Peggy Powler Goes Home.

[BIAD]

Old John Pebbles gently shook the clay flagon and hearing the reassuring sloshing of his homemade cider, wondered
if he should delay his usual ritual of getting to his bed before the sun went down and continue his blather with the little
woman sitting across from him. She too had partaken of the fermented juice and even though the Gnome was probably
twice her age, the occasional flash of his visitor's bare thigh still aroused feelings in him he'd believed had left long ago.

A large circle of fairies were coming to the last verse of their special Midsummer ballad and the bonfire they'd been
dancing around since late-afternoon was waning in its effulgence. The old Gnome and the small bare-footed female
watching the gaiety sighed as one at the simple exultation of life from beings who were and always will be one with
nature.

But even the sweet liquid wasn't powerful enough to shroud John's reminder that the tipsy lady in the poncho was
also a Witch and a half-Fae one to boot. The discreet festival hadn't been her sole reason for their meeting. Being
one of the rare exorcisers of those beyond the veil, his guest had recently expelled the spine-chilling creature known
as the Mowing Devil from a homestead over near Nine Banks. Seeing the tiredness around the eyes of the woman
under a wide-brimmed hat, he wondered what lay ahead for this cleanser of demons and monsters.

"After the Litha celebration is over, where do yer' think yer'll be heading to?" John asked in his best casual voice and
with all his will to keep the slurring out of his question. His sociable guest for the last two days pushed back her large
headwear and peered up at the blue-orange sky of early evening. "These old dogs are whisperin' that Ah' should head
towards the coast..." she answered amiably and wiggled her toes to emphasise what she meant. "...But me-heart has
been beckonin' me te' teke' a trip to somewhere Ah' have nay prevailed since Ah' was a young'un" the wool-gathering
wanderer added with a whimsical smile.

The full explanation wouldn't be revealed until the next day when the Gnome's guest finished her breakfast of unsalted
porridge and stood up from the small homemade table in his burrow. Hoisting a well-worn satchel onto her shoulder,
the famous necromancer of a hundred villages smiled as John Pebble also got to his feet and approached the woman
who'd been kind enough to spend a Midsummer's festival with someone many knew as a grouchy old bastard.

"Ah'll be on me-way now Mister Pebbles..." she said meekly and accepted the old Fae's rushed embrace, the ancient
Gnome's sparse hair smelled oddly of cinnamon with a faint wisp of last night's cider. "...Yon road is callin' again and
Ah'm itchin' te' go back te' see what home looks like" she added and gently patted her host on the shoulder.

As the little Witch skirted a ring of toadstools, stepped over the remains of a rotting log and disappeared behind a large
flowering rhododendron bush, one the fairies from the previous evening's merriment stepped out from the tall grasses
that hid John's little underground home from predators and followed the old Gnome's gaze.

"Where is she going" the almost-transparent spirit known as Bubbles asked as glitter-dust floated above the fairy's wake
through the undergrowth. The Gnome had seen almost a hundred Midsummer nights and had heard most of the tales
regarding the small sorceress who shunned footwear, most of them he was certain couldn't be true. Allowing a sigh to
leave his ponderings, John Pebbles scratched the raspy stubble on his chin and replied "Where would the Last Witch
of Underhill go when she says she's goin' home?".
.................................................................

With the dew still cooling her heels, Peggy Powler left the lush greenery of the forest and clambered unceremoniously
over the drystone that segregated the thick woodland and her favourite road of travel. The diminutive Witch knew that
Calder's Way passed close to the secluded area where Gnomes and other Fae lived and her need to be those of a more
magical predisposition than most humans had been too enticing to resist.

The farming community of Nine Banks lay a good day's walk behind her and ahead was the village of Beggar's Well,
a place she'd once killed a Barguest with an axe and felt great guilt about the act for several days. Peggy shivered as
she recalled those cold winter days across the moors, keeping away from farmhouses and the like. But with a quick
whip of her head and a glance towards the bright morning sky, the memories fell away and the little augurer's gait
improved along the cemented sea-cobbles of the fabled highway.

Underhill awaited and the woman who'd once been an auntie to the young girl left by her mother and the Carnival
would certainly be there. Peggy Powler smiled once more as she recalled the woman who was twice as old as
John Pebbles and could drink more in a night than the Gnome would manage in a week. Wicked Hetty, the Hag
of the Well.

[BIAD]

The Hoot-owl blinked its indignation at the strange scruffy object dangling from his favourite roost and ruffled his feathers
in vexation. The road made a fine capture-point with its light-coloured surface and with his preferred cuisine sporting dark
fur, the stunted bough was an grand station to see rabbits crossing Calder's Way and now someone or something had
commandeered his ideal perch.

Even though the night bird may have been approximately the same size as the contents of the object, the ruffled hunter
would never have the fortitude to request the snoring occupant to decamp and allow certain nocturnal practices to return
to normal out here in the boondocks.

Whatever further reverie the disconcerted binocular bird may have conjured with we'll never know as a sudden movement
in the harebell-filled meadow behind the weathered signpost proclaiming Underhill being two leagues away caused the
feathered predator to take to its silent flight. One often finds that supper moves in mysterious ways.
.................................................................

The small smoky campfire crackled in the cool morning air as Peggy Powler sipped at a hot mug of chicory coffee and
considered what lay ahead. The yawning Witch loved this time of day and last night's slumber was much needed after
such a long journey. Underhill was not too-far away and she guessed that by nightfall, her nostalgia for the old place of
some of her younger years her would undoubtedly tumble in and bring an ache to her smiling mouth.

Peggy felt the calling for ablutions and waddling over to a large elm, she squatted as she wondered if old Hetty would
still be there. 'The Hag O' The Well' she'd been loosely baptised by those who would never dare to say it to her face, due
to some questionable episode in her past, but the little spellbinder couldn't recall a day when she'd seen the raggedy-old
woman anywhere near the village's water-hole.

Hetty was her aunt on her father's side -although his background was as vague as the woman who'd shown her how to
speak to toads and command inanimate to levitate. It had been some relief to Myrddin the Great Wizard when he'd
arrived in Underhill and found a teenager who'd embraced the old ways and was willing to further her education in the
art of majick. Peggy had never mentioned it anyone, but she also believed Hetty and the famous Magician had been
more than mere acquaintances in the past too. Myrddin had stayed over one night at Hetty's small home and it had
only two beds. Peggy had slept in one of them and her arithmetic was fine for her age.

Madame Powler -even in her rare moments of sobriety, had never fully disclosed the ambiguous man who'd she'd met
before coming to the Carnival. He was from Fae heritage and had stayed long enough for Peggy's mother to have some
confederacy with his relatives, but beyond that, the girl who'd loved her time with the Carnie-folk had nothing to connect
herself to her father.

With the fire extinguished and her meagre requirements to bivouac packed away in her mysterious satchel, the convivial
conjurer of bewitchment left her musings cooling with the result of her bladder evacuation, climbed carefully over the wall
of Calder's Way and set her shoeless feet towards a place she'd learned to call home.
.................................................................

