04-27-2022, 08:34 PM
Maybe resilience is a special magic all of its own and those who frown at a situation for selfish reasons can change the nature of their
quandaries by their stubbornness to tolerate what life throws at them. Whatever the possible web of confluences, Stanley Dawes and
Peggy Powler opened a sleepy eye and smirked from their respective style of beds that the rainstorm had buggered-off.
For the little bare-assed Witch, a female Blackbird clucked its indignation of an intruder residing in its potential nesting place. For
the man slouched across his table with the mouth tasting like such a bird had defecated in it, Jimmy Dougie was grunting in pain as
he tried to sit up. "I'm sorry Master Dawes..." the ginger-haired teenager croaked in his endeavours, "...I was sure Diabolus had
settled and was up for a run". Stanley nodded vaguely and went to make some breakfast, he'd unintentionally fallen asleep where
he'd been sat and now Jimmy thought his boss had stood vigil over him during his own painful slumber.
"Aye, well can kiss the race goodbye and that monster can be fed to the dogs for all I care" the dishevelled livery owner growled as
he disappeared into the kitchen. The day would took some time in drying out, but the rumbling storm inside Stanley Dawes would
take longer to dissipate.
...................................................
"Though thee snorts at me-talent, Ah'll still thank yer' fur the much-needed brew" Peggy said over the mug of hot chicory towards the
aloof-looking Doctor of Dibbleswith. There was one slice of buttered-bread left on her plate and she felt it would be good manners
to leave it that way, be that as she was still the last Witch of Underhill, Peggy knew she was also an ambassador for her trade.
The village was as quaint as many the sorceress had passed through and even though most of its residents were still beneath their
covers, she'd been surprised to see that the community's practitioner of the body was up and taking in the quietness of the hour.
Peggy's flabber was gasted further when the Doctor had invited her onto his small garden to take breakfast with him, a mild beseech
that caused the puzzled Witch to forget to check the garden entrance for twisted sixpences or knots of horse-hair.
Such appeals were not regular occurrences for a resident healer of the body, yet Peggy believed the tall wiry-man in the tiny spectacles
wanted to seem gracious enough to appreciate a fellow-proctor of well-being. The truth was -and the cherubic-looking necromancer
knew it, that Doctor Higgins needed a favour from the little woman in the grubby poncho.
Theodore -for he felt this hour of the morning was not a time for titles, nodded and sipped at his own beverage, the birds were twittering
over their own type of sustenance in the privet hedge he'd grown himself and the bright sunshine seemed to be drying his self-sown lawn.
"I'm hoping last night's alluvion will be the last of the year" he replied absently and resisted the urge to check out a possible face-full of
confusion from the rustic woman who didn't mind showing some thigh.
The diminutive Witch swinging those shapely limbs back and forth in contentment from the high garden seat followed the Doctor's gaze
and agreed with "Aye, it was a frog-striper all-reet". Wiping her mouth with back of her hand, Peggy smiled inwardly at the slight flinch
of Higgins' eyelids.
The victual-orientated discussions of the feathered visitors to the Doctor's garden became the only pleasant sounds as the pair waited
for what was to come and Peggy pondered on whether to offer her leave as a prompt to the pinch-faced man's want. Placing her empty
pot down at the same time as Higgins on the wooden table, she knew that time had arrived. "Miss Powler...?" Theodore began in a weak
tone and quickly cleared his throat, "...I've heard that at times, you have a way of solving certain points of the compass where those like
myself sometimes struggle to make headwind"
Peggy halted her climb-down from the weathered outdoor chair and cocked her head in a way that offered mild-interest. "Whey Sir,
some say things that Ah' cannot reach is te' me-stature bein' how it is" she joked and turned her body back to show she was willing
to hear him out. A blackbird struck-up its territorial warble and the grass continued to grow as Doctor Higgins glanced towards the
bedroom window of his orderly-kept cottage.
"It's in regards of my wife and I..." Theodore whispered as he leaned forward to the attentive Witch who didn't wear shoes.
...................................................
Stanley Dawes stared about at the area of the Gallops where Diabolus had unseated his rider and struggled to find something to
take his anger out on. Pip Farnby stood beside his boss and watched him survey the clumps of woodland near where the horses
took their workouts, the smaller young man with hair that matched Dawes' tangled mane waited for Mr Dawes' annoyance to land
on him again.
