Peggy Powler & The Gretna Grindylow Encounter

[BIAD]

Sitting under the creaking giant elm tree where Calder's Way turned west to follow the coastline, Peggy Powler waited-out the rain
that found her walking towards the village of Seamarshes. The last few days had been hectic, what with searching for the young girl
that had been stolen from her mother in Hartford Knot and convincing the Scratter that had taken him to mend his ways.

Now musing on her week at the farming community, the Last Witch of Underhill felt that she deserved a couple of days away from
the policing of creatures not commonly found around the agricultural backwoods. The occasional tap of a solitary raindrop on her
wide-brimmed hat failed to dissuade half-Fae necromancer to change her position of waiting or her wish to peramubulate on what
she'd suggested to the adolescent Woodwose.

Tugging the hem of her poncho down over her thighs and absently gazing at the water-spattered sea stones of the fabled highway,
Peggy weighed the possible repercussions of interactions with the maverick youngster of the Fern People. These rarely-seen 'Folk
O' The Wood' were traditionally seen as elusive beings that kept themselves to themselves and only ever interacted with humans
on a barter level.

During a bad winter, a farmer might find his buckets already filled with milk from his stabled cows or discover his two-wheeled wane
creaking under the weight of collected cabbages from a frost-hardened field. Peggy had even heard of weather-damaged thatched
rooves being mysteriously repaired during the night without any of the family inside being aware of any overhead savior plugging the
holes in their shelter. Fern Folk gave their toil and for a few sips of milk, a handful of eggs or a couple of Brassica, they knew the trade
would assure a mutual distance would be kept in better climes between the shy people of the forests and those who broke the soil for
a living.

The moniker 'Scratter' simply came from the older women of certain rural colonies - toothless biddies that dabbled in the art of herbal
medicines and half-grasped rituals of majick. Peggy felt no animus towards these venerable men-less old buggers, they were simply
trying to show that they still had a place in a community and at the very least, were holding onto an accepted way of life that the new
religion ambiguously frowned upon.

The title for the young woods-being reflected the bodily scratching a group-ousted juvenile would perform due to a lack of grooming
that Fern People used to bond as a society. In the human social order, to 'scrat' means to ease a individual itch. In the woodland culture,
mites and ticks were dealt with in a duel purpose of melding trust within their tribe. If there's nobody to relieve one's annoying parasitic  
problems, one becomes a Scratter.

As the rain slightly eased and the little Witch peeked out from the heavy foliage that had kept most of a soaking away, Peggy wondered
if the hairy naked rogue creature had done as advised and virtuously sought out a partner for family purposes. Fern People were a dying
race and as the forests were annually making way for agriculture, the reasons were obvious. Stepping onto the already-drying surface of
Calder's Way, the bantam sorceress sighed at the inescapable truth that if the level of the agronomy kept up, a unique astute and gentle
species would be gone for good.
.................................................................

Seamarshes could be described as a close-cousin to Wyrmhaven, one of Peggy Powler's favourite haunts. There's a stream that defies
all the odds of becoming a river and unpretentiously sets off from the high moors in the Henge-Tarn district, trickles down past the towns
and hamlets that utilise its small power of feeding the surrounding soils and eventually empties itself into the Great Sea via a half-league
-wide glacial-created cleft in the land. This courageous creek also provides nourishment from its long arable-passage for a huge bed of
brackish-water reeds that surrounds the small fishing community known as Seamarshes. Maybe the clue is in the name.

It was said that for a brief period, Pesh was extracted from quarried shale in the crevice and used as a mordant to improve the strength
and permanency of colour when dying cloth, but the mining had stopped some time ago for reasons that Peggy had never really enquired
about and Seamarshes continued on its simplistic path of fishing for a way of an economy. Luckily for the thirty-or-so families living in the
tightly-knit community, there is a particular type of fish called a Nosy-Gulper that enjoys the safety in the waters of the marshes and this
slow-moving melon-shaped inquisitive creature is deemed a delicious fare and quite an expensive gourmet food.

Ambling down the wheel-rutted lane that spurred off Calder's Way, Peggy Powler could see a late-summer haze reclining on the calm
surface of the Great Sea and the huddled white-daubed cottages of Seamarshes sat like eggs in a reed-adorned nest of some giant bird.
The sun was bright and just reaching its zenith as the diminutive Witch stirred the dust of the track beneath her bare feet and wondered
where she'd be sleeping tonight. Not a real concern -Peggy quickly added, as she deemed her visit to the coastal settlement as a type
of holiday, but at least something to mentally gnaw on as she soaked in the peaceful vista of a sleeping encampment far from the usual
tribulations found amongst the timber.

A large gull glided its shadow across the visitor's route and offering a indignant 'querk-querk', soared away in search of another thermal.
The focus of the bird's curiosity sighed softly to herself and reached into her faithful satchel for a canteen of water. Squinting up to see
where the sky-sentinel had gone, Peggy smiled and promised herself she was going to enjoy this seaside sabbatical.

[BIAD]

Clem Willard noticed that a slight sea-breeze had gotten up since he'd first entered the cave and now, absently fondling the smooth-edged
stone in his pocket, he conceded that he would never visit her again, no matter what the strange woman behind the makeshift curtain might
offer him from that box. Using his hefty size to push through the wilderness of swaying eight-foot high sedges, the sixteen year-old flicked his
straw-coloured hair back and peered up at the the sun's position in the sky. Just how long he'd been in that hidden grotto of the so-called
recluse called Gretna Grindylow? he wondered as he found the slim corridor of dried soil that meandered through the thick reedbed.

What had he been thinking...? whilst avoiding his chore of fishing for dozing Nosy-Gulpers, the blonde youngster had carefully traversed
the hazardous slimy rocks under the steep headland and thought he'd wait-out the day doing the one thing he had truly enjoyed before he'd
been burdened with his parents opinion that he'd reached adulthood. As a child, Clem had liked nothing more than exploring the sea-eroded
fissures of the surrounding cliffs. But it had only been recently that he'd felt he was strong and brave enough to negotiate the partly-submerged
reef beneath the promontory and leave any watchful eye of Seamarshes.

The Great Sea was a haze-choked millpond as he'd arrived back at where his fishing pole leaned on the woven clump of reeds he'd fashioned
into a rod-rest. Hoping his Pa hadn't checked on his lonely vigil of acquiring the costly-prey, the fair-haired lad peered into to the slightly-smelling
standing water and whispered a home-fashioned prayer. Clem's frowning face blossomed into a specimen of genuine happiness as he saw a
large round fish with a hook in its mouth wondering why it couldn't swim to somewhere else.

Maybe if catching these torpid critters was as easy as today's hunt -Clem Willard amusingly thought as he carefully pulled his quarry from the
water, he would adjust his initial commitment to not call in on the crazy half-dressed harridan after all. That salt-encrusted chest might contain
more of the currency that could set him on his way to a better life than just dragging fat fish from their watery worlds and spending the evening
smelling of the creature's innards. Maybe a couple of visits to that water-dripping subterranean den would be enough Clem told himself as he
dislodged the hook from the Gulper's rubbery lips.

A slight smile lingered around his own mouth as he concluded that the Gretna Grindylow he'd discovered in that chamber was a poor copy of
the character from one of his grandmother's scary yarns. The now-passed-over matriarch had created an evil ogress in her tales to keep children
from getting lost in the leagues of tall reeds. Whoever was hiding in the cavern beyond the cape, she wasn't the kiddie-eating hag that could
tempt the most cynical child from the embrace of their mother. Besides, he was a grown man now and those jewels weren't doing anyone any
good sitting in that cavern.

Watching the Gulper gulp for air, Clem fished out the chunk of rolled-lead from his rucksack that his father had given him and quickly quelled
the fish's need to inhale water. If an oath was needed, he did silently declare that he wouldn't be wasting his next visit telling the supposedly
-shy Gretna Grindylow of the boring gossip of the village and describing the characters of his tedious tittle-tattle.

"You're a welcome to our family" Clem murmured to the dead fish in the same time-honoured tradition all the residents of Seamarshes who
angled for Nosy-Gulpers had quoted for generations before him. With a final glance back to the jalousie of quivering reeds that hid his secret
journey to the mysterious woman, young Clem Willard bundled his bloated prize into his bag and set-off for home.

.................................................................

"Yer' a kind man, Mister Willard and Ah'd be only-too grateful te' tek' supper with thee..." Peggy Powler imparted to the old man in the faded
bib-and-braces. "...Tis' a lovely place yer' have and the the quiet is a tonic fur' such as me-self" the little Witch added as she removed her hat
and followed the owner of the stilted house up the narrow wooden ladder.

To a keen traveller of the regions the Last Witch of Underhill wandered through, it would be obvious that the village of Seamarshes followed
the same experienced building traditions of other fishing communities along the coast. Homes on high abutments in hopes of avoiding the
severest of flooding and positioned in coves away from whatever storms blew in from the Great Sea. Ben and Millie Willard's abode was a
perfect example of this cautious approach to living beside the perilous ocean that asked and gave no quarter, a house on legs.

Millie -in the traditional fishwife's headscarf, bowed slightly as Peggy cautiously stepped onto the reed-woven platform and mumbled the
long-established address of her village. "You're a welcome to our family" Mrs Willard whispered timidly and not wishing for any confrontation
with the famous spellbinder, kept her eyes facing the surrounding leagues of swaying reeds. Following her gaze out towards sea of stalks,
Peggy wondered if Mrs Willard was watching for possible offspring arriving from that direction. A minute later, the little Witch's expectations
were seen to be correct. "Fair travels, Ma'am" the bare-footed guest greeted her female host and followed Millie's husband through the narrow
front door.
.................................................................

He was a stout and fairly handsome lad -Peggy noted as he ducked his head to enter the Willard home, a blonde teenager who looked the type
to not be a fisher of Gulpers for long. The young of these secluded communities often left for what they believed were more exciting futures and
it would be that only in later years, they'd realise the world isn't the sparkling bauble they'd imagined.

