"Curses!" Judge Stoddard wheezed as he reached the wrecked hen house and stared at the calamitous destruction of
his prized-poultry. Banjo was still growling out into the darkness and pulling at Flagg's hold of his collar. "Easy boy" the
usually-reserved butler whispered and followed the dog's gaze out into the blackness of the orchard. Peggy Powler
arrived moments later and cast an eye of disgust at the gore and feathers that were once roosting chickens.
The panting necromancer decided to remain quiet whilst her host vented his vexation at the slaughter of the hens, the
wooden hut they'd been kept in was oddly still intact, but the netted-cage had been shredded on the side facing away
from the magistrate's home. This aspect of the sad scene wasn't lost on the little Witch standing beneath a winter's
moon, but she knew this wasn't the time to discuss it.
"My best pullets...why?" Benjamin Stoddard fumed quietly and again, his faithful hound tugged to be released from
the uncomfortable Flagg. The calignosity of the orchard peered back at its small audience and that pale orb in the
sky offered none of its cold effulgence to assist in revealing what Banjo undoubtedly could smell. "He's out there"
the Last Witch of Underhill whispered to herself and wished there was a spell to help dogs talk.
With a great deal of tutting in his disgust, the old Judge ambled back indoors and occasionally hissed for Banjo to
follow him. Flagg laboured to keep his master's mutt from escaping as he too returned to the mansion and ignoring
the scruffy woman staring out into the obscurity of the barren fruit grove, he wondered if the Willowsgate killer had
struck again. For a few moments, the cold air of the late evening was the wary warlock's only companion and with
another peruse of the carnage, Peggy made her way along the stone-slabbed patio and processed her thoughts.
.................................................................
The old clock continued its marking of time as Judge Stoddard stared into the embers of his fire hearth and the
Witch sitting across from him reckoned his thoughts burned there too. Maybe tonight's incident would help in
surfacing some of the retired referee of Justice's recollections regarding the past, she mused, but waited to find
the moment to press him. Flagg entered and asked his employer if needed anything, Banjo appeared from behind
the steward's legs and headed for a large cushion on the floor that rivalled the one Peggy currently enjoyed.
If her attention had veered back to the owner of the hound, she'd have missed it, but leaning around the arm of
her chair, she saw the wispy strands of wool caught in Banjo's whiskers. "No, get yourself to bed" Ben Stoddard
muttered and waved a hand vaguely at his butler, Flagg left after a slight bow and the room was quiet once more.
Mainly because Peggy had forgotten to breathe. "Judge..." she anounced in hushed tones and snatching some air,
"...Ah' think yer' dog might've met whoever attacked yer' chickens".
.................................................................
Flagg concluded that he wasn't happy with a slumbering sorceress sleeping in her satchel dangling from one of his
employer's bannister support posts. But he didn't purvey his opinion on the woman who'd spent the night sleeping
beneath the gaze of Old Scratch as it somehow seemed fitting. Father Martin had always frowned at the oak effigy
when he visited his master and to Flagg, that was a condemnation he could currently agree with.
Quietly placing the pot of hot chicory and Judge Stoddard's regular breakfast of a bowl of steaming-hot porridge
down beside the snoring once-renown ombudsman in his usual armchair, the tired-eyed servant left without venting
his inclination of the bulge in the bottom of the suspended bag. But what the butler didn't see was the wiggling
finger sticking out from under the flap. It was time to find out what this haughty fellow knew.
"...Then when Sir Whitby Kipper died, the Notary instructed us to remove all of my master's belongings and dispose
of them" Flagg answered as he turned the fried-egg over. Miss Powler was certainly hungry as she was now eating
her second cook-made scone. "But he never expanded on where or how to get rid of his things..." the mesmerised
manservant continued "... Mrs Bell said we should bury them with him and so we did. I was just a Lower-House Boy
back then and was told to keep out of the way".
Peggy listened and mentally fitted the jigsaw of the previous owner of Judge Stoddard's palatial home, she thanked
Flagg for the breakfast and waited for the location of this unusual interment. Whitby Kipper had been a collector of
the cabalistic and the supernatural, from the butler's description this taciturn gatherer retained rare items and certain
paraphernalia that had been involved in forgotten rituals and questionable rites.
Chewing on her morning fare, the little Witch wondered if it could be that this titled scholar had somehow acquired
the means to draw a Wulpos into this existence...? unknowingly become a Nagial with access to the Lupis lazulia?
Flagg's droll comment regarding some of the his previous employer's materials was interesting to the now belly-full
spellbinder as one of the things listed was an alleged surcoat of invisibility.
When pressed on that particular item, the hypnotised hireling had believed it was acquired when Sir Whitby Kipper
had met a stranger on Calder's Way. Flagg admitted he wasn't sure, but he'd overheard it said by his older brethren
of service. Absently sliding her empty plate away, Peggy wagered such a tunic -if it had ever existed, was made of
untreated sheep's wool.
It had been written that the blue stone had been destroyed centuries ago and with it, the fiendish incubus known as
the Wulpos. But if the thing that was roaming the woods around Willowsgate was possessed with such a horror,
Kipper's hidden compilation of mystic curios may offer a lead how it rid the village of it.
Flagg stared out of the kitchen window at the mist-strewn orchard and waited for a different type of guidance. The
entranced domestic would answer, but only if the correct question was asked. It had been so long ago and there'd
been a girl who -but Peggy disrupted the butler's stroll down the florescent lane of nostalgia.