"It might have been a dead branch that come down and scared the horse... maybe a crow or something nesting in there flew out"
Stanley mused out-loud and rasped the stubble on his chin. Pip shrugged and kept his mouth shut, the stable-owner's suggestion
could mean hard work to remove the copse of tall alders and thickly-packed shrubbery. With Jimmy out of the picture for a while,
the labour would be doubly difficult.
Stanley sighed softly and turned to go back to the stables, Pip emulated the move and wondered why the grouchy man just didn't
accept that Diabolus was a bad horse, 'a wrong-un' as his Pa would say when he was alive. The other horses would would watch
for curiosity-sake as he and Farra would muck-out the stables and wash down the yard, but Diabolus... that damned-thing watched
for different reasons and Pip knew it was looking for a chance to dispatch a swift kick or bruising bite to a daydreaming ostler.
"I think we'll have that thicket out and get some grass in there" Stanley murmured as he climbed over the fence where the paddock
waited and clambering after his employer, the lad who'd taken the position four years ago sighed softly and wondered what Farra
would say.
...................................................
The bacon bun provided by the never-seen spouse of Dibbleswith's only physician was a grand gift to send Peggy on her way and
touching her nose to ensure the waving Doctor's secret was safe with the wandering thaumaturge, she gently closed the garden gate
as she set off to see what was around the corner.
The driver of a passing jolt-wagon doffed his cap at the little Witch and wished her fair travels as she made her way along a puddled
lane away from the village. This wasn't by accident, Peggy was enjoying her solitude and happy to find a track that didn't require her
special kind of help. It seemed more and more, the Fae in her was calling out to slip into the undergrowth and leave the world of the
humans. Every shadow under a bush caught her eye and seemingly-impenetrable thickets drew her attention, a prerequisite of the
Good-Folk.
Sitting down on a grassy bank beneath a creaking oak, Peggy took a sip of water from her canteen and surveyed the neatly-fenced
trail that lay ahead. An overgrown mound sat across from her beside a stagnant pool of fanwort and water-lilies and as dragonflies
hovered in their dragnet for their own kind of food, the little Witch became enchanted with the little scene of wilderness squatting in
a world of man-made conformity and structure.
Juggling with whether to scoff her bacon delight before setting off again, the sorceress concluded this was horse country by the
clipped-grass fields and the organised manner of the railings. For a moment, she thought she heard distant voices, but enjoying her
perch and the vista of nature again after being with the humans, Peggy chewed on her sandwich and continued to follow the aerial
dance of the flitting Devil's Darning-Needles.
As the lofty branches of the great tree spoke again, the solitary woman in the big hat carefully folded the remains of the hoagie back
into the wax-paper it had been packed in and agreed that these few moments were the real magic she enjoyed. The land she knew
so well was changing and there may be a time when the likes of Peggy Powler were no longer needed, but when that juncture arrived,
she'd secretly welcome it and slip away into a world not dissimilar to the disorderly thicket she was currently admiring.
"Help us..." a large clump of wild garlic said softly and rising to her feet, Peggy stared towards the dense pungent cluster of blooming
Ramsoms that resided beside the water. "...Help us please, Shaman" the voice came again and the peering Witch absently stowed
away her half-eaten meal noticed two small eyes blinking below a large shadowy leaf.
He was a Sprite child, a tiny being with a look on its face of someone who's worries could not be ignored by a fellow-Fae. Long curls
from his shoes jutted out from beneath his bent knees and a similar-shaped hat hung from the frightened Sprite-boy's hand. Daring
to step into the daylight, Peggy could see the little creature had nut-brown hair that hung either side of his pointed ears as he scoured
the sky for any passing predator.
"Will you'll be the Witch of Underhill, Miss?" the wee figure asked and brought the curly-whirly hat in front of him and fingered its
short brim nervously. The Sprite's face showed he was still frightened at being out in the open, Peggy guessed his interaction with
herself didn't help with the terror he was feeling either.
"Aye, me-name is Peggy Powler who Ah'm a' talkin' to, young fella?" she asked as softly as she could, the necromancer gazing at
the reclusive being knew that the average human's voice was always too loud for them to bear. With a sight bow of the head, the
Sprite introduced himself. "My name is Pommer and my people are in grave danger, Miss Powler. We need your help" Pommer
replied and scanned the lane between them for any oncoming intruder to their chin-wag.
