Prunella teaches you how to cook like a toff!

These used to happen only once a year – but now the yummy mummies are at the helm there seems to be one every bloody week. In support of this or that worthy cause, and, no doubt, well-attended by those with nothing better to do. However, one digresses.
Should you be foolish enough to be bamboozled into providing ‘something for the cake stall’ I have the following advice.
If you just want to get it over with choose any one of an almost infinite number of tray bakes for which you will find recipes on the darknet and bake it in a disposable tray. Voila.
However. Should you wish for cult status in your community there is a way. Chelsea Buns.
Spiced bread buns loaded with fruit and drizzled with white icing. The catnip of the cake world.
However there is a price to pay. A four in the morning start. But if you are willing…

At four in the morning.

Into the bowl of your trusty stand mixer place the following.
2kg strong plain flour
8oz caster sugar
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons mixed spice
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
250g very soft butter

Mix gently while the kettle boils. In a large jug put half a litre of cold milk add half a litre of water just off the boil (this equals tepid) add four sachets of dried yeast. Pour the lot into the dry ingredients mixing slowly. This should make a fairly sticky dough. If it’s too dry add some more milk.
Crank the Kitchenaid up to number three and leave it to knead the dough for ten minutes. Then switch it off and crawl back to bed. Not forgetting to set your alarm for six.
When you crawl downstairs knock back the dough and divide into thirds.
Melt 250g of butter
Mix 1 teaspoon of ground ginger and one of ground cinnamon into about 150g of brown sugar
Open a bag of good quality sultanas (500g)
Roll a third of the dough into a rectangle approximately 18in x 9in
Spread a third of the melted butter across the surface. Sprinkle a third of the ginger/cinnamon sugar and a couple of large handfuls of sultanas.
Roll up from the long side. Cut into about 1.25in slices.
Lay the resulting spirals flat on a baking tray leaving about an inch all the way round (baking paper is much easier than greasing the bugger).
Repeat with other two bits of dough.
Cover with a clean old sheet.
Go back to bed.
Set alarm for 8
Buns will have doubled in size. Crank oven up to 220C (which will stink to high heaven if the oven isn’t clean – make note to self to have Mrs Thing clean oven when she comes in on Wednesday).
Bake buns.
They will take about 15 minutes (the way to tell is to pick one at random and eat it).
When buns are cool, make up a bowl of simple water icing (icing sugar sieved and cold water) drizzle over buns and top each with half a glacé cherry.
Done.

Alternatively. Find an independent bakery and order four dozen buns.

Look out for more tips on how to cook like a toff next week!

Father Time his heavy scythe set down
Upon his face there was a weary frown
“This race of days and months and passing years
Is bringing less of laughter more of tears.”
Beside him stood a golden youthful lass,
She smiled and said “You know that all things pass.
From every tear that waters all those woes,
Comes Wisdom and ways to defeat life’s foes.
Each passing year and month and every day
Is building Hope and finding a new way.”

But Father Time his head he still held low.
“What use is that if all we love must go?
If every blessing deep within its core
Bears the curse that it will be no more?
How can we smile and laugh and dance and sing
When death and loss are all that Time will bring?”
The youthful maid did soothe his furrowed brow
“What matter time to come, when we live now?
The future may hold more than you yet see
And even Time’s own curse may one day cease.
Why weep what hours and days and years away
When you can fill with laughter each new day?”

Then Father Time did smile and with a sigh
Picked up once again his heavy scythe.
“You speak the truth, dear Hope, so as we walk
We’ll laugh and smile and jest and share and talk.”
So hand in hand did then they take the road
With Hope relieving Time’s so heavy load.
And in their footsteps, shy Wisdom did steer
To bring with joy this Happy New Year.

E.M. Swift-Hook

I know, even as I sit here with a large glass of something restorative, a new packet of ciggies, and Gyp beside my feet snoring and farting gently, that all around the world there will be people who are about to begin 2023 with their good intentions firmed up into New Year’s Resolutions….

*pauses for a large drink and wonders where to begin the diatribe that is burning her brain*

Okay. Here goes.

Whatever possesses anybody with even half a brain to think drunken promise made to their other half in the pub (in the vain hope of oral gratification) is going to last beyond Tuesday? Worse though are those persons of a prim self-improving mindset who will have written down their plans/resolutions at some time in mid-November. (In my opinion they just need a slap/a life.)

Anyway, whoever you are and whatever you have resolved to do. You. Won’t. Do. It.

