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    Enchanted Isle
    Enchanted Isle
    Enchanted Isle
    Ebook186 pages3 hours

    Enchanted Isle

    By John Davis

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    About this ebook

    “I yearn to take some hollow lane, or lazy winding way.”

    A fantasy travelogue, for all those who would gladly have never left the Shire.

    It is spring, and a gentleman traveller bids farewell to slate grey city streets, and heads out into the countryside, there to explore a land filled with wonder.

    Stories and adventures, encounters and observations, all are woven together in a tapestry that depicts a unique fantasy world, an enchanted isle that is neither bloodied by battle nor ravaged by war, and where a traveller is free to safely wander and wonder.

    In the style of H.V. Morton, had he gone in search of England and found Tolkien’s Shire, or J.K. Jerome’s “Two Men in a Boat” if his river was populated by mermaids.

    “Enchanted Isle” is a book for all those who enjoy exploring fantasy worlds, but have no love of battle and bloodshed.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherJohn Davis
    Release dateJun 8, 2017
    ISBN9781370305483
    Enchanted Isle
    Author

    John Davis

    Author, self-taught electrical engineering designer, worked for 50 plus years, finally retired and always wanted to write a book put his fingers to the keyboard. The words of this book poured out from his life experiences, lost loves, friends, grandparents and family. A fictional book with touches of true life and life long characters from his past.

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      Book preview

      Enchanted Isle - John Davis

      Part I: Spring

      ...setting forth...through the shires...

      I: Time to Depart

      Today I awoke to finally find the last of winter gone. In the garden, flower beds that had long been barren and bereft of life, stoic through the frozen months, now wore a mantle of green, with here and there a tentative bloom among which a first sleep-slow bumblebee weaved its erratic way. Trees swelled with bud on every twig and limb, else already unfurled their leafy raiment, whilst the blackthorn’s dark branches were fresh with blossom. The sun rode high in a fresh-painted sky of blue, the air was bright with birdsong, and on the breeze came that irresistible scent of the earth awakening, a scent that must surely stir the soul and spirit of man, unless his heart be wholly dead. Today, in short, I awoke to find that spring was come.

      And by purest good fortune, it is this very morning that I am at long last to depart upon my travels! Soon I will take my leave of this city, with its ceaseless noise and bustle, and its dreary slate-grey streets, and follow instead the bright clew of the unknown country, there to walk again the lost and hidden ways of the land. To lose myself among winding lanes, with the smile of a lass in a country inn at day’s end to make the long miles worth their while. To brave cliff-top paths, where the cries of the gulls tear at the heart with their piteous proud beauty; to climb fell and moor, or plunge deep into greenwood and dell. To walk with unfettered heart, to listen, to see, to open spirit and soul to the splendour of our enchanted isle.

      As I write these words I have no more inkling of where the road will take me than does the leaf blown upon the wind, and no more care. Perhaps my feet shall lead me over the horizon to places I have never been before, to look upon fresh sights and new wonders. Or perhaps nostalgia shall bid me re-trace once more old familiar byways, though in truth there is no such thing as a familiar path, for a road, like a river, is ever-changing, being not merely a thing of stone and dust, fence and hedgerow, but consisting also of what is seen and what is heard along the way. Perhaps I shall meet old friends, and certainly I shall make new. Perhaps, perhaps...

      But I linger too long at home, bent over this journal. I must be off, and away. The road calls!

      II: The Peddlers’ Fair

      Out in the countryside, spring was in full bloom. The hedgerows were green, filled with the furtive rustling of birds, whose gleam of beak and eye betrayed their keen watchfulness as I passed by, before their song once more made bright the day, and the sky overhead was blue, with clouds passing light and fleetingly. The lane along which I walked was dry, with winter’s mud and morass made hard but not yet turned to dust by summer sun, the air was warm, the breeze a gentle tease upon my face, and in short the whole world seemed as glad as I was to be alive, intoxicated by the joy and thrill of life and of living.

      Then I heard them! Coming down the lane towards me, their voices lifted in song and laughter which seemed to give expression to my own light mood, was a group of girls, not quite children, but with childhood just barely behind them. Like to the embodiment of spring itself they seemed, and as full of youth and life. Their dresses were of rags and tatters, but woven through with flowers and beads, and of so bright and varied colours that at that moment, they seemed to me more richly-arrayed than a queen in all her finery.

