Chapter 15

There was a sound in Flora's ears as she stood on the narrow pavement outside the bookshop. As she had her eyes shut it didn't register what the noise was at first, until she looked up and saw a huge black horse staring down at her. There stood Fury with Cal on his back and Finn running up behind. She took it all in quietly before putting her hands to her face and bursting into tears.

‘Well, this is new. I don't usually have such an extreme effect on people, especially as I haven't yet said a word.'

Cal waited calmly for an answer and Flora's tears stopped almost immediately. She wasn't prone to emotional outbursts but she still felt embarrassed. Today seemed a day of non-stop tears from her and Jen.

‘It's not you and they're happy tears. Or at least tears of relief.'

‘Glad to hear it. I was on my way to see you again to ask if you wanted to come for lunch and have a roam around the moors. To see if you can find the stones you sheltered under? I'm guessing this isn't a good time?'

Flora stroked Fury's muzzle whilst stroking the top of Finn's head at the same time.

‘You know what? I think this is the perfect time.'

‘So it takes your mind off other things?

‘Exactly,'

‘That's all right. I don't mind being used as an emotional support.'

‘Good. I don't mind being used as a moorland guide either.'

They laughed easily together and after Cal dismounted, all four of them walked up towards the lane opposite the inn. They reached the end of the lane and viewed moorland as far as they could see, with no sign of Cal's farmhouse or of the mysterious disappearing stones.

‘If you were a gentleman, you'd let me ride on Fury's back to the farmhouse' she teased.

‘It's because I'm a gentleman that I won't. He won't have anyone on his back but me and he's prone to throwing people off. Especially me when I first rescued him.'

‘I think I'll be okay. I know stroking him isn't the same as being in the saddle but…' she tailed off. ‘You rescued him?'

‘Yes, when I came here. Finn was rescued too, six weeks before that. I still think we chose each other. They had both been badly treated and the rehoming centres thought that a farmhouse in the middle of nowhere was the perfect home for two such nervous animals.'

‘You've done a good job with them.' Flora told him with genuine warmth. ‘If you can bring them amongst villagers like you did today. You've made good progress at socialising them.'

‘There's still a long way to go' he said, gratefully receiving the compliment. ‘For instance, young slender women wouldn't be able to keep control of Fury.'

Flora didn't say anything but her eyes pleaded with him.

‘On your own head be it' Cal sighed, giving in, ‘and I hope that doesn't turn out to be physically true.'

Flora gently talked to the stallion as Cal shortened the stirrups. She took her time getting hold of the reins, letting him get used to her touch on the withers. Then slowly carefully, she hoisted herself up using Cal's hand as a mounting step and sat still and quiet. talking to him all the time. He danced about from side to side for a minute but only gently, more as a token rebellion. Eventually, she squeezed his sides almost imperceptibly while keeping a firm hand on the reins and let him walk forward at his own pace. He seemed perfectly happy. She chanced a smug smile in Cal's direction. He shook his head.

‘I'm speechless' he said.

‘So am I. I haven't been horse riding since I left school and it's a long, long way up here.'

‘Serves you right' Cal grinned

They walked on in companionable silence for a few minutes and then he asked about her uncharacteristic show of tears and why it had happened. After her explanation during which he kept silent, he was astounded.

‘You move here not knowing that you're properly related to anyone. Only to find out that you have an aunt living almost next door and a great couple of times aunt who left you the family cottage - and are related to most of the earlier inhabitants. too? I'm glad you've made up with the virago at the bookshop. I'm sorry you never met Sybil again by the way.

‘ I think you'll find she is no longer a virago. And thank you. Did you know Sybil?'

‘We crossed paths quite a few times. Put it this way, if you thought Jen Cayley was a prickly customer then it's maybe as well you didn't meet Sybil. At least in her later years.'

‘That doesn't sound like her. Did you rub her up the wrong way?'

Cal put his head down.

‘May have done' he muttered.

‘Ha' said Flora with relish.

‘Only because I wanted to write about the Witches of Farstone and she point blank refused even though she knew I was sympathetic to the Old Ways. She used to say "You won't understand so I'll save myself the bother". For heaven's sake. It's what I do for a living. You can't write successful books unless you understand your subject.'

He watched Flora laugh as she thought of her Aunt Sybil giving him the cold shoulder and a thought suddenly occurred to him.

‘Although now you are a Gardwicke instead of a Goode and your ancestry is the same one that preceded Sybil through the centuries, perhaps you could help?'

He looked up at her with a puppy dog expression, no doubt learnt from Finn.

‘I don't know anything about my ancestry' she said, being economical with the truth. She suddenly grinned. ‘Anyway, you wouldn't understand so I'll save myself the bother.'

*

Cal had called at the farmhouse and collected a picnic he had prepared. He had left Fury happily turned out in the paddock behind the barn but Finn had accompanied them up onto the moor above the farmhouse. They had wandered the moor around that area, up and down hills with Flora turning back to try and view the farmhouse at every point. There was nothing to see. They had walked every inch of the moor where it was still possible to view Cal's home and there was nothing.