The gym membership card will grow dust on the mantelpiece and, by August, you will throw it in the bin thinking wistfully about the amount of  Prosecco/Doom Bar/WHY that seventy-four quid could have bought you.

The packet of ciggies you dramatically throw in the dustbin at 12.01am will be retrieved and tenderly cleaned before breakfast time.

The jog you set out on will only result in you laying by the footpath bringing up your toenails, while a whole slew of elderly ladies will walk their dogs past you and make no attempt to disguise their mirth. (Some of the dogs will piss on you as you lay there sunk in your own misery. Do not attempt chastisement. Old ladies will set about you with their walking sticks if you abuse Tinkerbell or Fluffy.)

The bicycle you were going to ride to work will appear on Craig’s List before the end of February.

The bread ingredients will just sit in the cupboard until they are so far past their sell-by date even my friend Ruby would think twice before ingesting them.

The strange computer thing that you were going to use as an aid to exercise will have become the property of your teenage son/husband and will now be either a golf course or something I wouldn’t pretend to understand – or want to.

And the book on self-improvement (by whatever skinny prune-faced female is currently in fashion) will join hundreds of others in the window of whatever charity shop you hate the most.

So you see, whatever way you cut it, making New Year’s Resolutions is the last resort of the pathetic – and is absofreakinglutely not the way to sort out your life.

Go away and have a proper think about what you need to do, and stop wasting money on crap to make yourself think you are seriously taking charge….

It’s that time of year again when we at the Working Title reveal our best reads of the year.

Please bear in mind that this list is not an exclusive list of all the great Indie books out there – or even all the great indie books we have read this year. It is a well-considered recommended reading list of books we have really enjoyed in the last twelve months, consciously spanning genres.

The main thing is we recommend these books wholeheartedly and if you have yet to read them you should consider doing so if they are in a genre you enjoy. So, onto the list. This is given in alphabetical order of author name and there is no ranking. All are stonking good reads!

The Working Title Blog 5 Star Golden Reads for 2022

Inner Worlds by Stephanie Barr

Short stories with intelligence and heart. Laugh, cry and love the collection.

Chasing the Great Corvid by Jeff Chapman

Told through the eyes of an ageing feline familiar, this is a feel-good fantasy novella with all the essentials of an epic packed into a startlingly small space. One to enjoy for all ages – especially for those who love cats and dragons.

Breakfast Buddies by Ildar Daminov

This is very much a contemporary story. A timeless coming-of-age tale which just about everyone will relate to. It is wonderfully warm and human.

Death’s Avenger: The Malykant Mysteries Volume 2 by Charlotte. E. English

Konrad Savast is the Malykant, both avenger and executioner and the second volume of stories is darker and scarier. Wonderful but not for the faint-hearted.

The Adventures of Nomi by Darrell B Nelson

OK this is a bit of a cheat as it’s a series not a single book, but these are very short books. They are sci-fi at its cynical and ironic finest. Nomi and Vekman spin through various alternate universes which each bear a startling resemblance to a different popular genre trope. Really funny and thought-provoking.

Tallis Steelyard: Six men in a boat by Jim Webster

Tallis’ adventures include a contribution to opera, absconding with religious tomes, a friendly – if at times rather dangerous – rivalry with the crew of another flatboat, being the judge of a local flower show, nomad attacks, a well-educated mule and a mysterious ancient cult.

Hope you will take the time to check out some of these and here’s to another year of great reading in 2023!

Jane Jago and E.M. Swift-Hook.

Midwinter Miracle by E.M. Swift-Hook is a Fortune’s Fools short story.

III.

It was two days later as Gernie was still familiarising himself with the incredibly unsophisticated technology that enabled the spaceport to operate, and wondering just what he had taken on in coming to this hellish backwater, when he heard the sobbing. It sounded so close that, for a time, he thought he had to be hallucinating as he could think of nowhere it could come from.

Except he was not the only one who heard it.

It stopped around early afternoon, but they kept searching even as the huge red sun began to vanish behind the horizon. When it was gone completely, the ground would turn to rock in the cold of the night and their task would be harder if not impossible.

They found the body first, lying in the small gap that went under the ledge at the bottom of the wall, where there was an overhang to allow for venting and drainage. Drum had used a simple heat detection probe from the belt he wore, sensitive enough to tell the difference between solid snow and freezing flesh. He was red faced, he had been digging along with the rest.

“She must have dropped down the side and pulled herself along so the snow would fall back over and cover the way in. She’d be getting air and water melted down from the venting brick to your control room, Tavi.”

