It's a long way from anywhere Fiona'd normally want to be. London just isn't cutting it, lately - the rat race has been grinding her down. She's holding her own, but somehow ...
     It isn't enough, anymore ...
     So here she is, out to Stonehenge to get away from everything. If 'everything' happens to not include a busload of tourists and New Age idiots, anyway. The expression on her face has been fairly polite, but with the British reserve of 'my god, there are utter bloody raving loonies talking to me and they think I'm one of THEM' somehow attached to it.
     The way she's dressed likely isn't helping her fend them off; designer jeans tucked into black walking boots, a white linen shirt and black vest, with a green scarf and matching jacket do little to convince the fen that she is not one of them. Even less does the long cornsilk hair with its elf knots and occasional braids with crystal bells and beads and baubles woven into the mane convince them that she isn't 'one of them'.
     "No, I'm not trying to look like Legolas' twin sister," Fiona tells one particularly persistent (and likely besotted) fellow, clutching a guitarcase up against her. "And I - look. I appreciate that you've spent thousand upon thousands of dollars to fly all the way from America to visit your holy shrine, but for the love of god, bugger OFF!"
     With that pronouncement made, she stalks off to the other side under the watchful eyes of the site guards, away from the main crowd of tourists, and sits on the ground, muttering to herself as she fiddles open the case to lift out an acoustic guitar. "And the first person who suggests a chorus of 'Michael Row The Boat Ashore' or 'Age of Aquarius' is going to get this guitar to the back of their head," Fiona adds meaningfully, glowering at some tourists starting to creep up towards her.

     It's not the normal kind of day one would expect someone to be out painting or sketching on, but living in Wales, you take them as you can get. Slightly overcast, cold enough that it's not entirely pleasant, if it were anywhere else in the countryside, it would seem odd to find a girl sitting on the side of a hill with a sketchboard and pencils, happily coloring away on the cards she has taped down against the gusts of wind that come over the open fields.
     She's got the air of a native girl around her. Not only with the jet black curls tucked up under her knit cap and the deep blue eyes against her fair skin, but also the cable knit sweater that looks like the wool was only roughly carded before it was made up. Heathered by natural inflection not dyes and mechanized systems.
     However, even more than that, she simply is as she sits. Her comfort is one of a person that could have been sitting there for hours, or even days. Perfectly content to be one with the hill and the land. Listening to the breezes and the rocks and the shrubs. Oblivious to the tourists except for the fact that when they stop to watch her work, as they're wont to do, she stops for a moment and smiles. Happy to speak to them about whatever it is she sketches, or the area, or where to go for a good pint.
     Either she does this a lot, or she's just generally congenial.
     When the less contented woman sits down near her on the rise, she grins a bit, commenting loud enough to be heard nearby as she continues to move her pencils over the page, "Didn't you realize the stones were a place of spiritual harmony. As long as your idea of harmony is the milling about of onlookers who can't seem to take a moment to sit still."

     "Yes, well, as long as they give me my little patch of space, I suppose I can't complain too much," Fiona agrees, settling the guitar across her lap and beginning to tune it, plucking a string and then turning the key gently with one ear turned down towards the body of the instrument. "But it doesn't stop me from wanting to."
     She shifts position, nudging her scarf out of her way, then straightens her back. Is it coincidence, or her glare, which is causing the tourists to feel a need to find other places to be? Either way, she relaxes a bit as they back off, turning to Wendy with a faint smile. "I'm not very big on spiritual harmony. Nice concept, but I've never found it works awfully well in practice. Fiona Arundel, by the by. Fee, or Fiona, never Fifi."
     She's a more restless sort, though she's settled in - her appearance is that of a cat submitting to the inevitable : just barely. Enduring, certainly, but patience and acceptance had better go knocking on other doors.
     She begins to pick out a rhythmic, faintly broken melody on the guitar, pausing every now and again to make minute changes to the tuning. "Nice to hear an actual other Brit here, though," Fiona adds wryly, then shifts languages smoothly into Welsh. "Bore da, by the by. Come here often, or you like me, wanting to see what all the noise and shouting's about?"