      "Come all you ragged ranting boys,

      Come all you lithe and long-legged lasses;

      Come one, come all, to the peddlers’ fair,

      For they’ll not pass by this way again,

      They’ll not pass by again."

      They ceased their song on seeing me, becoming almost shy, though not in truth, any more than a flower furled for the night is become a bud once more. And when I asked them where they were headed, after much laughter they said they were going to the fair, and bid me join them.

      How could I refuse such a fair offer? So with the pack on my shoulders made lighter by their company, I turned back the way I had come, walking but a little way before turning off upon a lane I thought surely went nowhere, so small and narrow did it seem, and entirely overhung with trees so that the sun, still young, scarce warmed the air. And indeed, for a time I wondered whether they had led me astray. But then from up ahead there came the sound of music, faint upon the air but growing louder as we approached, and I thought that I caught the snatch of a tune I recognised, old as the hills and young as the spring, taken up by whistle and fiddle as they danced over drums and guitar. Until at last, the lane made a final turn to give out suddenly into a wide and open field, the sun dazzlingly bright after the gloom of the path. And my guides laughed at my surprise as I looked upon the fair.

      Except that this was no fair, as I understood them to be. No shabby assortment of stalls and pens crammed into a town square this, where flesh both dead and alive was laid out for the attention of hard, swift eyes, and where the air was loud with the harsh cries of vendors and the harsher cries of animals in distress. No. This was a large open field under a larger open sky, whose grass was as yet unmuddied by the feet of the men and women and children who were there, come either to sell or to buy or merely to play. There were no stalls, either, but rather blankets laid out upon the ground, on which a dazzling array of goods were spread by the peddlers come to hawk their wares. There were bolts of cloth, and beads and bangles, there were pegs and pins and buttons. There were scissors and shears and knives, and boots and shoes and pattens. There were rarer goods, too, flint arrowheads said to be fashioned by fairies, and round gray-green stones that the vendor claimed to be dragon’s eggs – and who was I to disbelieve him? Men stood mulling over tools that gleamed fresh with oil, women handled rounds of cheese or sniffed packets of spice, while children thronged to an old man selling apples coated with toffee, sugar mice, and brightly-coloured sweets displayed in large jars.

      There was music, too, the music that had drawn me to the field as much as had the girls, gone now into the bright throng. A rag-tag band of ranting boys and grey-bearded men, that grew and dwindled in size as players came and went, instruments changing but the tunes remaining ever the same, bright and light and somehow freer beneath the sky than ever was music played in a concert hall. Someone had put down some boards on the grass and couples danced there, needing no caller, but rather each finding their own shapes, laughing and tripping as they went.

      Was this not unusual? I asked that afternoon of a peddler, whom the offer of a bottle of wine had served to make my drinking companion. Surely it is normally you who go to the farms and farmers, not vice versa?

      Ay, he replied. But at year’s beginning we allus gather here, and folk’ve learned it, and come to get the best of what we have to offer afore it’s gone. You were lucky to chance upon us, right enough, for one day a year is all, then we’re spread to the four winds, above and back of beyond.

      I heartily agreed with him.

      As afternoon wore on into evening, most of the wares were packed up, and the older folk and the children drifted away, back to village and hamlet, farm and croft. But the girls who had been my escort remained, as did I, together it seemed with most of the young people from thereabouts, lingering as food and drink appeared, and a fire was built high against the chill of the night. And now the music became wilder and more free, and the dancing likewise, ranting boys and ragged girls, barefoot under a sky filled with stars. Until, knowing myself to be too old for such company, and filled besides with too much food and drink, I finally took my leave, accepting the offer of my new peddler friend to share his fireside that night, beneath the eaves of a copse just beyond the field.

      Long into the night the music played on, dancing through my dreams. But come the morning, grey and early, I awoke to see the peddlers slipping away through the mist, and the green field emptied. And for a time, as I stretched the sleep from my limbs and stirred the fire to life enough with which to cook my breakfast, I could not help but feel melancholy. But then, made faint by distance, I caught the sound of a tune, whistled through rough lips. And as I thought of the peddlers striking out through the land, some of them perhaps taking the very same roads I would walk, forming an invisible net of trade and tattle, I could not help but smile – I wouldn’t be travelling alone!

