In a modern-day Britain where the Roman Empire never left, Dai and Julia solve murder mysteries, whilst still having to manage family, friendship and domestic crises

It had got dark and by the time Dai had picked up Bryn it was well past time for the evening meal.
“Don’t worry, Bard, we’ll grab some chips and garum when we’ve done this,” Bryn said cheerfully. “So this woman is a real patrician and she was married to one of the sleaziest of sleazebag bad-boy Romans you could ever come across? You have to wonder how that could happen. I thought them families had all kinds of laws that said unless the entire gens agreed, three augurs all peed purple piss on the kalends and the lares farted ‘Salve Oh Divine Augustus’ in harmony, the marriage wasn’t valid?”
Dai grinned. After the day he had just been through it was good to have Bryn’s caustic humour.
“Something like that,” he agreed. “But maybe our friend Rufus just bribed, conned or blackmailed them all.”
“Poor bloody bitch, if so. Would mean she’d been sold off to a wrong ‘un, a real bad boy.”
This apartment block was almost the twin of the one Dai had visited with Julia earlier that day. The same placid exterior, the same mosaic floors with the same designs. It was like having a bad repeating dream. Except this time there was no corpse to welcome them at the door.  Instead, there was a slightly sleepy looking, extremely beautiful girl. She had light brown hair piled up in a very fashionable style, and the most exquisite blue eyes which were set off by the lapis jewellery she was wearing. Dai regretted that so far they could only see her face on the screen by the door.
“Vigiles?” She barely glanced at the ID Dai offered and did not even ask their names. Dai had the feeling this was something of a routine event in her life. “What’s Roo-Roo done now?”
“Can we come in please, domina?” Dai asked politely. “This is something we need to talk about in person.”
“Well, you could,” she said smiling and then put a ripe strawberry in her mouth and licked the juice off her fingers.
“Uh, thank you,” Dai said, a little uncertain when the door remained closed. The face on the small screen smiled at him.
“You could,” she repeated, “but Roo-Roo would kill me if I had any men in the house when he was away.” She looked very serious.
“This is a very important matter concerning Roo-Roo – concerning your husband, domina. Please let me in, or if you insist I can send for a female vigiles to speak with you?”
Her expression changed and she screwed up her nose as if the very idea disgusted her. It seemed an extreme reaction.
“I’d better hope Roo-Roo doesn’t come home whilst you are here then.”
The apartment was less opulent on the inside than it appeared from outside. There was fine furniture and a couple of pieces of wall art, but it all had a worn look about it. Only the small niche where the lares sat gleamed with what looked to be several gold items, and one penate holding a cornucopia with jewels pouring from it. Dai wondered if he had interrupted her private devotions; as there was a small offering bowl visible and the slight smell of incense.
Octavia must have seen the direction of his gaze, because she walked quickly over to the niche and closed the doors, pulling the beautifully embroidered hanging over them. Then she turned to face the men, standing with her hands clasped behind her, almost looking defiant, as if engaging in the worship of her own household gods in her own house was something less than acceptable.
“I know you’ll think it all silly superstition,” she said, lowering her gaze demurely, “but I find it very comforting.”
Dai felt Bryn stir behind him and give a soft cough of embarrassment.
“Not at all, domina,” Dai told her, wondering how such a naive innocent could have wound up with a cunnus like Urbanus Hostilius Rufus. “Perhaps you would sit down and we can talk, there is something we need to tell you about your husband.”
She smiled and moved to one of the couches, arranging her stola with an easy grace and reclining on it completely, cradling her head on one arm as she looked at them with sky blue eyes.
“He’s in trouble again?”
“I am afraid it is a bit more serious than that. Do you have any friends or family near by? Anyone you could ask to stay with you for a few days?”
Octavia’s eyes glanced involuntarily at one of the inner doors and then looked back to Dai. She had coloured very slightly.
Deo Damnatus, Dai thought and exchanged a brief look with Bryn, she has a lover in the bedroom.
“He’s been arrested?” she sounded surprised.
“No,” Dai said, his tone flat. “I’m afraid he’s been murdered.”
Her mouth opened and she uttered a low cry came which picked up in pitch and intensity until it was a full-blown scream.
Dai found himself beside her, unsure whether he should slap her or hold her. She made the decision for him, sitting up and pulling him close, her hands gripping into his tunic as she almost stifled his face in her bosom.
“My Roo-Roo! My poor Roo-Roo!” she wailed.
With some difficulty, Dai disentangled himself and managed to hand her off to Bryn, who was not at all averse to having a beautiful young woman pressing herself against him as she sobbed.
“I’ll find you some tissues,” Dai said vaguely and moved to the door that Octavia had glanced at before. He was about to open it when she squealed.
“No! Not in there.”
Trusting Bryn to keep her from getting in the way, Dai opened the door to what he fully expected to be a lavish bedroom and a naked young man. Instead it was an undecorated room, with a simple double bed and cardboard boxes stacked up with clothes visible neatly folded in them. On the bed sat an elegantly dressed woman, who got to her feet as soon as she saw Dai. Her designer stola was draped in soft folds of silk about her. It took him a moment to place her, to think where he had seen her before. Then he realised he hadn’t, but he had seen pictures of her and the odd moment on TV when the news was covering some swish event. She had been on the arm of Tribune Decimus Lucius Didero.
Instinctively he bowed his head.
“Domina.”

