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Glynis likes to light candles before dark. She has a trail of candles leading from the kitchen to her small bedroom down the hallway. She made the candles herself by extracting the wax from the bayberries which grow with wild abandon on the bushes in front of the house. The candles burn cleanly and have a beautiful scent which helps her drift to sleep at night.

Glynis is in the portion of the house which was once the servants’ quarters. Part of the main house was destroyed in a fire many years ago and seemingly abandoned for good. There are acres of garden, once beautifully manicured, now overgrown and vibrant with life.

She is not sure how long she will stay here and lately has felt a restless pull to move on. Where? She is not sure. So for now, she practices her magic arts and knows she has much to learn.

Glynis is about to retire for the evening when something catches her attention. A flicker of light at the window. When she looks again there is nothing there. But something else is amiss; she can sense it.

“Oh, what is this? Eleven jars of potion? Darnit! I’m sure I made a clean dozen!”

Gorrash enjoyed twilight, that moment when the beautiful winter light was fading away. He could feel life beating anew in his stone heart, the rush in the veins of his marble body.

As a statue, life was never easy. When day breaked you were condemned to stand in the same position, preferably the same as the one you have been made, cramped in a body as hard as the rock you came from. The sunlight had that regretable effect of stopping your movements. But as night came light was losing its strength and nothing could stop you anymore. At least that’s what Gorrash believed.

He could almost move his fingers now. He tried with all his might to lift his hand and scratch his nose where a bird had left something to dry, but there was still too much light. If he tried harder, he could break. So he waited patiently.

Gorrash had had plenty of time to think and rething of his theory of light since his placement in the garden. The only thing is that he never had anyone to share it with. There was no other statue in the garden, and the animals were not very communicative at night time. Only a couple of shrews and night mothes (the later soon eaten by the erratic crying bats)

But nonetheless Gorrash was always happy when darkness liberated him and he was free to go. He could feel his toes moving now, and his ankles ready to let go. He loved when he could feel his round belly slowly drop toward the ground. He chuckled, only to check the flexibility of his throat. He had a rather cavernous voice. Very suiting for a garden dwarf.

When the night was fully there, Gorrash shook his body and jumped ahead to the pond where he washed his nose from the bird dropping. He looked at the reflection in the water and smiled, the Moon was also there, fully round. Its light felt like a soft breeze compared to that of the Sun.

The dwarf began to walk around in the garden, looking for the rodents. Chasing them would help him get rid off the last stiffness in his stone heart. He stopped when he saw something near the window of the house.

Aunt Idle:

My work was done. The new guru had found her feet and was up and running. My behind the scenes supporting role was over, so I booked a flight back home. I called Bert and told him and he informed me that Mater had been grumbling about being left on her own and how quiet it was. I was under no illusion that she’d welcome me back with open arms ~ not outwardly, anyway. The first thing she’ll do is start complaining about the racket and the chaos, or so I thought. Such is life with the aged ones.

So I was astonished when Mater rushed out on to the porch when my taxi pulled up outside the Inn, and flabbergasted when Bert rushed out after her holding a large box. Stunned by the strange sight of such animation, I simply watched open mouthed as Bert ran back into the house, clutching the box, as Mater furiously admonished him and gave him a shove, looking over her shoulder at me. As if I couldn’t see them!

The taxi driver opened the boot of the car and handed me my suitcase. I thanked him and settled my bill, and slowly approached Mater on the porch.

“I’m home!” I called gaily.

Mater giggled nervously (giggling at her age, I ask you! and wearing a pink floral babygro, it was almost obscene) and ran a withered hand through her sparse locks.

“What’s Bert got in that box?” I asked, in what I hoped was a neutral and cordial manner.

“What box? Er, nothing! There is nothing important about that box, I expect it’s just some old boring rubbish,” Mater replied, a trifle hastily, and altogether unconvincingly. “You must be parched after your journey, I’ll go and put the kettle on.” And with that she rushed inside, failing completely in her vapid attempt to allay my suspicions.

One thing was true though, I was parched, and Bert and the mysterious box would have to wait until after a cup of tea.

MATER

Bert seems to be digging a very large hole. I mean, good grief, it’s just a veggie garden. I don’t think my cabbages warrant all that effort. I pull open the window—the latch wobbles precariously on its single screw—and call out to him.

“What are you doing, Bert? Digging a grave or something?”

My humour is clearly lost on him. He glances over in my direction, distractedly, before placing his spade on the ground. He then kneels down in the dirt and leaning right inside the hole begins scrabbling with his hands.

How odd!

I pull a jacket on over my pink floral onesie. The onesie was a birthday gift from the girls and was accompanied by rather a lot of silliness and giggling. However I was privately rather taken with my gift and with summer over and a cool chill in the air it was very handy to put on in the mornings. Completing my ensemble with an old pair of gumboots by the back doorstep, I go and join Bert in the garden.