"So where did yer' put his stuff?" she asked and Flagg's almost immediate response was followed by the scrape
of chair legs on the smooth stone slabs of the kitchen. Walking quickly out into the chilly morning air of the fruit
plantation, Peggy believed if she was taller she'd be able to see the large elm tree where Whitby Kipper's trinkets
of the occult were buried.
his prized-poultry. Banjo was still growling out into the darkness and pulling at Flagg's hold of his collar. "Easy boy" the
usually-reserved butler whispered and followed the dog's gaze out into the blackness of the orchard. Peggy Powler
arrived moments later and cast an eye of disgust at the gore and feathers that were once roosting chickens.
The panting necromancer decided to remain quiet whilst her host vented his vexation at the slaughter of the hens, the
wooden hut they'd been kept in was oddly still intact, but the netted-cage had been shredded on the side facing away
from the magistrate's home. This aspect of the sad scene wasn't lost on the little Witch standing beneath a winter's
moon, but she knew this wasn't the time to discuss it.
"My best pullets...why?" Benjamin Stoddard fumed quietly and again, his faithful hound tugged to be released from
the uncomfortable Flagg. The calignosity of the orchard peered back at its small audience and that pale orb in the
sky offered none of its cold effulgence to assist in revealing what Banjo undoubtedly could smell. "He's out there"
the Last Witch of Underhill whispered to herself and wished there was a spell to help dogs talk.
With a great deal of tutting in his disgust, the old Judge ambled back indoors and occasionally hissed for Banjo to
follow him. Flagg laboured to keep his master's mutt from escaping as he too returned to the mansion and ignoring
the scruffy woman staring out into the obscurity of the barren fruit grove, he wondered if the Willowsgate killer had
struck again. For a few moments, the cold air of the late evening was the wary warlock's only companion and with
another peruse of the carnage, Peggy made her way along the stone-slabbed patio and processed her thoughts.
.................................................................
The old clock continued its marking of time as Judge Stoddard stared into the embers of his fire hearth and the
Witch sitting across from him reckoned his thoughts burned there too. Maybe tonight's incident would help in
surfacing some of the retired referee of Justice's recollections regarding the past, she mused, but waited to find
the moment to press him. Flagg entered and asked his employer if needed anything, Banjo appeared from behind
the steward's legs and headed for a large cushion on the floor that rivalled the one Peggy currently enjoyed.
If her attention had veered back to the owner of the hound, she'd have missed it, but leaning around the arm of
her chair, she saw the wispy strands of wool caught in Banjo's whiskers. "No, get yourself to bed" Ben Stoddard
muttered and waved a hand vaguely at his butler, Flagg left after a slight bow and the room was quiet once more.
Mainly because Peggy had forgotten to breathe. "Judge..." she anounced in hushed tones and snatching some air,
"...Ah' think yer' dog might've met whoever attacked yer' chickens".
.................................................................
Flagg concluded that he wasn't happy with a slumbering sorceress sleeping in her satchel dangling from one of his
employer's bannister support posts. But he didn't purvey his opinion on the woman who'd spent the night sleeping
beneath the gaze of Old Scratch as it somehow seemed fitting. Father Martin had always frowned at the oak effigy
when he visited his master and to Flagg, that was a condemnation he could currently agree with.
Quietly placing the pot of hot chicory and Judge Stoddard's regular breakfast of a bowl of steaming-hot porridge
down beside the snoring once-renown ombudsman in his usual armchair, the tired-eyed servant left without venting
his inclination of the bulge in the bottom of the suspended bag. But what the butler didn't see was the wiggling
finger sticking out from under the flap. It was time to find out what this haughty fellow knew.
"...Then when Sir Whitby Kipper died, the Notary instructed us to remove all of my master's belongings and dispose
of them" Flagg answered as he turned the fried-egg over. Miss Powler was certainly hungry as she was now eating
her second cook-made scone. "But he never expanded on where or how to get rid of his things..." the mesmerised
manservant continued "... Mrs Bell said we should bury them with him and so we did. I was just a Lower-House Boy
back then and was told to keep out of the way".
Peggy listened and mentally fitted the jigsaw of the previous owner of Judge Stoddard's palatial home, she thanked
Flagg for the breakfast and waited for the location of this unusual interment. Whitby Kipper had been a collector of
the cabalistic and the supernatural, from the butler's description this taciturn gatherer retained rare items and certain
paraphernalia that had been involved in forgotten rituals and questionable rites.
Chewing on her morning fare, the little Witch wondered if it could be that this titled scholar had somehow acquired
the means to draw a Wulpos into this existence...? unknowingly become a Nagial with access to the Lupis lazulia?
Flagg's droll comment regarding some of the his previous employer's materials was interesting to the now belly-full
spellbinder as one of the things listed was an alleged surcoat of invisibility.
When pressed on that particular item, the hypnotised hireling had believed it was acquired when Sir Whitby Kipper
had met a stranger on Calder's Way. Flagg admitted he wasn't sure, but he'd overheard it said by his older brethren
of service. Absently sliding her empty plate away, Peggy wagered such a tunic -if it had ever existed, was made of
untreated sheep's wool.
It had been written that the blue stone had been destroyed centuries ago and with it, the fiendish incubus known as
the Wulpos. But if the thing that was roaming the woods around Willowsgate was possessed with such a horror,
Kipper's hidden compilation of mystic curios may offer a lead how it rid the village of it.
Flagg stared out of the kitchen window at the mist-strewn orchard and waited for a different type of guidance. The
entranced domestic would answer, but only if the correct question was asked. It had been so long ago and there'd
been a girl who -but Peggy disrupted the butler's stroll down the florescent lane of nostalgia.
"So where did yer' put his stuff?" she asked and Flagg's almost immediate response was followed by the scrape
of chair legs on the smooth stone slabs of the kitchen. Walking quickly out into the chilly morning air of the fruit
plantation, Peggy believed if she was taller she'd be able to see the large elm tree where Whitby Kipper's trinkets
of the occult were buried.
Read The TV Guide, yer' don't need a TV.