From Dying to be Roman by Jane Jago and E.M. Swift-Hook 

Advice on growing old disgracefully from an elderly delinquent with many years of expertise in the art – plus free optional snark…

If you’re old then the process is clear
You must give up on romance and beer
It’s no longer fashion
To have a high passion
Stop flirting in bars, do you hear?

Eleanor Swift-Hook

Remember, remember the Fifth of November,
The Gunpowder Treason and Plot,
I know of no reason
Why the Gunpowder Treason
Should ever be forgot.

I do remember the fifth of November
When fireworks recall a plot
To blow up the whole bloomin’ lot

I do remember the fifth of November
When kids called ‘Penny for the Guy’
At the people as they walked by.

They’d make them before the fifth of November
From old clothes with newspaper crammed
Then sat in an old go-cart or pram.

But now we remember the fifth of November
As a day for fireworks planned
Displays both modest and grand.

But kids don’t make guys for the fifth of November
They no longer put up that cry
Instead ‘trick or treater’s come by…

Holla boys, Holla boys, let the bells ring.
Holloa boys, holloa boys, God save the King!
And what should we do with him? Burn him!

Eleanor Swift-Hook

A tale of angels, demons and dragons…

For a brief time they stood handfast before Aeva spoke again.
“Will it offend you to stand behind me? Close enough so I can lean on your strength.”
“If you tell me that is what you need, how should I be offended?”
“Thank you.”
Aeva took up a position on the hot white sand with Adamo behind her.
“Closer,” she murmured.
He closed the space between them so her back rested against the hard wall of his muscles.
“Ware downdraught.”
As Aeva spoke, the sky darkened and it seemed that a vicious wind picked up around them, spinning sand into vortices and flattening the trees about the oasis. Aeva was pleased that Adamo stood firm at her back while she narrowed her eyes and studied the skyline to the south.
The seeming wind died down, and the sky overhead took on the hue of molten copper. A fiery comet in the sky slowly came closer, and took draconic form. It was a Queen Dragon and she was as metallic and gleaming as the sky from which she came. Lower and lower she spiralled, until it would have been easy to believe her about to bury her aristocratic snout in the sand. But she pulled back at the last second, cupping her wings and landing with minimal disturbance.
“Aeva Darkstar. What brings you to the singing sands?”
“Guardian business, bright one.”
“How so?”
“They have mislaid a Messenger and his draca partner.”
“I have heard of no missing draca.”
“Precisely…”
The dragon chewed on that one for a moment, then she snarled deep in her chest.
“This Messenger is a mortal male?”
“He is.”
The dragon growled again.
“Do you suggest that the draca have borrowed it?”
“I suggest nothing. I merely offer a possible explanation for the disappearance of the Messenger.”
The saurian head dropped to the sand so that the dragon’s multi-faceted eyes were level with Aeva’s.
“Tell me, Invigilator, why is a Messenger of sufficient value to have the Guardians send one such as you to hunt for it?”
“Because it is the only male offspring of Freja Gunnarssen.”
The dragon recoiled as if slapped, and huffed out a gout of flame which set a burning bunch of twigs and tumbleweed rolling across the desert. Aeva pointed a single finger and the flames died. As the dragon gathered herself to leap into the air she spoke one word.
“Tomorrow.”
Then she was gone, upwards into the unforgiving sky.
Aeva turned to face Adamo.
“Now we wait?” he asked.
“Aye. We wait, and hope the draca don’t grow bored with their plaything.”
“Because?”
“Because if they do they are liable to eat him.”
Adamo winced. “That really would not be a good outcome.”
“No indeed. But for now we had best rescue your men from Gudrun’s evil fingers and see about setting up camp for the night.”
By the time the sun fell beneath the horizon Adamo’s fighters had set up an encampment around a biggish fire in a pit lined with rocks. After a meal of campfire bread, and honey from the fighters’ seemingly bottomless packs, supplemented with desert creatures roasted on twigs from a certain tree that gave the meat a delicate smoky flavour, Gudrun and most of the half-demon males sat on the floor playing a game of chance with pebbles and sticks. Aeva watched for a few moments – long enough to decide that nobody was going to come to any harm – before slipping out of camp and heading to the edge of the trees.