Removing her own hat, Peggy leaned forward just as Doctor Higgins had and whispered "then tell me how Ah' can help".
quandaries by their stubbornness to tolerate what life throws at them. Whatever the possible web of confluences, Stanley Dawes and
Peggy Powler opened a sleepy eye and smirked from their respective style of beds that the rainstorm had buggered-off.
For the little bare-assed Witch, a female Blackbird clucked its indignation of an intruder residing in its potential nesting place. For
the man slouched across his table with the mouth tasting like such a bird had defecated in it, Jimmy Dougie was grunting in pain as
he tried to sit up. "I'm sorry Master Dawes..." the ginger-haired teenager croaked in his endeavours, "...I was sure Diabolus had
settled and was up for a run". Stanley nodded vaguely and went to make some breakfast, he'd unintentionally fallen asleep where
he'd been sat and now Jimmy thought his boss had stood vigil over him during his own painful slumber.
"Aye, well can kiss the race goodbye and that monster can be fed to the dogs for all I care" the dishevelled livery owner growled as
he disappeared into the kitchen. The day would took some time in drying out, but the rumbling storm inside Stanley Dawes would
take longer to dissipate.
...................................................
"Though thee snorts at me-talent, Ah'll still thank yer' fur the much-needed brew" Peggy said over the mug of hot chicory towards the
aloof-looking Doctor of Dibbleswith. There was one slice of buttered-bread left on her plate and she felt it would be good manners
to leave it that way, be that as she was still the last Witch of Underhill, Peggy knew she was also an ambassador for her trade.
The village was as quaint as many the sorceress had passed through and even though most of its residents were still beneath their
covers, she'd been surprised to see that the community's practitioner of the body was up and taking in the quietness of the hour.
Peggy's flabber was gasted further when the Doctor had invited her onto his small garden to take breakfast with him, a mild beseech
that caused the puzzled Witch to forget to check the garden entrance for twisted sixpences or knots of horse-hair.
Such appeals were not regular occurrences for a resident healer of the body, yet Peggy believed the tall wiry-man in the tiny spectacles
wanted to seem gracious enough to appreciate a fellow-proctor of well-being. The truth was -and the cherubic-looking necromancer
knew it, that Doctor Higgins needed a favour from the little woman in the grubby poncho.
Theodore -for he felt this hour of the morning was not a time for titles, nodded and sipped at his own beverage, the birds were twittering
over their own type of sustenance in the privet hedge he'd grown himself and the bright sunshine seemed to be drying his self-sown lawn.
"I'm hoping last night's alluvion will be the last of the year" he replied absently and resisted the urge to check out a possible face-full of
confusion from the rustic woman who didn't mind showing some thigh.
The diminutive Witch swinging those shapely limbs back and forth in contentment from the high garden seat followed the Doctor's gaze
and agreed with "Aye, it was a frog-striper all-reet". Wiping her mouth with back of her hand, Peggy smiled inwardly at the slight flinch
of Higgins' eyelids.
The victual-orientated discussions of the feathered visitors to the Doctor's garden became the only pleasant sounds as the pair waited
for what was to come and Peggy pondered on whether to offer her leave as a prompt to the pinch-faced man's want. Placing her empty
pot down at the same time as Higgins on the wooden table, she knew that time had arrived. "Miss Powler...?" Theodore began in a weak
tone and quickly cleared his throat, "...I've heard that at times, you have a way of solving certain points of the compass where those like
myself sometimes struggle to make headwind"
Peggy halted her climb-down from the weathered outdoor chair and cocked her head in a way that offered mild-interest. "Whey Sir,
some say things that Ah' cannot reach is te' me-stature bein' how it is" she joked and turned her body back to show she was willing
to hear him out. A blackbird struck-up its territorial warble and the grass continued to grow as Doctor Higgins glanced towards the
bedroom window of his orderly-kept cottage.
"It's in regards of my wife and I..." Theodore whispered as he leaned forward to the attentive Witch who didn't wear shoes.
...................................................
Stanley Dawes stared about at the area of the Gallops where Diabolus had unseated his rider and struggled to find something to
take his anger out on. Pip Farnby stood beside his boss and watched him survey the clumps of woodland near where the horses
took their workouts, the smaller young man with hair that matched Dawes' tangled mane waited for Mr Dawes' annoyance to land
on him again.
