Safe Havens

Daraquen was crouched on her hands and knees on the wooden floor of her father's kitchen. Her tiny hand held a glass bowl into which she peered with intense curiosity. Inside the transparent prison, a spider that had been unfortunate enough to have attracted the girls attention earlier as she played around the wash stand, scurried frantically from one side of the bowl to the other, tapping its legs on the cold clear material as it sought to find some crack or secret exit through which it could make it's bid for freedom, running up the sides but then sliding back into the bottom of the bowl. The antics of the spider brought shrieks of excitement from the girl as the spider continued to fail in its escape bid.

After a while the spider ceased in its attempt to escape and sat motionless on it long legs. Daraquen tapped the glass bowl vigorously in an attempt to induce some movement from the strange creature. The spider however, seemed to be defying all her wishes and continued to sit quite still before her curling its legs tightly beneath its body. After about a minute or so of tapping and jogging of the glass she decided that a new approach might be required. Carefully she flipped the bowl over with the intent of dislodging the small animal from the glass, yet to her astonishment it remained as if by magic glued to the bottom of the glass, defying both her will and apparently the laws of gravity. Tapping the glass still providing no effect, the girl sought more drastic measures and raising the bowl a few inches from the floor brought it down with a soft bump. To her delight this produced the desired result and she emitted a little squeal of pleasure as the spider tumbled to the wooden floor and immediately ran to the edge of the bowl. It started to scramble frantically at the edges lifting its body clear of the floor and reaching high up the smooth glass walls of its prison.

A large explosion emanating from her grandfathers workshop interrupted the game. Moments later the door flew open and an elderly man with a long flowing grey beard, rushed into the kitchen pursued closely by a large billowing cloud of blue smoke. He was obviously not amused by the recent events and was muttering under his breath as he hurried to the washstand and grabbed the water jug, He turned quickly, without a word to the small child who sat in silent amazement, returning quickly back into his workshop. Daraquen turning from her activities with the spider, almost absentmindedly lifting the bowl as she did so, watched the old man disappear through the doorway into the blue fog that swirled from it. The spider, seizing it's opportunity to make a bid for freedom scurried out of the glass and made a rapid dash for a crack in the floorboards, slipping successfully to safety.

Her curiosity now tingling, Daraquen quickly rose to her feet and edged towards the blue mist filled doorway of the workshop. Inside the old man was busy dowsing a small fire that burned happily on the wooden workbench. "Confounded nuisance, blast, blast, blast', he cursed under his breath. His grey moustache and beard twitching agitatedly as he muttered. Slowly the blue smoke fumes paled as the steam from the now damp smouldering contents of the silver crucible the old man had been working with became visible. The fire contended with, the old man bustled about frantically searching through some papers. Daraquen thought she heard him mutter something unintelligible about a dog, she watched as he paused, scratching his head for a moment then he picked up a pen and began scratching into a large red note book, crossing out a few lines here and there and adding a symbol or two there. Suddenly he let out yet another long exclamation of contempt, surprising the small girl and causing her to jump back behind the doorframe. Couching low and peering around the doorpost she watched to see what the commotion was about.

The old man was waving and shaking the pen in front of him. Apparently the pen had taken it upon itself to discharge a large inkblot in place of a desired full stop and was now in the process of being reprimanded. As the old man finished his admonishment of the pen, he discarded it deftly into the fire, thus ending it life with all the reverence afforded a traitor. As it crackled merrily in the flames the old man muttered a short eulogy, remarking on the 'shoddy' and wholly unsatisfactory service which the instrument had provided him over the years and then brushed his hands together in a gesture of that's put paid to that. Almost as if in answer to the old man's cruel words, the heat of the fire caused the pen spit its remaining ink, almost as an act of final defiance, narrowly missing him. Exhausted from his ranting and fire fighting activities the old man slumped into his rocking chair and sat despondently resting his cheek in his hand and emitting a loud sigh and a final 'blast'

Daraquen stood staring from the doorway, moving from her hiding place and looking at the old man. She was forbidden to enter this room by her grandfather and so remained motionless on the threshold gauging the situation. After running all the alternatives through her head she finally ventured.

'Grandfather, what was that big bang?',

The old man looked up as if disturbed from deep thought, 'Uh, oh what?', he started, 'Ah, Dara. Come here child', he patted the arm of his chair and rocked gently. Cautiously, Daraquen moved into the room. Her senses tingled with curiosity, there was so much to examine in this room of fascination. Her eyes followed small smoke rings which rose to the ceiling from a small tube bubbling on the bench beside her, whilst further along she could make out a glass flask with some strange curly tubing which glooped and popped rhythmically ejecting small jets of purple and orange vapour which swirled and twisted into strange shapes before dissipating into the air. Walking over to her grandfather's chair and climbing into his lap, she repeated the question. 'That bang grandfather, what was it?' It shook the whole house.'

Her grandfather patted her on the head and smiled. 'Oh that, that was a little project I was playing with', he paused thoughtfully, then shaking his head, 'you know I really thought I had got the calculation right this time.' He paused and looked down at the child sitting on his lap. 'Well young one', he said affectionately, 'and what have you been doing this morning. That poor spider you've been tormenting, did you learn anything from it?', he enquired.

'I didn't harm it.', Daraquen replied defensively, 'I was very gentle'. She wasn't sure how truthful that sounded remembering her vigorous attempts to stimulate it with her tapping and bang of the bowl. 'I just wanted to see how it worked. It was very little, but it seemed very clever. Almost like it knew that I was watching it and so it pretended to do nothing for a while and just sat very still.'