It was dark in the thicket, but the desert itself was bathed in silver light. For a brief while, the beauty of it calmed her, but not enough so that she could ignore the worm of unease that wriggled in her gut. She shivered and wrapped her arms about herself. A change in the texture of the air told her she was no longer alone and, for the second time in a very few hours, she allowed herself to lean on another’s strength. Of course it was Adamo, and he rubbed his chin on the top of her head. She shivered and burrowed into the warmth that he carried.
“Are you cold Aeva Belladonna?”
She turned in his arms and lifted her face to better see how the moonlight gilded his skin.
“I am cold,” she admitted, “cold to my soul. Will you warm me?”
He put a gentle hand on the back of her head.
“Do you know what you are asking?”
“I do. The question is whether you will or will not.”
He laughed and bent to find her mouth in the moonlight.
Much later, as she lay across him he stroked her shaven head with a tender hand.
“Why did you not tell me?”
“That you are my first?”
“Yes. That. I would have been more careful with you.”
“That’s part of the reason why I didn’t say. I didn’t want careful. I wanted unbearable heat. I wanted teeth and sliding sweat. I wanted everything you gave me. Thank you.”
His hands moved down to her back and his fingertips lightly touched the scars where her wings had been. “It is I who should be thanking you for such a precious gift.”
And that should have been that, but it seemed he had other ideas, though she made no argument when he stood up with her still clasped to his chest and walked to where his blankets were laid out ready.
Aeva slept like a babe, waking with the sounds of those small creatures who ventured out of their burrows before the sun rose high enough to fry the unwary. She turned her head to see Adamo feeding a mouselike animal with crumbs. Aeva laughed, and the creature looked at her with accusation in its eyes.
“My apologies, desert dweller, I meant no offence.”
This seemed to pacify the little visitor sufficiently to finish its meal before scuttling off about its business.
Aeva looked at her lover to see his face shuttered and bleak. “What? Why do you look at me so?”
“Because you do not believe me capable of kindness to a harmless creature.”
She understood immediately, having lived most of her own life under the very same stigma. But how could she break through years of hurt and mistrust?
“Adamo. Look at me.” He did as she asked, although she could feel the rawness of hurt in him. “My handsome lover, it pains me to see you so hurt. And I need to make you understand that I am not like whoever hurt you. I know how kind and tender you can be. I have trust for you in my breast.”
“Then why did you laugh at me?”
“I did not laugh at you. It was the small one’s enjoyment of his meal. Made me remember that there is more on earth than the affairs of monsters and mortals.”
She felt him weighing the truth of her words and saw the moment he understood that she was sincere. He took her hands in his and raised them to his lips.
“Tell me what kind of a fool I am, bright lady.”
“All kinds. But perhaps…”
“Perhaps what?”
“Perhaps not so much a fool as a soul damaged by life.”
“Perhaps indeed. And will you hold that soul in your tender hand?”
Aeva was demon enough to understand the importance of that question, and to find, to her surprise, that her own damaged heart leapt towards him. She lowered her head as a tear crept down her cheek.
“I will hold thee dear, if thou wilt be my strength and safe harbour.”
He bent his knee and placed his hand on her breast. She reciprocated and they were joined. It was as simple, and as complicated, as that. To Aeva’s surprise, his fighters gathered about him punching his shoulders and ducking their heads to hide emotion.
“He has been too long lonely.” Gudrun spoke from behind Aeva. “His fighters revere him, but they fear his beast. Are you strong enough to bear his burdens as well as your own?”
“I have to be. He is mine.”
And with that admission Aeva Belladonna Darkstar sealed her fate.

