isn’t some weird Back to the Future crap, is it? I mean, come on…that was a movie! You know, a movie. And stuff like time travelling only happens in movies.” It annoyed her that grumpy guy barely said a word to her unless she forced him to. And who the hell was he to give her orders?

“Don’t you even take a second to think of how you got here?” She crossed her arms. He seemed a bit impatient, obviously he couldn’t wait to get moving. “What’s the last thing you remember?”

“I was at a coffee shop.”

“You too? Maybe there’s a connection…” Willow frowned. “We both were in a coffee shop, and then we ended up here. Doesn’t that seem weird to you?”

He just shrugged his shoulders.

Geez, people who didn’t say much were so exhausting! And that guy barely said anything at all, she didn’t even get the chance to hear if he had an accent, that’s how little he said. He seemed to be American though, but she wasn’t sure yet.
“Wait a second…where was that coffee shop you were in?”

“Nashville.”

“So was mine! Maybe we were in the exact same coffee shop and…oh, I know! We both were drugged and someone dragged us here.” Willow looked around as if she just waited for some creepy weirdo to turn up any second. “Maybe this is some sort of project or something. You know, for reality TV, and they have hidden cameras installed all over the place.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Well, smarty-pants, you got any better answer?”

He looked at her without any expression on his face. “Let’s just get to the closest town and find out.” He turned his back on her and starting walking. She didn’t want to just follow this stranger, but on the other hand she didn’t want to stay behind, right now he was the only one with her, although she didn’t know for how long. He would probably get away from her as soon as he got the chance. She sighed and increased her speed so she could keep up with him.
“Leo, wasn’t it? I’m Willow, by the way. And I think if you want to get anywhere you might want to say a little more.”

Leo grunted and kept walking. “What do you want me to say?”

“Where are you from? What are you doing for a living? Why are we here? And how did we get here?” Willow was half running along Leo to keep up.

“You talk too much. If we are really in past time you have to keep your tongue. It won’t be liked that you talk so freely. And I don’t want you get killed.”

Leo was sure Willow was talking but he actually didn’t pay attention anymore. He was trying to figure out why they were here and how they would get back. And if they were stuck here for some time they needed new clothes. Theirs was too much attention seeking. They came to a village after hours of walking. Leo grabbed suddenly Willow’s arm. “Hold on. We can’t just walk into there. Look at us and look at them, we will cause unwanted attention. Over there, we get the cloaks and disguise ourselves a little more.”

Willow couldn’t believe how ‘matter-of-factly’ that guy was. It didn’t seem to shock him at all that they had apparently landed in the freaking past, and instead of wondering how they got here, or instead of thinking how they would get back to their time, he just acted like he was actually used to time travelling. Willow still wasn’t sure if this all wasn’t just a big hoax and sooner or later some guys with cameras would show up. Time travelling wasn’t real, it was something that happened in books or movies, but not in reality. It was absolutely against every rule of science. She didn’t want to play along and be part of this madness, this was just ridiculous. Before she had chance to look around when they arrived in the next town, Leo grabbed her arm, took her aside and told her they needed to change clothes. So, he obviously seemed to play along. Brilliant. And what was she left to do? Join this insanity?
She watched Leo while he returned with some…what exactly was this? A curtain?
He almost threw it at her, and she bit her lip angrily.
“This is hideous! I might not be the girliest girl, but that doesn’t mean I want to wear something that resembles my grandma’s table cloth.”

He mumbled something while he put on his cloak.

“What was that?” She raised her eyebrows.

“This is not a freaking beauty contest, so put the cloak on or you’ll attract unwanted attention.”

She wasn’t used to be bossed around by people. She was the bossy one in her family, and she didn’t like being bossed around by someone else, especially not by a man.
“Listen, it’s great that you like dressing up and playing some weirdo roleplays or whatever this is, but don’t drag me into this.”

“You already are in this”, he replied coldly, then he turned around and started walking.

“Oh, screw this!” Willow pulled the ugly cloak over her head and followed him. She hated being depended on anyone, but on the other hand she didn’t want to be completely left alone, at least not now in this rather unfortunate situation. Man, she felt like she was wearing a huge potato sack. So much for not wanting to get too much attention…How could she not draw attention towards herself in this hideous thing?
And then she realized that he was right. Those people in front of her were definitely not from their time. Or they just liked to play dressing up…

Leo stopped Willow, and pulled her cloak close in the front to properly covering her clothes. Leo was worried that this would end badly.

