Timekeepers: Good as Gold

By J. Y. Harris

Gold? Seriously? Brad & Kristen Everheart are travelling on a family trip to Florida when they suddenly find themselves flung into the past.... again. This time, even their careful preparation and research can’t help them, and it’s only by sheer luck that they realize they’ve stumbled into the first discovery of gold in North America.

When they learn that the land-owner, Reed—who doesn’t yet know about the gold—is considering selling his farm, Kristen and Brad do what they can to dissuade him from this plan. And they succeed. Problem solved, right?

Wrong. That’s where the kidnapping comes in. As usual, adventure and danger are in the mix when Kristen and Brad are on one of their time-travel experiences.

Target audience for this novel is ages 11 and up. Approximately 44,300 words.

• Language: English
• Publisher: J. Y. Harris
• Release date: Dec 12, 2013
• ISBN: 9781310439766

J. Y. Harris

J.Y. Harris is a life-long reader, and has been writing creatively ever since she was a young girl. Over the years, she's worked with critique groups including published authors, and in 2008 was named a semi-finalist in the first Amazon.com Breakthrough Novel Award contest.Harris grew up and went to college in upstate New York, but has been living in North Carolina for over 20 years.She has also published a couple of contemporary romance novels under pseudonyms Dana Hayes and Jean Louise.Feel free to contact her at [e-mail], or as J.Y. Harris on Facebook.

Book preview

Timekeepers

Good as Gold

J. Y. Harris

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Copyright 2013 J. Y. Harris

All Rights Reserved

Published by JY Harris Books

Smashwords Edition

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

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Brad and Kristen aren’t expecting one of their adventures, so they’re unprepared when they find themselves in the middle of Nowheresville, USA. Once they figure out where—and when—they are, they accomplish their task quickly enough. But that’s when the real trouble starts.

Table of Contents:

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Author’s Note

CHAPTER ONE

Ugh, did we really have to get up at the crack of dawn? Kristen grumbled. "And for what—to spend another umpteen hours in the car. Why couldn’t we have flown to Florida, like normal people do?"

She adjusted the sunglasses on top of her head and checked to see that her suitcase was stowed properly in the trunk, then set her backpack down as she stood next to the car.

Her brother Brad rubbed some of the sleep from his eyes and stifled a yawn. Quit complaining. This is our vacation, remember? Rest and relaxation—with the emphasis on relaxation.

Spending the night at a no-star motel in... wherever this is... is not my idea of relaxation.

Brad smirked at his younger sister—something he did on a regular basis. Don’t worry, we’ll be in Florida later today and you’ll have all the sun and sand and swimming that your little heart desires. He flipped open his messenger bag and deposited a couple of granola bars. They were the good kind, Kristen noted: chocolate-covered.

She went back to the open trunk where her dad had packed their travel supplies. Picking up a couple of bottles of water, she tossed one to Brad, which he added to the granola bars in his bag. Kristen did the same, slipping her bottle into her backpack.

Oh, here’s my scrunchy, she said, retrieving the item from her bag. I knew I had it in here the other day. Using the elastic band, she pulled her long, dark hair into a pony tail.

Brad turned toward the open motel-room door. What? Yes, mom, I have the car keys. They’re right here.

He held up the keys and jingled them.

Kristen stretched her arms out and inadvertently knocked Brad’s shoulder. The keys fell to the pavement.

Oops, sorry, she said, and reached down to retrieve them.

Hey, watch out, Brad grumbled, as he reached down at the same time.

Brother and sister bumped heads just as Brad’s fingers closed on the key fob.

Ow!

Oof!

Brad laughed and straightened up.

Kristen reached a hand out to steady herself against the car. Instead, she fell over as her hand didn’t reach anything except damp earth at her feet.

What the—

No! Brad exclaimed. "No, no, no, no, no...!"

Kristen, who had been looking at her brother, now looked past him, and in the space of a millisecond she understood the reason for his dismay.