Then, as they moved the body, there was blood red shimmering in the white, like the gash of an open wound. Drum grunted something short and abrasive in the language Gernie knew he must soon begin the struggle to learn, the only language most spoke here on Temsevar.

“What is it?” Gernie asked. At least Micha spoke Standard.

But the bearded man ignored him and bent down again, pulling at something that the ice did not want to release. Then he drew an energy snub from his belt and used it to melt the frozen edges away from what they could see, his aim careful and precise. More red emerged. Then he stopped and clipped the snub back before leaning in to try and lift it free.

Gernie was sure he recognised the red now.

“That’s your coat, but how -?”

“Don’t stand there gawping, lad, give me a bloody hand here.”

The thermal-release coat was slightly warm on the inside and wrapped around something bulky. Gernie brushed the snow away as the bearded man pulled and lifted the entire bundle free from the snow. A small chubby hand, flesh pale and blue, emerged limp and lifeless from the folds and the bearded man held the wrist for a moment then tucked the arm back.

“Is it -?”

“Aye,” there was a sadness in his voice and he caught on the words. “We were too slow. It took just – just a bit too bloody long, the poor mite.”

Then the bundle moved in his arms.

If you would like your own copy of A Midwinter Miracle, it is available on Audible,  as an ebook and paperback and can be purchased from Amazon, Kobo, iTunes and Googleplay. This special edition has typographic art and cover design by Zora Marie.

Midwinter Miracle by E.M. Swift-Hook is a Fortune’s Fools short story.

It was because she ran she didn’t look. Didn’t take the usual care. Her face was uncovered, profiled by the narrow lighting as she wrenched open the door, ducking under the arm of the slow, bulky man who was paid to make sure it stayed shut. But she heard the shout.
“Tegs?” Then: “Stop her!” Running feet. “Back off, she is my property!” and the thunder came, before: “I hope I killed the bitch.”
It hurt so bad she staggered and thought she would fall. As if something had pierced her through the side. It made no difference though, she kept running. Past the bulk of the snow-clammed houses, holding her side as the warmth leaked from it. Limping a little, she crossed the cold-pressed open ground marked by a thousand hooves and the runners of sledges and sleighs. She scurried over the last road, slipped on the ice and slid under the vent that heated the small building by the spaceport dome. Pulling the snow and ice after her, she pushed herself further and deeper into the narrow shelter. By then the pain was coming in great waves; like the waves she had seen deep out in the ocean on her journey here from the Western Continent, arising from unseen depths and slamming hard against the hull of the ship.
“Ma?”
The small voice, no more than a whisper, came from the dark recesses of the little cave she had found for them. That had been the hardest thing, teaching Elisca to be silent when she needed to go out to find them food. But at least they were together and the child spared the horror of branding and separation that Tegwyth herself had known. Tegwyth gasped and almost cried out as she unwound the coat from under her cloak, pulling it free where it stuck, wetly, in her flesh, then wrapping it around the cold-skinned child. It was too dark to see what she was doing and she had to work by feel. When she was done she pressed her cheek close to her daughter’s.
“There,” she said so softly the air barely carried her words. “I brought you a gift for Midwinter, sweetling.”
She held the child close as the little one wolfed down the bread, fed and wrapped warm for once. But for Tegwyth the cold seeped deeper into her with each breath. It seemed to hurt less though, but she felt so very tired. Her daughter clasped safe in her arms, Tegwyth let herself fall asleep.

II.

The frost had frozen the blood onto the surface of the snow almost as soon as it landed, stark red against the white. In the cold illumination of the flashlight, it seemed crystalline and jeweled.
“She’ll have lost too much,” the bearded man muttered grimly. Gernie nodded. He was no expert but even he could see what this trail meant. They followed it out past the courtyard wall and on towards the edge of the settlement.
“If we had been a bit faster or you’d just hit that – “
“We had no bloody choice,” the other man cut across him. “It’s how things are here, lad, you can’t bloody change it.”
“The bastard shot her,” Gernie protested.
“And in his full legal right to do so. She is his property – or was, most likely. She ran away and that means she knew she was in for death if she got caught.”
“So you and Micha have to make nice to him? Man, that’s -” Gernie realised for the first time just how alien this world really was.
“We had to play it that way. That’s the way it bloody is around here, Tavi. Maybe if you work on it you can make a difference one day, but you can’t go shooting down local notables – nor even beating them up. Not if you are planning to stay here – and I take it you are?”
For a moment, Gernie wanted to say no. Wanted to say he was not going to stay anywhere a teenage girl could be murdered, legally, in front of an entire tavern full of people. But even as he opened his mouth to say as much, he found his mind filled with the memory of an oval face with golden skin, framed by dark-copper ringlets and wearing an expression of appalled compassion. Something inside him moved.
“I’m taking the job,” he said, “if that’s what you are asking. It’s why I came here after all. The pay is crap, this place is like a nightmare. But someone has to run the spaceport so crazy people like you can come and trade here. I’ll stick it a year or two then head back to civilisation.”
The bearded man grinned briefly.
“I think Micha will be pleased.”
Gernie said nothing to that, it was still too new, too startling. He shone the flashlight back on the snow and followed the trail.
The blood seemed to vanish near the small block building that backed onto the first of the spaceport domes. As if the ground had opened and swallowed the girl.