“Oh good man, I haven’t seen you here ever before. May we help you?” The man, he looked like a farmer spoke to Leo and ignored Willow which was very common for the time well so far Leo wasn’t sure yet what time it was.

“Yes sir you might, see me and my wife got robbed and are now lost on the way to my cousin could you tell me where we are?” Leo hoped Willow would just for once be quiet.

“If you follow this street you will reach London in the morning. We do not have much, but here take this it is a blanket and some bread. Good day sir.”

Willow watched the two men having a conversation while she just stood there as if she didn’t exist. That guy didn’t even look at her. After he handed Leo a blanket and some bread, he turned around and walked away.
“We’re lucky”, Leo said.

“Lucky?” She raised her eyebrows. “What do you understand by ‘lucky’? That we’re stuck here in the middle of nowhere, wearing potato sacks and have apparently fallen back a few centuries? I don’t know what your definition of lucky is, but that is most certainly not mine.”

He just glared at her for a moment, which made her a bit uncomfortable, she didn’t like it when people just looked at her silently like that.
“Not every person will be as generous as that man, and soon we’ll be grateful for every piece of bread we get.”

Soon? What did he mean by that? Was he suggesting that they were seriously spending more than just a couple of hours in this freaky place? The man had mentioned London…So apparently they were in England, and obviously they had to walk to get to London instead of calling a cab. He also said they would reach London tomorrow morning…so that meant they had to sleep somewhere during the night.
Willow’s eyes wandered to the blanket in Leo’s hands.
Hell, no!
No, no, no, no!
There was no freaking way she would sleep outside, without a roof over her head, in a country she had never been to (not to mention in a time she had never been to before), next to a guy she didn’t know anything about except that he was also from 21st century Nashville and obviously not the most chatty person.
“So…we seriously have to go to London by walking?”

“Yes.”

“I hope there’s going to be a hotel on the way, I ain’t sleeping in no forest!”

Leo looked at her. Why did he have to be stuck here with such a whiny brat? She was exhausting.

“And how do you intend on paying this hotel? They won’t take credit cards or American dollar. So do you have any gold or silver? If you do there are better things to buy with then a hotel room like food and clothes. Unless you know how we got here and how we get back, I’m trying to survive this and not die of starvation or because I get killed. And just so you know there weren’t, well ain’t any hotels in this time they are called Inns. So move a long we have a long way ahead. It is not safe in the country side.” Leo sounded annoyed and increased his speed. He formed a sack with the blanket and put the loaf of bread in it. “We need to find some kind of bottle to get water, and also we need to find a sheltered place to stay.”

Leo looked at Willow and saw that she wasn’t happy about the thought. He sighed, she doesn’t seem to know very much of the time they were in.

“Men this times didn’t see women as worth anything. You are pretty and men of these times will not stop when you say no and they are not gentle. I don’t tell you this to scare you but you have to know this. Men are pigs these times and rape is not a crime. I just want you to be safe, and not harmed.”

Leo stepped back to her and wrapped the second blanket around Willow, to hide her appearance from the eyes of men.

Willow needed a moment to realize what was happening, but then she stepped away from him.
“I’m not a baby, I can look out for myself.” She turned her back on him. Who the hell did he think he was? Her big protector? And what was all this stuff about men of this time being rude and rapists? He didn’t want to freak her out? Well, he did a fine job in that! Now she couldn’t stop looking around if there wasn’t a guy luring behind a tree, just waiting for the perfect moment to jump out and attack her. On the other hand…was she just imagining it or did he actually care? Well…he said he wanted her to be safe, which was kind of a nice thing to say, wasn’t it?
No. Not coming from that stranger she didn’t even know. Why the hell would he care whether she was safe or not?
And he said she was pretty. That was weird. Not that he said it in any weird way, but Willow had the tendency to read too much into something, and now she started to get paranoid that Mr Grumpy over there might have bad intentions.
Relax, he’s not that kind of guy…
Willow threw a quick side-glance at him. How could she be sure that he wasn’t that kind of guy? She had just met him. As far as she knew he could be some psycho serial killer, and she was with him, all alone, in a forest. This was just great…
In her slightly chaotic head she already planned how she could defend herself. Now…Leo was about ten times taller and probably twenty times stronger than her, or at least he looked like that, but she was fast. Back in high school she was the fastest girl on the track team, and she also beat many boys who were about twice her height. So yes, she could run away in case he would get dangerous, but what if she wouldn’t get the chance to run away? She was obviously unarmed, except if she threw her iphone at his head, but that would probably not really help. She could grab a stick and…
Geez, he’s not going to do anything! Stop being so damn paranoid!
Willow felt the weight of the blanket pressing on her shoulders. Did those maniacs back then fill their blankets with stones? That freaking blanket was insanely heavy!
She sighed and sat down. She was tired, and hungry, and fed up, and she wanted nothing more than getting home- or at least to a hotel, which, as Leo had pointed out very nicely, didn’t even exist!

