POV: Maya Chen
"Start talking."
Adrian stands in my doorway, sword still drawn, his scarred face hard as stone. Behind him, guards fill the corridor. The shattered poison vial gleams on my floor—proof that someone was just here.
Someone who climbed four stories and escaped into the night.
"That was James Hartford," I say, my voice shaking. "My ex-fiancé. The man who tried to kill me in 2024. He came to offer me a choice: join him and Lisa, or die."
"I saw no one." Adrian's eyes are cold. "Just you, screaming, with a broken vial on the floor."
"Because he escaped out the window! With climbing gear from my time!" I point at the open window. "Check outside—there might be rope marks, equipment, something!"
Adrian signals to a guard, who leans out the window and looks down. "Nothing, Your Majesty. No rope. No marks on the stone."
My stomach drops. "That's impossible. He was just here—"
"Convenient," Adrian interrupts, his voice dangerous. "First you claim your enemies are in Mordania. Then one appears in your locked room. Then disappears without a trace. Do you think I'm a fool?"
"Check the vial!" I gesture desperately at the shattered glass. "That's poison from my time. Synthetic compounds that don't exist here. Test it—it'll be different from any poison your people know!"
"Or it's regular poison you brought with you to stage this attack." Adrian steps into the room, and I see something terrifying in his eyes. Not anger. Calculation. "You refuse to give me weapons knowledge. You claim moral superiority. Then conveniently, an 'intruder' appears to prove your enemies exist. An intruder who leaves no evidence except what you control."
"No! That's not—" My voice breaks. "Why would I stage an attack on myself? What would I gain?"
"My trust." He sheathes his sword slowly. "My belief that you're a victim instead of a threat. My protection against murder charges." His expression darkens. "You're clever, Mira. Perhaps too clever."
This is James's plan. He knew Adrian wouldn't believe me. Knew that appearing and vanishing would make me look like a liar.
"Please," I whisper. "I'm telling the truth. James is here. He has modern equipment. He's working for Mordania and he wants me dead or complicit. I chose neither, so he'll try again."
"Then you'll remain locked in this room until I determine what's real." Adrian turns to leave. "No visitors. No servants you could manipulate. Just guards who'll report everything you do."
"Adrian, wait—"
"It's Your Majesty," he corrects coldly. "You're not my wife. You're not my ally. You're a prisoner who tells convenient lies."
He's almost through the door when a new voice cuts through the tension.
"She's telling the truth."
A woman steps into the corridor, flanked by Adrian's guards. She's young, maybe mid-twenties, with auburn hair and intelligent green eyes. She wears travel-stained clothes and carries herself with confidence.
I've never seen her before.
"Who are you?" Adrian demands.
"Dr. Rachel Kim." She bows slightly. "Quantum physicist from MIT, year 2024. The same lab explosion that sent Dr. Maya Chen through time caught me too. I've been searching for other survivors for six months."
My heart nearly stops. Another person from my time. But not James or Lisa—someone I don't know.
"Prove it," Adrian says flatly.
Rachel pulls out a smartphone—cracked screen, dead battery, but unmistakably modern. "This is a communication device from our era. Non-functional here, but the technology is centuries ahead of anything that exists in 1434." She hands it to Adrian carefully. "I've been tracking the quantum signatures of other time-displaced persons. Dr. Chen's signature is clean—just her. But I detected two others in this area tonight. One fled south toward Mordania. The other—" she glances at me, "—is in this room."
"That was James," I breathe. "You tracked him?"
"I tracked someone with modern equipment using residual quantum energy." Rachel's expression is grim. "But he wasn't alone. The signature suggests at least three people from our time are coordinating in this region."
Adrian examines the smartphone, his analytical mind clearly working. He presses the cracked screen, tries the buttons. "It does nothing."
"No power source here," Rachel explains. "But if you find someone who understands mechanics, they can take it apart and see technology that won't be invented for centuries. Circuits, batteries, LCD screens—all impossible for 1434."
"This could be an elaborate forgery," Adrian says, but his voice holds less certainty now.
"It's not." Rachel meets his eyes steadily. "I'm a scientist, like Dr. Chen. I don't want to conquer your world or play political games. I want to survive and figure out how to get home. But I've been tracking the others—the ones who ARE playing games. And Dr. Chen is right. James Hartford and Dr. Lisa Chen are building power bases in enemy kingdoms. They have modern knowledge and no ethical restraints."
"Why should I believe you?" Adrian asks.