"I caught one, Pa" Clem said as he surveyed the shoeless stranger sitting at the small wooden dinner table in the middle of the room across from
his father. Gingerly emulating the nod of the little woman in the weathered poncho, the tall youngster made his way into a rear room where Peggy
guessed meals were prepared. A room Millie Willard had already disappeared into.

As at other times in the necromancer's career, a small faint voice in the Last Witch of Underhill's head whispered there was more to this broad
-shouldered young man than met the eye and the skin on her forearms prickled as he passed by. Somewhere beneath that mop of flaxen hair,
there was a secret, not the usual unspoken hush-hush about his maturing body or coltish carnal thoughts, but something more uneasy that the
lad is genuinely struggling with.

"His name is Clem and I've still to get him to show some decent manners around guests..." Ben sneered in a resigned tone, as he watched
the big lad enter their kitchen. "...He's a good boy, but you know how the young spirit can be a restless one" the genial man appended and
waved his hands in imply what can one do about a fact of life. Peggy smiled, "Aye, one of those itches that must be scratched", she replied
and kept the private reference to her recent encounter to her herself.
Book-ends, she thought amusingly and waited for the old man to continue in idle chat-chat.

With the Nosy-Gulper gutted and cleaned, Clem glanced back through the door-less entrance of the kitchen and whispered his question to his
mother chopping some carrots and sea-potatoes. "Who is she?" he asked in a soft hiss and watching the knife cleaving the vegetables, the
only son waited for an answer that never came. Millie's vigilance of the sliced food never faltered as she murmured "later, you can get those
pants off for washing, you've had them on all week."

If quick-thinking is a skill, Clem Willard was going to have a prosperous future as he nodded and then replied that the Gulper needed to be
put in the saltwater bin outside first before he walked around half-naked. His Ma didn't clip his ear anymore, but only because he knew the
line not to cross. "Ow!" he hissed as his ear took the slap upside his head and lifting the remains of the fish, he would wait until he'd climbed
back down the steps and deposited the cleaned Gulper in the barrel beneath the Willard home before he rubbed the injured lug-hole.

Upstairs, the family table was being set for supper and a rare guest to dine with. The sixteen year-old lad changing into a clean pair of britches
was famished and only too-ready to find out more about the little woman that had came to eat. Downstairs, a dead fish floated belly-up in a
cask of fresh seawater and if it had still been alive, maybe it would've wondered why a sparkling jewel had been stuffed into its mouth.

[BIAD]

"Er, no Ma'am..." said Clem Willard with slight awkwardness, "...that barrel's for storing the fish in before the buyer comes"
and seeing the shapely little woman halt her disrobing, secretly wondered if he'd spoken too soon. Dawn had just broken and
deciding to rise early in order to retrieve his precious jewel bestowed to him by Gretna Grindylow, the young man had found
his family's new visitor already out of her weird sleeping arrangement and preparing to take her morning wash.

The sun wasn't strong enough to chase the shadows from beneath the stilted house yet and discovering a raised poncho and
revealing buttocks as he crept down the ladders, wasn't a regular sight for the blonde-haired teenager. " We...um, we use the
stream out-back for our ablutions" Clem added and with his obvious sexual-clumsiness showing, aimed his focus on showing
the staring woman the path that would lead down to the trickling source of food for the surrounding reedbeds.

Peggy Powler plucked her satchel from its overnight moorings and setting the strap onto her shoulder, followed the kid who'd
got a free early-morning eyeful. Replacing the lid of the wooden barrel, the little Witch wondered again about the secret this
boy carried and was unknowingly leaking.

Maybe the endowment to occasionally pick-up on a person's feelings had came from her mother's ability to read those who'd
entered her tent back at the Carnival or maybe it had been honed from her many interactions with people and their problems.
But whichever it was, the necromancer -who stood only chest-high to the lad leading the way, followed him through a corridor
of tall hollyhocks and absently discarded her musings as she now gazed at the serene scene of a tinkling waterfall and a quiet
secluded pool. 

"Yer've been a kind lad te' show me where te' tek' me-wash, but iff'n yer' have a time, Ah'd like te' talk te' yer' about life around
here in Seamarshes" Peggy said as she twirled her finger to inform the cheek-flushed boy to turn around away from where she
was standing. Moments later, she added he could reverse her request and following the instruction, Clem's wide-eyes looked
upon the renown spell-worker his mother had whispered about last night, neck-deep in the peat-stained waters of the pool.

An indignant Dipper chirped and flapped its scorn at the trespass of its water-dripping domain and then went back to searching
for Mayfly larvae hiding out beneath the half-hearted cascade of the tired stream. Feeling the stone-coldness of the well-travelled
water revive her body, Peggy mentally set-out her tools to unpick the lock of Clem Willard's secret.

In a way, it contravened her vow to take a vacation and washing the sleep from her face, she recognised this. But the little voice
in her head had assured her whatever the boy was hiding, it was worth some time-out from her relaxation.
Another type of itch that must be scratched?

Reluctantly taking a seat on the grassy bank above the pool, Clem guessed his Ma was up and preparing breakfast due to the
whiff of smoke curling from the chimney of his home. That meant others from Seamarshes would be arriving to utilise the pool
for their morning-soak and so he told Miss Powler. "Your privacy won't be for long, Ma'am... Missus Trencher next-door will be
needing to wash soon and she's..." the flaxen-haired youth quickly checked that the old biddy wasn't approaching via the path,
"...she's a bit of a chatterbox" he imparted in a softer tone than previously.

Peggy rewarded Clem with a smile and a nod, "Aye, well iff'n yer'll be accommodating enough te' avert thee gaze once more,
Ah'll leave the pool as we found it" she replied, knowing that the word 'we' would now bind her and the lad in an obscure bond
of sorts. It wasn't much, but it was a little footstep closer to giving room for Clem to tell her what he was hiding. Plonking her
wide-brimmed hat on her head, Peggy breathed "that's better" and with it, notified the Willard boy that he could now look up
from examining the passage of a passing weevil. Clem did and once more, showed his features were constantly reacting to
something he was keeping bottled-up.

"So anyway..." the Last Witch of Underhill began, "...how de' yer' find livin' here in Seamarshes?" and casually placed her arm
through the space between his body and elbow. The act was another footfall to urge Clem to disgorge his hugger-mugger and
the charming smile that accompanied it wouldn't do any harm either.

The truth was that he simply wanted to get that jewel out of the fish's mouth before the trader from Flixton arrived, but this was
something he could never tell Miss Powler because of the next question that would doubtlessly follow. "It's okay, I guess" Clem
mumbled and rode the waves of embarrassment he felt of having the woman so close to him. Jenny Longyard had once done
a similar thing in the marketplace and held his hand. That night, sleep had avoided him like the Devil-pox.

"You don't mind if I run ahead to get the Gulper ready for Mister Fawkes, do you Miss Powler?" Clem asked as he very-lightly
pulled away from the mature female invading his personal space. Peggy ceded to herself that she was being a little cruel in
her antics and mirrored the boy's movements. "Chores, Clem... they're always there to do" she said resignedly and watched
him scamper away along the couloir of nodding flowers. "Ah'll have the bugger out of yer' yet" she whispered good-naturedly
and wondered if having breakfast with the Willards would be a bit too much.
.................................................................

She'd said her name was Muriel Gump and came from a little village called Mocking Bay, somewhere north along the coast.
But busily stacking the sacks of marrows onto his flatbed wagon, Saul Pritchard knew he had never heard of the place and
wondered just how far away it had to be for him to never sold his wares there. However, the heavily-built man tucked his cap
into his back-pocket and continued to display his pleasant side, after all, she was a bit of a looker.

"If it's work you're seeking, there's always something to do on my farm..." Saul grunted as he tossed the last bag onto the
carriage and walked towards the pulling-end of his vehicle. Daisy-Maisy -the mare his daughter had named a long time ago,
turned her head and watched the man who would be clicking his tongue between his teeth in a few moments, climb aboard
and take the reins.

"...Providing for a community is all-year-round thing" he added without looking back at the pretty middle-aged woman and for
a second, dared to imagine himself rolling in the hayloft with such a voluptuous damsel. However, Saul Pritchard -father of
three girls and husband to a straight-forward-thinking woman, couldn't stop the day-dream where his wife enters the barn
and grabs a pitchfork.

"Do you think Seamarshes could provide employment?" the stranger asked as she stood next to the creaking seat where the
saucy-thinking bumpkin now sat. "All I have is this ruby my mother gave me and I would gladly give you it for your counsel
and transport there" Muriel said softly and flicked her hair back in a provocative manner to drive-home the deal.

Saul marvelled at the small red stone sitting in her dainty hand for a moment, he saw the Gump woman tearing off his shirt
and licking her lips with relish. It took all he had not too faint from the sudden rush of sexual desire. "I... I suppose I could
take you along as far as Copper lane and from there it's just a short amble to Seamarshes" he gulped and tightened the
reins around his hands until they hurt.

With a smile that would haunt the farmer tonight, Muriel set the ruby on the wooden seat beside Saul's thigh and then quickly
strode around the rear of the flatbed. "You're a true gentleman Mister Pritchard..." the sultry woman said as she climbed aboard,
"...now tell me, what do you know about the people of Seamarshes?" Saul clicked at Daisy to get her walking and pulling his cap
from his back-pocket, tried to remember when he'd actually told her his name.

[BIAD]

To be fair to Seamarshes -when it came to a healthy economy, the little seaside settlement fared better than many similar-sized
villages that Peggy Powler had visited. Now, peering into the large glass-plated window of their local store, the quietude that the
Willards enjoyed nearer the shore seemed to belong to a place far-removed from the fairly-busy main-street of the Seamarshes
the little Witch was now viewing.

The money undoubtedly came from the Nosy-Gulper industry and agricultural farming of the well-nourished soil in the region.
Albeit still a rustic-style of gathering the tasty fish, Peggy believed this traditional way of acquiring the source of the popular
cuisine had become essential in maintaining its status as a rare -and ergo expensive food.