“What’s that, Bert? What’s that you’ve found in there?”

“I’m not sure yet,” he replied. At least, I think that’s what he said. It was hard to hear him when he was hanging upside down in a hole.

I crouch down beside him, no mean feat at my age, and take a look.

All I can see are some bones.

“What is it? A dog or something?”

“Too big for a dog.”

“Oh my goodness!” I gasp. “Are those … people bones?”

Bert gently extricates an object from the dirt and pulling himself back up he perches down beside me. “Not unless they have a beak for a nose,” he says, gently dusting off the dirt and holding it up for me to see.

It was a giant skull. Like a strange giant bird.

“Dragon skull,” says Bert with a satisfied smile.

“Saddle Felicity’s dragon, Finnley, and Saddle Godfrey’s too. Felicity might need a spare. And stop gaping at me!” Elizabeth continued to beam magnanimously at her little treasure, the cleaning lady.

“Godfrey’s been experimenting with his hallucinogenic botanicals again,” she added, lowering her voice. “He probably won’t notice, or else he’ll just think it’s his mind playing tricks on him again.”

“You’ve been wanting to get rid of those dragons ever since we started, haven’t you?” asked Finnley. She didn’t need an answer, she knew it was true.

“You look like the cat who got the cream,” she said to Liz.

Finnley staring at Godfrey in a bemused manner. Dragons? She hated it when characters changed personality mid-story and without warning. It was unsettling. Sidling closer to him she tentatively reached out and poked his arm firmly with her index finger.

“Ouch, dammit Finnley! What are you doing?”

“Testing to see if you are real or if I am hallucinating. Anyway, seems you are real so all good.”

“Oh, there you are, Finnley!” Liz beamed. “I seem to recall I was looking for you but I can’t remember why. Perhaps it was to remind you not to monopolise my thread. You are doing it again, you know.”

Bert:

I just shook my head and carried on digging the new bed for the broad beans. Wasn’t no point in trying to tell her, just let her grumble on. Never bloody satisfied unless they’ve got something to moan about. Women! And granny’s in particular, never satisfied. She wanted the place to herself, that’s what she always said, wanted a rest from all the commotion and noise. So what does she do when she has a nice bit of peace and quiet? Spends the whole bloody time wittering on about how quiet it is.

I’d have enjoyed the chance to get on with me gardening if I didn’t have to listen to Mater going on and on about how quiet it was. I said to her yesterday, “Aint so quiet ‘round here from my perspective, with you going on and on about how blasted quiet it is,” but she just snorted at me and carried on grumbling.

I haven’t told her Idle called to say she was on her way back home. Let her enjoy the sound of her own chuntering a bit longer.

Suddenly Bert saw the funny side. Perhaps it was the early morning sun turning the whitewashed walls gold that lightened his mood. Perhaps it was the birds twittering and fluttering from tree to tree. Perhaps it was the feeling of warmth as the slanting sun bathed his wrinkled brow. But he laughed out loud, for the sheer joy of it all.

“Daft old coot,” muttered Mater, who was watching him from the kitchen window. “What is there to laugh about? Silly old sod.” She turned away from the window with a derisory little sound, but a smile was hovering about her shriveled lips.

Bea ordered a cup of coffee, and twinkled her eyes at the nice looking young waiter. She twinkled out of habit, as it had been a good many months since she had felt twinkly. She wondered, not for the first time, if it was the onset of pre senile dementia, or just a momentary madness. The truth of the matter was, she had no idea what she was doing there, but had a nagging feeling that she was there to do SOMETHING. The word Witless kept popping into her head. Protection of the Witless or something…wandering while whimsically wending ones willowy way…was it about woods? Enchanted woods?

She bit into the doughnut and the custard filling gushed forth, filling her mouth with it’s cool creaminess. Custard. Custard. She stopped chewing, lost in thought, the custard dribbling down her chin unchecked.

Liz was aghast. What had her characters been writing about her now? If there was one thing Elizabeth had learned while unleashing characters into the reality experience, was that there was no such thing as control. You could not expect the expected when it came to characters. It was almost as if they had a mind of their own.

“Not so fast!” she shouted to Felicity who was trying to climb the fence with the help of a sturdy old vine. She glared at Godfrey. “Now look what you’ve started.”

“Oh. how ridiculous!” exclaimed Elizabeth, throwing a transcript at Godfrey.

Deftly catching the paper being tossed in the whirlwind of a forceful exhalation of Liz’s cigarette smoke, he raised an eyebrow but remained silent.

“She had a dream, you see,” continued Liz. “A dream about a writer and her maid. She mentioned it to me because she had one of those funny feelings it was about me, and when she told me, well the first thing I thought about was, well, you know….”

But Godfrey wasn’t listening, he was winking at Finnley who was reading over his shoulder. The maid stifled a giggle.

“So then I said to her,” Elizabeth explained, “‘I wonder what she’s been up to, left to her own devices?” and then she asked him all about it, and that’s what he said. Thrown me for a loop, I must say.”

