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kunama_wolf's prompt when I thought my first piece was trapped in a broken computer or lost. It follows on from An Angel With A Message.Haigenes had a lot to think about. That was unusual because he wasn’t encouraged to think. Usually he was told what to do and did it. It was certainly easier than being shouted at and called slow and stupid because he hadn’t done what he’d been told straight away. Almost everyone he knew told him what to do: his Dad; his Mum; his brothers and sisters; the village priest; and, well, everyone else in the village.
Despite what everyone said about him he could think while working. The way everyone else was acting he might be the only one of them who could. The older men, like the priest and his father, were gathered in one group, talking furiously and quietly to each other while the young men his age were in another group, talking furiously and loudly to each other. The angel was watching all of them. Haigenes was the only one who was putting out the fires.
“Burn the blasphemers out!” The priest had said that a lot but Haigenes didn’t see how you could be a blasphemer if you’d only found the place that had the murals and statues that the priest objected to. According to the angel, Haigenes thought that tic of his right dusky red wing was probably a sign of impatience, the god Hasnor was very fond of this place and didn’t want it destroyed, despite what the priest said. When you got down to it, Haigenes was sure that an angel trumped a priest, even though this wasn’t a game of cards. So he kept taking the bucket back to the creek, filling it with water then bringing it back up the hill to throw on the fire they’d set to the fences and hedges surrounding the small farmstead.
“Have you considered,” Haigenes was startled to find the angel walking beside him as he came back up the slope from the creek again, “not working on a farm for the rest of your life? There’s nothing wrong with farming but my divine master is always on the lookout for good mortal servants…” He left the sentence hanging.
“I’m not smart enough to be a priest,” Haigenes almost laughed. “Ask anyone around here.”
“You can walk, talk and carry a bucket of water all at the same time,” commented the angel. “That seems to be more than any of your neighbours can manage. I wasn’t actually thinking of the priesthood, though you’d be a better candidate than your village’s man. There are other paths of service, you know. How do you feel about, say…books and weapons?”
kunama_wolf's prompt and rescued it from my computer that has issues. This has a sequel in the piece I wrote as a replacement when I had thought I had lost this one, The Man With The Bucket.Aldorachai found himself in this position rather often. He was beginning to think of it as an occupational hazard. The humans who did this sort of thing did seem to have a thing for fire. He supposed that this was just what it was like, serving a god whose portfolio had changed and whose current followers didn’t like to be reminded of what it had changed from.
The fences and hedges around the property had been set alight. That meant the mob would go after the buildings and the people next. Aldorachai sighed. It was time for him to step in.
He made an entrance, stepping through the fire at its fiercest point, becoming present in all senses of the word in as spectacular a fashion as possible. He was trying to get the mob’s attention after all. It worked.
“Look!” bayed one of the leaders and instigators, the local priest. “A divine angel come to help us cleanse this blasphemous site! Praise Hasnor!”
“Well you can start by putting out this fire,” snapped Aldorachai, “before the rest of the farm catches alight. What in the world were you thinking?”
The priest stared at him. “The farmer let the learned fool from Iboshoer poke around on his farm and he found the underground place with the lewd murals and statues of men together. They have blasphemed against holy Hasnor. They and the blasphemous place must be cleansed with fire!”
“So, did you not do well in theological history at the seminary or did you not do theological history at the seminary?” Aldorachai smiled at the half stunned, half apoplectic man. “Or, let me guess, because you Benarians have this peculiar system of one priesthood for everyone, you didn’t cover Hasnor’s theological history at all, did you?”
The priest, speechless, nodded.
“Well, here beginneth the lesson for all of you.” Aldorachai looked around to make sure he had the attention of all of them. “Back before you developed this peculiar idea that the Benarians are the chosen people of the gods, back before the Death War itself, so many gods played in the realm of human affections and relations they were called the Pantheon of Love. The Death War started with the Vardmasters’ ambush and murder of Erithme, goddess of romantic love. By the time it was over, only three of the Pantheon of Love were left so they shared out the empty portfolios and Hasnor became god of all carnal love.”
“All carnal love…” That was from a rather bovine-looking, large young man at the back of the mob.
He was immediately shushed with, “Be quiet, you great booby!” from those around him.
