I think about that for a moment. Fifteen hundred years ago, he dug a hole and placed the urn intact into the earth. Now it’s old and crumbling, and people are going to be picking over the coins and selling them to a museum. They were his property, and he wanted me to have them. No wonder he feels odd.
“All right,” I say softly. “I’ll call Beatrix.”
I ring her number, then sit back, watching him pick up his book again. He’s coping with all this remarkably well, but I still have to give him space to come to terms with it all. He’s only human.
“Gwen!” Beatrix says, sounding pleased. “Lovely to hear from you. We’ve been wondering what kind of day you’ve both been having.”
“Busy,” I say. “You’re never going to guess what happened to us this morning.”
We chat for a while about finding Valerie’s body, and I summarize our day, and the things we’ve discovered.
“Wow,” she says eventually. “You were right—you have been busy. I’m so sorry your day had to start like that, though.”
“It was a shame, but these things happen. Look, I have something to ask you. Or rather, for you to ask Uncle Max. I’ve been talking to Arthur, and he’s keen to get a job. He wants to be able to contribute some income.”
“He’s a real sweetheart,” she says. “You hang onto him, darling.”
I blush and study my fingernails as Arthur looks up. “Well, anyway, I don’t want to put Max on the spot, but I wondered if he’d be able to look around for a position for Arthur? I know he doesn’t have our formal qualifications, but he’s good with his hands.”
“Really?” she teases.
“Beatrix!” I blush even harder, and Arthur chuckles. “I meant with carpentry. I thought Max might know someone who can find him a job.”
“As it happens, we were talking about that today. Max can definitely find him work. He suggested he show Arthur around the business and have a chat with him, see what he’d like to do.”
“He’d love that,” I say, delighted they’re able to help.
“Wonderful. I’ll get Max to pick him up tomorrow. Eight thirty?”
“Yes, thank you. He’ll be ready.”
“All right. Well you take care of yourselves. Are you getting on okay?”
“Yes,” I say softly. “Very well.”
“I’m glad, dear. It’s only what you deserve. Let us know if you need anything else.”
“I will. Bye.”
I hang up and look over at Arthur. He closes his book, leans his head on a hand, and smiles at me.
“You’re going to work tomorrow,” I tell him. “Eight thirty.”
“Great,” he says. “I look forward to it.”
I shake my head. “You’re so new to this world. Don’t you want to get on a plane and travel? Go exploring? Discover all the amazing inventions and people and places?”
“We will,” he says. “You’re the most important thing to me. First, we need to get to know each other. Then we can explore the rest of the world.”
I pick up my wine and sip it as I study him. “What was Guinevere like? Are we similar at all?”
“Of course you’re similar. You are her.”
I purse my lips. “Oh. I suppose so. I’m having trouble getting my head around that. I guess it’s as if I have amnesia. Maybe that’s the way I should be thinking about it.”
He smiles. “I don’t think so. We both have to think of this as a new relationship. I don’t expect you to fall in love with me just because I tell you we were once lovers. It might be that this time around, you don’t feel the same way as you did before. I will do my best to win you all over again, but you can’t force love.”
“No,” I reply, “you can’t. Equally, if you get to know me and decide your feelings have changed, we’re not married. You’re not bound to me.”
He gives me a wry smile that says, You really have no idea. But he just states, “Time will tell.”
Our eyes lock, and I can’t look away. I keep having to remind myself I’ve only known him for one day. Neither of us should be making any decisions this early in a relationship. We barely know each other.
So how come what I feel for him is so strong? So deep?
I need to slow down, because I don’t want my heart to be broken. But it’s hard to fight against what feels like fate.
“Shall we watch a movie?” I ask, desperate to change the subject.
He nods. “I’d love to.”
“Come over here, then, and we’ll choose one. What kind of thing would you like? A thriller? Adventure? Historical? Comedy?”
“Something romantic,” he says.