     "Diolch, good to meet you." She reaches over, scooting on the grass a little as she does it, for a handshake, "I'm Wendy. Gwendolyn Meyrick, otherwise."
     With the mention of nicknames she wrinkles her nose, "Fifi? Dear lord, never. That just sounds vile." At least her name can't be made into anything that horrid. Gwen or Wendy's about it. Lyn in a pinch. "And harmony's what you make of it. I've never been one for burning incense and meditating as such myself."
     She grins slightly, "You just have to watch for us." She nods over towards a man standing off on the side, "He's local." She moves her gaze to the other side of the stones to a family who seems to be out on a picnic, "Them, too. They just look at it differently." She smiles, not seeming to mind either of the groups, though. Certainly not as much as you do. "Oh, I figured I had a break from my other project so I should come try this out. It's harder than I thought, for some reason, though. Can't put my finger on it, I just can't get it to look right. Maybe they're right and it's the different times of day."

     Stretching over, Fiona shakes the offered hand briefly, then leans back out again. "I don't answer to Fifi except with a punch to the nose," Fiona admits, returning to tapping on the strings.
     "I was into the punk movement for a long time. There isn't much ... harmonious ... about it. I've gotten more harmonious in my old age," ah, ripe old age at twentysomething, "but I'm still not awfully fond of people, in some ways." Her glance slides to the side, then is followed by a nod. "I don't know awfully many people in Wales. Well. One for sure. A few acquaintances. But one that definitely is Welsh - sometimes I think he thinks he is Wales." A small smile. Wouldn't Davydd just shite himself...
     "What project's this, then?" Fiona turns slightly, picking up the melody she'd been playing. The Everly Brothers? Odd choice for an erstwhile punk. "Nature and man at their finest? How does it look wrong, I mean?"

     "Good policy, I'd say." Wendy agrees with a grin, shaking lightly and then sitting back with her board once more.
     "Really? You seem friendly enough, all things. Well, on your terms, which is fine." Tourists not withstanding, of course. And she laughs lightly, "I think that's a common trait with Cymru. We're never going to be anything but what we are." Which, in their terms, is frequently determined by locality.
     "I'm doing a study. Of castles, mostly, but I figured I couldn't leave this out of the mix." Not if she wanted to be considered thorough anyway. As ancient structures in the isles go... it's fairly significant. She smiles, "Idea is to turn it into a book. Maybe. If that's the way it works out."
     Looking down at the pages on her board again she wrinkles her nose, "I had to give up watercolors all together. For some reason I just kept getting them everywhere." The idea of the whole experience seems to frustrate her to no end. "And now, I keep adding things in. Like here." She tilts the board so that the drawings on it are visible, the one in particular pointed to by a pencil tip, "This... thing over here. It keeps popping in. Or others like it. This is the sixth one today."
     She's done a sketch of the stones, in this case the two nearly in front of her, standing in a field of the winter grass. But the colors are all wrong. Not wrong in tone so much as not in the lines. It's like instead of coloring in the pencil outline sketch, she just ran the leads over the page in lines and sometimes blurs. Though it comes out... looking like the stones, oddly enough. In the drawing itself, there's a little shape. Not unlike a small hunchbacked man hiding behind the stone and peeking around with a little winsome grin. Though not so very defined. When the flashes of glamour come through, however, it's nearly blinding. 'Underneath' the pencil there is a riot of color and movement and magic, almost as though someone were blending magic in with the paper itself. Or, perhaps, looking through the stones into another world on the opposite side.
     From her confusion, though, she doesn't seem to guess that's what is going on.

     One hand comes upwards off the guitar, shading Fiona's eyes as she squints. It might be February, it might be overcast, but ...
     "Mmm, I think I see your problem," Fiona says slowly. She absently begins picking out the song again, though still not singing. It might well be driving some of the Americans crazy, driving them away, to hear 'Unchained Melody' unending without vocal accompaniment - but, well, that can only be a bonus, right?
     "Mm. Tell me, what do you think of bridges?" An odd question, perhaps - certainly a non sequitur. Fiona points with her chin to the drawing, then glances around and back. "Assuming you've an opinion."

     Wendy blinks. In that way that people blink when they have no clue what kind of jump in conversation just happened without them. Maybe the train of thought left the station without her or something. "Um. Well..."
     Not another one. Running into people who go off on these strange tangents seems to be a common occurrence lately. At least before she thought it was something in the water in Welshpool.
     "You know... they're... fine and all. I like the older ones, with cobbles and such. Never thought of drawing them, specifically... castles are more interesting..." She looks down a the drawing again as though she's trying to figure out what it has to do with anything, "You know... important things. Autos can't go through ditches so well."