From the produce-filled flatbed wagons Peggy had observed trundling into Seamarshes, it was obvious trading was healthy here
and with it, a devoted small community who wanted to keep it that way. If an example was needed, the principal thoroughfare
was still unpaved and showed some effects of the past winter, but over all, Seamarshes was tidy in a quaint -well scrubbed fashion.
.................................................................

After leaving the Willard's homestead, the straw-chewing Witch had ambled into downtown Seamarshes for no other reason as
to tick the visit off in her 'to-do' holiday list. When she'd first walked down the track to the cliff-captured hamlet, Peggy had veered
off down -what could be considered a deer track, to get her to the place she wanted to experience the most. That of the seashore.
The breeze from the Great Sea had brought a rejuvenation Peggy sorely needed and standing amongst the softly clashing reeds,
she felt that if her spirit had been spluttering before, it now glowed like well-fuelled lantern.

But at this precise moment, it was the dark-red silk dress hanging in the store window that caught Peggy's eye, the way it flowed
made the Last Witch of Underhill think of her mother again. With the rowdy noise of barkers promising with a wink of their eye and
a twinkle of a gold tooth, her mother would be there, inviting unsure customers into her Carnival marquee to have their futures told.
With a swish of the same sleek material, her flamboyant gait would leave any onlooker with the idea that the plush-dressed fortune
-teller enjoyed a comfortable existence amongst the travelling fairground folk.

Sadly, this was far from the truth. Growing up, Peggy had often gone without meals and if it hadn't been for Mr Volcano -the fire
-breathing entertainer who ran the logistics of the Carnival, the skinny girl in the dark-green dress would have gone to bed hungry
many times. Even now, watching the reflections of passers-by in the window, Peggy could still taste the jaw-jarring taffy that the
benevolent man would affably toss her way from time to time.

Sighing through her nose at the warm memories, the wandering half-Fae let the mild wave of an affluent community wash over as
she turned her mind back to this morning's puzzler, Clem Willard and his doldrums about a pebble. Returning from her dawn-dip
to the Willard's scaffolded home, Peggy had found the young man standing beside the water-barrel where he kept his dead fish
and gazing forlornly into the palm of his hand.

"If it's yer' fortune yer' wantin' readin', Ah' can tell yer' it fur' nowt" Peggy joked as she passed beneath the house and headed for
the wooden ladder. She wished to thank the elderly couple for their hospitality and relate that she'd be on her way without their
generous offer to take breakfast with them. The bantam spell-worker wanted that solitude that comes with taking a break from
one's calling whilst visiting new ground.

The coolness from Peggy's recent bathing magnified the lack of sun under the Willard's abode and maybe the lack of the young
man's virginal blitheness didn't help the temperature either. "Er, no Ma'am..." Clem answered as he held up a ordinary-looking
stone between his fingers for better scrutiny, "...it's my past I'm still struggling with" he mumbled absently and moved his focus
to the contents of the water-filled cask.

Peggy glanced his way and wondered what his concern could be, maybe something he'd found in the his catch that could have
a bearing of the sale to the buyer known as Mister Fawkes? Stepping out into the morning sunlight, Clem's concerns about fish
and rocks faded as the little Witch focused on not going a clatter down the wooden rungs of the ladder.
.................................................................

It would be only when the poncho-wearing thaumaturge had set her bare foot along the lane towards Seamarshes retail area,
had Clem's question lured Peggy's idle curiosity and now here before the large window of Silas Mann's General Store, she felt
the need to revisit the query. "Miss Powler...?" the fair-haired lad had asked as trotted in the small plume of dust his parents
recent guest had made. "...I have... can I ask you something?" Clem ventured as he closed the space between them.

It was a simple weather and tide-worn pebble, a smooth stone that had been honed by the Great Sea and deposited on a shore.
Clem's eyes told he was holding a lot back as he asked the small squinting woman looking up at him how such a commonplace
rock can change from being an emerald the day before. Peggy Powler -sage of the fantastic and unearthly, shrugged and advised
the young man to avoid charlatans when they offer him riches in the future. With that said, the smiling little Witch reached up on
her tip-toes and kissed his cheek. Gems turning into pebbles, indeed.
.................................................................

"It's a lovely day, isn't it?" the well-endowed middle-aged lady chirped towards the scruffy-looking woman idling at the General
Store's front window and with the salutation, Peggy came out of wool-gathering and peered in the direction the comment had
come.

It was fleeting, for the female in who'd offered the greeting was now entering Silas Mann's establishment and would be out of
earshot before the little Witch could respond. Stepping forward to the entranceway, Peggy caught the beginnings of a conversation
just as the heavy ornate door closed. "Good day Sir, my name is Muriel Gump and it's about the red dress in the window..."

[BIAD]

There are long-dead philosophers -and even the occasional live one, who would certainly elucidate on the scene Clem Willard
was now witnessing as he saw the approaching little bare-footed woman gazing thoughtfully down at the dried-dirt track that 
led to his home. Maybe those deep-thinkers -which sadly would not include Clem Willard, would postulate that the fleeting
tableau was a depiction of what Miss Powler had recently experienced in Silas Mann's emporium and the culprit she believed
had been responsible of it.

Peggy Powler seemed so immersed with her introspection that the fair-haired youngster wondered if she'd actually noticed the
scampering weasel that quickly navigated across the Witch's path and slunk away into the tall grasses he now sat in. However,
honesty demands the young Willard lad would have to admit that he wouldn't be able to tell due to Peggy's large hat that hid
most of her down-turned face.

"Whey' yer' bugger..." the Last Witch of Underhill cussed softly around the dwindling boiled-sweet in her mouth as she brooded
on her time inside Silas Mann's General Store. "...Even on holiday, Ah' canna' have a candlewick's peace from the scallywags"
she murmured and ignored the scurrying polecat in front of her.
.................................................................

The woman -who'd introduced herself to the shop's owner as Muriel Gump and suggested to the day-dreaming Peggy that
the day was pleasant, had left the General Store only a few minutes after entering with the actual item that the little visitor
to Seamarshes had been looking at. Did this particular act -more than the odd revelation she'd discovered later, have a
bearing on what Peggy would later discover and why she was now returning to speak to the Willard boy...?

With a slight frown, the musing sorceress filed the question in the 'Pending Shelf' in her brain for future perusal. Noting
that the subject of her reason to retrace her steps back towards the reedbeds was waiting for her, Peggy felt the pieces of
another strange jigsaw beginning to be placed on the table. There was more to this than just a mesmerised store owner
pleased with a sale for the price of a sea pebble and a kid looking pissed-off due to a similar object.
.................................................................

"Good day, Ma'am and how can I..." Silas Mann faltered as he surveyed the tiny unshod woman in the grubby poncho
entering his premises. "...How can I help you on this fine morn?" he urged himself to continue and sighing softly for being
in this situation, took solace in his earlier transaction. Miss Gump had made his day with her purchase of the red dress
and to the brushy-moustached shop-owner now looking down at this ragamuffin, he believed that like most good events
in life, a positive had to be paid for with a negative. That contrary was now standing in the doorway of his store.

The doubtful customer doffed her large hat and introduced her along with her usual greeting, a gesture that had served
Peggy well in the past. By the look on the skinny man's face, the Witch's introduction delivered once more.

Silas nervously pulled at the elastic sleeve-bands as he realised who was standing before him and with a smile that never
reached his eyes, quickly moved to grab a straight-back wooden chair that he used when selling shoes. "I apologise for
not recognising you, Miss Powler... the way the sun shines in through my door can often obscure my view of those who
kindly honour my business with their presence" he mewled as he brushed non-existent dust from the canvas seat.

Peggy gazed around the large commodity-filled room as Mr Mann scurried behind his counter and with a finger-comb of
his face-hair, presented his best accommodating grin. "I'm lucky to be able to sell all sorts of items a noted traveller and
crusader of the ethereal like yourself would find commodious and of course, the price would reflect my admiration for
your champion work" he burbled out without breathing. The Witch glanced at the empty hook where the red dress had
hung as she dismissed the chair as being to high for her without showing a little more than a bit of leg.

"Yer've a fine set-up here, Mister Mann and Ah must admit, me-curiosity te' view such a bounty of wares was the only
reason fur' steppin' in te' yer' shop..." his single patron admitted. "...But Ah' now see yon jar of delights may have called
to me-weak spirit, Sir". Silas' skittish eyes darted to the shelf near where the recently-sold garment had idled and there,
a large glass container filled with peppermint-flavoured Black-Bullets waited for the Witch with a sweet-tooth.

Scuttling to minister service and provide a reason for the woman who could turn people into broomsticks to leave, Silas
wondered if giving the candies to the scary Witch for free would be expedient to having any such spell being broached.
Yet, as he hastily passed the waiting wizard and reached up for the rock-hard boiled-treats, Peggy did publish some
majick in the form of her little wiggling finger, something she still wasn't sure why, even after she'd left the shop.
.................................................................

The afternoon was well underway as she waved towards Clem Willard and shook the perplexities of her deliberations
from her head. Why did Silas Mann sell a perfectly-nice silk dress for the price of a dull pebble that -even after Peggy
quietly closed the door behind her, the store-owner still believed was a sapphire? Approaching the blonde young man
with disquiet on his mind, the little candy-sucking spell-worker also wondered what glammer had this puzzling Muriel
Gump embraced to perform such an act?

"Hello Clem..." Peggy said easily and held out a small paper packet with the Black-Bullets inside, "...divna' tell me, yer'
couldn't live without me" she added jocularly. But peering at the boy's doleful features, it was obvious to the grin-fading
sorceress that the jest had failed. "Miss Powler..." Clem whispered and gazed over to where the faint footmarks of the
weasel still lay in the dust, "...have you ever heard of Gretna Grindylow?"

[BIAD]

It would be an odd tale to many and certainly it was something that had left Clem Willard confused since he met the
weird woman beyond the headland, but for his little companion shuffling her bare feet to keep up with his long strides,
it was an account she'd heard a couple of times during her mission of dealing with the many grades of the supernatural.