      III: The Hare

      I was making my way down a country lane, going nowhere in particular and thinking of even less, when there burst from the field to my right a large hare. Her coat – for without a doubt it was a she, though I could not for the life of me tell you why I knew this to be the case – was thick and sleek, a rich brown flecked with gold, which shone in the late afternoon sunlight. Her ears were raised high, quivering in the breeze, and as she turned to face me her nostrils flared, no doubt finding much in my suite of human scents to offend her fine-tuned sense of smell. But it was her eyes that were most remarkable, being neither brown nor even blue, but a pale violet, eyes that seemed to shine with an intelligence more human than animal.

      I could not say which of us was more surprised by the other, and for a moment we both froze, a silent tableau of startlement, with myself poised mid-step, she crouched as if to flee, yet both of us, for some unaccountable reason, held motionless. Then, as the moment lengthened, feeling that as the gentleman it was incumbent on me to break the tension, I slowly lifted my hat in greeting.

      Of course, I fully expected her to turn tail and run. But instead she seemed to relax, rising from a crouch to tilt her head as she regarded me with what I could have sworn was amusement. Somehow sensing that more was expected from me, I gave a slight bow, introducing myself and wondering, if she were not otherwise engaged, whether she might do me the honour of walking with me a while. At this she did take flight, but only to skip a few paces down the lane before stopping to glance back over her shoulder, coy as any country maid, as if to wonder why I was still standing there keeping her waiting. And, smiling at the absurdity of the situation, I did what any gentleman would. I followed.

      I have taken the sea air with women, and rambled over fell and hill with men. I have taken walks with – or rather been taken for walks by – all manner of dogs, and I have followed children on their adventures. I have helped to herd sheep, I have walked through fields accompanied by gentle cows, and have sometimes found my footsteps hurried by bull or – on one memorable and somewhat surprising occasion – madly-hissing goose. But this was the first time I had ever gone for a walk with a hare! Our conversation was, I am forced to admit, somewhat one-sided. But she, on the other hand, was undeniably an excellent listener, ears pricked as if keen not to miss a single syllable of my mostly-inane utterances.

      Several times she stopped to taste the air, and if I for my part caught little of the scents that intrigued her, she was understanding of my poor human senses, and appeared not to hold my limitations against me. We even shared a spot of tea, though here I fear I was an imperfect host, hoarding most of the scones for myself, and forcing her to be content with mere crumbs. And it was only when the sun was setting, throwing our lengthening shadows upon the road ahead, that she finally took her leave, rising up on her hind legs to bid me farewell with what I swear was a passable imitation of a curtsey. I bowed in return, and thanked her for the pleasure of the company, and then she was gone.

      By the time I reached the village where I was to spend the night, of course, my rational mind had begun its sorry work of spinning gold into straw, telling me that I had merely scared the hare into running ahead of me on the road a while. And perhaps, in time, I would have made the mistake of listening to that dry, soulless voice of reason, whose only purpose, it seems, is to drain all wonder from the world, and thereby leave it a dead and dreary place. But that evening, as I was sitting with my host in his study, enjoying both the warmth of the fire and the prospect of a good meal to come, the door opened to admit a young woman, with brown hair flecked with gold, and pale violet eyes which flashed with laughter as she looked at me.

      I don’t believe you have met my step-daughter, Jill? my host enquired.

      I shook my head. Pleased to meet you, I murmured, and she smiled.

      Likewise, I’m sure, she replied. Then she winked. And by the way, you’re most welcome.

      IV: A Helping Hand

      The hour was late, and I was weary. I had risen early that morning, for I knew that I had far to go, and had proceeded to tread the miles beneath my feet, the winding path drawn in towards me, then spun out once more behind. Over hill and down dale I had first strode, then ambled, then finally trudged, as the passing hours sent the sun arcing overhead, to finally dip down beyond the hills to enjoy a well-deserved rest that was yet denied me. My feet were sore, my back ached, my pack

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