It was a pretty thing with fairies, rainbows and unicorns. It had hung in the second-hand shop for as long as Merielle could remember. She loved it, but you can’t buy cot-toys when you’re a young woman living the life, can you?

When she fell pregnant, the mobile was still in the shop window, sparkling in the sun. Merielle got it cheaply, the shopkeeper said he was glad to see it go.

When baby Amelia was born Merielle hung the pretty mobile above her cot. Until one morning Amelia was gone – and all the fairies were gone from the cot-toy.

E.M. Swift-Hook

The adventures of Piglock Homes and his sidekick Doctor Bearson.

The creak of harness heralded the arrival of the strangest conveyance Bearson had seen in a long time. It was a large four-wheeled cart or covered wagon, with high curtained walls behind which there could be discerned the outline of stout bars. There was about it the rich smell of some carnivore and occasionally the barred sides shook. The equipage was pulled by a team of four heavy horses, whose driver was a short massively muscled man with a multiplicity of tattoos. When the walls behind him shook, he spoke comfortingly in a dialect beyond the understanding of even Homes.
The newcomer drew his strange vehicle to a halt at a careful distance from the hobbled donkey, which, even so, flared its nostrils and would have brayed loudly had not Yore leaped from his seat and grabbed it by the muzzle.
“Can you back off a bit, or I’m liable to lose this beast and the cart into yonder bog.”
The tattooed gent carefully backed his vehicle away and Homes left the donkey cart in to converse with the newcomer in a low voice.
“What do you reckon our skinny friend is up to?” Yore breathed.
“Honestly? I have no more idea than you. You know what he is like. Cards clutched to his scrawny chest until the last second.”
Yore grunted. “Well I’m keeping my hand on my revolver just in case.”
Bearson said nothing, merely displaying the grip of his own revolver for Yore to see.
The sun was just lifting over the eastern horizon when Bearson felt, rather than heard, a sound similar to the one Homes had made the previous night. Almost at once the tattooed gentleman’s cart began to rock alarmingly and whatever was inside it started making eerie ululating noises that ripped apart the quiet of the morning air.
Homes showed his teeth. “Yore, Bearson. Hold your fire unless you are in mortal danger.”
“Aye, aye, cap’n.” Yore spoke sarcastically, but Bearson understood that he would obey Homes.
The noises from the covered cart were becoming louder and louder and the rocking seemed almost fierce enough to overturn the equipage. Before the carriage was altogether overset there came a sound as if the paws of some great dog were slapping on the ground and all eyes turned towards the sound.
“What is it, man?” Yore was heard to ejaculate.
“You’ll soon see.”
The creature that broke out of the high bracken was enormous, and tawny striped with black. It was only visible for a very few seconds before the tattooed gentleman opened a door in his wagon and the creature disappeared.
“But. But. But…” Yore spluttered. “That’s not a dog.”
“No. It’s a tiger. An orange, bouncing tiger.”
Yore ground his teeth. “Orange, bouncing ‘dog’ to the old man. I see. But how did it get here?”
“You are about to find out, I think.”
The woman who followed the tiger out of the high bracken was tall and carried a curled stock whip in her right hand.
At first, Bearson thought it was the woman who had driven them across the muir the previous night, but then he realised this woman was older, and harder looking although there was an obvious resemblance.
She glared at the two carriages.
“I’m looking for my pet.” This woman’s voice was harsh and her accent was transatlantic.
Homes bowed. “Your pet, madam?”
“Yes. The pesky critter has a habit of escaping.”
“And frightening people close to death?”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“I think you do…”
She laughed, but it was a sound that tore at the throats of those who heard it. “Doesn’t a man who abandons his wife and child deserve a little fright?”
Yore cleared his throat. “The game’s up. Old Sleepytown died last night. So the charge is murder.”
The woman laughed and dropped her whip. Instead of turning back the way she came she ran into the jaws of the bog.
Yore made to go after her, but Bearson restrained him. “Leave her. That’s a mire out there. You don’t want to end your life sinking in stinking mud.”
“But she’s getting away.”
“She won’t get far,” Homes said sadly. “The waymarker poles have been moved so the safe path through the mire no longer exists.”
He stood at the edge of the unnatural greenness as the sun rose and burned away the mists from the muirland.
Yore looked at the tiny figure of the great detective and shook his great head.
“Churches la fem,” he said sadly, “churches la fem”.

Piglock Homes and his sidekick Doctor Bearson may return with a new investigation later in the year…

Jane Jago

The month of May, the month of May
Time to see the lambs at play
Time to see the the buds bursting
As nature launches into spring

The month of May, the month of May
Time to go outside and stay
Time to watch the birds take wing
As nests they build new life to bring

The month of May, the month of May
Time to welcome each new day
Time the windows wide to fling
So the freshness can flood in.