     "A bit literal-minded, for the drawings you're doing." Fiona grins slightly, then shakes her head. "It's not important. I tend to think more metaphorically, at times, is all - a bridge has two ways off of it, except there's a third. And it seems to me what you're ending up drawing - that's the third way down."
     Her hands shift on the guitar's neck slightly, and she pauses from conversation for a moment, paying attention to the song. Grey eyes closing, Fiona parts her lips to sing, though very quietly, apparently not really wanting to get an audience beyond those already nearby.
     "Oh my love
     my darling
     I've hungered for your touch
     A long lonely time
     And time goes by so slowly
     And time can do so much
     Are you still mine..."
     She resumes picking out the melody, though stops singing. There's a certain energy that vibrates, though - from a grounding perspective, it's not unlike sitting in the centre of a power station and hooking up to the wires, sending an extra 'charge' along - if you're going to send out a signal, what better place to hide it? On the other hand ... if you're going to send out a signal ... what better place for it to be noticed? But it's minimal; no more than a minor pulse. Certainly nothing remotely like the blinding light of the other night.
     "Not to sound like our friends across the way, but I'd say that if you're having these pop up in your drawings, then someone's trying to tell you something," Fiona says lightly. "Whether you chalk it up to the supernatural or your subconscious. I've had some ... odd things happen to me from time to time, myself, so I suppose I'm a bit of a self-appointed expert. But it's happened at every castle you've drawn? Where are these places, anyway?"

     Three sided bridges? That's just odd.
     She listens to the song quietly, looking back at her picture again to try and figure something out regarding what Fiona's just said. She seemed so rational at the beginning, so maybe there's something going on to it. Or at least she seems so sure there is. But, then, again, she could just be crazy.
     And then she blinks, mouth dropping open slightly as she looks at something on her board. Looking up at the rocks, and then down at her board again, "Hey!"
     Then there's the squinting response. Maybe it'll look different if there's less to be seen all at once. Or it'll look normal, or less bizarre. "It moved!"
     The drawing, it seems, not the stones. But you never know.

     They always do. Seem rational, that is. But Fiona as a sane and rational individual would likely get near-hysterical laughter from many. William, for example.
     "Moved?" Well, that's a new one, even on Fiona. She stops playing, leaning forward with a clatter of beads against the wooden back of the instrument, twisting round to peer at the drawing. "What do you mean, moved?"
     Just to be sure, she does look up at the stones, to make sure they're not swaying. Crushed to death by a falling monolith - what an ignominious fate. She'll never find out if Davydd likes her!
     The plight of every woman since puberty hit...

     "The... blobby thing... on the drawing." She points at the little gnomish man, who does look little and gnomish in the 'other' picture, "He... just wiggled around. Or, you know, something."
     Suddenly, it seems, saying it out loud doesn't come across as the best idea. Three sided bridges don't seem so off now, do they, Miss Wendy. "Er. Never mind."
     She looks up from the drawing, seeming to remember something else from an earlier bit of question, "Um. No, it doesn't happen on other things. At least I haven't had it happen much. Sometimes I have problems for a little while with watercolors on something, but when I switch to pencils it's fine again. Well, normal."

     "Mm. Tell me, do you ever have ... weird dreams? Or meet people and have deja vu of the bad sort? Like ... I don't know you but I should know you and I'm not sure that's necessarily a good thing, deja vu, not just the oh yeah, I think we met one night in a dark club deja vu." Fiona takes this stuff somewhat seriously, apparently. Three-sided bridges indeed.
     Setting the guitar in its case, the blonde Brit shifts to her knees in order to lean forward to look at the drawing again, squinting slightly. "...I'm sure I sound fairly loony. But let's face it, until they discover a way to make things sound sane when talking about weird shite happening, you can't help but sound loony. I promise not to wave any crystals at you."
     She casts a slightly nervous glance over her shoulder at the tourists, and lowers her voice. "Though we probably shouldn't talk too loudly about it. Don't think any of this lot speak Welsh, which helps, but ... you never know."
     That's right. In the middle of magical Grand Central Station, sit having a conversation about magic. Noone'll notice! Right.
     "What happens when you switch to pencils, anyway? Does it - you know - feel different, at all, or just behave differently?"