“Now,” Aldorachai went on, “my divine lord can’t override your free will, although I am ordered to prevent murder happening tonight. Know this. Before his portfolio expanded this was one of his major cult sites, a great temple glorifying his name. Out of use now for millennia, but he’s still very fond of it. You can choose to destroy it. If you do, he will turn his face from each and every one of you who participates in that destruction. Your prayers to him will be forever unnoticed. No more inspiration that will speed you to your desire. You’ll all be on your own with only your own attractions, or lack of them, to aid in your wooing.” He let the silence sit for a moment. “So what will you do?”
The mob split into two groups, the young and the old, and started arguing. Except, interestingly, the large, bovine, young man who emptied out his bucket of tools on to the grass then, leaving the hammers and chisels sitting there, went to the nearby creek to fetch water.
lilfluff's first prompt. It is followed by Rescue By A Halloween Witch.“I think a supervised event in the hall as a fund raiser would be an excellent idea,” remarked Mrs Amanda Bracken, the headmistress, to the Parents and Citizens Association meeting. “I don’t know how trick or treating works in places where people are used to it but the school received complaints last year about children knocking on doors and demanding sweets.”
One of the younger mothers asked, “How is that the school’s responsibility?”
“According to some people, Mrs Lancing, it is the school’s responsibility to control and monitor children’s behaviour at all times, even out of school hours. Even if those children are not and never have been our pupils.”
So it came to pass that at five o’clock on the 31st of October the otherwise sensible teachers Elvira Madden and Dorothy James were presiding over a fuming cauldron while wearing green stage makeup and fake facial warts as they waited to scare the children who were about to giggle and squeal their way through the haunted house labyrinth that had been set up through the school hall. They had their script, they had their organising committee-approved treats to hand out and now they had a cat.
“Where did he come from?” Dorothy asked Elvira as she watched the magnificent black tom wrap his way around Elvira’s ankles.
“I have no idea,” replied Elvira as she looked down at her feline admirer. “He’s not wearing a collar but he’s obviously not a stray, he’s too well looked after.”
“At the moment he looks like he wants to belong to you,” laughed Dorothy, then a bell rang. “We’d better take our positions, they’re opening the doors.”
The cat gave Elvira’s leg a final rub and ran off.
Then the children arrived. Years Five and Six who had no younger brothers or sisters to take care of came through in dribs and gaggles. Families of children careened through wildly separated, not always at the fault of the eldest. Dorothy noted that the Shrimpton twins came through separately but not alone, while Melissa Wright was trapped in some professionally made costume that, although effective, looked extremely uncomfortable.
About half of Elvira’s class came through clutching a parent’s hand, some with a just younger brother or sister, determined to prove they were a ‘big kid’ too, in tow. The Grimolochins were a surprise, not in that his father had brought him, but because Joe Grimolochin, normally a brave and happy boy, was clinging to his father’s hand and looking around fearfully. He was dressed as a lion, but he was a very unhappy lion.
“I checked,” his father was saying, “and there were none in here before the doors opened.”
“I know,” came Joe’s anguished reply, “but I can smell them. They’re here somewhere!”
“I can smell them too,” his father agreed, then assured him, “but the rats can’t get you while I’m here.”
“So,” cackled Elvira in character, “the young master is afraid of rats? Why tonight of all nights?”
“Because tonight they could be dressed up to look like something else so you can’t see them coming.” Joe added, “But you can smell them around and you don’t know where they’re going to come from.”
ellenmillion's first prompt. It follows after The Palace Will Shortly Be Making An Announcement.Yannic woke at his usual time and turned over to look at his sleeping wife. His sleeping second wife. Rensa always slept at least an hour later than he did but she never complained about waking up alone. He was sure she at least liked him and she did seem to enjoy his company but sometimes the report Tuluc had made Sevrin write worried him.
It had been just after their marriage, in the early days of Sevrin’s rehabilitation. The dark haired girl had tried to be unkind to the newly fledged Empress. The report read:
I told her that her husband, Yannic, was still in love with his first wife, Kiriel.
Her reply was, “I know. He probably always will be. It’s not like they argued and broke up. She died. There’s no reason she wouldn’t still be in his heart. He’s nice and he’s kind, but he’s never going to feel about me the way he feels or felt about her.”
