his cousin Renaud.”
“He gave you away too, huh?”
“Flamberge was fifty three inches long and had a flame blade.”
Andrew noticed he had avoided answering the question about him being given away too.
“I’ve seen those… a wriggly blade.”
The horse shook it head again. “Ay, wriggly.” He sounded pained again.
“Well,” said Andrew, with a huff of breath. “Now what?”
“I do not know, perhaps we will receive another sign?”
“We have to work out how to tie this thing up,” Andrew rewrapped the sword and carried it cradled in his arms. “Maybe I could sling it across my back or something, but it is so long.”
Bayard pushed the stone altar top, back into place.
Andrew faced the altar and felt an urge to say a prayer. He dropped to his knees, with the sword in his arms. “Thank you, for guarding us in our quest,” he said simply.
Bayard looked astonished.
They stared to walk out in silence together, when a beam of light came through the window and shone on the base of the supporting pillar nearest to them.
“Bayard! Is that a sign?”
Bayard looked where Andrew was pointing.
“It looks like some kind of flower… is it a tulip?”
“Oriande la Fée,” Bayard was reverential.
“It’s her sign? She wants this?”
“It makes sense,” said the horse.
“Wait a sec… she’s still alive?”
“She is fae,” said the horse simply.
“Oh right, immortal.”
Andrew uttered a heavy sigh. “Where does she live… tell me it is not miles away?”
“Touch the sign,” the horse instructed.
Andrew brushed his left hand down the pillar and it felt as if he was brushing through something that clung to his skin, like warm treacle. “What the…?” he asked.
“Magic,” said the horse. “You shall have need of it to open the door to her sithen.”
The curtain moved again in the breeze. “Can I use that, to tie the sword?” asked Andrew.
The horse reached up to his full height, held the material in his teeth and pulled the gauzy curtain from the top. It ripped off in a long sheet. Andrew twisted it and tied the ends around the pommel and the tip and across his chest. It made a long strap that allowed him to hold the sword against his back. He climbed back onto the horse and they walked slowly away from the ruined church.
“Luckily, she is not far from here. Her abode lies near Dunfanaghy or Dún Fionnachaidh, the fort of the fair-haired warrior, in Gaelic,” said Bayard.
“She’s fair haired isn’t she?” guessed Andrew.
“Ay.”
“So did she need Maugris to come to her aid against that guy who attacked her?”
The horse made a movement Andrew thought might have been a shrug. “She has lived long on her own wits,” he finally said.
“I am freezing… do you reckon we could get there before full dark?”
“Tis naught but twenty miles.”
Dunfanaghy turned out be a seaside village of about a thousand people. They passed through it after getting another coffee for Andrew, and walked the last two kilometres to Largatreany.
Bayard finally came to a halt in the courtyard of yet another church.
“At least this one is occupied,” said Andrew.
“Tis a cloister; a physical barrier between the world of prayer and the world outside.”
A cat sat on the ground beside a chair. A bird twittered in the late afternoon sun from the cage hung on the wall.
“Mo chara,” said Andrew but nothing happened.
Bayard snorted. “Wrong magic,” he said. “This is fae.”
“Oh, yeah. I knew that.”
Andrew stepped up and knocked on the green door with his left hand. As he did so, he felt the treacle magic slide off onto the door. It swung open and at the same time grew large enough to allow the horse entry. The cat watched them with interest.
“The sithen,” said Bayard. “I warn you, do not believe the truth of thine eyes.”
“What?” said Andrew.
“Fool,” said the horse.
“At least it’s warmer in here.” Andrew looked around. The hallway was lit by an ethereal glow that seemed to come from the very walls themselves. The door closed behind them and promptly disappeared. The lights darkened on one side and they turned towards the other lights. It seemed to shepherd them down the hall. They obeyed; they had little choice.
They stopped at some tall doors. They were a deep red colour and seemed warm to the touch. Andrew looked at Bayard who made his equine shrug again. Andrew pushed against the door with his left hand and it swung open.
