12. We're Getting Enough Slices of Apple for a Pie

23

And so it was that Kenneth Owen found himself with the band of followers of an enemy of the kings of 14th century France and England, Owain Lawgoch, traipsing through what Owain thought to be Poitou as he tried to find the River Sevre. As they clambered down the slope towards what they thought would surely be the stream, Iauen Wyn suggested that they must have wandered much farther in the storm the night before than they had realized. The ground was too hard and stoney, the slopes too steep, for Poitou. Nothing looked right. And yet the landscape looked vaguely familiar, but not right, not real, not quite any place anyone could remember.

After about an hour and a half, they came to the river.  It, too, was wrong. Terribly wrong. It was not a placid stream rolling through farm lands, something they should by now have realized they were not in as they wandered down rocky hills, but a feisty mountain river. And, it ran the wrong way, not leading them northwest towards the coast they sought but southwest towards who knew where. Still, it was a very cloudy day, the sun not really visible. Perhaps, Iauen suggested hopefully, they were just disoriented, that they hadn’t know the countryside as well as they had thought, that a clearer view of the sky might help them orient themselves.

24

Kenneth Owens’ tiny cottage barely had room for the four detectives to sit around the Table, although it kept them well-supplied with food and drink on demand. Sleeping had to happen elsewhere. There were of course plenty of inns nearby, so Marcus and Rafael and MIn-seo took rooms for the weekend at The Apple Tree, in Glastonbury. It was as different from Kenneth’s modern prefab cottage as anything could be,having been there forever, under a variety of names. It was pricier than some, but it was close to the Tor where Kenneth had last seemed to be. It had been Rafael Acosta’s idea. He did not mention that he thought it would be romantic when he suggested it, only that he thought was in a convenient location and that he liked the allusion to Avalon.


Of course, Kenneth had a phone with a magnetometer in his pocket, a bit of tech that didn’t need wireless connectivity, and he slipped it out, furtively. Indeed the river they had found ran southwest. He quickly repocketed his modern magic, thinking no one had seen him. But Aidan Prydudd had seen. Indeed, Aidan had been watching Kenneth carefully all the while. He was quite intrigued by this stranger, who seemed strange in more ways than usual. And intriguing in more ways than usual.