“Why are you sitting down?”, he asked.

She just glared at him. “Because I’m tired!”

“We can rest as soon as we found water.”

“You know what? You can go ahead and look for some water, I’ll stay here.”

He didn’t look really pleased about her suggestion. “I already said that it’s dangerous for women to be alone, especially in a forest, and-“

“Yeah, I got the message!” Willow got up and increased her speed. She just wanted to find some damn water and then find a damn place to sleep.

Leo looked at Willow. “I’m sorry. I just don’t want you to get hurt, because… it is not right to hurt a girl or anyone.”

Leo led Willow deeper in the forest but he had a hunch that they might find water there, and even if not they would have shelter there. And then suddenly the forest cleared off and they reached a small river, it was crystal clear and shallow. There was a small half island on which they would be safe for the night. “We can stay there. I’ll make a fire and maybe there are fish in the water. I might even find some berries and mushrooms. I hope you are not a picky eater. Do you smoke?”

Willow looked skeptical at the place. “No I don’t why?”

“You might have a lighter or matches in your pocket, it would make the fire making easier. But I’ll manage it without. I’ll go and look for dry firewood, and I know you are not a baby and can take care of yourself but I’m just a little old fashioned in some ways. I think as a man it is my duty to protect you. And just to be clear I would never hurt you.” Leo looked at Willow hoping she didn’t think for once too much.

This time Willow actually didn’t say anything. She was too surprised by what he just said. It was kind of creepy, because if she didn’t know it any better she’d think he could read her thoughts. That wasn’t possible, right? Of course it wasn’t! If it was possible and he could read her thoughts she would be gone in no time, because there was barely anything creepier than having a guy snooping around in your own thoughts!
But there was something about him, the way he said he wouldn’t hurt her…it was honest. She wasn’t really good in looking through people and get their emotions, but she could tell that he had been completely honest when he said that. There was an awkward silence between them since nobody said anything, then Leo turned around and walked away, looking for some firewood. Willow wrapped the blanket tighter around her. It was getting colder by the minute, and she hoped it wouldn’t start raining. This was England after all, so the chance it could rain was pretty high. She felt a bit stupid not helping Leo with collecting wood, but right now every inch of her body seemed to ache and she was so tired that even the blanket was getting too heavy for her. She had never been a whiny girl, but at the moment she felt like a 4-year old helpless kid. She really hated being in that position, it was the first time she ever felt like that.
By the time Leo came back, she was already lying, so wrapped up in her blanket that she looked like a caterpillar in a cocoon. She watched him making fire, and surprisingly he was really good at that. She wondered how on earth a guy in the 21st century knew how to make a fire. If she had been alone with that task, she wouldn’t know a thing about what to do and how to make this fire. She would have tried, of course, but she would have definitely not succeeded.

“You’ve been a boy scout when you were younger?”, she asked jokingly. “Looks like you have down all the skills you need to survive in nature.” There was no way she could picture him as a boy scout, but on the other hand she didn’t know him and it was hard to tell what kind of guy he was anyway. But she was very glad that at least one of them knew how to survive in nature, and she was so happy about that fire, even if she was still not completely warm.

Leo looked over the fire at Willow, she didn’t seem to be a person that was much outside. “No I wasn’t a boy scout, I’m just a lot outside. Here I got some berries and mushrooms and we have the bread. When we are in London we will see if we get some supplies like pots, cups and some rope I can built slings with to catch rabbits and other small animals.”

He took of the second blanket and handed it Willow while he ripped pieces off the bread. He took out the electric bill he still had in his back pocket and used it as plate, luckily it was two pages long. He sighed wondering if this was it, if they would have been stuck here forever.

“I was at the coffee shop and had a black coffee, no one talked to me or anything was not as it always was. And just before I appeared in the forest everything went blurry, like when a camera is not in focus.”

He looked at Willow, she didn’t belong her. She belonged into some college, with a group of girls, talking about boys and playing with their mobile phones. She was a Cheerleader type of girl not a camping in the middle of England without any supplies and equipment.