Unaware of the direction of their amble, Peggy Powler listened to the sixteen year-old in the knee-high pants explain
how he'd accidently discovered Gretna Grindylow in a cavern on the other side of the headland and how she had paid
him for information about the denizens of Seamarshes. The actual theme regarding their route only came up when tall
lad stopped to empty sand from his boot, this he did without slowing his confession.

"I was supposed to do some fishing for Gulpers today..." he muttered as he balanced on one leg and poured the sugary
-white particles from his footwear. "...But just being near that place gives me the heebie-jeebies" he admitted with a flick
of his blonde hair and setting his mineral-free boot back into the warm sand of the narrow path, he peered down at the
studious woman in the sagging pointy hat.

"I just thought talking to you and using this side of the bay would be better than letting my Pa find out I was dodging
my chores" he disclosed with a hint of shame that didn't go unnoticed by the Last Witch of Underhill. "Aye well, it's
an ill wind that blows no bugger any good" Peggy agreed and seemingly distracted by something, walked on, leaving
Clem befuddled at her comment.

He'd always been a child who his parents had been proud of, Seamarshes may not have been the hub of high intellect
or business-nous, but Ben and Millie Willard had been confident that the growing lad's moral compass would keep him
on a track that would lead him to a fair and comfortable future here in the fairly-prosperous seaside village or elsewhere.
Now looking at the soles of the crouching Witch's feet, it seemed to him that the actual thoroughfare he and Peggy were
on held more interest for the poncho-wearing sorceress than the teenager's highway of his destiny.

"Please don't get me wrong, Miss Powler..." Clem explained as he caught up with the bare-footed woman kneeling in the
bleached sand. Far off, he thought he heard a faint sound of two people talking loudly to each other through the gently
-swaying reeds, but Clem needed to clear his conscience to the one person outside of his household he could truly trust.

Ignoring this assumed heated exchange just beyond the wall of foliage, the young man added "...I'm not lazy, Ma'am
and I do appreciate the frollis that my folks need from fishing for Nosy-Gulpers, but this Gretna Grindylow-person has
really scared me" he professed as the hunkered spell-worker -who seemed to be seeding the sand with a similar-coloured
powder from her satchel, nodded absently in agreement with the young man's self-diagnosis.
Then rising from her squat, she suddenly turned towards him.

"Yer' keep yer' voice low from now on, yer' hear?" the Witch with the squinting stare whispered up at the stunned young
man and softly patting his sleeved-arm, she neutralised any thoughts that Clem may have had that she was angry for
some reason. "Iffn' the thing yer' found in the cave is what Ah' think it is, the bugger is up te' somethin' that involves
destroyin' yer' village." As the oddly-matched pair peered at each other, Peggy began to say "We need te' play this canny
and we need te'..." and then abruptly flung her arms around the upper-waist of the surprised Clem Willard.

A seagull wheeled overhead leaving it's late afternoon shadow somewhere on the sandy track just as a woman appeared
from where the the reed-hemmed path must lead to and encountering this assumed couple of undercover lovers, slowed
her travel. "Oh Clem, me-darlin'..." Peggy squeaked dramatically, "we should run away te'gether and..." then curtailed her
suggestion as she glowered towards the newcomer in the long silky-red dress.

Muriel Gump gaped back as she recognised both secretive paramours and in that moment, the little Witch whispered
something that the young man failed to hear. "Oh, I do apologise for my intrusion" the well-dressed lady gasped and
averting her eyes to the trail ahead of her, swished her out-of-place apparel in the act of leaving the clandestine tryst.

Clem's lungs were bursting and his ears seemed to be making a high-pitched whine as he mentally dealt with the weird
situation. Here he was with a woman hugging him without any signals of intimate attraction from himself and now, some
stranger passing by might gossip to his parents about this compromising setting.

Peggy waited until the following shadow of the well-formed and well-attired female had disappeared along the trail before
releasing the wide-eyed boy from her embrace. "Sorry about that, young-un'" she breathed softly as she peered along the
track where Miss Gump had gone. Seeing it was very likely that the woman had merely ducked into the tall reeds for an
opportunity to intrude further on this supposed-romantic encounter, the little Witch decided to take her blather with the
bewildered kid somewhere more private.

Reaching for Clem's hand and at the same time, putting her finger to her lips, Peggy led her assumed sweetheart down
the path towards Abner Cuthbert's boat-building business and away from the ears of who she believed was hiding herself
and her true identity. Glancing back every-so-often along the sandy avenue that led to Seamarshes, Peggy Powler glumly
resigned herself to the fact that her holiday was over.

[BIAD]

"...Yessum, she's a bit of a hell-cat that one" old Abner agreed with himself as he rewound a rope and picked the odd piece
of flotsam from its braids. Finishing his day-to-day chores of preparing for his customers to return from their lucrative daily
fishing, he cast a analytical eye on the odd pair that had at arrived on the small wooden jetty of his business.

The boat-building enterprise -that the sole-owner and only employee Abner Cuthbert operated, wasn't what many would usually
think of as a regular money-maker, but since Nosy-Gulpers had become a trendy dish for those in the larger towns to consume,
a floating vehicle to catch these expensive fish had proven to be a stable way of obtaining a decent income. Abner could now
list his one-man coracles as twelve boats and another almost finished to join his fleet.

For any landlubber wondering how the small circular vessels kept the water out, the high pile of firewood next to his weathered
leaning home and office on the little pier along with a faint smell of of burning timber, may have given it away. Out back on a
cleared area amongst the reeds, a bubbling pot of pitch waited atop a pile of glowing embers for the seventy year-old to visit
and give the occasional stir.

"Ah don't care for nosy-parkers tryin' to muscle-in on what I made with my own hands" Abner growled his confession and moving
his gaze from the bare-footed woman standing next to Ben Willard's kid, wondered if the molten tar was ready for layering onto
the leather hull of his latest craft. "...A new 'un to Seamarshes, is she?" he asked idly and halted his act of stowing the rope onto
a hook below the only window of his little abode. This question was aimed at the tallest of his latest visitors, the youngster who
didn't have a big hat on his head.

Clem Willard didn't speak, he still believed that when it came to adult discussions, it tended to be adults who took part. To the
sixteen year-old lad, his smaller companion deemed herself an adult and he -himself, was ashamedly still struggling to accept
this harness of responsibility, -though he'd never admit it to anyone. Luckily, the one wearing the big hat did respond.

Peggy Powler had just finished her perusal of the dozen dots floating just along the edge where the reeds ended and the waters
of the Great Sea began when she answered the unshaven man in the oilskin overalls and a cap that had never known a decent
wash. "Aye, the lady came te' Seamarshes recently and Ah' was just curious of why she wanted te' rent a boat" she asked as
she neared the edge of the dilapidated creaking wharf.

The Last Witch of Underhill wondered if this business was so remunerative, why the grizzled old duffer enjoying the remains
of the late-afternoon sun hadn't invested in a better platform to launch his product from. Swaying reeds that were tolerating the
high tide gazed back back from their temporary light-less undersea environment as Peggy waited to see what information could
be drawn from the boat-owner by her reply.

Abner Cuthbert chuckled as he hung the damp cable and then turned to check on his fleet of fishing coracles, the day was drawing
to a close and they'll be heading back to the jetty soon. Plonking his bony-backside on one of the two mooring bollards on the dock,
the old man explained his visit from the busty virago called Muriel Gump.
.................................................................

Billy Brewster had just gotten his coracle to move in the direction he wanted it to when Abner Cuthbert mused that a quick swig of
his home-made mule-kick would be a fine idea to celebrate another day of acquire some frollis. He didn't charge much for the little
boats and considering what Mr Fawkes would pay for the slow-moving fish, his customers were only too-happy to use his tiny crafts
to obtain the Gulpers.

"Good day, Sir..." the woman in the scarlet gown proclaimed as Abner's hand reached for the doorknob of his shack, "...my name
is Muriel Gump and I was wondering if we could talk somewhere less public?" she added and feigning the look of a person not
accustomed to the outdoors, peered downwards and attempted to brush an imaginary smear of dust away from the ample front
of her red attire. Surveying her voluptuous shape restrained in the garnet-hued dress, Abner's thoughts of glugging some gut-rot
quickly made way for more appealing lecherous thoughts.

But not wishing to lose control of the interaction on his own patch, the old man smiled within a squint and peered around at the
calm waters and the surrounding lightly-swishing reeds. "This be all my place Ma'am and there's no one in earshot of what yer'
want to say" he said easily and fleetingly fantasized she was angling to ravishing him in his shed.
However, what she had to say would quickly drive out any concupiscent conjurings.

"I have noticed that your business is here is a fruitful one and that you -with all respect..." Miss Gump thrust her chin slightly
forward in the act of primly enquiring the name of the person she was speaking to and when Abner answered, the aloof woman
with the cool sensuous eyes continued. "...You, Mister Cuthbert, are getting on in years." Absently -or at least the boat-owner
had guessed she was not aware she was doing it, the well-formed female ran her hands down her curving flanks as if ironing
out any creases in her silk garment that may have appeared during her off-road excursion to speak with him.

"I am going to be candid with you, Mister Cuthbert, I wish to purchase your boat-building company from you and the price will
not be out of my reach" Muriel Gump stated flatly and offered her best beguiling smile to the old man with his toothless jaw
hanging slightly. "No price" she murmured provocatively and for a moment, Abner felt stirrings he hadn't contemplated for
a good-few years.

Old age is a strange thing. As a person comes to realise that time is a constant companion and yet will hold no feelings or
sentiments you as your heart slows to a stop, the journey with this bleak friendless associate demands a doggedness of a
person to construct and defend one's own self-identity as a moral-driven being. 

This slow-building exercise involves failures and successes, a wary pilgrimage across a minefield of disguised encounters
that defines the person into a veteran who learns to look ahead and prepare to meet possible obstacles with a guile and
wisdom accumulated by that life-long jaunt with time. Abner Cuthbert wouldn't have said it like that, but he was fully aware
of the stratagem needed to get to seventy years-old.
.................................................................