I asked her why she hadn’t been married before. She replied that her family had identified a suitable husband for her three times but on each occasion the rebellion had killed him before the betrothal could take place.
It wasn’t that Rensa was unavailable or distant. She wasn’t. She had made it clear that she wanted to build a relationship on what they did have and he thought that was respect and growing affection. She liked his mother and his cousin Mirren was now her best friend. She carried out the tasks that were asked of her and volunteered her ideas and experience. He thought she was an asset as Empress.
She was having his child, a baby they both wanted. She was just over three months pregnant now so an official announcement had been made and she’d almost been overwhelmed with the congratulations that had flooded into the palace.
Except sometimes, just sometimes, he thought he could still see the terrified young woman, her ‘disfigured’ face hidden by veils, hiding in a storeroom while all her family and friends died outside. He wanted, so much, to help her but the only assistance he could offer was his own blood-splattered hand.
kelkyag's first prompt.When her mother arrived mid-morning to collect her from her aunt’s flat, Neoma insisted on showing her the flowers. “They came for Aunty Mayin at breakfast time,” the girl gushed at her mother. “They’re beautiful!”
Her mother, Ley, had to admit that they were. The arrangement was tall, slender, elegant and sparse. Simple pink flowers climbed up three brown-black bare branches set in a black stone bowl. The accompanying note was similarly intriguing:
I fear that I was inadvertently and unexpectedly both intrusive and inappropriate. Please accept these as my apology for any offence I may have caused. I will contact you at a more convenient time to discuss the possible alleviation of my disability.
It was signed by a group of foreign characters.
“These look like they’ve been done with some sort of stamp,” commented Neoma’s mother to her sister-in-law.
“Yes,” agreed Mayin. “It’s his name. He’s used his private chop, not his command seal.” She paused for a moment. “Ley, this is the first time I’ve been given flowers.”
“And they’re very serious flowers,” agreed Ley. “What does he mean by ‘alleviation of my disability’?”
“They believe that if you have a psychological component to your injuries you can ditch it by paying the person who gave you the injuries to take it away.” Mayin looked at the flowers pensively.
Her sister-in-law asked curiously, “Does that work?”
“About a third of the time,” was the offhanded reply. “Trouble is, I think it got more complicated when he called me a luck witch.”
“More complicated? How?” It was a sharply asked question.
“That’s the problem. I’m not sure.” Mayin kept looking at the flowers.
Two days Mayin emerged from her office building to get some lunch and found him waiting outside, like an island in the stream of pedestrian traffic going in and out of the building. He was wearing the same clothes he’d had on when he’d come to her apartment, the long coat a shade too warm for the weather, and he was standing at parade rest. She almost changed direction and went out another exit but something about the stoic way he stood there, waiting, appealed to her so she went up to him instead.
“Oberxiao.” She stopped just outside his reach. “May I help you?”
“I came to find out if you had accepted my apology and to offer you lunch as a venue for discussing my problem.” He shifted a little uncomfortably on his feet.
She looked at him curiously and asked, “What would you have done if I’d brought my lunch with me today and not come outside?”
He shrugged. “You would still have to leave the building to go home. Today I can afford to wait.”
“Negotiating a price for your disability is so important that you would put up with this,” she indicated the crowd, “all afternoon?”
“My particular disability affects the way I think about myself and limits my social options. Buying it off was important to me but now I wish to negotiate a different solution.”
Mayin consulted her watch. “I can give you forty minutes before I need to start back to my desk. All of these little sit-down places just here are good. We can eat and negotiate at the same time.”
“Excellent,” and he smiled.
ysabetwordsmith's first prompt.“There are angels,” explained Lasrial, “and there are vard. Angels are servants of the gods. It’s what we’re created for. We have free will, a desire to serve, a propensity to support the functioning of the universe and a talent for singing. The vard are miniatures of their masters, the Vardmasters.”
“Wait, those things are miniatures?” Tala interrupted him. “But the one fighting Gadiah was as big as you are! How big is a Vardmaster?”
“I’ve only ever seem them arrayed for war, manifesting to battle the gods themselves,” he admitted. “Of course, the gods can manifest at any size they desire. I’ve seen them large enough to hold a human or angel on the palm of a hand.”