     Wendy arches an eyebrow. Yeh. She kind of thinks the formerly normal sounding English girl is not so normal sounding anymore. She is, though, at least polite enough not to feel comfortable saying so right off.
     "Everybody has weird dreams, that doesn't mean much at all." She says matter-of-factly. Who's to say that her weird dreams are any weirder than anybody else's weird dreams.
     "And thanks for the invite, but I think I'll stay here..."

     "Everyone does, certainly," Fiona agrees, with a shrug, "but not everyone has figures that keep cropping up in all of their drawings, or which move after. I mean, suit yourself - just, I had some weird stuff happen to me, myself. But I don't much care for being overheard and thought a loony, you see."
     Crystal rattles in her hair as she shakes her head, and she settles back, absently strumming the strings of the acoustic again. "I know how it was like for me - it was awful. Nobody'd tell me anything, I thought I was going mad. But, well, if you're not having that difficulty, good on you."
     She nudges open the guitar case, frowning at the bottom of it. Fiona mutters, "Now, where did I put ..."

     Thinking for a moment, Wendy says in a lower voice, "Weird dreams don't make you a loony." She considers again, and looks back at her picture, eyebrows going up as she leans over to say in that same quite tone, "And -you- saw it move too." Didn't she?
     "So... it's... fine." She seems to say that more to convince herself than anybody else. Drawing another line on her picture cautiously while Fiona rummages through her case for whatever it is she's looking for. Probably some crazy pills.

     "Weird dreams don't make you a loony," Fiona agrees, brushing her hair back from her face, then leans forward to gently lay the guitar into its case. "But most people'd say that seeing things move in pictures do. And I did see it too, so that leaves us with two options."
     She pats the guitar gently, adjusting it as if putting a young and fragile child to bed. "Either we've got a particularly contagious and mutual form of lunacy," Fiona continues, "or you're not mad - and in which case, I appear to just possibly know something about it. Now, granted, I could be lying - you've just got my word on it that I don't need money and I'm, uh, not into women."
     The thought is almost amusing, isn't it? If I were into women, well ... Davydd would be the least of my worries ...
     "Though," Fiona adds, straightening up and cocking up an eyebrow, "if I were into money or women, I'd have to wonder why I'd come all the way out here instead of staying in London."

     That leaves the dark haired girl thinking again. Since, there is a logic to it. But, that doesn't necessarily seem to mean she's jumping right on board with the whole idea.
     "It's prettier here." That's in answer to the last statement. Which is the easier one. Despite the drizzly sky and cold wind, to many it would be better than being in a smoggy city certainly.
     She sighs, "Okay, so we've established that neither of us thinks we're loony. So maybe it was just some trick of the light out here that made it look like there was something going on." She's not going to say moved again. "And then we both thought we did, but we didn't."
     As an afterthought she clarifies, "And I'm not into lasses either. It's fine if you are and everything." Open minded of course, just not in her personal case, "I just don't."

     Fiona snorts, holding back a bit of slightly self-deprecating laughter. "If I were into women, it'd make my life easier, I sometimes think - men're a bloody pain in the you-know-where. But no, thought I exist in a state of single blessedness, I'm quite sure I'm heterosexual, so ..."
     A shrug is paired with that snort, and she glances up at the sky. "Yes, it is pretty here," Fiona agrees, a bit distantly. "Reminds me of something... Anyway, yes, I suppose we both thought we did. Or, of course, we're both mad - or there's more to heaven and earth, Horatio."
     Than is dreamed of in your philosophy... When did I become such a philosopher? I blame Davydd, it's all his fault.
     "Your call," Fiona adds cheerfully. "I promise - no crystals. I like how they look in my hair, but I don't chant to Ra while playing Tibetan flute music on my cd player and burning Indian incense."

     "Well, generally as my life runs, they are. But, somehow it just seems to be that way." Men being what they are. "And there's nothing wrong with those other bits either, 'course. I just don't do them myself either." Though other people here look like they probably just got finished doing that over there by the stones. Tourists, though.
     "I'll think about it." She doesn't seem totally off on the idea. But that's either way, really. There's still a chance that the strange girl with the crystals in her hair is trying to pull something. Or is, you know, blooming wacko.
     There's a brief pause in conversation. Wendy checks to see if her most recent line moved, or if it's still where she put it. She seems satisfied that it is. "So... um... Do you play in a band?"