The month of May, the month of May
Time to set aside the grey
Time to smile, dance and sing
For summer is icummen in.

E.M. Swift-Hook

It took eight more days of gentle riding to reach Durmouth, stopping each night at a wayside inn or staying with a friendly farmer. But still each evening Hepsy was feeling as if she had been run over back and forth by her hill-pony rather than sitting atop of it the whole way. But she didn’t complain, just took a good soak in a tub by the fire when there was one and rubbed ointments into her muscles and joints, charged with a little easing magic. Poll seemed not to notice the ride so much. He seemed happier than she had seen him for a long time.
“You are enjoying this,” she chided as they passed through the open gates of the city, cheek by jowl with wagons of goods and produce going in and nightsoil going out.
“And why not?” Poll asked and grinned at her, in that moment looking for all the world as he had the day they first met. “It’s still an adventure.”
Hepsy shook her head and said nothing to that. She was marrow-deep sure he couldn’t have forgotten what adventure had led them into the last time.
The Red Dragon Tavern was not the finest in Durmouth, but it was not in the dockside area where the very poorest scrabbled to make a living either. It was set on a decent street that led to the main city market square and offered refreshment to people of a middling kind – the farmers bringing produce to sell or the smaller merchants come to trade salt, pottery or good solid cloth.
It was not hard to spot the cheerful tavern keeper as she had the look of her brother. She wore sensible shoes, smart clothes and a harassed smile as Hepsi asked her about Stref.
“Ye’ll his friends from before? Well good luck to ye, ye’ll be needing it if ye want to get him to talk to ye. He’ll be in his room at the back.” She gestured to the door which was opening and closing with a flow of staff carrying laden trays. “Help ye’selves though.”
They did.
A lad carrying a stack of used soup bowls nodded them towards the right door, but there was no reply to the brisk knock Poll rapped on it. Or the next three.
“You think maybe he’s asleep?” Hepsie asked. “He was always a deep sleeper.”
“Likely so. I remember the time he was supposed to be on watch and fell asleep. We were just lucky Galthin always had one eye open or those land pirates would’ve slit our throats before we woke up.”
“He was good like that, saved us more’n once.” It was always hard for her to think of Galthin and not get just a little maudlin.
Poll tried the door and it opened easily. The smell from within rolled out, stale ale, stale sweat and undertones of urine and vomit. There was also a steady snore. Hepsie couldn’t see in and when she moved to do so, hand over her nose, Poll held her back.
“You’ll not want to see this, love. Go find us a table and I’ll be with you in a bit.”
His face left no room for argument so she bit back her questions and retreated to the bustle of the common room, finding a table being cleared which she could claim. It had a window view of the courtyard and barely had she sat down than she saw a door open and her Poll manhandling an obese, half-naked man to the water trough and douse his head into it over and again.
It was only when poll finally let his victim up, choking and protesting that Hepsie realised this was Stref. For a moment she couldn’t reconcile the bejowled and angry face, balding hair and lumpen body with the care-free, slender and agile man she had known. Then she did and she had to look quickly away, feeling embarrassed and hoping he hadn’t noticed her through the small window. She busied herself ordering food and it was being served just as Poll pushed through the press to join her, Stref trailing behind, decently dressed, and looking sheepish.
“You look as beautiful as ever,” he greeted her and kissed her hand in his old way, but with less of the grace. Then he sat looked wistfully at the food she had ordered for herself and Poll. That was so much the Stref she remembered that she pushed the plate of bread and cheese over to him.
“I’ve told the tale of it,” Poll said. “Stref will come with us.”
The quick look Stref shot her man told Hepsie that had not been the first answer he’d given.
“So do you know where we might find any of the others?”
His mouth half-full of bread and cheese, Stref spoke through it. “Linis left the Kingdom years ago. Last rumour had it she turned merchant and married. Could be anywhere now. I still have her ring so we could pay a spell caster to tell us where she is, if you want. Galythin, I heard went back to his forest people so unless you want to take ship to to Farward, you’ll not find him.”
“What about Raya and Coldon?”
Stref shook his head, swallowing down the mouthful before he replied.
“Coldon took ill soon after you left. Wasted away before our eyes until he was gone. Raya, well she took it bad. She upped and took vows to be a priestess of Shal. She’s living in a nunnery just west of the city. I used to go see her now and then, but she told me I just made her think of Col. That was over ten years ago, but far as I know she’s still there.”
It was hard hearing Col was gone. He had been the strongest of them all, lifting boulders as if they were pebbles and saving them all by anchoring the rope bridge with his own powerful muscles, when they would have fallen into the bottomless chasm.
“We’ll go see,” Hepsie decided.
“I won’t,” Stref said. “I promised her not to.”
Which brought a frown to Poll’s face. “That’s as it goes, then. You can gather supplies and talk to that spellcaster about Linis. You never know she might not be so far. We’ll fetch Raya – if she’s willing.”
“And if not? If Raya won’t come and we can’t find Linis?” Stref was asking but Hepsie wondered that too.
“If not, then there’s the three of us and that’ll have to do.”
“But…”
Poll pushed back his stool and got to his feet in a single movement. You’d not have known his knee was bad. “But we’re not lighting that fire yet,” he said firmly. “Just be ready for when we’re back. We’ll be leaving for High Top tomorrow either way.”
“Thank Shal it’s summer then.” Stref pulled the remains of their meal towards him, then glanced up and caught the looks. “What of it? My sister has me on a diet, I’m half-starved.”
Hepsie failed to smother a laugh and turned it into a cough, but she could tell Poll was not seeing it as funny.
“Just be ready,” he said, voice cold.
This wasn’t going so well so far.