"So yer' refused the bugger's offer, eh?" Peggy asked as she took off her hat and wafted a breeze across her face, the heat
of the day had abated, but being out in the open air and the Great Sea not providing such a draft, it was still quite warm on
the rotting jetty of the seated man recalling the encounter.

Abner squinted over to where the lad and the woman he knew was the fabled Witch who rid farmhouses of noisy ghosts and
nodded in his introspection. "A handful of emeralds, that's what she offered me fur' the business" he groaned as he got to his
feet. It looked like Billy and a couple of others were calling it day and by the sight of one of his coracles leaning dangerously
in the water, Olly Newsome had caught at least three Gulpers.

"She's not one for taking' no for an answer and she can rant with the best of 'em..." the old boat-builder said as he walked
away to check on his bubbling pot of tar. "...She was sendin' me signals that... well, maybe not in front of the kid" he adde
as he stepped off the jetty and slipped away behind a curtain of reeds.

Clem Willard remembered that his own hanging jaw was now drying in the early-evening air as he closed it with a snap.
The tale wasn't dissimilar from his own encounter with Gretna Grindylow, except the item for purchase was gossip and any of
the flirtation Mister Cuthbert had mentioned, had been beyond his comprehension. Gulping in the lubrication of his dry mouth
and on reflection of his visit to the dripping cave of the mysterious woman, the blond-haired lad concluded he was certainly
out of this depth with this situation.

"The day's gettin' on, me-lad and yer' should be settin' a foot towards home" Peggy said softly as she watched Clem mentally
dealing with his own encounter with the real creature that had visited Abner Cuthbert. Gretna Grindylow was hiding behind a
pernicious mask she'd titled Muriel Gump and up to something the little Witch hadn't worked-out yet.
"Let us away and tomorrow, Ah'll do some fishin' of me-own" the little Witch offered the punchy tall boy and together, they left
the old bugger in oilskins to his business amongst the reeds.

[BIAD]

In the minds of most of those snoring their dreams away in Seamarshes, the day was still a full prayer candle away and had
no value to retailers on main-street except for the yawning lamplighter wondering about his breakfast. But for Peggy Powler
-the Last Witch of Underhill, it was the ideal time to check on her hunting techniques.

The stars were twinkling over the Great Sea as the little Witch arrived at the sandy path that led to Abner Cuthbert's decaying
jetty and knowing her investigation would be limited by the advent of dawn, Peggy fished out a piece of equipment from inside
her poncho whilst surveying that no insomniac might intrude on her examination of the sabulous track.

The strangely-designed spectacles had been given to her long ago by Myrddin the greatest of Wizards and now with the oddly
-hued lenses offering a different world that lay among the massive reedbeds, the barefooted sorceress reviewed the area where
she and the young Willard boy had encountered the female in the red silk dress.

The majick powder she'd sprinkled on the sand just before Muriel Gump had appeared -and witnessed Peggy's mock-intimacy
with Clem Willard, was still there and carefully treading along the side the glowing spoor, the little woman in the large hat noted
she'd been correct with her assumption that the voluptuous stranger had ducked in among the rushes to possibly listen in on Peggy
and the lad's faux 'hanky-panky'. The grains from her enigmatic satchel were 'Ignis Dust', a phosphorescent talc carefully extracted
during expulsions of certain demons and their origins certainly not relevant to Peggy's current situation.

The luminous trail also indicated that her quarry had returned to the path and continued back towards Seamarshes and this halted
Peggy in her line of thinking. If Muriel Gump was really Gretna Grindylow, then wouldn't she have returned to the cave where Clem
had first encountered the shape-shifting harridan? Surely this hidden antre beyond the reef had a bearing to Grindylow's origins?

A Will O' The Wisp floated just above the reeds as the eyeglass-wearing shaman chewed on this challenge and bowing absently
towards the translucent hinkypunk, whispered "Fair travels" as the see-through orb went on its way. Did she have time to visit this
water-worn den before the sun came up...? Turning to where the sandy footpath led away to Abner's moored coracles bobbing on
the dark waves, Peggy decided to take a chance.
.................................................................

There's a particular sound that dripping water makes inside caverns that always appeals to a visitor with a sanguine step to think
twice before entering its innards. The wet accent warns of cold shadows and places of adrift, a stone coffin that wears time like
a favourite hat and mourns its affinity with loneliness by cooling a caller's soul down to an icicle.

But in the grotto of Gretna Grindylow, a little thumb bearing a flickering flame opposed this theme of misery and brought light
to the place where illumination rarely tread. Peggy Powler shivered as she peered around in the gloom and wondered if her idea
to check out the creature's haven had been astute as she'd thought in the more-airy setting of the path to the old man's business.
.................................................................

There was no doubt in the little Witch's mind that the loud wheezing emanating from the ramshackle shed derived from Abner
Cuthbert's interaction with the moonshine he cultured behind his tar-melting operation and creeping towards one of the single
-manned boats, she wondered if he missed any trade due to his imbibing of the home-made gut-rot. Showing far more than a
bare thigh in her descent to the little round vessel, Peggy left a florris on the mooring post and plonked herself unlady-like into
the coracle.

The word 'Bugger' was regularly used as the small dark shape on the silver waves taught herself how to steer and propel the
round leather-bound craft, but Peggy had been surprised how quickly the voyage to the area of the reef had taken. The large
glebe of reeds petered out just before the steep headland and peering over to where the Willard family home was situated,
the would-be sailor saw that no lantern in a window hinted that anyone was an early-riser.

With wet feet and a breathing that told of her alertness, Peggy dragged the coracle into the mouth of the cave and deliberated
on possible spells to use if the duplicitous bitch had decided to come home.
.................................................................

There was the curtain that Clem Willard had told her about, along with a large casket bound with water-tainted brass hinges
that the fair-haired lad admitted he'd been allowed to take a jewel from. The shroud comprised of parts of a fisherman's net
patterned with faded rags sewn into the holes where the mesh had rotted. Disquieting questions slyly eeled their way into
Peggy's mind of why a veil had been needed in the first place when Grindylow spoke to the Willard boy.

Did such a rendezvous require Gretna to hide herself from her innocent guest because of her original state?
If so, what power did this cave-dweller have that could now hide her proper form in the world outside of this damp den?

Whispering a charm to deafen the sound, Peggy creaked open the lid and studied the chest's contents. It was what she had
expected. The box wasn't quite full, but the glittering gemstones Clem, Silas Mann and Abner Cuthbert had believed to have
seen in the temptress' small lady-like hand were here and the bantam Witch finally named the creature she'd suspected had
arrived at the quaint affluent village of Seamarshes.

Caressing the dry mundane sea-pebbles in the chest, Peggy pondered on the sneaky bugger who enjoyed manipulating those
of the land for her own pleasure. The guileful buggers she knew as the Merethons.

Sailors -not water-going flounderers like the little woman currently standing alone in a dank cave , but real travellers of the sea
called them 'Sirens'. Yet to those who wielded spells and ousted unwanted Goblins from cowsheds, these residents of deep
lagoons and quiet inlets were the Merethons that were once believed to be extinct.

Without the congeniality of the many Mer-folk Peggy had met on her travels, a Merethon can bring chaos to any settlement
by the use of their deceit and bridle on human wants. Their bodies were covered in scales, but unlike the Mer-people, they
had no tail like a fish. If asked, Peggy would suggest their ancestors came from a reptile lineage because they had hind legs
and a caudal appendage similar to the stone-lizards she'd often see basking on Calder's Way.

Merethons despise social-contentment nurtured by those of the land and due to the Merethons' constant attempts to spoil
this harmony among the rural communities, certain influential people ordered a kingdom-wide extermination of the devious
water-dwellers. Myrddin the Wizard had told a younger Peggy of those days he'd accompanied groups of soldiers to seek out
these hypnotising creatures and counter their endeavours to bamboozle their pursuers. Eventually, their bold trickery and
disruption ceased and the Merethons were assumed to be obsolete.
.................................................................

Checking the gloomy cavern again that no sneaky spectator was loitering in the shadows, Peggy returned to the parked-boat
and made good her exit. The horizon was already giving way to a new day and the thing she'd believed was merely a folktale,
was now out-and-about in Seamarshes.

[BIAD]

Adding another coin to the guano-stained mooring post, Peggy Powler continued her reflections on the newly-entrenched
occupant of Seamarshes as she disembarked from the little coracle. Dawn was almost here and the dark-red lambency of
a late-summer sun promised more blue skies and a warmth one's skin will lament when the leaves fall from the trees.

Gretna Grindylow had played her cards well. After learning the fundamentals of who-was-who in the village from young Clem
Willard, the Merethon had somehow transformed herself into a female human and confident Peggy would win such a wager
on her next assumption, was currently inching her way into the favour of some of Seamarshes residents. Leaving the decaying
jetty, the waddling visitor losing her sea-legs would have to admit that the snoring boat-renter in shadows of the dilapidated
deckhouse might argue that suggestion.

Arriving at the junction where the unpaved track split to offer a way to the Willard's home and the alternative -to downtown
Seamarshes, the Last Witch of Underhill slowed her pace as she demanded her acumen to produce a way for the Merethon
to transmogrify itself from a lizard-like form to a full-figured female with an ear for gossip. Turning in the direction that would
take her to the village, Peggy felt last-night's maritime exploits lightly eroding her thought-processes about the creature called
Gretna Grindylow but who currently resided under the appellation of Muriel Gump.

With the first rays of sunlight breaking the horizon, the unshod sorceress knelt down into the tall grass that fought for space with
reeds along the sandy path and plucked her early-moring pick-me-up, a tonic that would get her through the day. Chewing on the
juicy stem of a St John's wort, the weary spell-worker stepped towards Seamarshes and resisted the need to use Myrddin's Ignis
Dust-seeing spectacles to locate Miss Gump's destination.
.................................................................