     "Ha. No. I've never been awfully keen on being the centre of all attention," Fiona admits, as she buckles the case shut again. "Recently, I've started playing on occasion at a pub - Black Jack Davy's, probably you wouldn't quite know if it you aren't in London much. Nice bunch of blokes - I found the place through someone else."
     Davydd again. Damn the man, can't he keep out of things?
     She absently massages at one of the elf knots close to her scalp, pushing the lock of hair back and away. "I used to work in the music scene, but I ... came to a critical point where I had to change things. So I did - went from one form of journalism to another, and it's worked a bit better for it."
     One hand comes up, gesturing to the pad. "So do you do that for money, or for love?"

     Wendy glances back down at the picture taped on her board again, though only briefly. Maybe she's afraid if she looks at it too long it'll move again, "Both, sort of." She shrugs, "I sell some cards at my... a place over by the national forest. That's it, though, I haven't actually sold much. Sometimes I have things in a gallery in Cardiff? And they do alright, but they're not normally for sale there. It's just a showing."
     She nods to the board, "I'm hoping maybe if I get a book together I can write some of the bits in. Then it'll be easier to sell."
     "You like the journalism though? Seems like it must be awfully fast work." She pauses for a moment and the points the back of a pencil at the other woman, eyebrows going up, "Wait... I saw you on telly!"

     Ah, already it's coming back to haunt her. Fiona manages not to cringe, just shrugs a bit sheepishly and nods. "You probably did. I've been in production for the past, oh, year or so - decided to give the other side of the camera a whirl. Not sure how I feel about it yet - or how they feel about me, for that matter."
     At least she's not asking me for my autograph, or for a date like that horrible horrible man at the train station...
     Fiona gestures loosely. "Your things're interesting, but they remind me of something someone ... told me about."
     Yes, let's not scare the girl away by going 'oh, yes, they remind me of the memories I inherited from my faerie great-great many times great grandmother'...

     "On the news. With that story about the man in the pushcart?" Bodies being the news that they are in Wales. "What's the business on that anyway? It seemed off all the way 'round. What with the cart and the people confessing like they did."
     So, now she's talking with a reporter associated with dead bodies who used to think she was crazy. Looking up all the time, Gwendolyn.
     At the mention of her art she glances back, turning again curiously, "Oh? Sometimes people tell me they look like they should go in fairy stories. Like Rapunzel and the Tower or somethin'."

     "Simple drug case, really. The fellow was trying to shake his addiction - the two that were responsible were fellow addicts, thought he was going to turn their supplier in. They killed him to protect their source, and drove him out of town and dumped his body." Fiona shakes her head. "They cracked when they got picked up by the police."
     An uncomplicated situation, at least on the face of it. Terribly sad, no doubt - so pastoral, in some ways.
     "Something of the sort," Fiona agrees, voice going a bit remote. "Do you read fairy stories? There's a lot in them, you know."

     "Oh." Wendy nods, "Well, that would make sense, I suppose. I didn't remember the first part of the story, I don't think I'd been up with the news then." She shrugs, not terribly concerned about that fact. Mostly, it was the chance to ask someone who might know the inside scoop.
     "Sure, I read them." She raises an eyebrow, "Like... in publishing?" That does have something to do with journalism, after all. "I sent some of my drawings to a children's author. She didn't say they were bad or anything, just not what she was looking for."

     "Well, I meant more in the sense of lessons. Most fairy tales contained certain morals or ... maxims which the writers wanted the readers to pick up - does faerieland a bit of an injustice in that sense, to boil things down to black and whites, but that's what humans do best, I suppose." Fiona cracks a slight grin, drawing one knee up and tucking the guitar case under her knee.
     She balls her fist against the side of her jaw, elbow on her knee. "It's something I've been ... studying a little lately, a bit of a pet topic, sorry. I don't imagine it interests you much."

     "Oh, sure, well, the modern versions do. The older ones weren't so concerned with it, really. Lots of them don't even have a point at all, they're just local legends or stories about people out in the woods." Wendy says with a shrug and a smile, "They just add the morals later on for the modern picture books. Some of them are pretty scary."
     Apparently it does interest her, "I generally follow the local ones, mostly, though. Welsh stories. The Russian tales are interesting, but not as... vivid I guess."
     "Well, I know a few fairly obscure ones, if you have an interest," Fiona offers, leaning back against a rock and stretching her neck from side to side.
     One hand comes down, to draw absent pictures in the grass and dirt. "Don't know if they're Welsh in origin, but ... there's some Welsh influences, certainly. But only half actually directly involve anything of note."

