Chapter 27: The Persephone

The sun was setting fast and the evening sky was dashed with vivid oranges and deep reds as the narrowboat made its way up the river Marland towards Winterton. It passed the little stone bridge – the marker that indicated the start of the estate - and slowed to a crawl, as if careful to avoid any unwanted attention.

Eliza scanned the horizon just to be certain that nobody had seen them. When she was sure there was no one around, she killed the engines and allowed the boat to drift a little so that it finally came to rest with a gentle bump under the obscuring boughs of a large weeping willow.

She could just make out the roof of Winterton Hall poking over the lie of the hill through the leaves and branches. One whole side of the building burned fiercely with the amber light from the evening sun as it continued to slip slowly below the horizon.

‘Make sure it’s tied properly,’ hissed Eliza from the rear of the boat, pointing to a mooring post. ‘We don’t want it going missing,’ she said smiling, ‘and we don’t want anyone taking it for a joyride either.’

Thomas threw a heavy rope to the bank. ‘No-one’s going to nick this great hulk,’ he muttered under his breath.

‘Beg your pardon?’ said Eliza, cupping an ear and feigning deafness.

Thomas beamed innocently and jumped to the shore before lashing the Persephone to a mooring post.

Meanwhile, Scarlet was thinking about her actions. She didn’t know whether or not to just grab Thomas and run home as fast as she could. The cottage had been wrecked, but more importantly, her parents had forbade her to go back to the wood nevermind come home late. But it was already late though, so what did it matter now if they were a little later? Scarlet’s comfortable life was beginning to fall apart, and she felt helpless to do anything about it. She shook her head and sighed. And then something caught her attention, and she pointed into the distance. ‘What’s that over there?’

Eliza looked in the direction, and there - sure enough - on the other side of the hill, she saw something that had punctuated the ground at regular intervals. They were all white and bleached - pushing up through the impeccably mowed lawn like giant peg-like teeth. What were they? They were too far away to be sure. What she wanted to do was climb the hill get a better look. The angle was too shallow to get a good view from where she was standing.

Eliza squinted ahead. ‘I’m not sure…’ she said finally. ‘We could go and look, but we should do as much as we can to lessen the chances of us being seen.’

Scarlet knew she was right and nodded reluctantly. Eliza gave a little smile - she could sense Scarlet’s desperation to go and explore.

‘We’ll go and look later,’ added Eliza, as a compromise. It was something, after all, that she would have done. But she didn’t want to risk anything going wrong. In the back of her thoughts were Tobias and Hillary at Winterton Hall. She just hoped that if anything did happen they’d be in a position to help. ‘There is a stone circle nearby called the Eleven Hags.’ she pointed out. ‘It could be that.’

Scarlet was clearly intrigued. ‘Really?’

‘Oh it’s well known round these parts.’

‘Why’s it called the Eleven Hags then?’

‘Legend has it that ten villagers went up to Winterton hill one Saturday night and made a bonfire around the ancient stone there called Old Nick’s Seat. As far as they knew, the stone had been there for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. Maybe more. Anyway, they took food and wine with them and a fiddler. As they drank more and more, they got more and more carried away. With the combination of the music and the drink, they danced and danced around the stone, so much so that they forgot about the ancient laws.’

‘What ancient laws?’ asked Scarlet.

‘About not dancing on the Sabbath of-course.’

Scarlet scoffed. ‘But that’s not a real law!’ she pointed out.

‘Oh it is my girl. It is. It’s just that nowadays there are other punishments that the devil inflicts on us. It’s just that you don’t realise. Mind you, there’s not that many religious people about any more child. Woe betide anyone who breaks that rule…’

‘So what happened then?’ asked Scarlet.

‘Well, the fiddler remembered and made his excuses and left sharpish. The rest of them, though, continued to dance well past midnight. But, when they’d exhausted themselves they found that they couldn’t stop dancing, and the fiddler’s music instead got faster and faster. They carried on dancing into the morning, pleading and shouting for the fiddler to stop.’

‘Hold on,’ said Scarlet, suspiciously. ‘I thought you said that the fiddler had made his excuses and left?’

‘Oh you heard me right dear. You see, it wasn’t the fiddler playing the music, but the Devil.’

‘What?’

‘Punishing them for breaking the Sabbath you see.’

‘And then what happened?’

‘Well, in the morning there were ten new stones around Old Nick’s Seat.’

Scarlet on tip-toes, desperately tried to catch a glimpse of the stones again. ‘Wow.’ she whispered.

And with that Eliza disappeared below deck humming to herself.

‘Just going to pop the kettle on. Anyone fancy a cup of tea?’

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