If an intrepid reader of this tale ever decides to take the unpaved path off to the right where a large glacier-dropped boulder
prohibits Calder's Way's dry-stone barrier continuance, one may be forgiven to assume they were trekking towards a rarely
-used fruit-picking area. Immense raspberry bushes resided along that backwater trail that offer plump drupe all year round
and diffused among this fertile shrubbery, pomegranate trees dangle their juicy pericarps at a convenient height for anyone
passing.

Peering through this entanglement of this eternal harvest, there's a grass-bound hill where certain myths abound that will
only distract the same reader from the journey we're currently taking together and so we'll move along with the offering that
such legends may get an airing later.

Just a few strides from this natural orchard, a sentry of ancient oaks and elms line the way to a broken-down village where
the residents are a paradox of the earlier compassionate verdure. The shutters on the windows of the ten dilapidated abodes
are always closed and a passing traveller would be lucky to find a door even partially open. Underhill is -and has never been,
a place for visitors.

Peggy breathed in the faint aroma of woodsmoke from the chimneys as it failed once more to rise above the higher ground
that gave the hamlet its name. Squinting in the afternoon sun past the boulder-walled well that her aunt was alleged to have
come from, she looked towards the last of the ramshackle cottages. A large clay effigy of the last night's visitor to the Witch's
roost squatted vigilantly on an ivy-covered ledge next to the unvarnished door of Hetty's home.

The sculpture had an interesting trick to it when anyone -although that was a rare act, visited the old woman's residence, as
it's head would turn but only when the caller wasn't looking. A young Peggy had spent many a day attempting to catch the
terra-cotta owl in its prying and never succeeded once.

"Aye, there be a bugger me-nose would still recognise even if'n it had a washer-woman's claes-pin stuck on it..." a voice
croaked just as Peggy raised her hand to tap on the peeling door. "...Get yer' bare-backside in here and tek' a cup o' tea
wiv' the only agnate of the famous Witch from around these Herne-forsaken parts" the ancient utterance demanded and
the blemished door slowly opened on its own accord.

Sitting in an unlit room some used to call the parlour, a time-worn venerable geriatric sat on a wooden chair that must have
been hewn from a tree that is now a fossil and the occupant of that hoary piece of furniture turned her head to scrutinise the
nearest thing she had to a daughter. "Me-old heart is poundin' te' see my best lassie..." Hetty of The Well cooed softly and
pointed towards a chair that had also seen better days. "...Come on in and set awhile".

[BIAD]

If time is a pugilist, Peggy Powler had to reluctantly admit to herself that the old woman sitting across from her looked
like she'd ducked only few of its boundless punches. Hetty's Halloween smile remained on her aunt's well-lined face as
her blood-shot eyes soaked in the sight of Madame Powler's only issue. "De' yer' knaa pet...? yer' a sight fur' these old
glimmers" Hetty rasped and suddenly broke into a wracking cough.

Peggy leaned close and placed a caring hand on the harridan's shoulder, she could feel the muscles writhe and coil
beneath the threadbare remains of the frock Hetty always wore. "You tek' yer' time Ma'am" the little Witch murmured
as she recalled her aunt's previous bouts of convulsions. Many winters ago, an almost twelve year-old Peggy had spent
two days and nights nursing the old woman through a severe stint of the hacking fits.

The young girl believed her mother's explanation that Hetty had once fought a dragon in its lair and its sulphurous breath
that had almost destroyed the woman's lungs. However, during the early hours of the second night and when Peggy was
almost unglued from lack of sleep, her father's sister had imparted between coughs that she'd once laid with Old Scratch
himself and it was his supernatural ardor had left her this way. Now caressing Hetty's flinching and rippling spine, Peggy
wondered if the old reprobate had provided the true reason for her seizures.

"Eeh yer' bugger..." Hetty wheezed "...that night wiv' the Devil has certainly knocked me-fettle" and managed a sly wink
towards the worried Witch beside her. Peggy remained quiet as she watched her aunt slowly sit upright and catch her
breath, to the necromancer reaching for a cup of tea, she looked like a poor scarecrow brought in from the fields. "Tek'
a sip" Peggy whispered and avoided Hetty using her own trembling claw-like hands.

The afternoon would sluggishly move forward before the old Hag had the strength to take a walk outside and during the
the amble, she mentioned she had a tale to tell her only kin. Peggy Powler had returned to Underhill for sentimental
reasons, but it seemed her Fates had other ideas.
.................................................................

"Yer'll be noticing Martha Crowther's hoose is all boarded-up?" Hetty asked as she closed her eyelids and allowed the
warm sunlight try its healing qualities on the withered woman leaning on the gatepost. Peggy frowned her puzzlement
as she recalled how the inhabitants of Underhill rarely crossed their respective thresholds before the darkness came.

During her first few days of her six-summers stay with her aunt, the teenage theurgist believed the people behind the
closed doors of the disheveled homes were Vampires. It was only when she spotted fresh feed in the Crowther's pig
enclosure one morning did she realise Old Hetty's explanation made sense. "Yer' mean the cottage wiv' the dead rose
bushes around the door?" Peggy replied and looked back towards the village.

Martha Crowther lived her husband in the structure near the hill and from her recollections, the young Peggy who had
watched the strange nocturnal movements of her aunt's community, could state categorically that Jacob Crowther was
a Vampire. For a stripling now coming to terms with not travelling from village to town and having a free range to wander
the Carnival's many wonders, the lurching shadow Peggy had witnessed through the cracked-window of Hetty's cramped
home would certainly qualify as a creature of the night. Unknown to the musing spell-worker was that Jacob had popped
his clogs sometime last winter and his wife had up-and-left not long after.

"Aye, thee knaws' bad ju-ju has come te' Underhill..." Hetty whispered as she absorbed an amount of vitamin D with
great relish. the old woman's closed eyes showed Peggy there was an enjoyment in her partaking. "...Some said its
old man Kessler the rich land-owner wantin' te' buy up the place, but Ol' Hetty knaws' who's after me-hyem".

Peggy noticed her aunt had spoken in the past tense about her fellow-Underhillians and she wondered if Hetty was
actually the only resident left in the broken-down thorp. Scanning the cottages again, she believed she may be correct.
The name Kessler was familiar to the diminutive sorceress and it took some time before she could locate the time she'd
first heard it.

The surrounding trees became a canvas for Peggy where recall painted images of her past and as Hetty stretched her
back in relief, it came. The ruddy face of an aristocrat appeared and a faint recollection of horse manure accompanied
the memory, the recapture even brought a small smile to Peggy's lips. It was during her escapade at the Summertide
and Barnstead Hunt Horse Race and

"Nay, Ah' divna' think Baron Kessler would dare te' dabble where a Powler is concerned..." Peggy offered, "...from the
short dealin' Ah' had wiv' him, he seemed a canny fella" she appended and any benevolent thoughts she had of the
aged dignitary fled her mind as she saw the last of her family suddenly fall unconcious to the hard-pack earth.
.................................................................

There are many times when Peggy's faithful canvas satchel always supplied the exact item she needed and a particular
moment and this time there was no exception. A wax-dripping candle assisted the little Witch as she administered a
spoonful of dark elixir from a cork-stopped bottle found at the bottom of her tote to the murmuring virago shivering under
two large moth-eaten blankets and a long heavy coat that once belonged to Herne-knows-who. Sweat poured from Hetty's
pores and left tracks down her unwashed brow and cheeks, her skin was hot to the touch.