Tala got a faraway look on her face, “That would be awe inspiring, to be held like that.” She snapped back, “But the Vardmasters can do that too? What are they?”
Lasrial nodded. “They can. The Vardmasters aren’t gods, they’re unmakers. A lot of the gods have destructive aspects but the Vardmasters are different. The gods and their angels support the sphere of creation we know as the universe. The Vardmasters don’t want to destroy the universe but to subvert the principles of its creation so that it not only never was but never could be. Everything they do is aimed at that.”
“Everything?” The younger angel was astonished. Lasrial sometimes thought that she was too open in letting her every emotion show on her face but when her thoughts were on their divine master he remembered what he had been like before the First Swordlord had fallen.
“Everything,” confirmed Lasrial. “The Death War. Stealing the souls of human dead. Encouraging good men to worship dead gods. Killing angels. I don’t know how it all fits together but I know they’re doing something out there in the spaces beyond creation.”
“But what? Why?” Tala was confused.
“I don’t know,” he shrugged. “Perhaps it is their nature.”
aldersprig's second prompt.“There have to be flowers,” the mother of the bride insisted. “Lots of flowers. When Raam’s sister got married the church was dripping in flowers. If we don’t have as many flowers as they did, she,” implying the groom’s mother, “is going to tell everyone your father and I are either cheap or poor.”
“And Raam and his father had to leave halfway through the ceremony because of their allergies,” rejoined Valeda, the bride. “I want Raam to be able to stay to the end of our wedding. If his mother makes snippy remarks, tell her that you care more about people’s health than the look of things.”
“Then she’ll have hysterics and accuse me of attacking her, you know what she’s like. I hate to say this of anyone but I understand why Raam’s father divorced her.” The older woman sighed. “You still need to decorate the church and the reception, and what are you going to do about the bouquet?”
“Well the table centrepieces don’t have to be flowers. In fact,” Valeda pointed out practically, “avoiding any liquid in the centre pieces might be a Good Plan.”
“Great Uncle Cato at your cousin Farica’s wedding,” agreed her mother. “Are you thinking candy gift boxes or something like that?”
“I thought so,” Valeda nodded. She picked up a craft book from the collected reference materials on the table and began leafing through it. “There’s a rather nifty design in here if I remember. Hang on, what about this?” She turned the book around to show her mother.
“Yes,” the older woman agreed after some consideration, “that has definite potential.”
The weather for the wedding was perfect; sunny, not too warm, not windy and dry under foot. The groom’s mother complained that there was no awning to keep the sun off the path from the car park to the church.
Once inside the church she pooh-poohed the decorations, arrangements of wooden and paper flowers, some of them works of art in origami. “Cheap and tacky,” was the pronouncement that set the bride’s mother’s blood boiling but it was the groom’s sister who put a stop to it.
“At least Dad and Raam will be able to stay at this wedding,” she hissed loudly at her mother.
“Pandering to weakness, that’s what it is,” her mother snapped back.
“At least it’s a physical problem, unlike your self-serving, narcissistic whining,” her daughter came back. “Now for heaven’s sake, shut up. Today is not and was never going to be about you!” The mother of the groom sulked for the rest of the ceremony.
When the bride came down the aisle, there were murmurs of appreciation. The glorious bouquet was a mass of ribbon flowers, cascading down the front of her dress.
The groom didn’t sneeze even once.
aldersprig's first prompt.Along with a short list of don’ts pregnant ladies, Rensa discovered, were encouraged to both exercise in moderation and nap. Her weight was still less than her doctor thought it should be and the first sign of her pregnancy had been a small dip in that weight. As a result she was now on a ‘sustaining’ diet backed by a vitamin supplement. Mirren, a month more pregnant than Rensa, was still the chief aider-and-abettor of the campaign to raise Rensa’s weight and she made sure small, regular, healthy snacking opportunities were being presented to both of them on a regular basis.
One more month, then they’d be through the first trimester and there could be a public announcement. That might stop some of the letters.
People wrote to the Empress. Rensa wasn’t quite sure why, but they did. They’d had to give her a pool of secretarial staff just to open and deal with the mail. Only a few of the opened letters came to Rensa herself.
A fair number were asking her to attend functions or support causes. Those went to the people who organised the Imperial couple’s diary.