“I guess your boyfriend will look for you and he will never know what happened to you. Maybe that’s what happens to people that just vanish, they arrive in another time.” He threw some more wood on the fire. “When you would sit closer to me you wouldn’t be so cold.”

Boyfriend. Yeah, right.
The last time she’s been in a relationship she got her heart broken, and since then she avoided being in any kind of committed relationship. Of course she liked flirting with the guys at college, or her new neighbour back in Nashville, who just moved in and looked like a young Brad Pitt, but that didn’t mean that she wanted to be in a relationship with any of those guys, not after her last relationship ended that badly. For the past months she enjoyed her life as single lady, and she didn’t plan on changing that any time soon. She was more concerned about her father and her brothers to whom she had such a close bond. Also her best friends. They would all look for her and worry like crazy. They knew she wouldn’t just run off like that. If she just had the chance to send them a note or anything to let them know that she was okay. Well, okay-ish. Right now she was cold, and hungry, and tired, and everything was aching…but at least she was still alive.

“When you would sit closer to me you wouldn’t be so cold”, Leo said while he was throwing some more wood into the fire.

Willow eyed him suspiciously, but he didn’t even look at her, he just stared blankly at the fire.
“I’m fine”, she replied, trying to sound convincing. Despite being wrapped in two blankets she was still cold, but she really didn’t feel like snuggling up with a stranger. And yes, he was still a stranger, because she hardly knew anything about him except that he had some really impressive outdoor skills.
She ate some of the bread while she stared into the fire. She hoped this all was just a bad dream, and she would wake up soon in her comfortable bed, but something inside her told her that wasn’t going to happen. She didn’t feel like talking at all, which was very strange for her. She had to be really sick in order not to feel like talking- or trapped in the past, for that matter…
She tried not to think of home, of her dad, her brothers, her friends.
“I think I’m going to bed….ehm…well, obviously that’s the wrong term.” Willow’s eyes wandered to Leo who still looked at the fire. He really was handsome, but right now she had other things on her mind. “I’ll try to get some sleep, I’m tired.” She got up and handed him the second blanket he had given her.

“What are you doing?” He looked up to her.

“You need a blanket, I can’t take both of them.”

“Keep it”, he mumbled, staring back into the fire.

“But you-“

“Just keep it.” That almost sounded harsh, although it wasn’t his intention.

“Okay, oaky.” She turned around, lay down again and wrapped herself up. Of course she was glad she could keep the second blanket, but she worried he would get cold. She was still cold, and it didn’t get any better when the fire slowly started to get smaller, but she tried to suck it up and fall asleep, hoping by the next morning everything would be over.

Leo ate some of the barriers and mushrooms and then a piece of bread. He watched Willow go to bed, and wished he could do more as keep her alive. He couldn’t even explain why he thought they would find help there. He wrapped himself in his cloak and tried to keep the fire as high as possible. Leo was not really an early riser but he had barely slept and kept an eye open for strangers.
But now that he was up, he thought he used the opportunity of having fresh water. He went into the river to get cleaned up. He enjoyed swimming in the ice cold water. When the bird where in the high of their songs he came out of the river, naked just like God have made him he walked back to their camp.

“Good morning Willow.” He smiled and took his clothes.

As expected, Willow had slept awful. Despite the two blankets she was freezing throughout the entire night, but as always, she was too stubborn to listen to someone else’s advice, so she did not lie close to Leo, although she knew exactly that it would have kept her a bit warmer being so close to another human body. At six in the morning, the fucking birds decided to hold a concert right in the trees over her head, crying their souls out, and Willow felt the urge to get a rifle and shoot them all down and eat them for breakfast. She pressed her eyes together and hid further under the blanket, but it just didn’t help, she was wide awake.
“Oh, you freaking little sons of bit-“ She broke off immediately when her attention was occupied by something else than the birds, or, rather, by someone else. For a brief moment she thought she was still dreaming, or maybe hallucinating because of the lack of sleep, but after she blinked a couple of times she realized that the picture in front of her was real. Leo was swimming in the river. In that ice cold river. Obviously very little dressed, perhaps even not dressed at all. Right now she could only see the upper part of his body- and man, that was a sight for sore eyes, she couldn’t help but stare- and she noticed something on his chest, it looked like a tattoo, but she couldn’t really see it because he was too far away. She didn’t have the chance to take a close look, because that same moment he turned towards her and was getting out of the water, and before Willow could see any more of that freakishly hot body she closed her eyes. She couldn’t help it, it just happened, it was like a reflex that forced her to close her eyes. She could hear him coming closer, but she did not dare to open her eyes.

