Kirstie

Kirstie turned to Fiona and the boys and said, “Your home is there near the barn. The boys can roll out of bed in the morning and get straight to work. The kitchen fire is the bricked in area there, between the houses. There is a brick oven and everything. The fences they are still building.” A couple of workmen stood around by the barn. One waved. “That is where the sheep will go. The pigs are there. The cows on the other side. And there are chickens in the barn. Also, the fields are mostly over there, and by my house there is a garden. The boys are welcome to pull the weeds.”

“It all looks lovely,” Fiona said. “I’ll just get the boys settled and get right on the cooking fire. We won’t disappoint you, Lady, but if it is all the same, respectfully, I would rather you finish what you were saying before we move in.” Of course, once the conversation started, Kirstie and Inga forgot to whisper, and Fiona could not help hearing the whole thing. Kirstie did not mind. She answered Inga.

“There are some special lifetimes I mentioned in the past that I can call on to take me to the place I need to go, like Nameless, or Danna, the Celtic mother goddess. But my main job, if you will, is to keep history on track. I can’t imagine anything more dangerous to history than letting a bunch of wild sprites loose on the world. I am supposed to make things come out the way they are written, and I get reborn in the place where the trouble is most likely to change the future unless I can prevent it.”

“How do you know the way things are supposed to come out?” Fiona asked, and added, “Begging your pardon.”

“I have future lives,” Kirstie said. Fiona did not really understand, but Inga nodded. She had seen Elgar and Mother Greta with her own eyes. They came from the past, but Inga saw no reason why Kirstie could not borrow a life from the future in the same way. Then she remembered Doctor Mishka. Kirstie thought to clarify if she could. “My many lives are not entirely isolated from one another. Of course, nothing happens exactly the way it eventually gets written down, but the gist and general thrust of history is clear. And it is equally clear when something threatens that, like Abraxas and his hags attempting to gain him worshipers and followers so he can return to the continent and mess up everything. Eventually, I will have to sail off again.”

“I will still worry about you,” Inga said.

Kirstie hugged the woman but turned to Fiona. “There are elves of the light that live in the woods nearby. There are dwarfs in the mountain there.” She pointed. “But they keep mostly to themselves. And there is a whole fairy troop in a glen not far from here. One or more of them might show up at my front door at almost any time.”

“I saw a fairy once,” Fiona said. “If you have a cow that is giving, we can leave a bowl of milk out for them as an offering.”

“That won’t be necessary,” Kirstie said. “If they want some milk, they know they only need to ask, and I would be glad to give it to them.”

Fiona looked uncertain. She always tried to placate the spirits lest they do her some mischief. Inga encouraged the woman. “As my fairy friend Buttercup explained to me, Kirstie is their goddess. They would not dare do anything that might make Kirstie angry at them.”

“If you say,” Fiona curtseyed a little to Inga. She turned to Kirstie and curtsied again. “Lady.” Kirstie saw this one-handed woman, this thrall, had more grace in her moves than Kirstie managed. She vowed to practice her curtsey.

Kirstie had a thought. Right there, she called to her regular clothes and let her armor and weapons return to the place they came from. Fiona looked surprised, and her eyes got big, but she said nothing. Oswald behind her said, “Wow,” And Edwin nodded in agreement, but Kirstie needed to verbalize her thought.

“My friend Hilda is as fully human as they come, and she has no contact with the little spirits on the earth. She does not even know about them. She is married to Troels, and she is six months pregnant. She could use the help since her mother and father are not rich and very busy on their own farm. I would be happy if you stayed here and helped me manage this place. I imagine I will be sailing off on another trading expedition in the near future, and I would like someone I can trust, and boys not afraid of work, to keep this place in good order while I am gone. But I understand having little ones about can be unsettling. If you want to stay, that would be great. But if you would rather, I can arrange to set you up in town where Hilda lives, and you can work for her. I would not mind if you chose to do that.”

Fiona did not hesitate. “If it is all the same, I think working this lovely farm would be fine. The boys and I have never had a home of our own.”

Kirstie nodded, but thought the woman needed another chance to decide, so she called Buttercup. Of course, Mariwood appeared with her since they were holding hands. It took a second before Mariwood bowed to Kirstie and Buttercup curtseyed most gracefully in mid-air. It took just long enough for Oswald to say “Wow” even louder than before, and this time Edwin echoed the “Wow”.

“Lady,” Mariwood spoke for the both of them.

“Mariwood and Buttercup,” Kirstie said. “Allow me to introduce Fiona from Northumbria and her two sons Oswald and Edwin. They may be living here to help me with the farm.”

Mariwood and Buttercup turned to the woman, keeping well out of the reach of the boy’s hands, and they repeated the bow and curtsy one more time.

“A pleasure,” Mariwood said.

“Lady,” Buttercup repeated, and Fiona smiled at being referred to as a lady, but she never blinked.

“I hope I may stay,” Fiona said.

“Oh, that would be wonderful,” Buttercup said, and Kirstie took that as a good sign. Fairies were very intuitive about who to trust and who should not be trusted.

Fiona appeared to blink and said, “I saw a fairy once in my place by the manor on the river Aire not far from where it joins the Ouse. Perhaps you know him?”

“I am sorry, Ms. Fiona,” Mariwood said, thinking about it. “That is a long way from here and I cannot say to whom you may be referring.”

Buttercup also spoke. “I can think of only one man right now. Mariwood is my heart. I have a very small heart, you know.”

“What about your friend, Inga?” Kirstie said. “She has been missing you.”

Buttercup spun around to face Inga. She hovered, looked down, and turned her toe in the air like a little girl might turn her toe in the dirt. “I’m sorry.”

“It is all right, little one,” Inga said. “I am glad you are happy.”

Buttercup let out her most radiant smile. “I am happy,” she said and flew up to hug Inga, or at least she hugged Inga’s nose, one cheek, and an ear. It was as far around Inga’s face as her little arms could stretch.

“Mariwood and Buttercup.” Fiona tried the names on her tongue. “They seem very nice.”

“Most people are nice if you give them a chance,” Kirstie said, and invited Fiona and the boys to see their new home.

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MONDAY

Kirstie remembers that trouble comes in threes. Then Kirstie and Yasmina both discover it is time to go. Until then, Happy Reading

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