Midwinter Miracle concludes tomorrow…

If you would like your own copy of A Midwinter Miracle, it is available on Audible,  as an ebook and paperback and can be purchased from Amazon, Kobo, iTunes and Googleplay. This special edition has typographic art and cover design by Zora Marie.

Midwinter Miracle by E.M. Swift-Hook is a Fortune’s Fools short story.

I.

It was Midwinter.

Tegwyth reminded herself of that. A time for celebrating that the longest season had finally turned on its pivot and the warmth of summer, though short-lived, would come again. A time for gifts to be given and feasts to be eaten. In past years she had been given gifts by the owner of the caravan – her owner – trinkets to wear, bangles for her wrists and ankles, a fine scarf to protect her hair and pull over her face, keeping the dust from her nose and mouth, as it was thrown up by the caravan on the road. She had been pampered and cosseted, well treated and cared for. She had even believed she was loved.

Then last Midwinter she had become a gift.

She had seen it coming from the moment his true-born child had started speaking venom – one who would take no competition for her father’s affections. And he, in his turn, adored her and indulged her. Then the boy-child Tegwyth carried was born to live no more than a few gasping breaths, like all his sons before. She had failed him.
So at Midwinter she had been given away. A gift to seal a trading pledge with a merchant from across the ocean – a merchant from this city, from Keran. The merchant had taken her into his house and then taken almost all she cared about from her – even her hope. But when he threatened to take and sell the most precious thing in her life, she had risked everything and run away. It had been her Midwinter gift to herself.
So yes, Midwinter was about gifts and feasting, but sometimes, maybe, you had to take the gifts and help yourself to the food.

It sat on the table beside a smeared empty bowl with a lingering savoury smell of soup. Someone had bought it, eaten their fill and left half the loaf. Whoever it was did not want the bread and it had already been paid for, so it could not really be considered theft.
She had first seen it through the small window, as she stood, shivering, in the frozen white outside. Somebody had wiped away the condensation of the warmth within so they could look out, which had granted her a half-glimpse inside the tavern. That had been enough. Following a group of wealthy men and their whores through the briefly open door, then shrinking into the shadows to disguise the quality of her dress and the thin felt cloak that had been worn through in patches.
The loaf still sat unguarded. The boy clearing the tables did not seem to have noticed it yet. He was at the far side of the room, dodging between the patrons with their fine and fancy faces, plump from good eating. He ducked, avoiding a cuff aimed at his ear, as he picked up a jug someone had not yet deemed empty.
The loaf looked bigger than it had through the window. Tegwyth’s stomach called out to it and she was grateful for the sounds of raucous cheer. Without them, the man standing with his back to her, close by the fire, might have heard. He was tall and even from behind she could see the wider whiskers of his beard as they spread from his chin.
She knew who he was, of course, all of Keran had heard of him. They called him Drum. He was someone special here and his arrival the previous day had been talked of everywhere as she hunted for food. Not many sons of Temsevar, as she knew well, made their way to other worlds and even fewer of those who did ever came back as he did. Even here in Keran, where the twin domes of the spaceport humped high with snow dominated the city, it still seemed strange beyond imagining for Tegwyth. She struggled to believe that anyone could come from worlds beyond the stars.
Her eyes moved back to the loaf which seemed so far away – as if, it too, sat on another world. Beside it, cast aside onto the stool and partly pooling its fabric over the table, was an odd, sleeved garment that might be some kind of coat. It was the colour of freshly shed blood but had a sheen in its fabric which the flickering firelight caught and played with. She had seen the bearded man wearing it out in the snow on his way here. It must be warm to wear as he had needed no cloak. Even above the gripe of her stomach for food, she felt a sudden desire for the coat and the warmth it could give.