From a fantasy tale by E.M. Swift-Hook

Summer is icumen in, let’s go down the pub
In the garden we can sit, and sup a little jug
We’ll watch the maypole dancers, then
Throw peanuts at the Morris men
Who quite forget to stamp and whirl
While checking out the young clog girls
Then, when the evening cools the sky
The folk singers they will pop by
And underneath the Mayday moon
They’ll play the old familiar tunes
On comb and paper and bassoon
Until the singing starts, too soon
When some old geyser with a beard
Will stick his finger in his ear
And sing an old traditional lay
That someone else wrote yesterday
He’ll lose the tune forget the words
But never feel a bit absurd
Because he’s here to serenade
On rather too much ‘lemonade’
And when the landlord shuts the bar
We’ll amble home, it isn’t far
As into bed we fall you’ll say
There went a bloody fine May Day

©jj 2021

The Working Title crew bring you the opportunity to enjoy wisdom from the mysteriously enigmatic Madam Pendulica…

Aries
This sign needs a short sharp name to ram home when you have to shout at them to get their attention. Which you will – a lot. Anne, John, Kim or Gilles might be good choices.

Taurus
Bullish folk need names that are going to bear repetition – a lot of repetiton. So something that sounds nice to say like Alexander, Yolanda, Beatrice or Grayson.

Gemini
Twin names are always a good call for Gemini, even if you only have the one, it will always feel like there is another lurking about. Good choices might be Romulus and/or Remus, Chloe and/or Zoe.

Cancer
Crabs definitely do better in life when they have names that have a seaside feel to them. Marina, Piers, Sandy, or Ocean would be good options to consider.

Leo
The lion self-regards as the monarch of the zodiac so needs a very noble name. Try for something that sounds pompous and you are bound to succeed. Marmaduke, Regina, Balthazar and Hermione spring to mind.

Virgo
Be sure you name them after someone chaste and intelligent. Saints or might offer good inspiration. Ignatius, Benedict, Hildegard and Brigid, for example.

Libra
A well balanced name is a must for any Libran. It need not repeat but it does need to rhyme within if not. You could try Zsazsa, Lily, Brenden or Chester.

Scorpio
Names of famous murderers will really fit a Scorpio – and help give them a role model to aspire to, perhaps. Lucretia, Caligula, Dexter or Lizzie might be good choices.

Sagittarius
Of course you need to try for an equine link for your Sagittarian. Good choices might be Philip, Horsa, Epona or Rosalind.

Capricorn
The goat of the zodiac needs a nice woolly name. You can try Barbara, Aran, Jason, or Agnes.

Aquarius
Naming an Aquarian is always a challenge. You simply can’t choose something weird enough for them! Perhaps you might consider Zadok, Melpomene, Ramesses or Xiomara.

Pisces
There needs to be water in a Piscean name, just a splash will do, but they can become very dry without it. Victoria, Angel, Niagara and Iguazu could all be good choices.

Madame Pendulica predicts she will return…

Papa having been a narrow-minded martinet, with a very heavy hand, nobody much mourned him when he died of ill-temper three days before his fiftieth birthday.
Grandmother seemed to shrink even further into her black clothes as the household that was once so quiet and regimented filled with noise and laughter.
She payed a famous necromancer to reanimate his portrait, and it mouthed platitudes and moralities daily.
When Buggy discovered this was computing rather than magic, it was the work of but an hour to reprogram the simulacrum so that it called grandmother ‘scrawny tits’ and swore sulphurously.

©️jj 2021

Introducing a new series of fun flash fiction from Jane Jago which will feature twice weekly in the month of May!

