Rain hammered the roof like the steady roll of distant drums.
Jacob hunched over the glow of his monitor, fingers flicking across his keyboard as he directed armies across a map of 9th-century England. In the game, banners of blue and red shimmered with the names of kings long dead — Alfred of Wessex, Ivar of York, Edmund of East Anglia.
He sipped cold coffee, half-aware of his grandmother's muffled cough down the hall. The rest of the house was dark. He had promised her he would sleep soon. He never did.
"Come on," he muttered, zooming in on the marshes near Thetford. His East Anglian troops stood outnumbered three to one. "If I can just pull the flanks—"
Lightning strobed white across his screen. The game froze. Symbols flashed across the map — runes, flickering, almost alive.
"What the hell—"
A jolt tore through him, like falling through ice. The monitor flared brilliant white. He reached for the plug, but the world folded in on itself — noise, light, cold, and then nothing.
He woke to the smell of smoke and damp earth.
For a long moment he didn't breathe. A beam of gray light cut through a narrow window. Straw rustled beneath him. The air was heavy with something animal — sweat, woodsmoke, and fear.
Jacob sat up too fast and winced. His hands weren't his own. They were lean, strong, calloused. A ring of rough iron circled one finger.
"What…"
A door creaked. A man stepped in, wrapped in furs, his face lined and familiar from history books — not possible.
"My prince," the man said, bowing stiffly. "Your father waits in the hall."
Prince.
Jacob swallowed. His heart pounded in his ears. Outside, he glimpsed a wooden palisade, men in leather and mail, horses steaming in the morning chill.
He caught his reflection in a basin of water. The face staring back was young — sixteen, perhaps seventeen. Pale eyes. Blond hair.
Not Jacob. Eadric.
The name surfaced unbidden, like something whispered from within.
And from somewhere far away — the echo of thunder, and the faint, dying hum of a computer fan.