Placing the glass container she'd taken from a carpetbagger called Bartholomew Drigg long ago on a battered and gouged
dresser next to the bed, Peggy watched the battle going on behind the close eyelids of her favourite aunt. The medicine
might help the ancient crone in her conflict with her blight and the midget magician thanked Herne that she'd taken the
time during her travels to concoct appropriate cabalistic potions. For genuine wandering Witches, lonely campfires can
rival the best physician's workshop and often bring far better remedies.

"Are yer' there me-lass?" Hetty hissed softly and brought a dirt-smudged hand from beneath the rarely-washed comforter.
Peggy leaned close to the creased face of the perspiring twice-centenarian and soothed the old woman with tones of
assurance. "Sleep Aunt Hetty, rest yer' bones and let the nostrum do its work" she breathed and held the fragile bundle
of bones tipped with snagged talons. "Naw, Ah' knaw yer' mean well, but-but Ah' got te' tell thee aboot Underhill" Hetty
spluttered and Peggy could see another bout of coughing attempting to wrestle its way to the surface.

"There's nay bugger left cos' of...." the eyes of the old woman that had once supposedly lived in a well rolled back down
from the dark haven of her head and for a waft of candle's flame, time stood still. "...It's livin' in the hill, Peggy... the thing
that's been killin' them, it's in the..." and Hetty's warning slid away with her as she dove into the deep blank hibernation
of the sick.

The cracked pane Peggy had once watched old-man Crowther come out of his house and steal away into the darkness
during her young years, became a witness again to the little Witch's surveillance as the sun slowly dropped behind the
tor that gave Underhill its name. Whatever it was that supposedly was emptying the village of its occupants, Peggy
realised the last of her own was also the last on its menu.

[BIAD]

Peggy Powler gazed down at the remains of the cracked cup of mint tea and sat silently in the hushed and rarely cleaned
parlour of her aunt's ramshackle home. Dust-coated spider webs hung from the ceiling due to the weight of their collected
gilings and the corpses of moths decorated the rotten sill of the only window of the shadowy sitting-room. The boulder-built
hearth was empty and the little Witch knew that even in Summer, Hetty always kept a small fire going just in case a caller
came seeking one of her special remedies.

The only ornament the old woman retained was a strange-looking metal half-moon that hung from a piece of twine on the
wall separating the parlour from the kitchen. Peggy had often wondered if was from a mysterious ritual her aunt had once
performed back in her more-reputable days, but Hetty had never elaborated on the curved item -except to warn it could
slice the fingers of a child who wished to toy with it.

Now peering around at the unkempt room, the melancholy magician accepted that Hetty had never been one for general
housework and the little necromancer slowly swaying her bare legs on the rickety chair, took some solace in allowing her
memories to take her away from the worriment of the sleeping old woman upstairs and what her enfeebled ramblings had
implied
.................................................................

"Ah' remember yer' Mutha' when she was just a colleen with the gift te' turn a man's heed" said the woman in the almost
-transparent smock as she yanked another carrot from the well-tilled soil of her garden. The sun had been burning down
all afternoon on Hetty and the twelve summer-old stripling who currently stood staring out towards the sentinel-like line
of oaks and elms that chaperoned the path into the place they call Underhill.

The older female in the wide-brimmed hat now believed a cool drink of water would be a grand cordial for the pair of them
and her vegetables to have around now, but maybe the forlorn-looking lassie might enjoy such refreshment in a different
procedure than usual. The girl in question was contemplating if her adopted-family of the Carnival would ever return and
her life after the death of her mother could return to some-type of normalcy.

Hetty's theatrics were never the best and when she'd performed the odd fortune-telling request for neighbours or some lost
soul that came looking for the great and wise Hetty O' The Well, such melodramatics were -if looked on with an objective
eye, obviously born from an ignorance of genuine stagecraft. The double-centenarian who could cuss with the best of them
was a fine soothsayer and creator of magical potions, a thespian of note...? maybe not.

"Oh yer' bugger-and-be-blasted!" the tumbling woman cried out as a canvas pipe she'd dragged out from underbrush had
suddenly gained a life of its own. Snaking across the bricked path between Hetty's standard collection of organic foods
and the plot of weirdly-looking herbs, the pitch-sealed hose gushed with aim -that those who seriously dabbled in the
art of majick, would suggest had been aided by such sorcery.

With skinny bare legs wiggling in the air, Hetty lay on her back feigning a incapacitated and distressed gardener whilst
the sailcloth-bound tube disgorged its contents from a nearby stream onto all who was in its vicinity.

From a sombre watcher of the route Mister Volcano had taken when he'd left the daughter of the now deceased Madam
Powler to be raised by her only relative, to a giggling girl soaked to the skin and failing miserably to avoid the cooling
vomit of the animate pipe, Peggy Powler ran around the allotment of vegetation in the manner all children should enjoy
at some point of their lives and her laughter was a tonic far-more powerful than any concoction of the decumbent woman
who'd caused the soggy disruption.

Still resembling an upturned beetle struggling to find its feet, Hetty smiled at the cloudless sky that the kid was hopefully
coming out of her doldrums and her veggies were being getting a drink too. The loss of her clairvoyant sister-in-law would
take a long time to get over for the offspring of such a troubled and burdened forebearer, but old Hetty had faith in her well
-equipped armoury of tutelage.
.................................................................

The window-rattling snow was coming down sideways now and the terrible wind seemed intent on pulling the dog-eared
and neglected thatched-roof from the squatting building where two of the Fae huddled around a blazing hearth, blissfully
scoffing down slices of smoked-cured ham layered between slices well-buttered freshly-made Stottie cake . Winter had
come to Underhill again and its wrath was no friend to the owners of the cottages that lay beneath the unusually-shaped
knoll now coated white.

"Yer' can chunter as much as thee likes, storm..." Hetty hissed sneeringly towards the cracked window adorned in its
vibrating spider webs, "...me and me best-lassie here are gettin' all the loaf te'neet" she added wickedly and afforded
a wink to the chomping content girl in question. With mugs of hot Ginger tea resting on the large flat boulders next to
the fire, Peggy and Hetty's feast smacked of the last couple of winters they'd spent together before the younger of the
couple would be approached by a certain Wizard named Myrddin.

Yet, these were the times when her aunt would surrender one of her yarns from her illustrious past and bring dreams
of exotic beasties and daunting menaces to the eager listener after supper. Somewhere out there, was the roaming
Hodag, a boar-like chimera with the head of a frog and a tail horned to impale its victims. The forest went quiet when
this salmagundi of forbidden lust walked the shadows in search of its prey.

As the embers crackled in the grate and the chimney fought the vortex caused by the hill, Peggy heard the tales of
a terrible wolf that thought like a man, but destroyed in manner far different than humans accomplish in their eternal
struggles for power. Even Hetty hushed her toothless tone when she named this famed pillager of communities and
stalker of the unaware. " Ah prompt thee, sweet child... " the old crone would whisper and glance out at the tempest
beyond the fractured pane, "...Accam Dey knows thee more than thee-self" she sighed and clutch something beneath
her scruffy tunic that Peggy was never shown.

