Stolen by Time

What would you do if one touch sent you back 1,151 years with a Viking warrior you can't resist—KAMILAH:

One minute I'm cataloging artifacts in the Met's basement. The next, I'm on my knees in a Viking great hall, surrounded by warriors who've never seen a Black woman before.

The year is 873 CE. I'm 1,151 years from home.

And the ice-cold jarl staring at me with those devastating blue eyes? He thinks I'm either a goddess or a threat. Maybe both.

I should be terrified. I should be desperate to find the runestone that brought me here and get back to 2024. Back to my mother. My job. My safe, lonely, predictable life.

Instead, I'm watching Bjorn Ironblade move through his world like a caged wolf—all lethal grace and buried pain—and I can't look away.

When plague strikes, my medical knowledge saves his people. When enemies attack, my modern tactics win the battle. And when he touches me? When his scarred hands claim my body with a hunger that's been dead for three years?

I forget I ever wanted to leave.

But the runestone still works. I can go home anytime. All I have to do is touch it.

So why can't I make myself reach for it?

BJORN:

She appears in my hall like a vision from the gods—dark-skinned, defiant, speaking prophecy in a language that sounds like ours but isn't. My people think she's divine. I think she's dangerous.

She's no goddess. She's something more terrifying.

She's hope.

I've been dead inside since Helga. Three years of going through motions, leading my people but feeling nothing. Then this impossible woman looks at me and I remember what it means to burn.

She says she comes from the future. From a world beyond imagining. And she can return there whenever she wishes.

But every night she stays, she's in my bed. Every morning she wakes beside me. Every day she chooses us over everything she left behind.

Then I see her staring at that cursed stone, and I know—losing her would destroy what little of me remains