Black and purple clouds billowed in layers above the Preseli Hills. A storm had been threatening for days but that morning it had broken in a deluge. Arriving exhausted and starving at the elegant town of Fishguard, they were kindly and sympathetically received at an establishment in High Town and woke late the following day to sea views completely obscured by low cloud and yet more vertical rain. That morning they ate a hearty and much-needed plate of scrambled eggs, served in a wood-floored breakfast room with a cheery fire and white covered sofas.
The landlady, Karen, a kindly and busy refugee from London, had an impossible workload of bedlinen, breakfast and two teenage boys, yet found time to stand next to Anna and gaze sympathetically out of the window with her at grey skies and unceasing rain. ‘How far are you going today?’
Anna shrugged. ‘I’m not sure yet,’ she said, hoping fervently that the other two would decide to go nowhere and they could stay in the warm.
‘The weather forecast is better for tomorrow; it’s bucketing all day today,’ said landlady Karen. ‘This early in the year we’re not full, although it gets manic later on. If you wanted to stay another night, you’d all be welcome,’ she said, ‘although I’ll need to get into the rooms to clean them.’ Then she disappeared downstairs with an armful of plates.
Another night. What bliss. But knowing Fitz he will already have decided to keep going today.
But Fitz hadn’t decided to keep going, nor, unusually, had Perceval, who wanted to rest his horse. So to Anna’s delight the matter was quickly decided. Perceval said he would attend to Oscar and vanished off. But, once the euphoria of not having to spend that day walking for miles had worn off, Anna wasn’t sure what to do with herself. There were some books lining the shelves of the sitting room. A History of Britain in the Time of King Alfred written by someone called Nathan Mew. Maybe there would be a reference to this mysterious Meghan person that the others seemed reluctant to talk about.
Anna threw herself down on a comfy sofa and tried to concentrate on King Alfred but the brave warrior king kept going in and out of focus and eventually she drifted off to sleep.
Fitz had wandered off somewhere to do whatever dragons did in the pouring rain. Perceval had also vanished. Anna took her book upstairs but again soon fell asleep, not waking until it was late afternoon and already dark. King Alfred lay unread on the bed.
Her room at the front of the house overlooked the street. Opposite the hotel a single streetlamp glowed bravely in the endless rainy night and a delivery lorry hauled itself up the steep hill on its way to wherever it was going. A closed commercial premises with a chipped, painted sign announced itself as ‘Fortune’s ish and C ips’. She took King Alfred back downstairs. Fitz was nowhere to be seen, but Perceval was there, seated comfortably in the cosy sitting room staring dreamily into the firelight.
‘Hail Anna,’ he said, when she entered. ‘Perhaps you can help me with a mystery. It’s curious. I have watched the fire for thirty minutes now. Yet the logs don’t seem to be consumed by the flames. I call this miraculous.’
‘It’s because it’s a gas fire, Perceval.’
‘Ah! Not real wood, then?’
‘No, Perceval’ Anna said, trying not to laugh. Poor Perceval; he really did struggle with the modern world.
‘I see.’
They sat in silence for a moment. Anna had grown fond of the old knight. She suspected he was much more caring than he let on and was devoted to the dragon, although the two bickered constantly. Perceval seemed to want to say something, she thought, but didn’t know where to start. With no poetry book to hand he seemed restless.
‘May I see your book?’ he asked, leaning over to peer at the title.
She handed it to him. He flicked through the pages and looked at some of the pictures. ‘Not a very good likeness. I remember him, you know, as I said. We were teenagers together, in a manner of speaking, although the idea of a teenager hadn’t really been invented back then.’
Anna looked bemused but said nothing. If Perceval wanted to tell her things, he would do it in his own time. She was just happy to sit in companionable silence. She settled in the other chair next to the fire. The only sound in the room was the gentle hissing of the gas fire and the rain on the windows. It was so peaceful she felt herself again drifting towards sleep. How relaxing this place was. She felt she could stay here for days, for weeks, forever.
Seconds later she was wide awake and sat bolt upright, shocked.
‘You see, my dear, it started when they tried to hang me.’