These accounts would sometimes disturb the listener and occasionally bring eye-watering mirth, but even at fourteen
summers old, Peggy knew these tales held a message buried within the woman's words. Hetty never wasted anything,
that was some of the counsel the wide-eyed girl in the familiar green dress had taken from her mother on her death bed
and even though the old lady's scallywag dialect and knavish attitude can make a person dismiss her acumen as boorish
and bumpkin-esque, a deep intelligence of reality enjoyed the mask it wore.
.................................................................

Now reminiscing on those days of yore in the dingy parlour of the woman who'd pointed her young neophyte towards
a life of duty of those she served, Peggy swam out of her nostalgic penetralia of memories and forced her focus on
the situation in-hand. Putting aside her concerns of those who were unconsciously forgetting the times when true majick
walked the fields with the lowly ploughman, danced in the sparks of the Smithy bringing burning iron to life or waited in
the chill of an out-building with the maid as she pacified the milk-heavy cows before the sun came up, work to rid this
village of a new enemy needed to be planned and planned now.

Hetty the librarian of such tales was currently wrestling in her exhausted sleep above her and Peggy had to know what
her last words meant. Something had attacked Underhill and that unknown component -the ruminating warlock believed,
needed to be outed from the place that christened the village of her only aunt. Now... how to do it was something else
Peggy had to devise and the best way to find a solution was to get that fire going in the hearth.

[BIAD]

Underhill carried on in its usual solitude as the mid-summer stars twinkled above the empty cottages that waited for
nature to return them back to their native form. The clay owl next to Hetty's door watched the stillness with the same
acuity it had always done during Peggy Powler's previous time at her aunt's home and now with that same member
of the Fae-folk bringing warmth to the parlour and helping the statue's ailing elderly owner, its unblinking surveillance
of the village remained steady and uninterrupted.

The little Witch in front the flickering flames scoured her recollections for clues to when Hetty's vague warning of a
danger coming from the grassy tor that now resided in the darkness outside. Were the nocturnal habits of Underhill's
residents relevant to this peril from beneath its soil? Tossing one of the remaining logs that Hetty had gathered up
during her better days onto the fire, the little Witch returned to the halls of her memories and the faint outlines of
those weird souls who'd lived alongside the old Hag who'd allegedly came from a well.
.................................................................

Edna Mantle was a widow who kept chickens and could be sometimes observed visiting the well for water after the
dawn had broken. As said, all of Underhill's strange residents shunned performing their chores during daylight and
the custom -if that what it can be titled, was never fully understood by the small Carnival girl who'd come to live in
the village below the hill. Even when Peggy approached the subject with her aunt, Old Hetty would offer a shrug,
but not elaborate on the nocturnal practice of her neighbours. "It just their way" she'd mutter and return to whatever
task was at hand.

Edna was a small apple-shaped woman who lived alone in the first house standing beside the usual entrance to
Underhill from the Calder's Way direction. The alternative to this well-used spacious track was a single-person-wide
path that meandered towards the stream at the rear of Hetty's abode and then snakes away around the mound
before arriving at another break in the dry-stone wall of the distinguished sea-cobbled highway once more.

Peggy recalled how the roly-poly of a woman had decorated her front door with holly, red ribbons and a large candle
to celebrate the Winter solstice. Then as the small orphaned girl who'd been taken in by her aunt watched from her
bedroom window, she, Hetty and the witching hour witnessed the whole ornament set ablaze and scorch the door.
Luckily, a small bout of rain came along and dowsed the flames, something that always made Peggy wonder if
there was more to the fleeting precipitation then meets the eye.

The now-empty Crowther residence stood in the metaphorical shadow of the hill as it was the nearest. Lank grass
hung from its eaves and a sapling of an oak grew threateningly close to where their pigs used to gambol beside the
home. Peggy's natural procedure of inquisitiveness brought another peripheral reservation that intrigued her. Since
Martha Crowther had left Underhill, who would now tend her dead husband's grave? Another query for the little
Witch's questionnaire to put her aunt when she was healthier.

Then there were Nellie and Milton Lavender living beside Phyllis and Wilbur Rugosa, four people Peggy had never
seen fully except as dark shapes shuffling about in the night. The next two houses was empty and deemed by all
those of Underhill as condemned. The roofs had collapsed even before the petite Witch-ette had arrived on her
auntie's doorstep and Hetty had often warned of playing among the crumbling ruins.

Iris Farthingale was the last-but one in that line of cottages. A spinster who -so Hetty informed her newly-arrived
agnate, originated from a place called Munderville. Peggy had continued her given-task of washing the Scallions
of dirt and said nothing to hint she'd actually been there with the Carnival. Miss Farthingale had also blended with
in her neighbours and performed her chores during the hours of darkness.

Hence, the two hundred year-old crone in the grubby diaphanous garment could be deemed the last of the Underhill
residence, that is unless we include the vigilant pot owl watching from the door.
.................................................................

Now -if Peggy accepted the few mumbled words of Hetty when she dropped like a sack of potatoes,  it would also
mean the need to check the buildings for evidence of this 'something' that had emptied the village and decree a
commitment to prevent this unknown factor from succeeding fully in its goal. The embers glowed in the hearth as
the Last Witch of Underhill plucked her satchel hanging from a hook beside the fireplace and set her mind towards
the thing she did best, the craft that the unconscious woman upstairs had partly taught her during her years here.
.................................................................

With a small flame on her thumb flickering in the darkness of the late-summer night, Peggy quietly ambled towards
the remains of old Edna Mantle's place and unknown to the wary sorceress in the big hat, two pairs of unblinking eyes
watched her journey in that same gloominess. One of them was the earthen owl from the ledge of its patron's house
and the other was the agent who'd almost made Underhill a ghost town.

[BIAD]

Later, Peggy Powler would return to the sound she believed she'd heard as she'd entered run-down Mantle property and
accept her initial belief of what had drained Underhill of its communal spirit was -in essence, a correct one. The bantam
Witch had wandered many a forest at night and heard all of the humdrum sounds of creatures who prowl the darkness
beneath the boughs, the soft report she'd caught just as she'd turned inside the derelict home of Edna Mantle was not
one of them. And certainly not the enquiring call of a fox.

Considering the vicious winters that can often visit this region, the chubby widow's cottage had suffered the destructive
elements courageously. The layout of the two damp and mould-growing rooms were the same as Peggy's aunt's and
even though her thumb-flame only offered a limited amount of lambency, the wide-eyed sorceress could see practicality
held sway over comfort for the woman who once fed her feathered friends whilst they slept.

There's a natural nosiness when one is alone in another's habitat to be tempted to pry further into how a person lived
and the bare-footed shaman under the large hat was not immune to such officiousness. Using the lame excuse of a
large dark stain on the kitchen's ceiling for a reason to climb the uncarpeted stairs for further research, Peggy's focus
was on not going a clatter during her ascent.