Another substantial subset was from school children who were writing to the palace as part of some set project. There was a fairly standard reply for those with space for appropriate tailoring and Rensa signed those responses herself.
Most of the rest were begging letters. Most of those got a politely worded redirection of their request for help, with copies of the applicable forms if necessary. Others were handed straight to the criminal investigation liaison who now occupied a desk in the secretariat room, some for fraud investigation but others because what they revealed was some form of illegal coercion on the writer.
The threats, and there were some, also went to the criminal investigation liaison. Some people just didn’t understand that it was illegal to threaten anyone through the mail.
A few correspondents’ letters got sent through to Rensa. Mail from Yannic’s family that had gone to the public address and not the private one or letters from the woman who’d discovered a sketchbook and pencils hidden down the back of a dresser that she’d acquired which had come from one of the palace’s private apartments. She’d returned the sketchbook with a note remarking that she was sure the Empress would want the pictures of her family back and Rensa’s return note of heartfelt thanks had led to a mail friendship. The sketches themselves, beautifully done, weren’t of Rensa’s immediate family but they were of people she knew and were the only thing she could point to and show others what her world had been like…before.
The letters she hoped the announcement of her pregnancy would stop were the advice ones. The embarrassingly detailed ones on how to get pregnant.
Of course, they were probably going to be replaced by equally detailed letters on what she should do in pregnancy and childbirth…
The Prompt Request is open from now (Monday, 1 October, my time) until sometime Saturday, 13 October, my time. now closed. Thank you everyone who prompted and signal boosted.
If you give me more than one prompt you need to know that I will work through the list in order starting at the top.
The rules and parameters:
1. Each prompt will be:
a. a short sentence or phrase;
b. a story of mine posted to LJ you want to see more of – it does not need to come from a Prompt Request; or
c. characters of mine from stories posted on LJ – they do not need to come from a Prompt Request.
2. For each prompt I write to I will write 300±50 words. If you want to see something I’ve done along these lines before, please see the results of my July and September Prompt Requests. I have found that stories sometimes carry me away and you may get more than 350 words due to no fault of yours.
3. I will write one prompt per person, unless you signal boost this Prompt Request or a story from it , in which case I will write an additional prompt per site/platform you boost on i.e. one prompt each on LJ, Twitter, Dreamwidth, etc, for each day of the prompt request you signal boost. I am setting an arbitrary limit of 14 extra prompts per prompter from boosting. You will need to tell me about your boosts because I am not across every site and platform.
4. For each prompter I get, I will write 50 words in a prompting reward serial story;
5. No fanfic, I just don’t know enough about enough current series and settings to do your favourites justice – give me a name or names and I promise what you get will not be the people you know and love; and
6. Please, nothing that has to be porn – I have to be in the mood to write that sort of thing and I would like to be able to post these stories without warnings. (Yes, I know, 1b & 1c could produce prompts that are almost like that.)
7. For every ten prompt-based pieces I write I will I write a background piece on a world or character, subject to be chosen by audience poll.
Why am I doing this? Practice! Plus I’ve found that I enjoy the interaction with all of you.
And yes, there is a tip jar. This is for extensions. I will write extensions at 500 words per $5.00.
1. If I receive any money for extensions I can no longer be flabbergasted because that’s already happened but I will be very surprised. J
2. For every $15 I receive for paid extensions I will write to one more prompt, chosen by those who have paid for extensions, from any ‘unsupported’ prompts received in the Prompt Request. This will occur after I have written the paid extensions. An ‘unsupported’ prompt is one which does not have a signal boost to support it.
If you are kind enough to give me more signal boosts than you want to prompt, I will use each of your ‘left over’ signal boosts to power another 50 words in the prompt reward story.
Please tell me where you’ve signal boosted as a reply to your comment giving me prompts.
Thank you for participating.
“Why are we sneaking away to the station like this?” It was so early it was still dark. The sky above was clear with a few late stars and the eastern sky was beginning to colour. Mist sat in the dips in the fields. Both of them were dressed for the early morning chill. He wore a light coat with a scarf wrapped around his neck below the red hair. She wore a shawl flicked around her shoulders and unsecured by anything but it’s own weight.