Smiling, I choose Sleepless in Seattle. Arthur holds up his arm, and I curl on the sofa beside him and rest my head on his shoulder, then sneak my arm around his waist, while Merlin stretches out in front of us.
For the rest of the movie, we barely move an inch.
Chapter Fourteen
By ten a.m. the next day, I’m in the process of helping Duncan and Una excavate the urn holding Arthur’s coins. The farmer allowed us access to the field, and Duncan drove the car up to the site between the oak trees so he could unload the equipment.
It’s a gorgeous spring morning. I’m thoroughly enjoying myself, although I miss Arthur more than I would have thought possible. Max picked him up this morning, and Arthur kissed me on the cheek before he left, making me blush as Max smiled and turned away to give us some privacy.
“I’ll miss you,” Arthur murmured.
“Me too,” I whispered back, and I had to restrain myself not to run after him as he got in the car and Max pulled away.
I suppose part of my unease is the fear that he’s going to vanish as quickly as he arrived, and I’ll never see him again. I like him so much. And what girl wouldn’t love the way he seems to adore me, and want to do anything for me? It’s like a perfect bubble, floating on the spring breeze, but I’m terrified it’s going to pop and I’ll be left with nothing but a memory of his beautiful blue eyes.
I push the fanciful feelings away and concentrate on the rich earth before me. I’m not going to get depressed over something that hasn’t happened yet, and might never happen at all.
“Okay,” Duncan says as we finally remove the layer of topsoil that Arthur and I had filled in the day before. “Let’s take some photos.”
It’s a painstaking process. Merlin sits at the edge of excavation, apparently content to watch as we mark the area with tape measures to indicate the size of the site, then begin to remove the soil, taking photos every time we find another coin. Every trowel-full of soil that comes out is sieved, and we place any objects we find into clear plastic bags and write on them a number, so we know in what order they came out.
It’s not long before we uncover the lip of the urn and the top of the coins inside the pot. We put our trowels aside, and then we’re on to brushes, carefully flicking away tiny fragments of soil to reveal the coins.
They’re muddy, of course, the surfaces obscured, but I can see that most of them are bronze, with the occasional silver one shining through. We remove the loose ones on the top, but Una wants to keep as many of them inside the pot as we can, so now we begin digging around the edge of the pot, continuing to sift the earth to make sure we don’t lose any of the coins.
It’s a slow process, but I’m happier than I’ve been for a long time, my hands covered in earth, listening to the birdsong and chatting to the two of them about archaeology as we work. I know they don’t want to leave the pot half-excavated overnight, and they’re going to want to lift it today, so even though it’s tough on my back and knees, I stay with them, stopping only for a sandwich at lunchtime before we carry on.
At regular intervals, Arthur texts me. The first one makes me laugh.
Max showed me how to text, so here I am. This is amazing! I can talk to you even though you’re miles away! I love the twenty-first century. A x
I chuckle and reply, How are you getting on? Does Max have a
suitable position for you?
Definitely, he replies. I can work here while I take a carpentry and joinery course, so I have a proper qualification, but he says I know most of the work already. I’m going to start next week.
I’m so glad. And the two of you are getting on all right? I ask. It’s important to me that they like each other. Max married Beatrix when I was a toddler, so I’ve known him as long as I can remember, and he’s very important to me. And of course, I want him to like Arthur.
He’s a top fellow, Arthur replies. We’re going for a beer after work. I’ll be home in time for our meal out, though.
That makes me laugh. He’s really fitting into modern working life.
By mid-afternoon, we’ve removed the earth around the urn, sketched and photographed the site, sieved all the earth and removed any loose coins and other objects, and we’re ready to lift it.
“It’s going to be heavy,” Una warns.
So Duncan comes up with the idea of crafting a sling from one of the tarpaulins he keeps in his car to cover a dig if it starts raining. He folds it in half and slides it into the hole beside the urn, and we tip it onto its side as far as we can before each taking a corner and pulling together. It is super heavy, but after ten minutes of hard work, we finally have it out and on the ground.