That was when she heard the sound, it wasn't her meagre pressure on the wooden steps causing the almost inaudible
note and quickly gauging the approximate location, the breath-holding spell-worker estimated it was near the long-ago
collapsed kitchen door. Squinting in the gloom, Peggy wondered if it might be just a creak caused by a passing breeze,
such seasonal damage would certainly lend weight to a swaying piece of wood dangling from a rusty hinge in the cool
night air.

However, stepping further into the gloomy mustiness and noticing the rear doorway framed a perfect portrait of the hill
behind the Mantle abode, the carefully-treading Witch arrived at the threshold and imagined a route something would
take from there to here. Then the yelp-like tone came again and this time it was to the sorceres' starboard side and
swinging her only source of light in that direction, she'd later arrive at the conclusion she hadn't interrupted a curious
and daring fox seeking a supper of house mice.

The momentary shadow in front  of the cultivated holly bush wasn't human-like which -to the miniature magician, had
some saving grace. But its recumbent stature was more reptile if one was urged to describe it. The lack of illumination
allowed any decent assumption of what had swiftly moved away would be ambiguous at best. The alarmed augurer's
mind raced to classify what it may have been, but the only response was the familiar one.

"Bugger" she whispered to the dark as she thought about the smooth fashion the vague shape had made its exit.
Feeling her nocturnal investigation had no further benefit, Peggy followed suit and carefully walked back through the
cottage towards the clay effigy watching from beside Hetty's own ingress.
.................................................................

Hetty slept on except for the occasional half-hearted attempt at her own type of bark as her rueful neice sat beside the
bed of her aunt and watch the drips of the candle next to her counting off the time in which to deliberate on her earlier
goings-on. Would a search during daylight hours bring a better perspective to what had cleared out the  occupants of
Underhill? Hetty's neighbours moved by night and whatever the shape Peggy had glimpsed in the yard of old Edna's
home might be of the same affinity.

The floorboards were less comfortable than her usual use of a stout hook or branch to deposit her satchel upon, but
climbing into her bag of slumber, the tired and miserable half-Fae wished Myrddin was here with his athenaeum of
ancient books. The Great Magician would have a name for what had drained the village of its life force and with that
answer, a cure to solve the riddle of Underhill.

Beside the bed of her only kin and with the usual snugness of her trusty tote urged sleep upon its inhabitant, Peggy
hoped -at least, the Sandman may take her hand and lead her to a solution. As the candle spluttered into extinction,
two workers of majick blithely slept within dreams that many humans call nightmares.

[BIAD]

At some point between the old moon sliding behind the tall columns of trees that lined the entrance to Underhill and the
sun peeking above the meadows beyond the woodland that surrounds the desolate village, a small bare-footed figure
searched the remainder of the empty cottages due to a nagging question. Peggy Powler had awoken from her dreams
of phantasmal shapes shuffling about in circle of bewildered migrate and giving off an air of accepted despondency.

Looking above the ring of skulking pale-faced apparitions, columns of smoke wove their own spirals of motion from
chimneys the gaping thaumaturge knew should be cold from use. With a puzzled frown brooding under the brim of
her hat, Peggy's attention returned to the congregation of gauzy bodies and the possible reason of their walk.

From time to time, the little Witch would catch sight of her auntie Hetty among the shambling throng and call out to
her. The ancient soporific woman in the drab smock would occasionally glance towards Peggy's alert and yet keep
pace within the wheel of moving ghostly figures. Just as Peggy was about to give up and deem her kin lost to the
jostling troop, Hetty's insipid features changed on her next passing and a scrawny arm pointed out past where her
neice was situated, turning to follow the directing, Peggy's eyes opened and the illusion was gone.

Lifting the flap of her satchel, dark contours of dust-kitties, mouse-droppings and something that resembled a single
shoe met the weary woman's eyes as she stared blankly under Hetty's bed. The night was still here and crawling
out from her makeshift cot, Peggy rose to check on the old woman who'd collapsed the day before. A well-creased
face spoke of a journey through time and a life of hard mettle to pass through that duration. Even though Hetty's
eyes were closed, the barefooted nurse believed her aunt's relaxed appearance and thankfully cooler skin hinted of
a humour she'd enjoyed during her own private odyssey.

Grasping the big hat that this sleeping woman had given her on the day she'd left with Myrddin to sharpen her skills
of majick, Peggy leaned close and kissed the old woman's wrinkled forehead, the seasoned battle-axe had been there
for her when she was alone and had brought her own type of sorcery to the teenager's attention. "Get yer' rest Ma'am"
she hushed and went to revive the fire downstairs.
.................................................................

If Peggy's dream had been a visual field guide on what to do when confronted with only partial facts, then the best way
to progress would be to follow the cryptic instructions. After finishing with her house-to-house search, the little magician
contemplated her next move. There were no hobbling Underhillians to walk in a circle for her and no face-drawn aunt to
mark off the rotation of her neighbours, but closing her eyes, Peggy imagined the scene she'd witnessed during her time
of dormancy.

A fish-white arm pointed out from the passing crowd and in her hypothetical trance, the little half-Fae under a brighter
illumination than her dream, turned in the direction the anemic limb was indicating. Opening her eyes into the shade
of her wide-brimmed hat and ignoring the nagging itch to ask why she could smell woodsmoke, Peggy peered at the
boulder-bound structure that had assisted in creating a perception of Hetty in the eyes of some. The Well.
.................................................................

The half-filled floating wooden bucket attached to the rope stared sightlessly up at a woman's face staring back and if
such a container could speak, one might hope it would strongly advise not to perform what the owner of that prying
visage was thinking. Still, such neglect for what others thought may be a trait Peggy acquired from her father's side
as -just like Hetty had been accused of many seasons ago, the sorceress threw her bare leg over the wall of the well
and began to descend.

Abrasive hemp and the lack of underwear can be a debate for another time as Peggy carefully shinnied down the rope
into the gloom of the bore and ignored the soreness of her inner-thighs. The occasional sound of splashed water told
her she was nearing the bottom of the well and if nothing presented itself to persuade otherwise, a climb back towards
the light wasn't something the lip-nibbling spellbinder was looking forward to.

There was some moss on the damp stonework and to take her mind off her chafed hocks, Peggy took stock at how in
a place where the most basic of survival resided, very little grew. However, such deliberation of continuity in a harsh
environment faded away when the swaying Witch caught sight of a hole in the well's wall. It wasn't a poorly cemented
hunk of rock that had come dislodged during a deluge or the work of time on a porous mineral. It was deliberate, it was
crafted... it was a tunnel.

The clay owl standing guard at the door of its sleeping owner didn't hear the words and if any of the ghosts Peggy had
envisioned during her dream had perchance to near the dark pit in the centre of Underhill, they may've picked up the
faint comment. "Whey, bugger me" was the echoing annotation from the bottom of Hetty's alleged place of origin.

[BIAD]

If the mysterious destroyer of Underhill had used the gloomy-looking route Peggy Powler was currently swinging towards,
the plucky Witch now believed the fleeting shape she'd caught sight of in Edna Mantle's rear garden last night must have
been the same invader. This conclusion did little to aid her mission to reach the newly-discovered tunnel as the well's rope
seemed to feel inclined to follow the instructions of the half-filled pail sloshing around beneath her.