Aeva’s Challenge by Jane Jago will continue next week.

Pearls of wisdom from an octogenarian who’s seen it all…

Now I have your attention, let’s think about Halloween.
This is the night when, according to superstition, the veil between here and wherever is at its thinnest. So what do people do? They dress little Testosterone and Menopause in ‘supernatural’ costumes and they send them out to knock on the front doors of total strangers crying ‘twick or tweet’.
In what alternative universe is that a good idea?
Has nobody read Hansel and Gretel?
The opportunity for deeply disturbing adult behaviour is there for all to see. But no. What does the great British public do? It opens its fricking door and dispenses sweeties willy-nilly.
Then, just as you are fifty quid lighter for the night, and at last even the most persistent of winkie has been put to bed, the door knocking becomes rougher in character and the local teenage males come out to do a bit of extortion – with menaces.
These bastards don’t bother to even pretend they are in costume, and they really won’t be satisfied with a mini Mars bar. Mostly they want ciggies or beer, although one or two will expect a fiver in their greasy palms in order that they won’t throw eggs and flour at your front door, or accidentally key your car, or tie a firework to your cat’s tail.
From the depths of my armchair this seems too close to blackmail to be acceptable, and I determined to put an end to such behaviour once and for all.
I am in the fortunate position of: one – being wholly nerveless; two – having more hefty grandsons and nephews than you could shake a shitty stick at,
Conceive of the scene, my friends, local thugs beat a tattoo on elderly lady’s front door. It opens with an eerie creak and a huge figure with a gimp mask stands in a sulphurously lit hallway.
“I’ve been waiting for you,” it says in a voice like a winter hailstorm. “Do come in…”
Exit thugs stage left. Pursued by creatures whose faces gleam green in the streetlights.
We don’t see trick-or-treaters after dark these days…

A darkling drabble offers a shiver of horror in a hundred words…

A ghostly fairground on Walpurgis Night. The girl pressed on through the sights and smells, careful to touch nothing in her passing. She knew her goal, and music pulled her onward to the place that would test her fortitude and prove her a true witch. There it was. The horses pranced and the music screeched and groaned. Each waltzing horse had a laughing child on its back. Until you looked closer and saw that the pink mouths were stretched wide by agonised screaming, not laughter.

Moved to pity, she was glad of an empty stomach as she stood and endured.

Jane Jago

In an effort to educate the nominally literate and inform those with sufficient humility to understand their own lack of comprehension, Esme offers the correct definition of misunderstood words…

Misconstrue

1. (noun – pronunciation note: miss-cons-true) A successful female fraudster. Example: After she vanished with his life savings, Roger realised the woman he loved was a misconstrue.
2. (verb – pronunciation note: misc-on-strew) Spreading various random items over a surface. Example: She emptied her handbag onto the table and misconstrued them to try and find her lipstick.

If you have any words whose meaning escapes you, Esme Crockford is always happy to share her lexicographical knowledge and penetrating insight into the English language.