"Because I can prove everything she's said." Rachel pulls out a small notebook filled with equations and diagrams. "I've been mapping the temporal rift. The explosion created a stable wormhole that appears every three months. The next appearance is in fourteen days. If you want proof of time travel, I can show you the rift itself."
The room falls silent.
"Fourteen days," Adrian repeats slowly. He looks at me. "And you knew about this rift?"
"No!" I say desperately. "James just told me tonight. I didn't know it was stable or predictable or—"
"So there's a way home." Adrian's voice is ice. "And you didn't mention it."
"I just found out!"
"Or you've been planning your escape." He gestures to the guards. "Take Dr. Kim to secure quarters. Comfortable, but watched. I'll verify her claims."
"Your Majesty," Rachel says carefully, "I understand your suspicion. But you need to understand what's at stake. James and Lisa aren't just building power—they're introducing technologies that could destabilize your entire world. Gunpowder. Advanced metallurgy. Chemical weapons. If they succeed, the next few years will see warfare unlike anything you can imagine."
"Then give me the knowledge to fight them," Adrian demands. "Both of you. Give me the weapons to defend my kingdom."
"And start an arms race that kills millions?" I shake my head. "No. There has to be another way."
"There isn't!" Adrian's control cracks, rage bleeding through. "My kingdom is dying. My people starve while enemies circle. And you—both of you—have knowledge that could save them. But you refuse because of ethics? Because you're afraid of the consequences?" He steps closer, towering over me. "I've watched my people die from diseases you could cure with basic knowledge. I've lost battles because my weapons are inferior. And now you tell me my enemies have time travelers helping them, but you won't help me?"
"I'll help," I say firmly. "Medicine. Agriculture. Sanitation. Engineering. I'll give you everything that helps people live. But not weapons. Never weapons."
"That's not your choice to make." Adrian's voice drops to something dangerous. "You're my prisoner. I could force you."
"Torture me?" I meet his eyes. "Is that who you want to be? The king who tortures women for information?"
Something flickers in his expression. Pain, maybe. Or shame.
"Guards," he says quietly. "Take Dr. Chen to the dungeon. Dr. Kim to the guest quarters. I need to think."
"The dungeon?" My voice cracks. "Adrian, please—"
"Your Majesty," he corrects again. Then softer, so only I can hear: "I want to believe you. But I can't risk my kingdom on faith. Not anymore."
The guards grab my arms. As they drag me toward the door, Rachel calls out:
"Dr. Chen! The rift—if you want to go home, you have fourteen days!"
Fourteen days.
Two weeks to prove I'm innocent, survive James and Lisa's attempts to kill me, avoid being executed for murder, and reach the temporal rift.
Two weeks to choose between staying in this nightmare medieval world or risking everything to return home.
If home even still exists for me.
The dungeon is cold, dark, and wet. They chain me to the wall—not tight enough to hurt, but impossible to escape.
I'm alone in the darkness, listening to water drip somewhere in the shadows.
Everything I tried to build here—the trust, the alliance, the hope of survival—destroyed in one night.
James won. Again.
I close my eyes, exhausted and defeated.
Then I hear footsteps. Soft. Careful.
Someone's coming down to the dungeon.
A figure appears in the torchlight outside my cell. Small. Female.
"Lady Mira?" Elara's young voice whispers. "Are you all right?"
"Elara?" I struggle to see her through the bars. "What are you doing here?"
"Bringing you something." She slips a small object through the bars. It lands near my feet—a piece of bread wrapped in cloth.
"You could get in trouble—"
"I don't care." Her voice is fierce. "You saved Thomas. You tried to save everyone in the sick ward. You're not a witch or a demon. You're the only person who treats people like me—servants, peasants—like we matter."
Tears burn my eyes. "Thank you."
"There's something else." She leans close to the bars, whispering urgently. "I heard Lady Seraphina talking to someone in the gardens tonight. She said, 'The witch is finally where she belongs. Once the king executes her, everything returns to how it should be.' And the person she was talking to—" Elara's voice drops even lower, "—spoke strangely. Like you do. With unusual words."
My blood runs cold. "What did this person look like?"
"I couldn't see clearly. But they wore fine clothes and moved like a noble. And they gave Lady Seraphina something—a small bottle. She said, 'This will handle the other problem.'"
Poison. They gave Seraphina poison.
"Who's the other problem?" I ask desperately.
"I don't know. But Lady Seraphina smiled and said, 'By tomorrow, the Demon King will have no choice but to wed me. His little future queen will be dead, and the other one will be blamed for it.'"
The other one. Rachel.
They're going to kill Rachel and frame me for it.
And I'm chained in a dungeon, unable to warn anyone.