"Really...? I had no idea" exclaimed Henry Bunker in a whisper to his first and only customer to his tearoom. The shapely lady in
the tight red gown nodded primly and lifted her cup to her ruby-toned lips to hide her discomfiture of what she had just disclosed
to the little bald round-faced man in the apron.

She'd been at his door as he'd rolled-up the canvas blind and politely introducing herself as Miss Muriel Gump, Henry had steered
the curvaceous middle-aged woman to a table just near the large sheet of well-washed glass advertising his spouse's business.
'Customers bring customers' -were the unassertive man's favourite words and certainly endorsed by his slumbering hectoring wife
upstairs. Such a patron of obvious quality would surely serve his motto by being seen in the eminent position of his front-window.

Muriel Gump produced a small handkerchief from her tiny seashell-shaped purse and daintily dabbed the corner of a her left eye.
"I feel trusting you with this sudden divulgence puts me at a disadvantage with your glaring ethical disciplines, Mister Bunker..."
she said as Henry glanced down at his client's bulging decolletage and sucked saliva from his mouth. "...It is not a revelation
that one should make between strangers" she added and lackadaisically revealed a selection of jewels sparkling in the darkness
of her pearl-adorned clutch.

Drawing a chair from another table, Henry sat down beside the attractive woman and gently patted her un-gloved hand. Weekdays
were usually humdrum in Seamarshes, but here in the early morning, the henpecked breadwinner of 'Victoria Bunker's Victuals &
Beverages', had found some scandal that would make his day much easier to endure. "There-there Miss Gump, these rustics are
always ready to take advantage of such a refined damsel as your good-self" he mourned quietly so that Victoria didn't hear him.

Maybe this well-endowed sexpot was a rich widow...? the hairless bringer of weak pekoe thought as he dared himself to caress
the tearful lady's wrist. Maybe -with a confession of his own, he may create an intimate bridge of trust between them that might
lead to who-knows-where? Sighing through his nose, Henry furtively checked the staircase that led to their living-quarters and
surveyed the closed door of his wife's establishment before he began his trade of gossip with Muriel Gump.

Moments later, Mister Bunker rose to his feet and nodded again at the wide-eyed curvy customer that what he'd just imparted to
her was true. His wife's tearoom was quiet and the battle-axe upstairs didn't know the secret he'd fused with Muriel Gump, another
positive tick on his list to sustain his struggling self-reliance. This day was turning out to be a grand one, he thought as he gambled
another glance at the swell of the woman's exposed cleavage.

"Who'd have thought that of Saul Pritchard?" Henry whispered with a wink to Muriel and scurried off to prepare the woman's chosen
breakfast of lightly-buttered toast. He felt confident that -if narrated properly and with certain facts omitted regarding the provocative
woman currently sitting at the front window and himself, Victoria would no longer purchase produce from that filthy-minded bumpkin
with the wandering hands.

[BIAD]

As the day wore on and the residents of Seamarshes absorbed the malicious chitter-chat through the conduit of the
vendors and merchants down the main thoroughfare, Peggy Powler witnessed the germinating neurosis that left
nobody above suspicion. The bright afternoon offered the Last Witch of Underhill little to ease her lack of sleep and
stepping away from the mushrooming madness, found some small solitude in between the buildings belonging to a
Butcher and the village's only Blacksmith.

"Aye, It's becoming a bedlam out their, Ma'am..." Ned Trotter said easily as he poured the gritty slurry of his dowsing
bucket into the back alleyway, "...Gossip is a disease best left to those with the mouths to chew it" he appended and
wiped a grimy rag across his sweating brow. The beater of metals peered over to where small woman in the big hat
seemed to be searching for a place in shadow as he slipped the strings of his leather apron over his head and folded
the grazed and charred pinafore across his arm. At a guess, Ned would reckon she was looking for somewhere to hide.

The dull headache that the sorceress was feeling offered a small lurch to her empty stomach as she turned to see who
the wise comment had come from and surveying the wide-shouldered blue-eyed man staring back, realised his remark
required an address. "Yer' nay wrong there Mister...?" Peggy began and after Ned introduced himself, continued with her
own judgement. "...Tis' an infection of the worst order and a tasty germ palatable te' most" she agreed.

The sun watched down as the tired Witch admitted that she was looking for a place to rest for a few minutes and after
some more small talk, Ned suggested the more-temperate area up along the headland, the sea breeze and the green
fields were more conducive to calming a soul than the chattering chaos out in front of the stores he added and stepped
back into the shade of his metal-forging business.

Adjusting the strap on her shoulder, the flagging spellbinder set her course for a setting that would hopefully help to
bring her slumber.
.................................................................

The Smithy had been correct and breathing in the cool air blowing in from the Great Sea, Peggy's spirits picked-up a
little as she arrived back on the familiar road of Calder's Way. The dry-stone walls that usually bordered the well-used
highway gave way to hedgerows of dogwood and wild privet laced with weathered wooden fencing. Sluggishly passing
the odd space between the shrubbery, the tired Witch could see docile sheep wondering who this pint-sized wanderer
was that dared to interrupt their grazing.

It was only when Peggy found a secluded location where a rogue struggling walnut tree leaned inland amongst swaying
white heather on the open bluff above Gretna Grindylow's cavern, did she fall forward into the ashen ling where some
believed fairies walked. As the salty zephyr brought some courtesy by blowing the frayed hem of Peggy's poncho over
her exposed buttocks, the exhausted owner of the rump tumbled down the passage of welcoming sleep.
.................................................................

"Is she dead, Pa?" the boy asked softly from the flatbed's seat as his father went to see who was recumbent on his land.
The sheep never liked this piece of heather-covered acreage and Saul Pritchard guessed it had something to do with the
openness to the sea. Maybe even the steep drop to the waters below was a factor too, he mused as approached the small
body laid near a stunted shrub.

Inspecting the unshod feet sticking out among the flowering heath, Saul caught himself crossing his chest with his finger
to protect him from the alleged Fae that were said to dance here when everyone was asleep. Silly superstitions muttered
by ignorant farmers he thought, although he'd never say it aloud.

The hat was massive and covered the head of this toppled would-be scarecrow. Nearing the body, the area's established
grower and transporter of meat, vegetables and fruit, wondered for a moment if Rufus was right about the prone figure
and someone had been murdered on his property. However as the breeze calmed, the loud snoring from the stranger
beneath what some would call a 'Devil Tree' told otherwise.
.................................................................

Peggy Powler mentally agreed with herself that the dog's cobalt blue eyes were a sight that bettered any of the false
jewels a mendacious Merethon with the nom de guerre of Muriel Gump could submit. The storm had become worse
here on the tossing ocean of her dreams and Peggy clinging to the sodden ropes of the rigging, knew that she and the
terrified skinny mutt were to be dashed on the cliffs glimpsed above the rolling waves.

Feeling her hat being snatched from her head by the surrounding cyclone, the little Witch fought to remember how she'd
found herself on this battered schooner and why she was alone accept for the dog. Shaking droplets from her wet face,
Peggy found that the blue-eyed dog could allay the confusion of its fellow passenger of doom.

"If you don't mind me saying so, Miss Powler, this voyage of ours would be a lot easier of us, had used a better hand on
the tiller, don't you think?" the cur suggested without moving it's fur-soaked muzzle. Sliding across the rain-lashed deck,
the soggy mongrel neared the wet woman hanging onto the side-stays of the ship. "There's an old proverb that might be
useful to us for our next trip, but can you recall it?"
.................................................................

Saul Pritchard plucked the wide-brimmed hat away to reveal a bantam-sized sleeping woman snoring happily into a clump
of heather. He'd moved all kinds of produce to many towns and villages along the coast, but staring down at the female in
the grubby poncho, he accepted that he'd never encountered such an unusual sight.

Then with a small snort of waking, the bare-legged stranger turned her head and smiled up at the man in the dark-green
smock and knee-length breeches. "A woman, a dog and a walnut tree..." Peggy whispered in a thick tone from drowsiness,
"The more yer' beat 'em, the better they be".

Looking back towards the wagon where his son waited, Saul crouched down and for some unknown reason replied "yes!"

[BIAD]

The farmhouse -if that was the appropriate title for such a place, wasn't what Peggy Powler would envisage for a family
that received income from rearing animals and crops. The strange upturned boat-like wooden building smacked more of
an abode for a sea-orientated household, maybe a captain of a ship with his kin waiting worryingly at the seashore for his
return.

However, Saul Pritchard's later explanation of how his ancestors had shaped his decision to create his lifestyle helped the
little Witch understand why he'd chosen to abide in such close proximity to the Great Sea and use the surrounding land to
bring food and other resources to the region. With Daisy-Maisy's swishing a beat to their journey, Peggy, Saul and young
Rufus rode the flatbed wagon down a small track to where the farmer's wife and daughters were hopefully preparing supper.

Listening to the well-built man reminisce on his past, Peggy believed the sleep beside the walnut tree had done her some
good. It wasn't just the need to close her eyes and rest her body that Peggy now appreciated, it was the dream that had
hinted a possible way of ridding Seamarshes of the guileful Gretna Grindylow. But discerning the brass-tacks of the vision
was a job the bare-footed necromancer realised, would be the crux of the matter.

"...And then when my Pa passed over and left the farm to my older brother, I thought that I should strike out on my own
and build a business that would cater for the travelling bug I guess I'd inherited from my Grandpa..." Saul Pritchard turned
to the boy engrossed in the tale beside him and ruffled his hair, "...and Rufus' great-Grandfather".

Trundling down a leafy lane off Calder's Way, Peggy felt the goodness that rode with them in the buckboard. The genial
man seemed a good person and if any attestation was needed, just a simple glance at his devoted son would be all the
proof one would require. Yet moments later, what she saw next might have negated that assumption.

The Last Witch of Underhill stared at the wrong-side-up vessel amongst the stunted trees and wondered if the driver of the
wagon had possibly been dropped on his head at a young age. It was a house, it had a smoking chimney, it had windows
and a front door. But for the shape was undoubtedly of a marine craft.