Duncan immediately rights it and ties the tarpaulin around it to ensure no other coins fall out, and then we lift it into his car. Finally, we fill in the hole with earth and loose stones from around the site.
When we’re done, and Duncan starts covering the site with leaves and twigs, I take the shovel back to the car and close the hatchback’s boot. I’m just about to turn away when a strange wind whips across the site, making me pause. In the reflection of the window, I can see Duncan behind me, tidying the site, and clouds scudding across the blue sky.
And then, as if it’s one scene in a movie fading to the next, the sky darkens, and suddenly it’s night-time. Duncan vanishes, but in his place two men appear.
One has long grey hair braided and fastened at the nape of his neck with a silver clasp, and lines around the corners of his eyes. He’s wearing dark red trousers and a green tunic. He holds the urn of coins in his hands, and he’s watching the other man, who’s digging the ground in the same place that we just were.
The second man is taller, with longish dark hair and a thick beard. He’s stripped to the waist, his body shining with sweat in the moonlight. He lifts his head and his eyes meet mine, and I feel a sharp connection between us, like a bee sting—a tug in my solar plexus.
It’s Arthur.
“Ready, Gwen?” Duncan asks.
I blink, and the two men vanish. The sky clears, and it’s daylight again.
My mouth has gone dry, but I manage to mutter, “Yes, of course.” I open the door for Merlin to hop in, and I get in beside him.
All the way back, Una and Duncan chat with excitement about the find, but I look out of the window, feeling oddly detached and unable to concentrate. We return to the field unit, and they ask me if I want to help remove the coins from the urn, but I’m on edge and too restless to work. I thank them for the great day, call in at the café to make sure everything’s running smoothly, then head home.
I stand in the kitchen, feeling Arthur’s absence in every bone in my body, even though I’ve only spent one day with him. Merlin comes up and nuzzles my hand, and I bend and put my arms around him.
“Was that you?” I whisper. “The other man in my vision? Taliesin the bard?”
He licks my face, and I give a shivery sigh. Did I really have a glimpse into the past, over fifteen hundred years ago? The moment when Arthur put the urn into the ground? It’s hard to believe, and yet why is it any more impossible than having him come back to life?
I stand and look out at the garden. It’s always brought me comfort when I’m feeling out of sorts. So I pick up my gardening gloves and head outside into the spring afternoon.
I work there for a couple of hours, mowing the lawn, then doing some weeding in the veggie patch. There’s something about gardening that enables your body to work automatically, leaving your brain to work through things like a computer left to run its own program.
As I slide the trowel into the rich earth and pick out the tiny weeds, I think about my day, uncovering the silver coins between Gog and Magog, so long after Arthur first buried them. It was almost as if he sent them to himself in the future, like a message in a bottle. A fanciful notion, but I like it.
I think about the brooch of his in the museum, and the look of joy on his face when he saw it. The threads that link us to each other in life continue on, weaving through time. The Books of Shadows I have indoors, written by my ancestors, are similar—Josephine, Harriet, Lizzie, and Alice; the notes they wrote all those years ago are messages they delivered to me as sure as if they tied them to the leg of a pigeon and sent them through time.
I work, parting the earth, pulling weeds, removing stones. Rich earth, thick and moist, like chocolate muffin mix being turned with a wooden spoon. My baking is more than combining flour and eggs and herbs. It carries within it those threads of time; the experiences of my mother and grandmother, the knowledge they’ve passed to me, either directly through their books, or indirectly, through their DNA. A message in a bottle…
I feel a little drowsy; it must be the sun. I sit back on my heels, shade my eyes, and look at the greenhouse, just a few feet away. The nearest glass pane to me is bright in the sunlight. I can see Merlin lying on the grass beside me, his snout on his paws. His brown eyes are watching me.
And beside him, lying on the grass, is a woman in white, covered with colourful flowers.