E: (chuckling) Left to her own devices, she generates considerable intensity in extremes.

A: is this a character that has become a focus?

E: Reverse.

A: So it’s a focus that has become a character…. is there any information on the focus itself that I could offer her to play with that?

E: The focus is a past focus, but a recent past focus…a past focus in the timeframework of the 1940s…

A: in the Americas?

E: This focus travels, but I would express is based in Britain.

A: That makes sense.

E: And in actuality is involved with early computers…with large cables. LARGE cables…

A: [babble babble ohh ahh blah blah] …and she is female?

E: Yes.

“Forget about that!” cried out Roberto who was still looking out the window. “Who is this strange man wearing a hat lurking in the garden?!”

“So many questions and so few answers,” smirked Finnley.

“I recalled a dream last night. One thing led to another, maybe I’ll tell you about that later, but it is connected, so remind me later. Then I was reminded of a story. Then I had a message from someone about a dream about a writer with a maid called Agnes, and she had recalled another story about Brooklyn. And of course, that got me thinking about stories. And story characters! And us!”

At this point in Liz’s monologue she paused and looked meaningfully at Godfrey, Finnley and Roberto. She repressed an urge to slap Roberto, who was gazing out of the window (thinking about mountain tajines no doubt), to get his attention for the meaningful look that she wanted to give him, and cleared her throat loudly instead.

Not a moment later she had to control the urge to slap Finnley, who was just about to make another remark about the length of her sentences.

“I didn’t say a word!” Finnley exclaimed with righteous indignation. “I only thought about it!”

“And I didn’t slap you, did I. I only thought about it too!” retorted Liz.

“Ah, but you’re the one who wrote it down. You’ve gone and done it once you write it down.”

“Don’t be daft,” replied Liz. But she wondered, what if?

“As a matter of fact, I was dancing,” said Finnley with exaggerated politeness. “It is something I do to get back in the flow of the Universe … and counteract negativity.” She looked pointedly at Liz.

“Anyway,” she continued, “allow me read to read a little from the great Prof E P Lemon’s latest offering:

“It’s also like in taiji, you sometimes get into that flow state but for that you need to go past the learning phase, can’t really go around that.”

Finnley looked sympathetically at Liz.

“Perhaps you are still at the taiji learning phase, Liz.”

“How would I learn taiji?” asked Liz humbly. “I can see you are a master, dearest and wise Finnley.”

Finnley looked thoughtful. “Apparently the Prof used to go regularly up a mountain. The air is more taiji up there … maybe you could do that? Don’t worry I will take care of things here,” she said quickly, envisaging the peace and tranquility of a few days without Liz continually haranguing her.

“Take as long as you need to get some taiji,” she added with what she hoped was a kind smile.

CLOVE:

I offered to help Stevie go through her mum’s things expecting her to refuse on the grounds of it being private, but she said, Yes, you do it and I’ll watch, it will be easier that way. Stevie wanted to do it all methodically and start with the drawers, and I said no, that’s silly starting in the least likely place.

So we did it my way, and haphazardly followed random impulses. I’m not sure whether it was successful or not, because Stevie didn’t find what she was looking for (not forgetting that she didn’t know exactly what she was looking for anyway) but we did find something interesting. If I wasn’t going home soon, I’d have sent a message to Corrie right away, but I decided to keep it to myself for a bit, I don’t know why.

The elephant in Sue and John’s bedroom caught my eye, one of those big ceramic Indian ones with a flat saddle to put a spider plant on. It weighed a ton, but we managed to turn it over without making too much of a mess of the spider plant, which we forgot to remove first, and sure enough it had a cavity inside and there were some papers wedged up there.

Stevie got excited and started making squeaky noises and telling me to be careful. I gave her a look, and pulled them out and handed them to her. They weren’t like documents or anything, they were torn up maps with some little bits cut out where the letters of the names of the places were.

“Just a load of old rubbish! It must have been in there when she bought it, I can’t see Mum shoving rubbish up there. How exasperating, I thought we were on to something!”

“Let me have a look at them, Stevie,” I said, slowly reaching out for them. I was starting to have a funny moment, trying to remember.

It took me a minute or two, but I did remember. Although I can’t imagine how it could be connected. But still, it was a bit odd. It reminded me of what we’d found at the Brundy place that day, me and Corrie.

AUNT IDLE:

“Have you seen that daft look on Mater’s face this morning?” I asked Corrie. “Pass the butter. sweetpea.”

“She started going a bit gooey looking last night when she was grilling me about the twins that Clove’s bringing with her when she comes home,” she replied.

“Is she going senile?” I asked.

“She’s no worse than usual, Auntie. She does seem overly interested in those twins, though. I wonder why?”

There is was again, nagging at my brain to remember. The image of Fred standing beside my bed popped into my mind. Suddenly the penny dropped. Surely it couldn’t be!