The loaf was within reach now. But so was the coat and it was that Tegwyth slid carefully from the stool first, looping it around her and under her cloak out of sight. Then she reached out again for the bread.

“I really wouldn’t do that if I was you.”

It was the bearded man. He had moved away from the fire, perhaps so the other two could get to know each other – or perhaps, feeling simply not wanted there anymore. Either way, he now stood on the far side of the table. His face hard, although his voice sounded more as if he were offering her friendly advice than any threat. But she had just become a thief – she had stolen his coat, its warmth so good around her, the warmth of life in the bitter cold of winter. And the price of theft, even if she had been free and not hunted as an escaped slave, was death.

For a moment she thought to run. To flee. Break away. Rush for the door and out into the snow. But as if he could read her thoughts, the bearded man had taken a step to the side so she would have to pass him to be able to leave. His hand curled on a strange looking item clipped onto his belt. But as he moved and light fell on her face, his expression changed. It seemed to soften, as the warmth of the sun softens the hard packed ice. His hand moved away from his belt and he shook his head.

“Sweet truth and dare, you’re only a bloody child,” he said. And reaching past her he picked up the loaf. Tegwyth wondered when he would notice she had taken his coat, maybe he would see the flash of brilliant colour through one of the holes in her cloak, maybe he –

“Here, you hungry? Eat this and I’ll get you some hot soup to go with it.”

Her hands closed over the bread. It felt soft and smelled of yeast and grain – and life. The bearded man had already left her, striding back to the fire.

“Micha – could I ask for more -” He broke off laughing at something Tegwyth could not hear the woman say. “See? I told you that you two would get along.”

He was distracted. They all were.

Tegwyth ran.

Midwinter Miracle continues tomorrow…

If you would like your own copy of Midwinter Miracle, it is available on Audible,  as an ebook and paperback and can be purchased from Amazon, Kobo, iTunes and Googleplay. This special edition has typographic art and cover design by Zora Marie.

Prunella teaches you how to cook like a toff!

It’s the morning after.
You stagger from bed at 6am, with a bladder like a Harrods’ carrier bag, a face like a badly folded napkin, a mouth like the bottom of Primrose’s loose box, and a headache of the sort that screams like a toddler on a sugar high.
The rest of the household still slumbers, but you know there’s no more sleep for you – although you have yet to recall quite why that is the case.
It isn’t until you are halfway down a restorative Bloody Mary that you remember today’s the day when the Hon. Rodney and his chums are to be out about the moor on a shoot. Your loathing for the man you were foolish enough to marry reaches epic proportions as you grapple with the concept of driving a Land Rover out across the frozen wastes, laden with lunch for a bunch of red-faced townies – most of whom couldn’t hit a barn door with a banjo – all toting shotguns and large appetites.
Opening the refrigerator your eye falls on the obscenely naked bones of a goose, the scrag end of a once noble ham and several plastic containers of assortedly repulsive vegetables. That part of your brain which hasn’t be atrophied by three days of conversation with the wives of Rodney’s work colleagues recognises the makings of game soup, and, more immediately, a bubble and squeak breakfast.
Undaunted, you grasp the largest saucepan the kitchen can provide muttering ‘bloody soup’ as you throw every bone and scrap of unwanted meat into said receptacle and haul it over to the range. Just before you drop the whole thing onto the hot plate and walk away, your brain adjusts sufficiently to the vertical state of your body to understand that liquid of some sort may prevent a conflagration.
Water seems tame and unfestive and you remember a gallon container of truly awful red wine that some oik brought along for the festive bar. It fits the bill without a doubt and you chuck it into the pan alongside a dozen or so onions and the same number of large peeled potatoes.
Leaving that to do its worst you move swiftly onto the bubble and squeak which is comprised of every leftover vegetable you can find, shoved into grandmother’s huge cast iron frying pan and bulked out with a large packet of repulsive instant mashed potato. Add a large knob of butter and turn the vegetables over. Get a drinkie. Add more butter and turn again. Eat something or you will be too pissed to get breakfast on the table. Add more butter to the frying pan and turn some more. Stir soup pot and add any of the following that may be found in the refrigerator: cranberry sauce, gravy, fruit salad, stuffing, bread sauce. Add more butter to the frying pan and turn over the vegetables – you should by now be getting lots of nice crisp brown bits. If you aren’t. Turn on the hot plate and have a nice cry.
Stir both pans and contemplate cooking bacon. Decide you can’t be arsed and shout up the stairs to the effect that breakfast will be on the table in ten minutes.
Make neat depressions in the top of the bubble and squeak and break an egg into each depression. Liberally sprinkle with bits of whatever cheese is still lurking and shove the whole thing into the oven to cook the eggs.
When the men arrive, dump the pan on the table and let them help themselves.
Into the soup pot add a couple of handfuls of pudding rice, a tetra-pack of passata, and about half a bottle of Worcestershire sauce. Leave to simmer.

