One Dark and Stormy Knight by Hermione Moon

Author:Hermione Moon
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Published: 2020-04-04T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twelve

It turns out there are several coachloads of tourists visiting the Abbey and the Adventure in the afternoon, so I’m flat out from lunchtime onward. By the time the evening comes and I get home, I’m shattered. I think the emotional turmoil of the past week is finally taking its toll. I decide to get a fish and chip takeaway and eat it with a beer while I watch an action movie that takes up no brain power, but I thoroughly enjoy. By nine p.m., I’m in bed and asleep, Merlin curled up in the doorway, keeping guard.

We open the café on Saturdays, but although I go in to bake a few rounds of sausage rolls and muffins, by lunchtime I’m done, and I leave the café in Delia’s hands. She’ll have Monday afternoon off instead. I head home with the luxurious feeling of having a whole afternoon and Sunday off.

This weekend it’s the spring equinox, one of the two times of year when the hours of day and night are equal all over the planet. It’s the pagan festival of Ostara, and one of my favourite celebrations. The Christian festival of Easter isn’t for another few weeks, but the two have a similar theme of renewal and rebirth.

Today, after a sandwich and a cup of tea, I spend a few hours working in the garden. I have a veggie patch and herb garden, as well as several flower borders and a greenhouse. I weed the vegetable beds and dig some compost into them, sow some carrots, broad beans, peas, and onions, and plant some mint, basil, thyme, and sage. Tomorrow I’ll sow lettuce and tomatoes in the greenhouse, and plant some summer bulbs—lilies, gladioli, and agapanthus—in the borders, and I’ll do some spring cleaning indoors.

I bring out a new pack of bottles of water, take the bottles out of the plastic wrap, and line them up on the outside table, ready to be blessed under the full moon.

By this time, it’s late afternoon, the sky is clouding over, and I feel the first few drops of rain, so I retire inside. I spend some time reading about various herbs and spices, then plan out some new recipes that I hope will help people with various ailments.

Cinnamon lowers blood sugar and cholesterol levels, so I come up with a new recipe for some spiced toffee cookies that I’ll make in the café on Monday. Turmeric is another spice that has anti-inflammatory properties and is good for arthritis, and I create a recipe for turmeric carrot muffins—I’ll add a spell to them to take away pain. Basil helps reduce stress, so I invent a bacon, pesto, and sundried tomato muffin, and I’ll top that up with a relaxation spell.

By now it’s raining and a little gloomy, but I cheer myself up with a cup of herbal tea and a Twix. After my rest, I lower the ladder to the loft, switch on the light, and climb up.

I don’t come up here often, but it’s relatively clean and free of dust.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.