"It might have been a dead branch that come down and scared the horse... maybe a crow or something nesting in there flew out"
Stanley mused out-loud and rasped the stubble on his chin. Pip shrugged and kept his mouth shut, the stable-owner's suggestion
could mean hard work to remove the copse of tall alders and thickly-packed shrubbery. With Jimmy out of the picture for a while,
the labour would be doubly difficult.
Stanley sighed softly and turned to go back to the stables, Pip emulated the move and wondered why the grouchy man just didn't
accept that Diabolus was a bad horse, 'a wrong-un' as his Pa would say when he was alive. The other horses would would watch
for curiosity-sake as he and Farra would muck-out the stables and wash down the yard, but Diabolus... that damned-thing watched
for different reasons and Pip knew it was looking for a chance to dispatch a swift kick or bruising bite to a daydreaming ostler.
"I think we'll have that thicket out and get some grass in there" Stanley murmured as he climbed over the fence where the paddock
waited and clambering after his employer, the lad who'd taken the position four years ago sighed softly and wondered what Farra
would say.
...................................................
The bacon bun provided by the never-seen spouse of Dibbleswith's only physician was a grand gift to send Peggy on her way and
touching her nose to ensure the waving Doctor's secret was safe with the wandering thaumaturge, she gently closed the garden gate
as she set off to see what was around the corner.
The driver of a passing jolt-wagon doffed his cap at the little Witch and wished her fair travels as she made her way along a puddled
lane away from the village. This wasn't by accident, Peggy was enjoying her solitude and happy to find a track that didn't require her
special kind of help. It seemed more and more, the Fae in her was calling out to slip into the undergrowth and leave the world of the
humans. Every shadow under a bush caught her eye and seemingly-impenetrable thickets drew her attention, a prerequisite of the
Good-Folk.
Sitting down on a grassy bank beneath a creaking oak, Peggy took a sip of water from her canteen and surveyed the neatly-fenced
trail that lay ahead. An overgrown mound sat across from her beside a stagnant pool of fanwort and water-lilies and as dragonflies
hovered in their dragnet for their own kind of food, the little Witch became enchanted with the little scene of wilderness squatting in
a world of man-made conformity and structure.
Juggling with whether to scoff her bacon delight before setting off again, the sorceress concluded this was horse country by the
clipped-grass fields and the organised manner of the railings. For a moment, she thought she heard distant voices, but enjoying her
perch and the vista of nature again after being with the humans, Peggy chewed on her sandwich and continued to follow the aerial
dance of the flitting Devil's Darning-Needles.
As the lofty branches of the great tree spoke again, the solitary woman in the big hat carefully folded the remains of the hoagie back
into the wax-paper it had been packed in and agreed that these few moments were the real magic she enjoyed. The land she knew
so well was changing and there may be a time when the likes of Peggy Powler were no longer needed, but when that juncture arrived,
she'd secretly welcome it and slip away into a world not dissimilar to the disorderly thicket she was currently admiring.
"Help us..." a large clump of wild garlic said softly and rising to her feet, Peggy stared towards the dense pungent cluster of blooming
Ramsoms that resided beside the water. "...Help us please, Shaman" the voice came again and the peering Witch absently stowed
away her half-eaten meal noticed two small eyes blinking below a large shadowy leaf.
He was a Sprite child, a tiny being with a look on its face of someone who's worries could not be ignored by a fellow-Fae. Long curls
from his shoes jutted out from beneath his bent knees and a similar-shaped hat hung from the frightened Sprite-boy's hand. Daring
to step into the daylight, Peggy could see the little creature had nut-brown hair that hung either side of his pointed ears as he scoured
the sky for any passing predator.
"Will you'll be the Witch of Underhill, Miss?" the wee figure asked and brought the curly-whirly hat in front of him and fingered its
short brim nervously. The Sprite's face showed he was still frightened at being out in the open, Peggy guessed his interaction with
herself didn't help with the terror he was feeling either.
"Aye, me-name is Peggy Powler who Ah'm a' talkin' to, young fella?" she asked as softly as she could, the necromancer gazing at
the reclusive being knew that the average human's voice was always too loud for them to bear. With a sight bow of the head, the
Sprite introduced himself. "My name is Pommer and my people are in grave danger, Miss Powler. We need your help" Pommer
replied and scanned the lane between them for any oncoming intruder to their chin-wag.
Removing her own hat, Peggy leaned forward just as Doctor Higgins had and whispered "then tell me how Ah' can help".
Edith Head Gives Good Wardrobe.