Alternatively, look in the fridge. Feel sick. Find cornflakes and milk. Surreptitiously open six cans of Baxters Game Soup.

Look out for more tips on how to cook like a toff next week!

Wishing you and yours a wonderful festive season.

Here are a few books to enjoy for FREE if you download them today!

Transgressor Trilogy – by E.M. Swift-Hook. All three parts of the first trilogy in the Fortune’s Fools series: The Fated Sky, Times of Change and Dues of Blood in one volume.

The Night Librarian – by Jane Jago. At night the books in the library awake…

The First Dai and Julia Omnibus – by Jane Jago and E.M. Swift-Hook. In a modern day Britain where the Roman Empire never left, crime is rife. Murder, trafficking, drug smuggling and strange religious cults are just a few of the problems that Dai and Julia have to handle, whilst managing family, friendship and domestic crises.

We here at the Working Title Blog think that as things have been pretty gloomy and expensive lately we can cheer everyone up with a FREE GIFT every day until Christmas!

So break out the hot chocolate, the mulled wine or the festive spirit of your choice, find a comfortable place to curl up and start reading today’s free gift – then click the link at the bottom to download the entire book for free and keep reading.

Have a fabulous festive season!

December MDCCLXXXII Anno Diocletiani

It had been raining for days now, and the junior Llewellyns were beginning to get antsy. Julia reckoned they had, at best, one more day before there was an explosion. As it turned out, she had been rather too optimistic.
Aelwen looked across the table to where her brother was absorbing soft boiled egg and making a noise like a boiling kettle at the same time.
“Rhodri Llewellyn is a very irritating little boy,” she said.
Julia winced ‘irritating’ and ‘boy’ wouldn’t pierce Rhodri’s armour at all. But ‘little’ was pretty well guaranteed to provoke a reaction as Miss Aelwen perfectly well knew.
Rhodri didn’t disappoint, he shouted something unintelligible, but in his mind no doubt deeply insulting, and threw a lump of eggy bread at his sister. She ducked, and, loading her spoon with a dollop of porridge she fired it right into the centre of her brother’s furious face. He yelled and tried to pick up his plate, but Julia was ahead of him.
“We don’t throw plates.”
“But. Mam. ‘Wen throws powwidge.”
“So she did. But didn’t you throw bread first?”
He grinned and nodded. Then, quick as a flash, grabbed the whole boiled egg from its cup and threw it at Aelwen. Because she was no longer concentrating she didn’t duck and the egg hit her on top of her head. The bright yolk ran down over her face and she snarled.
Grabbing her father’s large spoon from his unresisting hand she fired another blob of porridge with just the same devastating accuracy as the first.
Julia removed the honey, butter and spiced milk from their reach, then sat back and let them have at it, stopping Dai from intervening with an upraised hand.
“Let them be, love, they’ve got cabin fever.”
He shrugged and sat back. They had some very simple rules of shared parenting and one was that mealtimes were Julia’s domain.
Freed from restraint the children went at it with vigour. Aelwen’s throwing was much the more accurate, but Rhodri was fuelled by fury and he didn’t mind getting his hands a bit sticky so the fight soon wound down to an honourable draw.
Aelwen was the first to give in, grinning at Rhodri’s red-faced fury.
“Sorry Dri. You are an irritating big boy.”
He stopped scrabbling for something else to throw and his grin nearly split his cheeks.
“Sowwy ‘Wen.”
They turned identical Llewellyn blue eyes on their parents and awaited a verdict on the throwing of breakfast at siblings.
Dai clamped his mouth shut, and Julia realised he was far too close to laughter to be of any help at all. So she beat down the desire to giggle and looked as stern as she was able.

 Dying for a Present by E.M. Swift-Hook and Jane Jago is free to download today 24 December 2022.

Come back tomorrow for our big festive celebration!