“I don’t want anyone to see us and stop us,” he answered as he set a brisk pace. “In all the time you were being told you were Karen, you never went further from here than Hainbury or Market Tonbury. I’m wondering if that was deliberate.”
“Deliberate?” She had shorter legs than he did so she was having to work harder to keep up.
“Yes,” he looked down at the dark head hurrying along beside him, “I’m wondering if someone doesn’t want you going too far away in case you’re recognised as being not Karen.”
“A deliberate campaign of keeping me misidentified?” She considered that then said, “So in my real identity I’m a threat to someone?”
“Someone linked to that taint we’ve both noticed,” he agreed, “someone who doesn’t want to be interfered with. Which is why,” they’d reached the station now and he led the way onto the platform, “We’re buying our tickets from the ticket machine and not the station master.” He suited his actions to his words and got them both tickets to the city. “It’s also why we’re going to wait for the train where we can’t be locked in or seen from the road.”
“You think they’d stop us getting on the train or even get us off?”
“Possibly not by force,” he agreed as he led her down the platform away from buildings and the entrance to the platform. “It could be done by distraction or some other non-violent method, but force is an option. Here comes the train.” She followed his gaze up the line to see headlights shining on the rails from beyond the curve. As the yellow nosed front of the train came into the platform he swore softly. “George Greenup’s just come onto the other platform – he’s seen us and he’s waving. If you haven’t seen him, don’t look and just get on the train. Looks like we might have trouble at the next station.”
“What are we going to do?” She looked up at him, head cocked to one side. “Unless there’s someone actually at the next station I doubt anyone could get there in time to board the train, assuming George does call someone about us. There would be time to intercept us at the next three stations though, and if Hainbury and Market Tonbury mark the limits of the taint’s influence, that’s how far we have to worry about.”
“I have an idea. We need to move back to the carriage behind us though.” He took her by the hand and led her through the door into the seating area. Early morning travellers dozed or read, some even dozed while trying to read, but none of them paid any particular attention to the red haired man and the dark haired woman moving down the aisle.
Neither of them spoke until they reached the vestibule at the far end of the carriage. “What’s the plan?” To her eye there was nothing in the vestibule to hide behind or in. She’d seen bigger built in wardrobes.
“We’re going to hide in plain sight and I’ll need you to stay close to me, close enough you hardly have to straighten your arm to touch me.” He held her hand tightly. “For this first part we just need to be in contact to be a unit.” He began to mutter something in a language she didn’t recognise.
When he finished he whispered, “Quietly now,” and led her through the connecting section and into the next carriage.
No-one seated in their new carriage looked up when they came through the connecting door and no-one looked up when the two of them stepped into one of the two toilet cubicles together. When she reached for the door to lock it he stopped her. “We don’t want to give them any reason to think there’s anyone in here. Leaved the door unlocked.”
“I thought we were supposed to be hiding.” She was confused.
“We are. We’ve already started.” He looked about them. “These toilets are smaller than I remember them.” He looked back at her. “I’m not a mage but like a lot of people I’m capable of learning and doing two or three simple spells. While I was overseas, while I-. Well, I learnt how to do a bit of invisibility. I’ve already put an ignorance and avoidance on us. Now I’m going to bend the light around us. We have to be close because I can only cover a small space but we can move as long as we move together. Okay?”
“How close?” She looked up at him for an answer, noting that there wasn’t much space between the basin and the bowl.
“Put your arms around me.” He caught her look. “This is necessary. Just do it, please.” When she’d complied he put his arms around her in turn, making sure his hands didn’t land anywhere that might be considered as taking advantage of the situation. At least if they were knocked from side to side in this space it would be his elbows that took the damage and not hers.
The train came to a stop and the carriage doors opened. More than one person got on because they could hear a voice saying, “This is ridiculous. The up-train will drop the papers off and we won’t be there to get them so all the deliveries will be late. And if those Racklin kids get to them before we get back, there’ll be newsprint from one end of the village to the other.”
Another voice murmured something then the first voice answered, “Yes, I know. Orders are orders. I know I don’t need to understand everything, but sometimes I wished I did.” Then they heard the door into the seating section of the carriage open while footsteps came towards them.