“Good morning, Willow”, he said, and she had a hard time trusting her ears, not only because he said good morning, but also because he sounded…chipper. Yes, Mr Grumpy himself actually sounded friendly. She couldn’t believe that it was possible. She was about to open her eyes when he realized he was still naked, and that naked really was meat as in ‘completely naked’.
Oh, holy mother of God!
Willow had actually planned to pretend that she was still sleeping, but he obviously knew that she wasn’t because he had greeted her.
“I don’t know what your…ehem…traditions are at home, but at my home people are not…eh…walking around…let’s say…nude.” Her eyes were still closed.

“I’m not going to swim with my clothes on”, he replied dryly.

She blinked and saw that he at least had some pair of pants on. She lay on her back and took a deep breath. If she had been at home, she would take a hot shower now, but all she could do here was to either swim in the freaking cold river or stay dirty. She decided to at least wash her face and hands, so she got up, but it didn’t take long until Leo heard some squeaking and cursing. He quickly turned around. “What is it?”

“C.O.L.D!”

“What?”

“The water is fucking cold! I feel like I put my face in a humongous ice cube!” She ran back, grabbed a blanket and rubbed the rest of the water off her face. “How on earth can you swim in that ice water?”

Leo just shrugged and got dressed. For a moment Leo wondered if he shouldn’t have went into the river, well at least not without clothes. But he never cared if he saw someone naked or if someone saw him naked. It is just a body, nothing more. “Come on we gotta go. You will warm up while we are walking.”

They walked for a few hours until they got to a crossroads and suddenly from the east road they saw a wagon coming. It was a simple wood wagon, a simple man was sitting on the front. The horse looked like it was going to die any moment well not that the man looked any more alive.

“I guess you don’t want me say this but keep your mouth shut, women in this time were to be seen not heard.” Leo mumbled while the wagon came closer.

“You don't need to tell me when to keep my mouth shut.” Willow snapped back.

Leo sighed. “I know, but I would like not to get killed or see you getting killed.”

Willow didn’t have time to reply the wagon came to a hold next to them. “Good day.”

“Good day Sir. May I ask what the way is you are going? Maybe my woman and me can ride along in the back?”

“London. The wench can sit in the back and you can sit in the front with me, if you go the same way.” The man was just as grumpy as Leo, well no actually he was worse he didn’t see Willow as worth sitting next to him.

“I will sit with my woman in the back. Thank you Sir.”

Leo turned and looked nearly pleading at Willow. “Please don’t make a scene here. We need to get to London.”

Willow didn’t really listen to what Leo just said. She bit her lip, trying not to jump at that old man and rip out the remaining hair he had left on his head, one by one, in a particularly painful way.
“That old son of a –“

“Did you even listen to what I just said?”, Leo interrupted her.

“Sir, we need to go on, otherwise it will get late”, the old man said.

“Yes, we’re sorry.”

“I’m not!”, Willow hissed, but Leo threw her a warning side-glance and was about to help her on the wagon, but she pushed his arm away to signal him that she was perfectly capable of taking care of herself. When Leo sat down next to her she only crossed her arms and glared furiously at the back of the old dude. Oh, how much she wanted to put her hands around that wrinkly neck and strangle him…
“Calling me a wench! Who the hell does he think he is?”

“Can you keep it down a bit?”, Leo asked. “If you continue cursing him we might end up walking all the way to London.”

“That jerk treats me like dirt.”

“Don’t take it personally, but it’s nothing unusual for men to treat women like that, not in the time we’re currently in…”

Willow pressed her lips together. “I’m not sure if I can manage to be patient with all those sons of bitches around me.”

“It’s not a matter of can, it is a matter of must. You have to be able to control yourself.”

“You sound just as oppressing as the rest of those morons here!”

“If you would work with me instead of against me-“

“I’m not working against you, I’m trying to defend myself.”

“That’s the same thing.”

“It’s not!”

“It is!”

“Shut up!”

“Okay, when I shut up, you’ll get killed”, Leo snapped. “Fine by me!”

The two fell into an awkward silence and looked into different directions, until Willow let out a quiet sigh. “Okay, I will try to keep my mouth shut. But I can’t promise it will work.”

The drive to London was rather quiet, the man they were driving with wasn’t one of the chatty guys and they were actually sitting too close to him to talk about their situation. Outside from London the man stopped. “I can’t get you further, so get off. Good day.”