A woman waited for them. She had long blonde hair, some braided into a plait that had been wrapped across the top of her head in an intricate pattern. She wore a full length cream gown, with long sleeves and a simple gold braid tied loosely around her waist. She looked the very picture of a mediaeval romance fairy. Maybe she was the model for all those illustrations. She sat on a throne, elevated a little, perhaps three steps up from the rest of the room. The room itself was vast but appeared vacant.
The horse bowed and Andrew followed suit.
“Madame,” said Bayard.
“Greetings, my knights errant,” she said. Her voice was beautiful.
Andrew frowned at the errant bit.
“It means roving or wandering in this instance,” whispered Bayard. “Not sinful.”
“Okay,” Andrew whispered.
“Bayard, thou must introduce me,” she breathed, as she studied Andrew.
Andrew shivered. He felt as if her voice had brushed across his skin.
“May I present, Andrew Maugris…Descendant of Maugris.”
“Really?” she sounded genuinely surprised. “Goodness, when did that happen?”
Andrew supposed it might be awkward to meet the descendant of your lover, even if it was centuries ago. He wasn’t sure whether he wanted to remind her of her old lover, or not; women this beautiful usually scared him into silence. He liked his women a little feistier.
“Thou hast completed thy quest?” she asked.
“We have the blade Durendal.”
“Might I have it?”
Andrew slipped the tie from his shoulders and approached the throne. He felt he ought to kneel and he held the blade flat in front of him with both hands. He had unwittingly chosen the exact right way to pass it to her. She smiled but his head was lowered and he didn’t see it. Bayard frowned. She lifted her hand and almost touched him on the head.
She took the sword from his hands. Andrew backed away to stand next to his equine companion. She unwrapped the cloth a little, as if to check they had given her the real sword and had not swapped it out. Andrew thought that was smart of her.
“So, Bayard,” she asked, “where hast thee been?”
He looked confused; shifted on his feet, as if her small talk worried him. “In the forest Madame, playing.” He sounded surprised that he had actually admitted that to her.
“For eight hundred years?” she asked. One of her exquisite brows curved “That be a lot of horse play,” she said.
Andrew snorted and decided that he really liked her.
She gave him a more assessing glance now. Andrew lifted his chin against the weight of her gaze. He looked straight into her eyes.
“Thou mayst go, Bayard,” she said. She had not taken her eyes off Andrew, nor he from her.
Bayard cleared his throat.
“Yes?” she asked.
“May I speak with my companion for a moment?”
She blinked. “Of course.” She waved a hand airily at Andrew.
Andrew turned slowly to look at the horse. “You look worried,” he said.
“Are you sure this is what thee desires?” He lifted his head in the direction of the fairy queen.
“Yes, perhaps Galahad was an ancest
or of mine too.”
“Galahad?” queried the horse.
“He wanted to find the Grail, but he didn’t want to go home again.” He rolled his eyes at the look the horse gave him. “I read… occasionally,” he blustered.
“I will have need of someone to wield the sword,” the fairy queen interjected.
“He is no good with a blade. I fear he is as his namesake,” Bayard pointed out to her.
“Really?” she sounded a little disappointed. She tilted her head to the side and studied him again. Andrew sucked his stomach in and wished he had indulged in less Christmas spirits. “I am sure he hath other skills,” she said in a low voice, as she looked him up and down.
The horse made a resigned noise. “I tried,” he said. “Farewell, Andrew. May you live long with the fairy queen.”
“He will not age as long as he chooseth to abide here,” she stated.
“Wow,” said Andrew. “I didn’t know that. Is there anything else I should know? It’s not always this empty, is it? You must get lonely.”
“They are veiled,” she said.
“Like the buildings were,” he suggested.
They were moving slowly towards each other like magnets.
“They will appear when I giveth them permission.”
“Because you are the queen.”
“Yes,” she said.
She was right in front of him now.
“I wilt see myself out,” said Bayard, as if he knew no one was taking any notice of him.
“Say ‘yes’,” she said to Andrew.
“Oh, …yes,” he said.
She took his face in her hands and she kissed him on the lips.
“Yule tidings to thee, Andrew,” she said.
“Happy Christmas,” said Andrew.
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About the Author
I feel I should be witty and informative about how many children and household pets I have. But really, the chickens lay eggs and I am yet to see what use the teenagers are. They eat the eggs, I suppose. I love writing. I also read a lot and