Pritchard had said his grandfather had been a sea-going chap and arriving by boat on the shingly shores of Fennon County,
discarded his maritime practices for a beautiful young woman he'd seen looking for seashells on the beach. Denying his
love for the tiller and taking up the plough, Grandpa Pritchard married the girl and built a new life on the land he'd spent
his early years sailing away from.

With backbreaking work and a lot of nous, the peripatetic sea-dog and his pulchritudinous woman became nothing short
than an intricate part of the economy around the region. The farm flourished and this fairytale-family enjoyed a fine lifestyle.
It wasn't long before grandchildren arrived and blossomed into adults, two young men called Jonah and Saul

This was the old yarn Ivy, Iris, Evie, Rufus and Missus Martha Pritchard had been told many times and that was what
they believed. But it would be later, when the enterprising man who found the little Witch sleeping amongst the heather
would unknowingly relate the real account of how his forefather had come ashore near Seamarshes.
.................................................................

Little Evie Pritchard curtsied towards their bare-footed guest and began to giggle. This ice-breaking incident came after
Rufus had enjoyed a rambunctious reception from his sisters and mother due to his return from his uncle's home. The
boy had spent two weeks helping out at Jonah Pritchard's farm and learning the ropes for when his father was on the
road delivering Jonah's and his own produce. During a private chat, Iris and Ivy were relieved to find that their younger
brother hadn't been taught how to dismember a sheep yet.

"Aye, it's a strange day when yer' come across a grown-up who's the same size as thee, lassie" Peggy quipped at the
chuckling girl. The fabled Witch was unknown to Saul, Martha and their children and that was fine with the hat-holding
woman standing in the doorway of the upside-down home. Being gestured in by the lady in the flour-dusted apron and
matching hands, Peggy forego the usual perusal of the Pritchard entrance. There'd be no twisted sixpences or knotted
ropes of horsehair to effect their new guest, only a caring family wishing to be hospitable and an aroma of freshly-baked
muffins.

Smiling at each of the pretty girls as they scanned the little woman in the dark-green poncho, the object of their interest
wondered how long it would be before the virus of gossip would seep along Calder's Way and creep down the little path
to where this clan of happiness unwittingly waited. Allowing Ivy -the eldest of the girls, to take and hang their visitor's
faithful satchel on a coat-hook, Peggy followed Rufus and his kin into a room set in the rear of this head-over-heels
home. A home where a plate of muffins resided.
.................................................................

With Martha and the children unwittingly following in their grandmother's footsteps, Peggy Powler and the man who'd
invited her for supper watched the searching for seashells on the shingle beach below their strangely-built home. The
evening was warm and yet the Great Sea offered an occasional waft to keep the temperature pleasant in a setting the
little Witch rarely got an opportunity to appreciate.

"Yer' a lucky fella'..." Peggy stated as she stirred the wet pebbles with her toes, water-smoothed stones that some in
Seamarshes believed were gemstones. "...the village just beyond yon headland is awash with foolery right now and
Ah'm' at a loss how te' fix the bugger" she offered and pointed vaguely to the tall cliffs that separated Seamarshes from
the haven of serenity Saul Pritchard had carved out for his family.

The transporter of vegetables nodded as he sucked in a great gulp of sea air. "Yes, I hear things on my travels and I'm
aware my name is not exactly the flavour of the month in Seamarshes" Saul admitted and plucked something out of
his pocket. "Avarice is something that taints all of us, I suppose" he mumbled as he scrutinised the object in his hand.

Realising that one of those precious moments had arrived where truth glimpsed out from the murky maze we call 'life',
Peggy quickly guessed his family were far enough away for her to chance a spell. Of course, she lamented the notion
of using a charm on such a kind host, but the time was now or she must let it pass by. Checking again on Saul's jovial
loved-ones, the necromancer wiggled her little finger and whispered something that was lost on the breeze.
.................................................................

They were all asleep and the upturned boat-of-a-home was quiet. Peggy peered out at the dark sea from her dangling
satchel and pondered on what Saul Pritchard had unintentionally told her. Being fully-alert from her earlier slumber,
the diminutive spell-worker hanging in the crooked tree -once again, came to the conclusion that what was believed
and what is reality, are often two separate animals.

The windjammer called Pritchard who'd come ashore at Fennon County and found his true-love, wasn't quite the brave
helmsman who his grandson had first presented. First of all, the main character of Saul's story hadn't beached, there
had been a storm and he'd crashed his vessel on the nearby cliffs. Secondly, Saul's well-told legend was absent of what
his grandfather had once mentioned to him during a day of gathering walnuts in the orchard on their farm.

Peggy sighed from wondering what it all meant. There was a route here, a way to solve the Gretna Grindylow's villainous
scheme. Dropping the flap of her faithful bag and shuffling for comfort, the little sorceress recalled how her mesmerised
host stared blankly out to sea and recited a comment about what his grandfather saw waiting for him and his pet-dog as
his small schooner lurched towards the wave-lashed escarpment.

The word he used was lizard.

[BIAD]

Although she never gave it thought at the time of their wander back from Saul Pritchard's orchard, Peggy Powler would later
deliberate on why it was Iris -the middle one of the sisters, who had unknowingly revealed a way to get Seamarshes out from
under the curse of the Merethon called Gretna Grindylow. The little Witch's early-morning walk came after she'd snoozed for
a couple of hours in her dangling canvas bed and then with questions still on her mind, found herself wide awake with dawn
still beyond the horizon of the Great Sea.

Setting her passage to avoid the hard-shelled drupes scattered on the ground of the grove, the bantam sorceress failed to see the
little girl in the pale-white nightdress watching her from the orchard gate. Peggy was busy dissecting the sparse information she'd
gleaned from Saul Pritchard's hypnotic account of his grandfather's arrival in the quiet shingled bay and his sighting of an upright
lizard-like being, the answer was there, she was sure of it.

"Will you be staying with us for a long time, Miss Powder...?" Iris mispronounced the Last Witch of Underhill's name with the lilt
of a child one can only forgive instantly. "...We're having pancakes this morning" she added as if her initial question had some
logical connection to her statement regarding breakfast. A startled Peggy looked up from her submerged reverie and offered a
face of curiosity towards the little girl standing alone in the wee-hours of the night.

"Shouldn't yer' be in bed, me-darlin'?" the wool-gathering necromancer suggested kindly as she approached the ghost-coloured
shape standing on the bottom slat of the five-bar gate. The sea continued its eternal sound of movement beyond the bushes
that made up the rest of the orchard's boundary as Peggy and Iris stared at each other in the gloom.

"Ivy thinks you might be that Witch from Underhead who can do majick..." the wheat-haired girl whispered secretly towards the
bare-footed ambler of walnut nurseries and whipping around her butter-blonde locks in the dew-damp air, furthered "...I think
you're here to catch Missus Skink".
.................................................................

With Peggy's flame-flickering thumb lighting the way down the small track towards Iris' strangely-constructed home, the cheery
twelve year-old showed her own kind of enchantment as she gazed at her smaller companion's ability to create a special-type
of candle. "Does it hurt?" Iris asked softly -remembering to breath and clutched her fingers tightly to stop her grabbing at the
weird flambeau. Unable to douse the smile that the young girl demanded from anyone she encountered, Peggy shook her
head and said the trick was always in the spell.

"It tek's a long time to master these things, me-lass..." the Witch said seriously "...Majick is nay a toy nor a weapon. Iffn' there
is a power te' wizardry, it resides in the person who harnesses it, not the art itself" she supplemented and hoped she'd quoted
Myrddin her tutor correctly. Iris nodded with a look of deep appraisal of the words as she surveyed the track where the pair of
unshod females strolled and then for no reason at all, replied "You talk funny". Peggy's smile merely widened.

As the break of day broke across the edge of the world, the answer that the poncho-wearing visitor to Seamarshes had been
seeking, suddenly tinkled out on an idle musing from a little girl who couldn't sleep. Realising the real worthiness hiding within
the words, of the doggerel, it would some time later in the day when Peggy would recite the child's rhyme and joyfully bask in
the mordancy of their meaning.

"I had a little walnut tree, where nothing could be found, but a black walnut laying on the ground.
A woman with a tail came to visit me, and all for the sake of my little walnut tree.

Missus Skink's dress was made of crimson, her smile was of a cove. She asked to take my walnut and promised me my love.
I shooed her to the water, I drove her to the sea. And then the salty waves took the Mermaid away from me."

With the moribund gloom struggling to remain alive in the leafy path, the little Witch asked Iris to carefully repeat the tune and
putting the poem to memory, enquired where she'd picked-up such a strange rhyme. Looking towards the glowing lantern in the
kitchen window where the jonnycakes were being spooned onto the griddle, the distracted girl in the gossamer gown explained
she had heard it from her grandpa after he'd passed over.

Leaving another potato-sack of questions until some other time, the excited exorcist hurriedly escorted hungry Iris towards a meal
of sweet hotcakes and a day of busy work for herself.
.................................................................

It is agreed by those who know and before the preachment of the new religion, that the domain that Peggy Powler patrols are
staked down with giant oaks onto a bauble that hangs from Herne's mighty wrist. The sky of this disc-shaped trinket is the
arena where the sun chases the moon in an eternal hastilude of love.

Every evening when the exhausted sun ends his amaranthine pursuit to find and mate with the pale Goddess who flees on the
shoulders of her star-dusted mare, the blazing ambitious suitor weeps into the vast waters of the Great Sea and casts a brine to
enrich the creatures within and bring taste to those from the telluric tribe.
It is written.

After contemplating a full stomach and these esoteric facts, Peggy Powler hitched her satchel onto her shoulder, thanked the
Pritchard family for their generous hospitality, stroked the nostrils of Daisy-Maisy and set off to bring the disguised Merethon
to heel.

But first... she needed a fish hook.

