Silverstone Part One: Through Dark Waters by J.J. Moody

Author:J.J. Moody
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: love, adventure, friends, magic, family, journey, hero, quest, magician, anxiety and depression

Chapter Three

The Birthday Party

Ben spent the next few days in the company of Appleby, Eva, Liam, Ivor, Alder and others of the Peregrine farmers.

The people were good-humoured and the camp was often filled with laughter. They had suffered greatly during the plague, and in their travels with the tented village from one place to the next, but rather than break their spirits, it had made them hardy to most day-to-day problems. Even the latest bandit attack was treated with a good sprinkling of jest, and the warriors’ heroism exaggerated ever further at evening meals, which the camp ate together in the main shelter.

“If those marauders want to take my best blucumbers they’ll have to do better than a few bows and arrows and sneaking up at them through the forest. Why, I’ve more to fear from the snails and brownfly than them!” he’d heard one lady shout.

“My turnapples’d turn sour and poison the land for that foul behooded lot if they laid a hand on them anyways!” another chimed in.

On Appleby’s farm plot, Ben tried to assist as best he could. On the first day as their guest, Eva showed him around to get him familiarised so that he could help with her chores.

She began with the pomp-hens. “Pomp-hens lay us big, rounded eggs, like these beauties.” She held up a black-shelled sphere the size of a tennis ball from the laying tables inside the wooden hutch. “If we’re lucky, they each lay three a day, and that’s plenty for us and leftovers to barter with. But Pomp-hens need to be treated carefully,” she said, as she placed the egg carefully in a grass-cushioned tray and directed Ben outside to the day pen.

“Pomp-hens are very majestic and like to be treated with respect. You have to stick to the same time going into their hutch so as not to surprise or interrupt them, and if you’re looking at one and catch her eye you should bow and show her lots of humility, or she will get very grumpy and peck and scratch at you till you’ve learned your lesson. When you feed them it’s best to keep your eyes down and carefully spoon the feed into neat piles; they’re a very particular about that as well.”

Ben stared at the strange things. They were a lot like the chickens he knew, but bigger and prouder, and with bright, multicoloured feathers more like he’d expect to see on a parrot. One of the birds strutted towards him, and he noticed a bright yellow crest on its head, swept upwards and to one side like Jordan’s blond quiff. It looked boldly back at him, and he suddenly realised that Eva was bowing next to him. He hastily bent over, hoping he had been fast enough. After a minute the pomp-hen pivoted like a catwalk model and swaggered away confidently.

Next, Eva moved them along to the digboks enclosure. As Ben walked towards it he thought it might be empty, as he couldn’t see anything moving within the fence perimeter.

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