     She raises an eyebrow curiously, setting her pencil down in the box and picking up another one next to her on the blanket. "Oh?" Shifting her seat a bit, she lowers the board to turn towards the journalist a little.
     The now empty hand goes up to tuck a black curl behind her ear, nodding, "Sure, if you want. I don't know that I've heard all of them by any means, so it's probably new to me."

     "Well, I was reminded by your mention of Rapunzel and her Tower, is all," Fiona comments, brushing her own corn silk length of hair back over her shoulder. "It begins once upon a time, of course, as all of these stories do..."
     Her eyes half-close, and she brings her hands together under her chin. "Once upon a time, somewhere far off, there was a land of many kingdoms. These kingdoms were not always peaceful, but neither were they always at war - and there, there was magic, as common as today you'll find television jingles."
     "In this land," Fiona continues, voice becoming a bit dreamy, thinning out a bit, "there were fears of some about the days when magic might cease to be - so all the kings and queens and lord and ladies and magicians and wizards and sorcerers and sorceresses and so on, they got together, to discuss it. In the end, nine of the kingdoms ended up forging a particular pact - to ensure that magic would remain, and moreover, that the enemies of magic could not put an end to them and their kind."
     Her hand drifts through the grass again, then lifts to her knee. "In each of these nine kingdoms, a tall white tower was constructed, and in each tower, the reigning king or queen, lord or lady would place his or her throne - tying their lives and their power into the land, and into the magic."

     Wendy sits quietly, bringing a leg around so that she has her back mostly to the stone circle, instead watching as the story unfolds with interest. Absently, without any attention from her directly, her hand makes lines on the drawing board she has sitting with her. Though, it's not visible at all while she makes the easy gestures. The likely effect being random lines on nothing at all.

     "Time went by. The kingdoms had woven a new magic, but it was not enough. There were other enemies ... enemies which were formed of that magic. And though the towers had become as natural as anything in the kingdoms, there was cause to call upon a champion, for the lands' time of need." Fiona absently plucks at a blade of grass, stroking it between her fingers.
     The grass glimmers, slightly - reflected light along the smooth side, no doubt. "They found a champion - but he was not yet quite ... ready to champion their cause. They went to him nonetheless, and they asked him if he would. And he agreed, though it meant altering his life - magic alters things. True magic does, at any rate. It is a side effect of being magic. It does not hide things, but alters them."
     Fiona sets the blade of grass aside, continuing remorselessly, almost doggedly. "He was changed, and he was given a kingdom for his troubles - that is the typical reward in fairy stories, isn't it? But things continued to happen. There were pacts made, and broken - hearts soldered together, and wrenched apart - and time went by. And everything was as expected, until old enemies of the land united their forces."

     "My." Wendy continues the motions of her hands on the drawing board, though she still doesn't look at it. Sitting close enough to Fiona on the side of the small rise that the other woman's voice doesn't have to carry far. She has her pencil box, and seems to be using a board on her lap rather than an easel to draw the ancient structure. Though she isn't looking at it at the moment. She tilts her head a bit as the grass glows, but cloudy Welsh days will do odd things to the light. As she's already commented more than once.
     That seems to be all her commentary though, listening to the tale of white towers and champions.

     "One of the queens was imprisoned within her own tower. She sent word to those she could reach, but the imprisonment was cruel, and she was little able to break from her own tower. Enough word got through that the other towers were quickly secured - but there was a ... weakness, that had to be compensated for."
     Fiona speaks carefully, slowly, trying to think things out in a logical fashion. It's harder than it sounds. "She was left to weaken, being gradually driven mad. In the hopes of ... freeing the flow of energy, there were pacts made with some of the enemy - a trade of hostages, in a sense - and many lives were sundered by the turmoil. The champion, though - she could not reach him, nor could any. He was ensorcelled..."
     One hand rakes through the grass, and she glances up wryly. "She died, the champion woke up, and they say that means there is an empty throne still waiting to be claimed... along with, of course, the champion. Pretty story, though I don't tell it at all well - there's too much missing."