Gone was the motel, which had been a mere fifteen yards from them. Gone was the car, which is why Kristen had fallen to the ground; you can’t brace yourself against something that isn’t there. Gone was the nearby interstate highway which they’d had the pleasure of hearing all night from their motel room.

And gone were their parents, who’d been just about to exit the motel room and join Brad and Kristen at the car.

Instead, what was there was... well, nothing. Rocks and dirt and a rabbit that was looking at them with bemusement.

Just... nothing.

The siblings looked around.

Are you kidding me? Brad yelled. "Are you friggin’ kidding me?"

Kristen took a deep breath. Oh, God, not again. Not today. Not... here, of all places.

Brad stopped fuming and was visibly trying to regain his composure. I know, right? he said. "I was prepared for this to happen in Florida. We both studied up on the history of the central part of the state, and we have that stuff with us. That we would have at least been somewhat prepared for. But this?"

I know, Kristen replied. Like I said, I don’t even know where we are.

Someplace in North Carolina, Brad said with a sigh. I didn’t know Dad was going to stop here for the night or I would’ve come up with some info. But we got in late last night, were leaving early today... such a short period of time. Who knew it wasn’t safe?

It was Kristen’s turn to sigh. "Okay, so what do we know? We’re in the boondocks of North Carolina, around the year ‘who-knows.’ So what do you know about North Carolina?"

Her brother shrugged and shook his head, sending his dark-brown bangs dancing. I know it’s called the Tar Heel State. The Wright brothers did their flying thing in North Carolina, at Kitty Hawk. And there are some good colleges here.

Kristen looked at him in surprise. You’re looking at colleges in North Carolina?

I’m looking at colleges—period. And I’ve seen some good ones in this state.

Unfortunately, I don’t think that helps us at the moment, she said.

Did mom or dad say anything yesterday about where we are? You know mom, she likes to know what’s around, like malls or museums or attractions.

Kristen shook her head and drew out her cell phone. No. And I suppose there’s no GPS, as usual.

Nope, just like the other times. All that tells us is that it’s before 1980 at the latest, which isn’t much good.

Hey, wait, Kristen said. I’ve got it! She knelt down to dig in her backpack.

Got what?

Hang on, they’re in here someplace.... Yes, here they are. She drew some pamphlets out of the bag. Good ol’ mom. As you say, she’s always interested in what’s around, and she brought these back from the motel office last night. I don’t even know why I kept them.

They were promotional pamphlets of various attractions and exhibits. Kristen gave a few to Brad and she reviewed the rest.

A history museum, Brad said as he flipped through them. That doesn’t help. Whitewater rafting; apparently there’s a big facility nearby where you can do that—thanks, but no thanks. Something called the Devil’s Rocks. And a national forest. I assume we’re not in a national forest. What’ve you got?

Well, apparently there’s a big renaissance festival in the fall, in a town called Huntersville. No idea where that is. Also—oh, this is interesting. Apparently there’s a gold mine nearby.

Gold? Really?

Yeah, Kristen replied as she scanned the pamphlet. Fun fact: the very first gold discovered in North America was actually—surprise!—in North Carolina, at the turn of the nineteenth century. Someplace called Reed Gold Mine.

Huh, that’s almost fifty years before the California gold rush. Who knew?

I know, right? But none of this tells us where we are. Or when. What year, I mean; we already know that it’s June 12. And it looks like there’s nobody around to give us a clue.

Yeah, but don’t forget, Brad said, the first time this happened we didn’t know what was going on, either.

Kristen nodded. True. But at least that time, we were dressed for the occasion.

The previous fall, the Everheart siblings had participated in a re-enactment at a local Revolutionary War battle site near their home outside Philadelphia. They’d gotten lost in what they thought was early-morning fog, but when the mist disappeared, they discovered things had changed. There was no parking lot, no park, no cell phone service, no modern civilization of any kind. When they’d run into a girl dressed in authentic colonial garb, who said she was on her way to deliver a message to Continental Army forces, Brad and Kris realized they hadn’t gotten lost physically. They had somehow gotten zapped through time to the year 1777. No idea how... no idea why... they just knew that it happened.