'I see', the old man replied, 'and what else did you discover about your little spider?' he asked.

Daraquen paused for a moment and then after a little thought added, 'Well actually he was really quite small. I mean he looked BIG when he had all his legs out stretched, but when he was trying to hide he tucked them all up and looked like a little ball. I suppose that he really felt he was a big spider by making himself look big …' her explanation was cut short as she sudden let out a yell, her face drained to a deathly white and a cold sweat broke out on her face. 'Grandfather… ', the girl stammered, trembling with fear on the old man's lap, 'i.. it's happening again', she stammered. Her face had changed dramatically from the chirpy look of a normal 6 year old to that of a frightened and confused child. Looking down at her left knee she could see it was now bleeding and a very nasty graze had appeared. ' What's happening to me?. Grandfather?', she whimpered. The old man put his hand on her forehead and comforted her. 'It's alright Dara, dear it's ok, come on let go and put a bandage on that knee and then we can go and see if we can't find some tadpoles in the mill pond'. The old man smiled at his grandchild, lifting her as he rose from his seat and carried her into the kitchen. Placing her on the table he set about dressing the wound on her knee.

*-----

In the village of Clyver Avog, a little boy picked himself up from the dusty path he had tripped on, dusted himself down, looked down at his knee and saw the blood. Instantly the pain was there and it hurt. It hurt as soon as he had seen it and consequently he had burst into tears and run in to his grandmother's house. The only person in the whole world that Daradyll trusted implicitly was his grandmother. He knew that she would tend his wounds quickly and the pain always disappeared immediately. She always knew if he was troubled and any questions that he asked were always answered simply and clearly.

'Now, now, calm down, Daradyll. What's the matter?.', Variquen asked as the small boy rushed into her kitchen. He stood there for a moment, sobbed, sniffed, pointed at his leg, 'I've hurt my leg grandma.' He whimpered.

Lifting the boy onto her table, Variquen fetched a small bowl and filled it with some hot water from the kettle. She fetched some herbs and dried leaves from some jars and crushed them into the hot water stirring it and allowing it to stand for a few minutes. While the crushed leaves infused in the hot water she turned to the boy shaking her head and smiling, 'You are always getting into something aren't you'. The boy pouted at her, his sobbing had ceased but the pain was still there. Variquen added some cold water from an earthenware jug into the hot water and tested the temperature with her finger, then carried the bowl across to the table. She fetched a clean cloth from a dresser drawer and returned to the small boy, folding the cloth carefully before dipping it in the water. She gently began to bathe the wound, irrigating it with the antiseptic wash she had prepared. The boy flinched as the warm water and herbal concoction stung in the raw exposed flesh of the graze.

'Now keep still!', the old woman instructed the boy firmly but with a kindly voice, 'there's some grit in it which we've got to get out' Carefully folding the cloth into a rabbit ear she slowly cleaned the wound, flicking the small particles of grit clear of the infected area. By now the numbing effect of the herbs had anaesthetised the injured area and Daradyll sat in quiet admiration as the old woman tended his wounded leg. Finally Variquen fetched a jar of curious yellow cream and dressed the wound, binding the dressing in place with a bandage. 'Now off you go', she said on completion of her task, 'I've got things to do and I don't need you fooling about under my feet'.

Daradyll clambered off the table and ran to the backdoor, turning back he smiled at the old woman, 'Thanks Grandma'

'Just mind you don't go and injure something else', Variquen called after him as he skipped down the garden path, 'and keep out of trouble', she shouted as he disappeared around the corner of the cottage.

Climbing the fence that bordered the paddock, Daradyll made his way down to the brook. The mid summer sun warmed his face and he paused to look up into the blue skies to watch the clouds momentarily before continuing on to the small stream at the bottom of the field. The children from Clyver Avog often spent warm summer afternoons splashing in the cool waters of the Wythebrook that began their long journey to the Farg, the sea to east of Clyver Avog, from the snowcaps of the Igvardris Mountains. A small string of stepping-stones bridged the stream and allowed access to the fields across the stream to the small copse that crowned the foothills on the northern side of the valley. It was across these stone that Daradyll now made his way, carefully negotiating each as he leap from one to the other taking care with the fourth, which he had on previous occasion discovered had a disconcerting way of toppling its load into the babbling waters of the stream. Having safely arrived at the far side of the stream he made his way along the riverbank towards a large willow tree whose branches overhung the brook. When he was not playing or running errands for his Grandmother, it was to this tree he would make his way.

Here he would lie for hours beneath its drooping canopy of thin branches and listen to the babbling waters of the stream. He always experienced a sense of well being under this tree and often he would doze. It seemed to him that the tree would tell him tales of the old days, of strange creatures and people from under the mountains. Of talking plants and rock that moved, and it would describe to him through dreams, of the changes in the world, but each time, as the dream approached it's conclusion a dark mist would rise up and the air would become chill and stifled, all sounds muffled and finally a darkness would fall upon him and he would awake.

He was however, slowly beginning to take control of the dream, each time pressing the darkness back. Today he felt particularly good, it was like everything finally made sense, he couldn't quite understand why but he felt that in someway this willow tree and he were in someway connected. More than that all that he perceived was connected in someway. As he settled down under the tree and watched the shadows cast by the clouds chase across the paddock on the south side of the brook, he glanced up at the village. The sky was light blue and a gentle breeze cooled him and caused the willows branches to sway softly. The birds chirped and chattered and the waters of the brook babbled quietly. Slowly he fell into a deep and peaceful sleep.