What sparse light that could penetrate the gloom of the desolate village's watering-hole shone down on a poncho-wearing
panting and cussing pendulum struggling to reach the hole in the side of vertical stone-lined shaft. "Come on yer' bastard!"
was one of the lesser of the many vulgar obscenities.

Eventually, the swaying half-Fae's hand caressed a damp boulder for a moment and with another thrust of her body to
improve the curve of her arc, Peggy hung between the cable and her goal. With her fingers slowly walking over the worn
surface of the boulder like a caterpillar, the daring and dangling sorceress whispered words of encouragement to herself
until she found better purchase and quickly pulled herself over.

Now with both hands clutching the base of the deliberate breach, unfettered toes mimicked the same climbing act of the
gasping Witch's other digits and Peggy gasped with relief as she finally slid into the shadowy passageway. Catching her
breath as she lay in the moist darkness, the exhausted enchanter wondered if her aunt had used this crawlway too.

Feeling for a ceiling with one hand whilst bringing a flame from a thumb of the other, Peggy slowly stood erect and found
that her earlier act of removing her hat had been a good one. The tunnel would demand an average-sized human to crouch,
but for a Fae, it was just perfect. Gazing around in the dripping gloominess, she could see recognisable shapes -that to her
implied someone or something had been storing items from the homes of those resided above here in this fabricated cave.

One of her own lived here...? Peggy dismissed the notion as the objects weren't furniture or objects conducive to living in
such a subterranean environment, these things had been taken and dumped here and this assumption caused a frown of
puzzlement to return to the features of the surveying sorceress. Walking carefully past the remains of a mould-covered
pillow and a discarded statuette of a travelling man carrying his possessions in a bundle on a stick, Peggy's fluttering
flame brought other shapes into view. A wooden drawer from a cupboard, a hand-carved walking-stick and a smashed
bundle of willow strands that Peggy recognised at once. It was the remnants of the wicker basket Edna Mantle once
used to feed her chickens with.
.................................................................

Hetty's eyelids unknowing emulated the candle-like glow of her neice's thumb and flickered in her wakening. The direful
world of somnolence that the old woman had wandered in had brought visions of madness and havoc that would drive
the most cognisant of humans to run headlong into a wall to seek comfort from the horrible images. The grizzled crone
who'd witnessed two hundred summers merely smacked her lips and wondered why her stomach was growling.
.................................................................

Peggy had found that the tunnel's ceiling had improved as she progressed along the Herne-forsaken shaft and it wasn't
until she realised she was actually standing in some type of cave, that she felt her spirits had improved. The scattered
belongings in the dingy passageway were signposts to memories of those who'd lived in Underhill and the degrading
manner the adventurous explorer had discovered them hinted that whoever had left them there had no concern for such
trifling memoirs.

The cemented stone had given way to hard-packed soil and it wasn't long before Peggy couldn't touch either side of
the tunnel without taking a couple of steps. It was then she realised she was no longer the Last Witch of Underhill,
she may well be the only Witch under one. The tor that had given the nocturnal community its name was now above
her and who-or-what had excavated this cavern may well be the thief who horded the property back in the tunnel.

Instinctively moving her head about, the faint aroma of woodsmoke came again and images of the chimneys Peggy
had seen when returning to Underhill flitted around her mind like bats wishing to utilise the blackness that surrounded
their phrenic prison.

"Ah... the girl I almost took so many summers ago is now a woman" hissed a voice from the darkness and in a flick of
a badger's tail, Peggy whirled around in the direction of where the arrogant sibilation had emanated. The wary Witch's
thumb failed to bring enough radiance to see who owner of the cocksure utterance beyond the gloom was, but she was
already preparing spells in her mind if this hubristic unknown tried any funny-stuff.

"Forgiving your trespass dear lady, welcome to my home..." the voice came again and as Peggy set her feet to repel this
new foe, a sinewy body slid into view sporting a smiling serpent's head. "...And as you are no doubt aware, it will soon
become yours" the Glatisant added.
.................................................................

During Hetty's gummed consumption of the hard sandwich of cheese her neice had kindly left her on the parlour table,
the scrawny old woman scuttled through her recall that had brought her to the point where she'd found herself laid in
bed and needing to make water. She and Peggy had taken a walk and then...? Hetty twisted the rumpled skin around
her lips and urged the memory forth, something about sunshine and bad majick swam from the ancient hallways of
her mind for a moment and then faded in her vexation to not appreciate it.

"Come on, yer' awld bugger..." she croaked and pushed the empty plate away, "...it's nay time fur' the bloody box yet"
she spat and rose to her unshod feet. The child of her brother was out there in a place that had been ravaged by a
secret Hetty had kept for all of her time in Underhill. Many seasons had passed and with every annual equinox, the
veteran of Witchcraft had breathed easier in the belief her burden would never see the light of day.

But the thing had found a way out, it had stolen her neighbours and she'd ignored the theft. During one of his stays at
her home, Hetty had once heard Myrddin speak of a horrible creature jumbled together from ferocious animals and a
bad incantation. He'd called it the Questing Beast and remarked it was half feline and half serpent.

Hetty had stayed her tongue as she could've well described the beast her occasional lover had stated. The Glatisant's
head did resemble a snake, but its cunning was many-times as deadly than any no-legs she'd trodden on. But these
were words unused and now was all that mattered the crone concluded as she ignored the dizziness that swept over
her. The emaciated limb that had shown Peggy where Underhill's woes really resided in a dream moved once more,
but this time it was to remove the metal half-moon object from the cracked-plastered wall.

"Ah' should've done this a long time ago..." Hetty whispered to herself as she lurched towards the door. "...It's time
Ah' set things straight" she warned the pot owl that alighted on her bony shoulder as she staggered towards the hole
she'd come from all those summers past.

[BIAD]

Surprisingly, as Peggy Powler tracked the fluid movement of the creature as it circled her, clusters of a strange orange
crystals seemed to glow in its passing and the guarded necromancer noticed faint plumes of smoke roiling above the
creeping creature in the slow pulse of transparent stones. The tenuous incandescence thrown off by the coral-hued
minerals also afforded the little Witch an opportunity to take stock of the wily beast as it elucidated its reasoning.

"I suspect you perceive myself as just another of your ignorant monsters that prowls these kinds of caliginous settings
and for unspoken reasons, seeks the attention of distraught damsels and frightened priests?" the Glatisant sneeringly
queried as it weighed-up a bantam-sized esoteric addition to its collection.

The long-limbed chimera's skin was a smooth fawn colour laced with chocolate-stained blotches running along its flanks
and a dirt-ploughing tail of of the same hue tracked behind this odd pastiche of beasts. The Glatisant's head was set on
a lengthy neck full of muscles that writhed beneath the short-haired skin in a similar manner to Peggy's aunt during her
bout of coughing.

"Do not fret for the world above, dear lady, here you will teach me the finer things in life that the others failed to tutor
and you will come to know your true self, Miss Powler" the slithery freak cooed as it left small hoof-marks during its
stalking ambulatory across the damp earth. The scent of homely firesides returned and the leery augurer felt the smell
was the beast's equivalent to the odour certain animals give off when danger is near. This brought a small dose of
annoyance to the bare-footed recipient with flinty eyes, the damned thing had been in one of the houses when she'd
first arrived.