Now, Brad said, Thank God we’d gotten costumes for the re-enactment from the school drama department, or we would’ve seriously freaked people out.

Yeah, but this time, no such luck. Kristen looked down at her tennis shoes, jeans, and old zip-up hoodie over a tee-shirt. Although I guess it’s a really good thing dad likes to run the AC in the car, or I would’ve been wearing shorts and a tank top.

Me, too, Brad agreed. Well, shorts and a tee-shirt. Like Kristen, he was wearing jeans also, and he had a faded plaid shirt thrown over his tee.

Well, he continued, I guess there’s nothing else to do except pick a direction and start walking. If the pattern holds, we know we’ve got a deadline. He frowned. What are you doing?

Kristen had picked up a number of rocks nearby and was putting them in a pile, a small mound.

I’m making a marker, she replied. So we don’t have to guess or estimate where we need to be when the time comes.

Brad smiled. Good thinking, sis. There’s hope for you yet. He found a dead branch and broke it into three pieces, placing them around the rocks in a triangle formation.

Then the Everhearts started walking. They had no particular direction in mind so they just looked around for anything that looked like a path into the nearby trees, and soon found one. Eventually, they figured, it should lead them somewhere; paths don’t appear on their own.

The two teens were silent for a while, each lost in thought. Kristen listened to the birds singing, the chipmunks chattering, the rustle of leaves on the summer breeze. She realized she didn’t take time to really look around to see and listen to such things in her ‘normal’ world, and she probably ought to. She remembered thinking the same thing when she’d been wandering around the backwoods of Pennsylvania in 1777, but once back in her ‘own’ time she’d once again gotten swept away by modern life and the comforts of the twenty-first century.

And the second time she’d time-travelled, well, she’d found other wonders to admire that time. And at least then she’d found herself in civilization—or, what passed for it at the time—with houses, shops, carriages, that sort of thing. Not that she’d been able to enjoy most of it, but still.

Even so, upon her return from the past, Kristen’s idea of relaxation involved earbuds, a laptop, and a closed bedroom door.

After a while, the small track Brad and Kristen had been following got wider, and soon the siblings heard another sound of nature: running water.

It wasn’t the kind of running water that came from a faucet, obviously, but a stream. And usually, where there’s a stream, there’s bound to be people. If they followed the water one way or the other, they should eventually find civilization. The big question was, what would that civilization look like?

The stream wasn’t large, maybe two or three yards across, and the water flowed lazily rather than hurriedly.

Look how clear it is, Brad said. Must have been nice, back in the day, to be able to drink fresh water directly from a stream like this one, without worrying about whatever trash or chemicals might have been dumped into it somewhere.

Yep. Instead, we pay money for water that comes in a bottle. The bottles have pictures on them that suggest the water came from a fresh mountain stream, or untouched glaciers, but in reality it probably comes from a faucet in a factory in New Jersey.

Brad smiled. Just goes to show that with the right marketing, you can sell almost anything.

Okay, P.T. Barnum. Getting back to the subject at hand, which way do you think we should go?

Across the stream the trees thinned out so it was easier to see more of the countryside. Unfortunately, the improved view didn’t help with their decision, as nothing out of the ordinary could be seen in any direction.

Great. No convenient village or even houses in sight, he said.

How far back could we have gone? Kristen wondered. North Carolina was one of the original thirteen colonies, right? So there have to be people somewhere.

Brad grunted. Assuming we landed sometime after colonization. Yeah, it was one of the original thirteen, but in most colonies, the greater populations were usually along the coast, where there were seaports and shipping. If I recall the map correctly, we were driving through the middle part of the state, nowhere near—

Brad broke off suddenly, causing Kristen to look at him. What? she whispered? What is it?

He pointed to the