Flora was beginning to believe she had imagined the whole thing - but how could she have? The stones had kept most of the deluge of rain from her. It had given her shelter, respite against the storm. Without it, she may not have survived. So where was it?

Frustrated, both she and Cal gave up their fruitless search and settled down near a spring which tumbled over limestone and disappeared underground. Cal put the basket on the ground and Flora helped herself to sandwiches, chicken legs, apples and tea from a flask. They sat in silence until Flora ventured an opinion.

‘This is completely weird. What the hell is going on? I can remember exactly the position I was in when I saw the light from your farmhouse. It was sort of in a diagonal line from here. I remember finding the stones almost as if they had just appeared there. I didn't think about it. I was just so happy to find somewhere to shelter. I thought I was going to die before that.'

Cal smiled and shook his head.

‘You're not going crazy. I honestly believe you may have seen the Faegate or the Faestone.

‘The one that Farstone is named after?' interrupted Flora. ‘Well, if it's named after it, it must exist. It must be around here somewhere. Below a bluff? Hiding in a little valley?'

‘Was it hiding when you saw it?'

‘No, it was just on - or perhaps just below - the crest of a hill which looked down on your farmhouse?'

Cal frowned.

‘ Describe it' he said.

‘Like I said, it was - what did I call it before? A dolmen? There were two upright stones with a large flat stone propped across them. A capstone? There was a short tunnel formed by the stones, going through it.'

He looked up.

‘Tunnel? Not a chamber going underground?'

‘Like a burial chamber, you mean? No, it was dark but I could see what looked like a stormy sky through it at the other end or, maybe more like a whirlwind twisting round, moving the air.'

She reflected on this, unaware of how still Cal had become. She hadn't really thought about it before - but now she remembered the feeling she had when she looked into that dark maelstrom.

‘I didn't want to go further on through the passage the stones made, even though it might have given me more protection from the rain if I had. I just felt I should stay where I was on the edge of the shelter. Weird...' she mused, her brows lowered.

After a few seconds, she became aware of Cal's silence. She raised her head towards him. His black eyes pierced hers.

‘You didn't want to go any further because you had found the Faery portal into their world. That is what the Faestone is. Your remarkable instincts stopped you from going through the portal to risk being lost forever in their world.'

Flora stared back at him in disbelief. It was all she could do not to burst out laughing.

‘Surely you can't believe that? You sound like the Storyteller at the inn. It's just one of your folklore stories. A tale from long ago when things like that seemed real to people because they didn't know any better.'

Cal was angry. His mouth was set and his jaw twitched.

‘ And you think we know better now, do you? You think that science and technology can explain everything, do you? That the new ways are best and the old ways were the product of ignorant people who knew no better?'

He spat these last words out.

‘Oh, come on.' Flora could feel her temper rising too. ‘Surely you can't believe the stones were a portal into another world, peopled by beings we cannot confirm the existence of?'

‘Confirm the existence of? Why do things always have to be proved? Can't you have a little faith? That is what the modern world has done to us - wanting proof for everything and even when they have that proof, not believing it. The world has lost touch with what it once was and we are so much the poorer for it. If you want proof of the existence of this portal then you will have to find it first. And as you have searched the moor where you swore it was, we have another dilemma, don't we? Because if it isn't where you said it was, did it exist? Did you make it up? And if you were telling me the truth about this place that doesn't exist… then I will have to take my own leap of faith to believe you, won't I?'

He unclenched his fists and rubbed his face hard with both hands. He went on speaking more quietly.

‘The Faestone is very rarely seen. It is seen only when it is needed and only to certain people. It may have existed here on the moors for eternity, but for all but the chosen few, it remains invisible. Unfortunately, I don't seem to be one of the chosen few.'

Flora couldn't trust herself to say anything. From wanting to make fun of his theory, there was something in him now that made her believe him. What he said, had started to make sense to her. Was this place making her crazy? Had she been wrong to move here? Yet -where were the stones? How could she deny their existence when she had seen them, felt them, sheltered inside them?

‘I'm sorry, I don't know where it is but it did exist, I know that so…'

She tailed off. It was all she could offer. The way the day had turned out meant an end to the pleasantries. Cal shoved the remains of the picnic back in the basket and they made their way, in silence, back in the direction of the farmhouse. Neither one wanted to make things any worse by referring to their conversation, but neither could they force any small talk from themselves.

As they reached the farmhouse, Flora managed a, ‘Thank you for the picnic'. Cal managed. ‘Will you be okay walking back?' and that was it. As Flora set off at a rapid pace towards the village she turned back. Cal was nowhere to be seen but Finn stood there looking straight in her direction with the saddest expression on his face, before disappearing from sight.

Flora wanted to cry for the third time that day. She just needed to get home to Gallipot Cottage, attack a bottle of wine with intent and put the whole strange day behind her. When she opened the door she found a letter on the doormat, addressed to her in Sybil's hand. Peggy hadn't waited, she had posted it through already.

Flora squeezed her eyes shut and let a shuddering sigh escape. Would this make things better - or a whole lot worse?