A Finer End

Society. Glastonbury Assembly Rooms, Saturday, 7:30 to 9:30. An introduction to crystal energy and its healing powers, showing how the chakras and crystals correspond Make elixirs and learn how to energize your environment.
    ‘Oh, bloody perfect,’ he muttered, crumpling the paper and tossing it back to the wind. That was the worst sort of nonsense, just the type of thing that drew the most extreme New Age followers to Glastonbury. Ley lines... crop circles... Druid magic on Glastonbury Tor, the ancient, conical hill that rose above the town like a beacon...
    Although Jack, like generations of his family, had grown up in the Tor’s shadow, he’d never given any credence to all the mystical rubbish associated with it - nor to the myths that described Glastonbury as some sort of cosmic mother lode.
    So why on earth had he just scribbled what seemed to be a garbled message from some long-dead monk? Was he losing his mind? A delayed reaction to grief, perhaps? He had read about post-traumatic stress syndrome — could that explain what had happened to him? But somehow he sensed it was more than that. For an instant, he saw again the small, precise script, a thing of beauty in itself, and felt a tug of familiarity in the cadence of the language.
    He resumed his walk to the pub, then a thought stopped him mid-stride. What if — what if it were even remotely possible that he had made contact with the dead? Did that mean... could it mean he was capable of instigating contact at will? Emily—
    No. He couldn’t even allow the idea of such a thing. That way lay madness.
    A skateboarder whooshed past him, wheels clacking. ‘You taking root, mister?’ the boy called out. Jack lurched unsteadily on, across the bottom of the High Street towards the George & Pilgrims. As he reached the pub, the heavy door swung open and a knot of revellers pushed past him. An escaping hint of laughter and smoke offered safe haven before the wind snatched sound and scent away; and then, he could have sworn, he heard, faintly, the sound of bells.
     
    The cats slept in the farmyard, taking advantage of the midday warmth of the pale spring sun. Each had its own spot — a flower pot, the sagging step at the kitchen door, the bonnet of the old white van that Garnet Todd used to deliver her tiles — and only the occasional twitch of a feline ear or tail betrayed their awareness of the rustle of mice in the straw.
    Garnet stood in the doorway of her workshop, wiping her hands on the leather apron she wore as a protection against the heat of the kiln. She had almost completed her latest commission, the restoration of the tile flooring in a twelfth-century church near the edge of Salisbury Plain. The manufacture of the tiles was painstaking work. The pattern suggested by the few intact bits of floor must be matched, using only the materials and techniques available to the original artisans. Then came the installation, a delicate process requiring hours spent on hands and knees, breathing the dank and musty atmosphere of the ancient church.
    But Garnet never minded that. She was most comfortable with old things. Even her work as a midwife — although it had honoured the Goddess — had not given her enough visceral connection with the past.
    Her farm, a ramshackle place she’d bought more than twenty-five years ago, was proof of how little use she had for the present. The house stood high on the western flank of the Tor, its pitted stone façade in the path of a wind that had scoured down from the hilltop for years beyond memory. The sheep that grazed the grassy slope were her nearest neighbours, and for the most part she preferred their company.
    At first she’d meant to put in the electricity and running water, but the years had passed and she’d got used to doing without. Lantern light brought ochre warmth and comforting shadows, and why should she drink the chemically poisoned water the town pumped out of its tanks when the spring on her property bubbled right up from the heart of the sacred hill? Enough had been done in this town to dishonour the old and holy things without her adding to the damage.
    A cloud shadow raced down the hillside and for a moment the yard darkened. Garnet shivered. Dion, the old calico cat who ruled the rest of the brood with regal disdain, uncurled herself from the flower pot and came to rub against Garnet’s ankles. ‘You sense it, too, don’t you, old girl?’ Garnet said softly, bending to stroke her.