My heart bangs against my ribs, and I inhale sharply. Merlin stands, and then he looks down at the woman, so I know he can see her, too. We both watch as, very slowly, she sits up and looks at me, then stands. The flowers fall to the ground and disappear.
Her blue eyes stare into mine for a long moment. I’m breathing fast, my heart racing at a million miles an hour. Then, unable to stop myself, I turn my head to look at Merlin on the grass behind me. He’s there, but the woman isn’t. I look back at the greenhouse. She’s vanished.
Merlin sits, telling me that he can’t see her, either.
“Oh Goddess,” I say. “I didn’t expect that. Why did she appear to me?” But I don’t really have to ask the question.
Something’s happening to me; I can feel it. My supernatural abilities are slowly blooming, like a rosebud unfurling its petals in the sun. Perhaps it was connecting with Arthur in the sixth century. Or maybe it was realizing today how much I’m connected to the women in my family who’ve gone before me. They’ve handed down more than their recipes in their Books of Shadows. I have their genes, and they carry magic within them, all through the generations, maybe all the way back to Alice Young in the seventeenth century who was hanged for witchcraft here in Glastonbury. And maybe back even further, all the way to Guinevere and Morgana.
The Labradoodle gets up, comes over, and nuzzles my hand. “It’s all right,” I tell him. “I’m not scared.” If anything, I feel excited, enlivened. It’s as if I’ve been asleep, like Arthur, for so long, and now I’m just starting to wake.
Chapter Fifteen
“Honey, I’m home!”
I hear Arthur calling inside the house, and I smile, go indoors, and wash my hands in the sink. Arthur comes into the kitchen, Uncle Max behind him.
“Did Max tell you to say that?” I ask.
“He did.” He walks over to kiss my cheek
“You should have a shower,” I tell him, blushing. “We’ll be going out soon.”
“All right.” He holds his hand out to Max, who shakes it. “Thank you for today,” Arthur says.
“You’re more than welcome,” Max replies.
“I’ll see you Monday morning, then?”
“Absolutely.”
Arthur smiles, then disappears upstairs.
“Do you want to sit down?
” I ask Max.
“No, I’ll get going in a minute. I know you’re going out.” Max leans a hip on the kitchen counter and smiles at me.
“So… How was he today?” I ask softly. I’m not comfortable talking behind Arthur’s back, but I wouldn’t be human if I didn’t want to know what Max thinks of Arthur.
“You’ve fallen on your feet there, girl. He’s solid and dependable, exactly the kind of guy I’d want for you.”
“Oh, I’m so glad you like him.”
“I like him because you like him. But I know what you mean.” He comes over to me and gives me a hug. His white beard tickles my cheek. “I do worry about you,” he whispers. “You’ve been through so much. I’m glad you have someone to watch over you now.”
I swallow hard. “I hope that’s the case.”
He moves back a little. “What do you mean?”
“Only that I can’t shake the feeling that he’s going to vanish suddenly. I’m… afraid to hope, you know?”
Max rubs my upper arm. “I’m sure that’s not the case,” he soothes. “He’s travelled through time to be with you. That sounds like a long journey, and not one he can—or would want to—repeat.”
“I suppose.”
“I’m really glad to have him on the team. He’s a hard worker, and he has a wide range of skills.”
“He said something about taking a course in carpentry?”
“Actually,” Max says, “I’m considering more of a general training course for him. For some time now, I’ve been thinking about putting together a team of handymen, a kind of odd-job squad. You’d be surprised how many calls we get from people wanting small things done around the house—shelves put up, doors fixed, dripping taps mended. I think it would be perfect for Arthur—flexible enough so he can be there if you need him, but a reliable source of income so he feels he’s contributing.”
“It sounds great,” I say, although I feel a twinge of doubt. Will the man who led a whole army—the infamous King Arthur—be content being an odd-job man?
Max kisses my forehead. “I’d better go. I have to drag Beatrix out of the studio every evening or else she’ll be there all night.”
A Knight on the Town Page 10