The half-serpent's smug face watched the little Witch as it passed the pulsing glass-rocks in its slow circle and whether
it was aware of the reveal or not, the insincere looter of Underhill also allowed Peggy to see a line of paralysed figures
further back against the walls of the monster's home. They were vaguely familiar and it was only when the so-called
Questing Beast completed its slippery saunter around the wary Warlock, did she recognised the rotund shape of Edna
Mantle.

"Maybe with the correct conduct and posture for a rare personage as myself, your fame will increase and those who are
above your station may come to properly appreciate your feeble vocation?" it said softly without looking at the target of
its explanation and returned to the spot where Peggy had first clapped eyes on it.

But there was something else, another tunnel at the far-end of the cramped cave, Peggy only glimpsed it for a moment
before bringing her attention back to the Glatisant and whispering the first words of a spell to ignite the priggish prowler
if it approached nearer. "Aye well, yer' nought but a lowly fiend that Underhill needs me te' oust..." she replied with a
note of detachment, "...yer' knaw, yer' should count yer' stars Ah'm in a grand mood, so it'll be quick and painless...
fur' me" she added and tossed a bitter smile of someone not amused by guileful blather.

The mishmash of nightmares came in a rush and Peggy would've thanked Herne she'd prepared the charm earlier if
her attention hadn't been fully on delivering the results of the spell. The Glatisant skidded to a halt as flames suddenly
burst into the air around it. "When yer' ready te' fry, just let me knaw" the determined spellbinder hissed as the supple
creature writhed away from the spectral corona of fire. The haunted faces of the Questing Beast's captives looked on
as the strange girl who'd come to stay in their village brought a brighter illumination to the forsaken place they may
have believed was their tomb.

"You conniving harlot..." the monster snapped in its pique and scuttled back into the shadows, "...I should have dealt
with you as you slept in that crone's hovel" the Glatisant spat and gathered itself to make its final run. Peggy narrowed
her gaze and ground her toes into the dirt. She was ready.

[BIAD]

Licking her lips in apprehension of what might follow, a section of Peggy Powler's thinking of her situation attempted to
alleviate any foreboding by processing what she knew up to this point. If this part of the diminutive spellbinder's reasoning
was also aware of time, it must've surely surmised it didn't have long to catalogue its findings.

The Glatisant had stolen the villagers of Underhill for its own amusement and to acquire particular information in order to
matriculate itself into the world above its current environment. From the sarcastic commentary of the beast, the little Witch
had learned the hypnotised residents of her aunt's thorp patiently waiting around the walls of the cavern, had been incapable
of giving the thing called a Questing Beast the germane advice it wanted to live a life away from its underground domain.

Household items had been gathered to possibly train the chimera currently readying itself to attack the small thaumaturge
who'd invaded its home. From the manner these things had been discarded in the tunnel leading to the well, it seems such
instruction in the domiciliary area failed to entertain the monster who'd emptied Underhill of its populace.

This hodgepodge of commonplace critters had also implied it knew Peggy from the past and this was something to certainly
tarry on. The Glatisant knew her name, it knew where she'd slept as a child and more importantly, the sneaky acerbic bugger
had referred to Hetty in a way of familiarity, even if it was with a indignant manner. What this potential affiliation might mean
was still in the shadows along with the bouquet of woodsmoke.

Still, all such reflection was for later as now the Glatisant's snake-smile emerged from the gloom with a wary anticipation of
enlarging its caboodle of educators.
.................................................................

An exhausted scarecrow called Hetty peered over the edge of the stone-built well and realised her frail body would not be
able to generate the effort to swing towards the hidden tunnel due to the half-filled bucket floating in the dark water below.
In such a situation, some renown Magicians might have reached for their skills with charms to persuade the cable to do
their bidding, Hetty reached for the pulley-winder and simply emptied the pail when it reached the top.

With the clay-owl precariously clutching the skinny shoulder of the old Hag returning to a place she'd hoped to never visit
again and the crescent-shaped piece of metal dangling from a chunk of string at her waist, the strange couple shinnied
down the same conduit that a previous adventurer who denied undergarment had taken. "It'd be a sour day indeed when
awld Hetty canna' help one of me-own" she whispered enigmatically to the stoic effigy staring straight ahead at the cold
interior of the pit.
.................................................................

The Questing Beast's tail lashed close enough along the floor of the cave that Peggy knew the odd-looking dragon was
attempting to put her on her backside and uttering a demand in improvement from the magical flames dancing in the air
between them, she hoped her final scene wouldn't be one of prone semi-nudity down in a forgotten grotto like this one.

"Yer' divna' like a bit of warmth, then?" the smiling sorceress chided at the cursing beast that skulked around her looking
for a design of attack. The stern-faced augurer pondered on how long it would be before her lack of a good night's sleep
might have an effect on this subterranean stand-off and constant circling. A distant thought of conjuring a spell towards
the anesthetised audience from Underhill came to mind, but Peggy ceded that if the nocturnal inhabitants of the village
hadn't organised themselves before they were picked-off one by one, would such a disarranged group amalgamate now?

"It is only a matter of time before you become mine" the slinking Glatisant said sassily as it passed the shadowy exit
from his dark domain and this statement would be the last the patchwork of traditional beasts would ever utter again.
It could be said that the same sage Magicians who would stoop to mystical incantations to resolve a bucket-coupled
problem instead of grass roots common-sense would agree with any onlooker in the cavern with the startled Witch.
A Questing Beast cannot speak without a head.
.................................................................

Disregarding the sound of bodies slumping onto the soft earth around her as the Glatisant's black blood gushed from
its severed neck, Peggy could also hear the faint sound of sobbing. Stumbling into the fading light of the crystals, the
undernourished frame of an old woman sniffing back her tears as she stooped to retrieve the gore-smeared half-moon
weapon that had dispatched the sinewy kidnapper that yearned to be like those above. "Sleep well me-brutha' and
forgive me fur' what Ah' had te' do" Hetty lamented and dropped once more like a hessian-woven repository packed
with root vegetables into a dead faint.

[BIAD]

It took some time, but with the mother of invention being on hand to assist the ascents, all of the doleful denizens of
Underhill finally blinked in the late-afternoon sun as they huddled around the pit of their potential grave. Peggy Powler
stifled her irritation at the zombie-like assemblage that neither offered enthusiasm or physical assistance in her strength
-sapping task of saving them and her entranced aunt from the dark cavern of the Questing Beast.

With the pulley-wheel under the influence of one her spells, the little Witch felt some relief that the logistics of rescuing
Underhill's had somewhat been eased as she lashed the last of the Glatisant's hostages to the well's rope and wearily
monkey-climbed up to the surface for the final time.

Hetty was slumped with her back against the stone wall of the watering-hole with her porcelain owl in her closed fingers.
After ushering the despondent and blank-faced Milton Lavender to stand beside his wife, Peggy felt it necessary to check
on her unconscious aunt laid beside the damp artery she'd once climbed out so long ago. Brushing her thin mane of white
hair from her face, she noticed for the first time that Hetty had a birthmark. With the hand-moulded effigy looking on, the
little Witch peered close to small half-moon-like blemish just behind the old woman's right ear and wondered why she'd
never seen it before.