The toilet door was pushed partly and the red haired man inside would have made eye contact with the middle aged man who opened it but for the spell that hid him. He felt the girl in his arms hold her breath but the searcher held the door open for less than a three count before letting the door close and checking the toilet cubicle on the other side of the aisle. The girl didn’t exhale again until they heard the connecting door to the next carriage close and then she did so quietly into his coat.
They travelled like that through six more stations, two beyond Hainbury just to be on the safe side. The door was opened three more times in what seemed to be a systematic search of the train by teams but it appeared that they were not seen. When they did emerge, they timed it so they blended with the people getting on the train at Runner’s Green. No-one in the seating section looked askance at them and they were able to get seats together. It was a much more comfortable ride than in the toilet cubicle.
It was half past seven when they arrived at the train terminus in the middle of the city. He led her unerringly through the station to the Underground platforms, consulted the destination boards and took her to the deepest of the three sets of platforms. They got on a train leaving the city, went one stop and got off. He led her up the steps out of the station, looked around to get his bearings and then strode confidently along the street. They crossed a main road and headed into a tangle of backstreets and after three turns and two more street crossings he stopped them outside a white two storied building, starkly recent in between two sets of terraces.
“This is a prayer hall,” she ventured quietly.
“Yes, it is,” he agreed. “If I’m going to go to the Church Knights muttering about taint and conspiracies to keep you from knowing who you really are, I think I want a letter of introduction from someone respectable, don’t you?”
“I suppose so,” she agreed uncertainly.
“Well, the someone respectable works here. Come on.” He stepped up to the door and knocked briskly.
A man with a neat beard and moustache opened the door and looked the red haired man up and down. “How may I help you?” He seemed dubious that he could.
“Peace be unto you.” The red haired man paused as if expecting a response but went on when he didn’t receive one. “I am here to see Hajji Razzaq ibn Abdullah. Please tell him that Asim al-Ahmar is here. The young lady is travelling under my protection because she was tricked into believing she’s my sister.”
“Please wait here.” The man closed the door.
Nearly five minutes later the door was thrown open and a short, round-faced man wearing glasses threw open the door. “Asim!” He threw his arms around the red haired man. “It is so good to see you again! Come in. Come in.” He looked at the dark haired young woman beside him, “And this young lady must be your sister of whom you spoke so often.”
“Actually, she’s not.” The red haired man almost sighed. “That’s partly why we’re here. I need your help.”
“Then you must most certainly come in and tell me all about it.” With that the small man ushered them inside, past the man who’d first opened the door, and into a small office. After he’d served them coffee and biscuits he sat down at the desk and said, “Good. Now we can talk.”
“When I got home, after I was allowed to go home given all the issues with the Kara Amida affair,” the red haired man told his friend, “I was told that my sister, Karen, had been savagely attacked and as a result had needed some facial reconstruction surgery and had amnesia. I was then introduced to this young lady.” He indicated the girl sitting beside him. “Everyone assured me she was Karen but that never quite gelled. Then two days ago we found Karen’s body – she’d been at the bottom of a well for four years.”
“I am so sorry my friend,” the Hajji was sympathetic. “So now you are here because you want to find your sister’s killer and to know who this young lady is?”
“Yes.” The red haired man agreed. “The police in charge of the investigation hadn’t manage to correctly identify her in four years. I have no great confidence in their ability or willingness to do so now.”
“We’ve both noticed an occasional trace of taint,” added the dark haired girl, “and this morning there was an attempt to find us on the train.”
“Oh, ho!” Their host chortled. “I’ll warrant I know why they couldn’t find you. Asim here can hide a patrol from a pack of ghilan if he has the time and the warning.” He sobered up. “So, you want an introduction to the Church Knights?”
“Yes please.” The red haired man raised an eyebrow, “You came to that rather quickly.”
“My position was envisaged by His Holiness the current Caliph’s grandfather, blessed be his memory, as a person for Muslims in a strange land to gain help from when they ran into matters of taint and black sorcery far from home. We’ve always had quite good relations with the Church Knights on that point. The problem we face now though is that when this post was first established there were ten or twelve reports a year of which maybe one in twenty turned out to have anything to it.” The small man took a deep breath and went on, “Now we receive eighteen or twenty reports a month and one in six has substance to it. It is true that there are more Muslims in this country these days, but it worries me that the proportion of matters of true concern is rising. As well, secularisation of the Christian population in this country means that I am receiving reports now from non-Muslim youths of both sexes brought to me by their Muslim friends because they don’t know who else to turn to.” He shook his head. “Something is going on, my friends, and neither I nor the Church Knights care for it at all.”