     Stories, they say that all stories find their way to stonehenge. More than just simple glamour travel long the ley lines that meet here. Nice Aston Martin's sometimes arrive as well. The sporty little comes to a stop, dirt road crunching beneath the tires, and out of it a tall man climbs.
     You've both meet him... though perhaps only briefly. Lowe, pronounced 'Low Vah,' and he even has the business cards to prove that. With single-mindedness of purpose he seems to be heading for the center of the circle. That is.. at least until he sees the two young ladies.. Fiona and Wendy seen he turns to head towards them.

     "Is... that the end?" Wendy asks curiously, as though she expected some kind of finale to the story itself. Though when Fiona continues to say she doesn't know some of the other bits she nods, "I... it sounds familiar but I don't know that I've heard it told... well... before." There's a furrow that develops in her brow as though she's thinking hard. And her hand stops for a moment at that, surprisingly perhaps.
     Then she sees him. As though there's something that draws her eye over to the stalking man as he comes over the grass. "Shit." Her voice is low enough that Fiona may or may not even here it, though the frown she gets slightly is enough to demonstrate the sentiment. This is followed by a sigh, "Of course."

     "That depends, really, on what you consider an ending." Fiona's seated near Wendy, a closed guitar case half under one bent knee. "It's sort of -"
     Wendy's exclamation causes Fiona to blink and interrupt herself as she looks to the other woman, inquiring, "Something I said? Something you ate? Somethi- oh."
     That 'oh', of course, is prefaced by a glance up and a blinking doubletake at the approaching Lowe. "I ... think I see. Cue back to earlier in our discussion : a man. This one's your particular problem?" All this in a suitably low tone of voice before she then looks back up to offer Lowe a blandly impersonal smile.
     She's dressed a little different from the last time, her long cornsilk hair beaded and belled in places, otherwise left down, elf knots tied in various places along different lengths. Jeans, a white linen shirt, and a green vest are paired with black boots; that with the guitar likely makes her look like she's about to be picked up on suspicion of folk music. She doesn't immediately offer a greeting - perhaps trying to place the man who's approaching, grey gaze slightly wary.

     Though they are hidden by his hair, large ears hear quite well. "I assure you I am no one single person's problem." Lowe says as he approaches, his hands resting in his pockets. A foot tapping idling up upon the ground. "I hope I am not interrupting... I just have a quick question for our dear Wendy here."
     Dark eyes settle on the young woman and he asks, "You are family with what 'the next day' would be? As in the day after we last talked."

     "Mr. Lowe, it's so lovely to see you. Yes, I've been well, thank you. I hope you had a good Yule. No, I didn't have any problems with the roads icing over during the holidays, I stayed at home with my mother." Her eyebrows arch with mild surprise, though it is, from her saccharine tone, quite obviously feigned. And in response to nothing from either of the conversations. "You were concerned? How very kind of you, I'm terribly sorry. You see, I didn't understand that when you were telling me what I was going to be doing, you meant it to be a polite invitation."
     Maybe there's another conversation going on with somebody else? Or, she's making up one on her own. Which, with the slight sarcasm at the end, is probably true. And her tone drops back into its regular cadence again, "Yes. I know what the next day is."

     "It's been a while since Chinon, hasn't it, sir?" Fiona offers Lowe a small, faint smile, then shakes her head with a tinkling of crystal baubles. "I suppose you've seen Davydd, then, have you."
     She pauses a moment, then turns back to Wendy, telling her, "Has senility set in just yet, do you think?"

     Turning to Fiona, Lowe bows his head and says, "It has been yes. I hope the day is finding you well. Again I apologize for the intrusion. But I thought since I was here I would say hello."
     He looks to Wendy then and nods his head, "But I suppose you are right. It was merely a friendly offer. When you are done running though, I will still be there. Well usually. If I'm not visiting Oslo."

     Wendy leans forward towards him slightly, as though she's going to tell him a secret from the ground, "You could try being a little nicer? I get the scary thing. You live in a broken down castle. Spooky."
     She sits back and sighs with exasperation, this time genuine, "Really, I just do not get you." The board is lowered and on it are sketches of the stones in their circle with their oddly glowing lines (Vibrantly brilliant in chaos if viewed with Other Sight) and on one of the formerly blank cards, a tower.
     The tower, actually. Specifically, Isabel's tower. The queen's tower. In vivid detail as though someone were sitting in front of it and drawing every turret and arch with attentive care.