They called her Nanny Bee, although as far as anyone knew she had never been a wife or a mother, let alone a grandmother. But she was popularly believed to be a witch – so Nanny it was. She lived in a punk-walled thatched cottage that crouched between the village green and the vicarage. The Reverend Alphonso Scoggins (a person of peculiarly mixed heritage and a fondness for large dinners) joked that between him and Nanny they could see the villagers from birth to burial.
Nanny’s garden was the most verdant and productive little patch you could ever imagine, and she could be found pottering in its walled prettiness from dawn to dusk almost every day. People came to visit and were given advice, or medicine, or other potions in tiny bottles or scraps of paper – but they always had the sneaking suspicion they were getting in the way of the gardening.
But there again, digging is second nature to gnomes.

It was a sunny Sunday morning and Nanny was listening to the church choir while she pricked out some seedlings. She was idly wondering who possessed the piercing soprano that was permanently half a beat behind the rest when a shadow fell over the potting shed. She put down her dibber and went outside. A winged horse hovered over her tiny lawn.
“Ho sister,” it said, “there’s trouble at the castle and you wanted immediately.”
“If His Greediness has got himself indigestion again, I ain’t coming.”
“No. It isn’t that. There’s something happened to the lordling. His wife is in her chamber sobbing and he’s nowhere to be found.”
“Oh right. Hang on. I’ll just get my bag.”
“And maybe change your gardening boots?”
“Oh. Right. Okay. I’ll come out the front door.”
It’s not every day that you get to ride on the back of Fledge his own self, but Bee was a prosaic being and rather resented being pulled away from her petunias.
Fledge dropped neatly to earth in the stable yard and walked quietly to the mounting block. Nanny jumped down and bowed to the horse.
“I thanks you for my safe ride.”
“You are welcome.”
The castle functionary who awaited her sneered down from his great height. Nanny ignored him and stumped off towards the private apartments. To his chagrin, the tall clerk had to run to keep up with her. The door guard saluted her with his pike before winking broadly.
She walked sturdily int the formal presence chamber and chaos. There appeared to be upwards of a dozen people all shouting at the very tops of their voices. The only pool of silence centred around a slender figure cloaked in rose-pink velvet, who stood right in the centre of a patch of sunlight. She turned her perfect face and smirked at Nanny, who chose not to notice her.
“You’ll have to be polite to me when I have the young one’s ring on my finger,” beauty hissed.
“Oh. I doubt it,” Nanny spoke absentmindedly as most of her brain was taken up with assessing the situation around her.
As far as it was possible to make any sense, the Lord and his Heir were nose to nose and both were puce with rage. Her ladyship was alternately screaming like a banshee and having recourse to her Lacy kerchief. The other shouters appeared to be various staff members and functionaries who could safely be discounted.
Nanny ambled over to where father and son were having their ‘discussion’ and knocked politely on the younger man’s knee. He stopped yelling at his father and looked down.
“Ah, Nanny,” he said genially, “can you make this old fool see that I’m firm in my resolve.”
“Your resolve to do what, sir?”
“Why to divorce my unfaithful wife and marry my true love.”
Nanny looked into his fair and foolish face and sighed. She beckoned and when he bent down he was felled by a scientific blow from a knobbly little fist.
As soon as he hit the ground the air wavered about beauty and she began to look less beautiful. She looked at Nanny with loathing before she picked up her skirts and ran.
“When he wakes up he won’t remember any of this. But somebody needs to explain to his wife that she is NOT to withhold his conjugals if she don’t want this to happen again.”
Nanny went back to her petunias, deeply grateful that gnomes only consider sex in an abstract manner, and only as it pertains to other people.

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 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?

E.M. Swift-Hook

You thought you knew what they meant? How wrong you were. Never fear, Jane Jago will set you straight!

AFK – After (I) Finish Knitting or Ah’m From Kentucky
ASAP – As Stupid As Pi**
BRB – Burping Refried Beans
BTW – Bugger The Weather
DM – Disoriented (by) Music
FAQ – Friend Ate (all the) Quality street
FTFY – For Treats Frozen Yogurt
FYI – Feet (with) Yellow Infestation
G2G – Gesticulating to Grandma
IMHO – In Movies Hopeful Orphans
IRL – Indoor Reared Lettuce
LOL – Lizards On Lockdown
MFW – Mowing Flowers Wilfully
OMDB – Oh Mother Dat’s Bad
OMG – Overly Malicious Grandmothers
OTL – Obvious Treacle Latitude
PITA – Place Inside The Ambulance
PITR – Pig In The Road
RT – Reduced Telemetry
TBH – Terrific Blonde Hairdo
TLDR – The Laundry Didn’t Rinse
TTFN – Terribly Tiny Fork (and) kNife
TNTL – Translation Not Terribly Likely
TTYL – The Tradesmen Yodel Loudly