“I didn’t come home expecting to land in another ghul-hunt,” said the red haired man.
“Not a ghul-hunt, Asim. I fear this will be much worse.”
“Excuse me,” interrupted the dark haired girl, “but why Asim? Isn’t your,” she turned to the Hajji, “his name, excuse me, Rhys?”
“Oh yes,” explained the little man with a chuckle, “but despite what happened to the rest of his squad, he was never officially seconded to or embedded in the Army of the Caliphate so he needed a nom d’guerre. Asim is a good name and al-Ahmar simply means ‘the red’. Please, finish your coffee while I write your letter.”
As their host wrote away in a flowing elegant script, the girl turned to her companion and remarked, “That sounds rather different to the official story of what happened to you.”
“The official story is inaccurate for a number of reasons,” Rhys smiled back at her. “All of them good ones from someone’s point of view.”
The letter didn’t take long to write but the fountain pen ink had to dry while the Hajji wrote out the covering envelope. They finished their coffee, like civilised people, then the Hajji folded the letter, put it in the envelope and sealed it in. As he handed the envelope to his friend he made a short remark in his own language. Both of his guests blushed.
Rhys was the one who realised what that meant. “You understand Persian?” He spoke in that language with an accent that was understandable but meandered around the Caliphate and outside it.
“I speak Persian.” She smiled. “I speak Persian! That’s something else we know about me!” She turned to the Hajji and asked in her educated Baghdadi accent, “Did you truly mean it when you said that he should he should marry me?”
“Oh yes,” the little man smiled. “He’s at an age and time of his life that he should marry and you have been living under his protection, albeit as his sister. You seem well matched and it would tidy things up appropriately.”
“With your position here, you’d be a licensed celebrant wouldn’t you?” Rhys had switched back to English.
“Of course. Who else would conduct weddings for our congregation?” The Hajji was still smiling.
“Well, if we go through with it, then I expect friends’ rates on your fee.” Rhys spoke like a man driving a bargain.
“Naturally!” The two men shook hands and then the Hajji added, “And if things are arranged in a hurry, I know a butcher who can get you a whole lamb or a calf for spit roasting at short notice.”
The two men continued to banter with each other all the way back to the front door. When they were outside again the dark haired girl asked Rhys, “Did you two just arrange our wedding?”
“Possibly.” Rhys looked down at her. “We didn’t discuss what you’d wear though. Perhaps his wife could help you if you’ve no-one else?” She punched him in the arm.
After a few minutes of walking she asked, “Are we going back to the station?”
“No,” he looked both ways before stepping out to cross the road, “we’re going to catch a bus.”
A short time later the bus dropped them on the Embankment and they started walking downstream. They passed a bridge over the river and then the historic buildings came into view. She stopped and asked, “We’re going to the Episcopal Palace?”
“To part of the episcopal complex, not the Palace itself,” Rhys clarified. “I believe their office is in the old parish church.”
“Whose office?”
“The Church Knights’.”
“Of course, the letter of introduction.” She smiled at him. “Why didn’t I realise they must have an office here?”
He shrugged. “It would make just as much sense for their office to be at the Abbey or one of the Cathedrals.”
She grew more and more apprehensive the closer they got to the Episcopal Palace. Finally, less than a block away, she stopped and grabbed his arm. “Rhys, do we really need to have a Church Knight come with us? Can’t we just go to the missing person people on our own?”
He put his hand over hers before he answered. “If we go to the police and talk about taint they’re just going to send us back here. And frankly, if I’m going to bring up the lack of proper investigation into your identity by the local police I want to have someone impressive backing me up.” He leaned forward and looked at her more closely. “You’re making me think that there’s more to your memory not coming back than simply amnesia. All right, I’m going to take you to get another cup of coffee, but first I’m going to blindfold you and spin you around, okay?”
“What?” She was flabbergasted.
“It’ll be fine, trust me.” He smiled at her.
“Okay.” She smiled back but she didn’t sound at all sure.
This story continues here. It got too big for one LJ post.
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