Leo saw that Willow was about to complain but not this time. He grabbed her arm and pulled her of the wagon. They managed to get unseen through the town gates. It was just shortly after eleven, the entire town was out. Something was in the air, and then Leo saw the sign.

Execution of William Wallace at the 23rd August at high noon at the tower of London.

“Great this is a bad time to be here. Let’s go to the Tower, that’s the safest place to go with the flock.” Leo mumbled, keeping Willow close. “Put up your hood.”

“Why?” Willow looked annoyed at him.

“It is better to stay low, so stay out of sight.” Leo said sounding serious. And this seriousness made Willow pull her hood over her head.
A woman, rather poor and dirty looking ran accidently into Willow and spilling something stinky over her cloak.

“What the fuck do you think you are doing you idiot bitch! Watch where you are going!” Willow started screaming at poor women. Leo just needed to take a quick look at the crowed to know this could get dangerous. “Willow! Willow, be quiet!”

“Shut up! This bitch just ran into me!” Leo continued screaming and making a scene.

Leo grabbed Willow and pushed her roughly out of side into a small alley between two houses. “What the hell are you doing? You wanna get us both killed? You can’t yell like this at a woman, or at anyone for the matter of fact! Do you hear me?” Willow had turned around from Leo but he grabbed her arm tightly and turned her around not caring if he was hurting her for the moment. He was to angry at her for being so stupid just yelling at a woman on an open street when there were lots of soldiers in town.

Honestly, if someone grabbed Willow’s arm like that, she would have already fought back, but right now she was so surprised about the fact that this quiet grumpy guy actually had that in him. Well, he did look strong, but he didn’t seem the type who would be that bossy. Also, she wasn’t used that people around her were that bossy, usually she was the bossy one. She was actually not offended but rather positively surprised that there was a guy out there who knew what to say to make her shut up, he definitely was the first one. Not that she would admit that.
Willow backed away from him and crossed her arms. “I think I’m old enough to know how I can speak to people.”

“Yeah, maybe in the 21st century, but not here, where women were not even allowed to voice their opinions.”

“I think you take this whole history crap way too seriously.”

“And I think you don’t take it seriously enough”, Leo snarled. “Don’t you get how serious this whole situation is? If you continue making scenes like that you’ll end up hanged or God knows what else they do with you.”

Willow was quiet for a moment. She wasn’t sure if she just imagined it, but he actually did sound really concerned. She took a deep breath. “So…any chance we can do a little sightseeing? Tower Bridge, Buckingham Palace, Piccadilly Circus…that sort of stuff?”

Leo just stared at her.

“What? Come on, I’ve never been outside of the States, and now that we’re in London we might as well make the best out of it.”

He still stared at her, then cleared his throat. “I take it you didn’t pay attention to history class?”

“Not really.” She shrugged her shoulders. “There were other classes I preferred.”

“Yeah, obviously.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” She pursed her lips.

“First of all, the Tower Bridge isn’t built yet, neither is the Buckingham Palace, and especially not Piccadilly Circus. And secondly, we’re not here for sightseeing, we’re here to find out what the hell happened to us and how we can get out of this again.”

Willow sighed. “Okay, okay! I want to get out of here too. But it still would have been nice to see a little bit more than just weirdoes in Lord of the Rings outfits, you know?”

Leo rolled his eyes.

“What about the Tower, it’s already built we could go on a tour and see the crown jewels.”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“The Tower at this time is a prison. No way in hell I will go in it.”

“Oh, yeah maybe not so good for a tour.” Willow was rubbing her upper arms.

“I’m sorry, did I hurt you?” Leo asked looking rather sad and embarrassed at Willow, when suddenly someone behind them shouted.

“Ladies and Gentlemen, come and see the traitor William Wallace being executed. The verdict of his trail was execution of. He will be stripped naked and dragged through the city at the heels of a horse to the Elms at Smithfield. He will be hanged, drawn and quartered — strangled by hanging but released while he was still alive, castrated, eviscerated and his bowels burnt before him, beheaded, and then cut into four parts. So go and get in line to follow the traitor and see his death.” A man looking important yelled over the place.

“Wait William Wallace got executed in 1305, erm August I think around the twentieth. Well at least we know at what time we are.” Leo pulled Willow closer to him when a troop of soldiers passed them. “Maybe coming here wasn’t the best idea. Please Willow play along and don’t get into a fight.”

The soldiers bind William Wallace at the horse naked to drag him through town. It was a nasty sight to see.