[BIAD]

"Stand there and keep yer' glove on..." the small woman hissed quietly from the side of her mouth, "...and when Ah' touch me-hat,
yer' pull like yer've got a Gulper on it. Okay?" Smiling up at Clem Willard, she offered another mint-flavoured Black-Bullet from her
paper-bag and turned to leave. The fair-haired lad in knee-high britches nodded in his bewilderment and watching the poncho-wearing
spell-worker walking out of the dusty alleyway with a pail of water into the late-morning sunshine, reviewed his initial opinion on the
renowned sorceress they call Peggy Powler.

Like most of the adults around him -a faction of society that Clem Willard's parents had thrust him into without asking if he was ready
for such an association, the sixteen year-old had believed that the bare-footed traveller held great magical powers to ease the day-to-day
living for those who toiled on the land and sea. With wonders that stole one's breath away, Clem's mother had explained over breakfast
that their recent guest was said to police the regions with illustrious wizardry and was a formidable foe against those of the supernatural.

But what seemed to be a more remarkable talent of the wandering warlock -a predilection Millie Willard seemed proud of as she posited
over washing the dishes, was that the Last Witch of Underhill tended to work and hold an affinity with those she predominantly catered
for. Namely, the common people.

Continuing his appraisal as he watched the thin twine spool out across the dried-dirt, Clem had to admit that Miss Powler's accent was
strange and bawdy at times, the manner of someone not out of place in an alleyway or in a rowdy tavern. She never wore shoes and
from the rare glimpses he'd been afforded during the short time he'd been with her, Clem could suggest she was barren of the most
scantiest of undergarments.

Yet here this famous necromancer was, ambling out into Seamarshes' main-street without a magical spell to stop the awful gossiping
malady that had befallen the village, just a borrowed fishing-hook pinched between her fingers in one hand and a sloshing bucket of
seawater in the other.

It had been a confusing time for the son of a fisherman, discovering a jewel could change into a mundane stone of the sea, unknowingly
relating hearsay to a conniving cave-dwelling lizard-woman he had believed was called Gretna Grindylow and now, angling for something
beyond his backwoods imagination from the shadows betwixt a bakery and a leather-goods store.
Maybe that was why Clem merely nodded and sucked on his sweetmeat.
.................................................................

"I'd have never believed it of Silas Mann..." Gertrude Petticoat whispered to the Post Mistress leaning forward on the counter-top, "...all
this time playing around behind his lovely wife's back with that strumpet!" she added with a twist of her painted lips to show her verdict
on the matter. Absently sliding the letter into the appropriate pigeonhole for the next Midnight Mail rider to pick up, Hilda Poppins kept
her own features neutral as she examined the information the busy-body of Seamarshes had just dramatically articulated.

Technically, Gertrude was correct, the owner of the large general store down the street was engaged in some hanky-panky with a woman
who he wasn't married to. But it wasn't Victoria Bunker from the dolled-up diner, it was Hilda Poppins and nobody -to date, had any idea
the mousy-spinster in the nose-tweaking spectacles from the Post Office and the whiny moustached seller of everyday commodities were
meeting amongst the vast reedbeds out near the shore with the sole intention of dalliance.

Realising the village's veteran yenta was still rambling on about the miss-aimed adultery, Hilda struggled to drag her focus back to the
backdoor-gossip as she removed her glasses and touched the faint marks left by tight frame. "It's just like I said to Muriel..." Gertrude
continued, "...this vulgar underbelly of Seamarshes is not a place for a lady to endure and I've been seriously thinking on speaking to
my husband about moving along the coast to a new village I've heard about called Mocking Bay".

Checking that her chattering customer's enveloped-message was in the correct slot for collection, Hilda Poppins merely nodded.
.................................................................

She was still wearing the crimson gown and bowing slightly as she left the conversation with the greengrocer checking on his outside
display, Muriel Gump set her course to cross main-street to the place where she'd first acquired the blood-coloured garment, Under the
shaded eyes of a little grubby-looking woman with a big hat, the destructive harridan that hid in plain sight bathed in her piecemeal
plan to desolate the sedate settlement of these loathsome land-dwellers.

This was the way Gretna Grindylow was going to succeed, it was a different way many of her kind had attempted before her. Since the
days the land-people had first found ways of trespassing onto the waters and taking what was not theirs to take, Merethons had vowed
to strike back and clear the oceans of those who dared to use the kingdom of the sea creatures as their own. But it had ironically been
a fruit of the haven from this bombastic band of sea-roamers that had given Gretna the upper-hand on her executed ancestors and their
failed plots.

A magical kernel found in the dashed-remains of a vessel, a simple black walnut that gave the owner the ability of a pretender. It had
taken Gretna Grindylow many years to master its glammer and now under the bright summer sun, that harness was in full-authority.
Oh, how they will pay for their transgression.

"It's a grand day, would yer' agree?" Peggy Powler asked cordially as the disguised Merethon stepped onto the wooden boardwalk
where a runt-vagrant with the big hat languished whilst sucking on some type of candy. "Er... yes it is, Ma'am" Muriel replied with
a tone of someone speaking down to someone of low quality and passing the uncouth time-waster, noticed a slight movement as
the small woman touched her headwear. Assuming it was simply part of a grimy-rustic's address, the creator of ruin in Seamarshes
returned to arranging her thoughts before she began to spin another web of lies in the establishment of Silas Mann.

As the red gown swished, a young man with hair of unripe straw pulled on the fishing line with all his might and the reality that had
been accepted in the prosperous hamlet, changed forever. The pearl-encrusted purse isn't real, Muriel Gump isn't real, but under the
murmured conjuration from the idle drifter who'd fought demons and monsters, one would reveal the other of this false adumbration.

Sparkling gemstones spilled from the tear of the Witch's fish-grapple and bounced on the wood as dull pebbles, the contents of the
purse scattered upon the boardwalk and for a moment, the world of Peggy Powler and Gretna Grindylow became still. But within
that flicker of a candle's flame, it was the smaller of the pair who moved first and reached out to grasp the object larger than the
surrounding sea-burnished stones coming to rest at the hem of Muriel Gump's vermilion-coloured vestment.

It is said a black walnut can draw lightning and this was why farmers chop down walnut trees where cows sometimes seek shelter
from inclement weather. Ship builders will not use the wood because of this vexing curse and even insects shun the shade from the
Devil Tree. But what was secret to most was that a special black walnut can also afford its bearer a counterfeit costume. A bogus suit
that can fool the eye.

To Silas Mann peering out of the window at the full-figured prospective customer, it was like one of those light-shows they put-on at
Carnivals or a trick with a curtain and distracting words a travelling magician might use to entertain his crowd. Under a noon-sun, the
the busty woman shimmered in her red dress and then became something worse than the moustached-man's wife finding out he was
grinding hips with the Post Mistress.

It was a monster, a lizard-like thing with an uncoiling tail that had been wrapped around her body. Shiny scales of keratin covered the
creature's entire torso and as the black walnut recanted its glammer of subterfuge, the crimson garment Silas Mann had sold, fell from
the Merethon's true form. Where eyes of lustful beguile once peered out at those enchanted by Muriel Gump's saucy charges of the
village's residents, black slits of a reptile now blinked at the realisation of a scheme unmasked.

Screams of alarm arose around the once-quiet encounter on the noon-day thoroughfare as the little Witch drove home the revelation of
who had infected their parish and hurled the contents of the bucket towards the transformed trickster from beneath the cliffs. Screeching
with savage rage, Gretna Grindylow suddenly lunged at the thief of her camouflage and almost found purchase on the swinging satchel.
But Peggy had rehearsed her foil during her return from the Pritchard estate and a scaly claw only found warm air where the little Witch
had once stood.

With shocked faces abound on main-street, the hissing Merethon, once held in high regard by those now seeing -what they would later
would eagerly agree was the cause of their mistrust in each other, lurched away from her hated enemies and halfway there, continued
her escape on all-fours. The flailing tail slipping to the labyrinth of reeds was the last Seamarshes saw of Gretna Grindylow.
.................................................................

Epilogue.

It would be the beginning of Autumn before Seamarshes could be said to be back to normal. The gossip was now accepted as part of
the invader's design to spoil their way of life and in many quarters, apologies were given in private. Saul Pritchard was the recipient
of many of these repents and just as a side-note, Silas and Hilda called a halt to their reed-bed ruttings... for the time being, anyway.

For Peggy Powler, there'd been an odd type of gratitude from the folks of Seamarshes. Provisions were given to help her during her
journey and invites to a particular tea room had been many. As the leaves in the Pritchard orchard fell from their moorings and little
Iris hummed a nursery rhyme taught to her by a ghost among the trees readying for winter, the item that Ned Trotter had forged in
his kiln was secretly handed over to the saviour of the Blacksmith's community.

The chimneys of Seamarshes coughed out their woodsmoke to bind with the cold mists that were becoming regular from the Great Sea
and the Willard family went on with their life of catching Nosy-Gulpers. Their flaxon-haired son had taken up with a pretty young woman
called Jenny Longyard, a past friend of his who was growing into being more than someone of similar age and interests.

As the Fall came calling and Clem Willard would check to see if the fat-round fish had taken to his bait, he'd nervously glance towards
the stoic reeds that led to Gretna Grindylow's lair. Maybe it'd been a dream he'd had after witnessing the horrid creature flee the street
in broad daylight, a wishful delusion of a boy becoming a man and wanting a settled path for his future.

But peering into the brackish water in the reeds, he'd sometimes wonder if he had really heard a faint reciting of a little girl's poem.
Alas, if Clem had looked out of his bedroom window into the darkness of that late-summer's night, he may have seen the troubadour of
that ballad quietly tugging sackcloth from the freshly-tempered spear laced with strange runes and bizarre scrawl. She wore a big hat.

'I had a little walnut tree, where nothing could be found, but a black walnut laying on the ground.
A woman with a tail came to visit me, and all for the sake of my little walnut tree.

Missus Skink's dress was made of crimson, her smile was of a cove. She asked to take my walnut and promised me my love.
I shooed her to the water, I drove her to the sea. And then the salty waves took the Mermaid away from me.'


The End.