In a modern-day Britain where the Roman Empire never left, Dai and Julia solve murder mysteries, whilst still having to manage family, friendship and domestic crises…

It was pleasant bowling through the winter countryside with the thin sunshine turning the dead bracken orange. and a pale blue sky overhead. Julia revelled in a moment to just sit.
“You don’t get a lot of down time do you, domina?” Bryn observed.
“No. And I sometimes wonder if it was wise of me to take this job alongside motherhood and the rest of it. But I have good people around me. And I think I might go mad if domesticity was the whole of my life.”
“That’s what Gwen says about you. Reckons your mind is too busy to be satisfied by just running a house. She’s much the same, but she has her healing and the Druid stuff.”
“I know Gwen understands. But Dai’s mam can’t. I think that’s why she pokes and prods about how I’m bringing up Aelwen and Rhodri.”
“That’s also what Gwen says. She’s been tempted to interfere, she and Olwen being good friends, but she thinks you have it in hand.”
“ I do. I just ignore it. But it hurts Dai. Though it may be going to stop because Gallus has promised to have a word.”
“I reckon that’ll turn the trick. Olwen is not an easy woman in a lot of ways, but he manages to love her and live with her.”
Julia laughed. “Yes, well, what she refers to in her son as ‘Llewellyn angst’ could just as easily have come from her.” Bryn grunted. “Very probably. But, domina. We seem to have acquired a tail.”
Julia looked in the rear-view mirror. There was a shiny muscle truck barrelling along behind them, and,  judging by the black smoke from its exhaust, it was being driven as fast as it would go. She showed her teeth.
“So we do. That was quick.”
“It was. Maybe too quick for it to be a decision from on high. I mean, all a car chase is going to do is bring whoever into even clearer focus. And that’s stupid.”
“Yes. As you say. Stupid and knee jerk.”
Bryn made a disgusted sound in the back of his throat. “If I had time, I’d go back and bounce my pacifier off his thick head.”
Julia laughed. “I reckon it’s an inept attempt at intimidation. They mean to put the frighteners on us. Run us into a ditch and clear off. No real harm done. Just frighten the little woman so she backs off.”
“Yeah. Somebody doesn’t know you very well, do they? What do you want to do? I’ve no great fancy to be chasing up and down the Mawddach with some idiot trying to run me off the road.”
“Me neither. Are you game for a bit of rule bending?”
“Always.”
Julia slid a hand under her armpit and brought out her trusty pistol.
“Submagistratus Llewellyn, you aren’t carrying a concealed weapon are you?”
“I am and as I’m both a citizen and technically a Vigiles, it’s fully legal. It’s what I propose to do with it that’s a bit irregular.”
“Tell me more.”
“Even chummy’s favourite muscle truck is going nowhere on shredded tyres.”
Bryn’s grin was every bit as appreciative as she had hoped it would be. “What’s the drill?”
“Next longish straight bit of track you speed up. Then slow right back. We see how our tail reacts. If we think he really is following us, I shoot out a couple of his tyres.”
Bryn chuckled. “On it, domina.”
As he spoke the track widened, flattened, and became arrow-straight following the line of one of the roads built by Julia’s ancestors. Bryn increased speed and Julia turned in her seat.
“The stupid irrumator is only trying to catch us.”
She knelt up. “Slow down now Bryn, but reduce speed gently.”
As Bryn eased up on the speed their pursuer kept on coming. Julia raised her pistol and put two rounds in his left front tyre. The vehicle lurched violently to the left, and as the driver fought his bucking bronco of a vehicle she gave the right front a similar treatment. That rather put paid to any further pursuit.

From the The Dai and Julia Mysteries, Dying for a Present, a novella by E.M. Swift-Hook and Jane Jago.

Advice on growing old disgracefully from an elderly delinquent with many years of expertise in the art – plus free optional snark…

If you’re old then the rule really is
You have to like cribbage and bridge
Your idea of fun
Should be tea and a bun
Not neat vodka straight out of your fridge

Eleanor Swift-Hook

It’s Halloween and I am feared
To walk the woods tonight
The creatures who avoid the sun
Have by the flight of hags been cheered
And they my sorrows slight
And though the night has just begun
Wind whistles in the forest beard
While eldritch flickering light
Pursues me as they have their fun
Their voices sibilant and weird
Echo strangely, and the fright
Dictates I lift my heels and run

Jane Jago