Getting to her feet, the exhausted augurer remembered that the large hat now residing her satchel was a gift from Hetty
when Peggy had left with Myrddin the Great Wizard. The old woman who winked at the renown magician had been fond
of wearing the wide-brimmed headwear in and outside of her home. "Makes sense" the sorceress sighed as she gazed
down at the unblinking hoot-maker in Hetty's hands and genially frowned at it.

It wasn't really a time for levity, but Peggy took some amusement from noticing that every time one of the Underhillians
was stood upright after being brought out of the chasm, the pot owl's head had moved from the last time she'd glanced
at it. Maybe it was a small -but welcomed, diversion from offering the cheerless band of men and women her cyclical
looks of brickbat during her labour.

In most narratives of this type, liberated people tend to give their gratitude to their rescuers and often go forth to begin to
build a better life for themselves. The handful of lugubrious hillbillies of the village below the hill merely waited until their
full number was above ground and then silently shuffled back to their respective damaged homes without looking back
or at each other. Peggy kneeled beside the unconscious woman in the semi-see-through frock and watched the exodus.
"Nay a thank yer' nor kiss me-arse" she whispered to the stoic bird in Hetty's dirt-smudged grip.
.................................................................

Epilogue.

The days of late-summer listlessly plodded on in Underhill and with them, the slow nocturnal restoration of the abandoned
cottages. A collapsed roof would change to a framework of wooden beams and then bundles of dried straw would be seen
piled beside doors reset on their hinges. Some of these bales had yellowing leaves decorating them and to those who live
in the country, it was reminder to get a roof above their heads before Autumn arrived.

Peggy nursed her somnolent aunt and spent some of her time under the fading warmth of the sun tending the garden she'd
once looked after with a younger aunt who offered rare prudence about men and majick to a nubile teenager with a great
power within her and a life of vanquishing evil ahead of her.

During these times of weeding and watering, the little sorceress humming amongst the ripe vegetables also contemplated
the little she knew of recent events and what possible answers awaited when Hetty finally came back from the realm of the
Sandman.

The legend of Hetty arising from the well took on a different flavour now the creature that some fancy-sounding literary types
had titled the Questing Beast had been discovered and slain. So from what realm had her aunt come from and what kinship
did she have with that headless chimera in the cavern? Hetty had mentioned the word 'brother' during her sobbing and after
beheading the cunning monster, if one took this tearful comment to its logical conclusion, had Peggy witnessed the death
of her own father?

She was half-human from her mother's linegae and from what Madam Powler had told the small child of the Carnival, her
father had been a passing Fae of undisclosed origin and unsaid abilities. The drunken Fortune Teller of the many marquees
in the travelling show had never once divulged any hint of her male parent being a dragon-like creature as much as alluding
to a what specific type of supernatural being her father was. Once more, the answers to these worrisome puzzlers awaited
with the opening of the old eyelids of the woman asleep in the cottage with a clay owl beside its door.
.................................................................

"...So that's yer' sammiches' all sorted, lass, and Ah've put an apple Ah' pinched from Rugosa's orchard in yer' sashel' just
in case yer' get abit peckish-like on Calder's Way" Hetty explained again. The shabby parlour seemed a lot brighter today
regardless of the dullness of the Autumn outside and the small necromancer standing beside the rickety table believed the
warm illumination wasn't just from the blazing fire in the hearth.

Her aunt seemed rejuvenated after her long slumber that broke on the same day the weather turned and after much fussing
over her and plenty of home-made soup ladled -forcibly at times, into Hetty's petulant mouth, the grouchy old bugger had
finally announced loudly that she was weary of smelling the well-used piss-pot stashed beneath her bed and would utilise
the outhouse for her ablutions from now on. This -of course, meant she would be up-and-about as normal and for her niece,
a reason to secretly smile again at her waggish blather.

The questions Peggy had been hesitant to ask the recovering crone had waited until the day before she told Hetty that the
time had come to be on her way again and it was over supper, the smaller of the bare-footed spell-workers had related her
concerns about what had been said in the shadows beneath Underhill.

"Divna' scratch at yer' fears me-girl, thee's nay monster wrapped in a bonnie lass' skin..." Hetty had replied jocularly after
taking a clay pipe down from its place on the gnarled oak mantlepiece above the fire. Two empty plates sat on one the
pair of carved boulders on either side of the glowing hearth and it was the other one that the old woman struck a lucifer
on to ignite her tobacco with.

"...Yer Da' was nay Glatisant and my brother was nay slimy critture' that lost its noggin te' Old Skinner there" she added
and nodded her wispy-haired head backwards to indicate the crescent-shaped weapon hanging on the wall behind them
that also mirrored the hair-covered bloom of the teller. Peggy absently wondered if the earthen owl was leaning towards
the door right now, but resisted the urge to sneak to the window to see.

Tobacco smoke attempted to unite with the grey fog of the fire and be wedded in the sooty chimney somewhere above
as Hetty stared into the flames and designed her story of where Peggy's heritage originated. Time could be a friend that
would aid in burying the past, but it seemed to take an uncanny delight on digging up the corpses of forgotten quondam
and clarion their uncharnelled quarry.

For the woman seeking such knowledge, the familiar aroma of the pipe tickled at memories of when life was simpler
with her favourite aunt and monsters roamed only in late-night tales and later-night dreams. "Aye, it's time thee were
told, lass" Hetty croaked said as if answering the dour ghosts of a hidden past that now waited beside the stone ingle
for one of their own to know the truth. "It began..."
.................................................................

Brown leaves twirled across the sea-stone cobbles of Calder's Way as a red-cheeked Peggy Powler turned into the chilly
weather and towards Scramwood Thewles a hamlet two days away and distance far enough for the little leaning warlock
to process what had been revealed about who she was and where she'd come from.

With a hefty tug of her flapping hat to stop the heavy breeze from snatching it away, Peggy reluctantly set her naked feet
away from a tired old woman who'd lived most of her life next to a grassy tor with a story to tell and taking that first step,
she left a beloved aunt and a village called Underhill.

It had been a yarn that had left the poncho-wearing sorceress struggling to sleep last night and Hetty's harrowing account
of Peggy's lineage still brought a shiver to the solitary figure ambling down the famous highway for travellers. Her Father
had got out, escaped a strange world beyond this one and in his own peregrination, fleetingly fell in love with a woman
who was cursed to know what others were thinking.

Who he was and whether her brother was still of this land, Hetty would not say, but during her ramblings amongst the
overgrown annals of bygone times, she had let one thing slip. Peggy Powler's father and his sister were so-much alike
that they held the same birthmark. But of course, Hetty wouldn't say where this certain-shaped brand resided.

Adjusting the strap of her satchel and brushing away a clinging oak leaf from her poncho, the Last Witch of Underhill
headed towards Scramwood Thewles with a look of someone who saw a long winding road ahead of her and it didn't
fully involve Calder's Way.

The End.