     There's a small pause from Fiona as she listens to the exchange, then turns to give her answer to Lowe.
     "No intrusion. Wendy and I were passing the time of day, after all - it being a national monument, I hardly think that either of us could exactly ban you from here. Not without quite a bit of salt."
     She leans forward to adjust the position of her guitar case, then freezes into position as her glance falls onto the drawing board. Colour drains from her face for a moment; she reddens a moment later, and sits up on her knees, palms flat on her thighs.
     "So, Mister Lowe," she imitates Wendy's choice of address as the best example given, "what do you do in Oslo? I know what one does in ruined castles... but not in -Oslo-."
     Wendy gets another glance, and Fiona murmurs, still in her fluid Welsh, "I wonder if I ought to point out the caterpillar on his shoulder."

     "I could try being a bit nicer, but I don't want to be. I was nice to people for a very long time and it only meet with the most dubious of success." Lowe waves a hand and says, "As for Oslo, I just need to pay a visit on an old friend."
     Lowe looks at his shoulder as you mention the caterpillar on his shoulder. With a shrug, he looks back to the young ladies and says, "In any event I should leave you two be. I am here to talk with an old friend, if you'll both excuse me." and that said he starts walking for the center of the circle again.. where there happens to be no one at all.

     Wendy rolls her eyes as Lowe walks off, shaking her head, "Seriously, I just do not understand him at all." She sighs, picking up the board again and looking down at it. When she sees the tower she blinks slightly, surprised herself by what she sees, "Oh."
     "Well, I suppose that goes with the story then." She tilts her head slightly and keeps looking at it a moment more before looking up again, "So, you've met him, I take it?"

     "Once. He's the ... acquaintance of ... someone I know." Not a lover, not a boyfriend, not even exactly a friend. Fiona isn't sure where Davydd fits, and that's an irritant in her life. "We were introduced in Chinon..."
     The same weekend she got to see William naked - again. Some sights, she just doesn't need to see.
     "Your eye is a bit better than I think you make allowances for. He seems very keen on you visiting him, though - in his own charming way," Fiona comments, a bit dryly, glancing at Lowe's receding back. "Reminds me of Davydd, just a little, though Davydd's more of a charmer."

     Turning to glance at his back as he moves to the circle itself, Wendy nods before looking over once more, "Llewellyn, I assume?" So, yes, she knows him too, it would seem. "Yes, well, he does seem to be interested in it. Too bad it's so easy to disappoint people sometimes."
     She raises her eyebrows slightly, "Reminds you of him?" Laughing as though she thinks that's incredibly funny she holds up a hand, "He reminds you of Llewellyn?"

     "Ah, it figures you'd have met Davydd. Small world." And getting smaller all the time. Fiona shrugs, pseudo-philosophical about it.
     She brushes her hair back from her face again, shaking her head very slightly. "In a way, yes. They're both very ... driven when they've found something they want. And they go back, oh ... years." She'll be a bit vague on that.

     "I was using his castle as one of the ones in my series." For the previously mentioned book. "They've turned out some of the best so far, I wanted to get a few more in, but." She shrugs, not elaborating on that in particular.
      Nodding she agrees, "Llewellyn mentioned they'd been friends for a while." Wendy shakes her head, "I don't see how, though. Lowe's so..." She wrinkles her nose, "Dark. I guess." Mr. dropped now that he's not in attendance it seems. As though she knows it's not really the type of name you add anything to and was just doing it anyway.
     "Llewellyn's been very generous so far. And friendly." She shrugs, "Which Lowe... hasn't."

     "People change, but Davydd's ... well, Davydd is Davydd." For a moment, Fiona descends into brooding, scowling down at the grass.
     She shakes her head, fisting one hand against the ground to push herself up a bit. "I don't know much about Lowe," she admits, "only the second time I've met him. Seems ... well, a typical representative of Davydd's friends. They're all batshite, and that likely includes me."

     "You don't sound too fond of him, certainly." Wendy says curiously, finally putting her pencil down for once, adding it back with the other in the box. The board gets put on the blanket, jean covered knees pulled up slightly, "I take it he's your particular problem then?" An echo of an earlier conversation once more.
     "I thought he was married?" She seems confused, "You said you were down from London, so you wouldn't be... Oh..." Eyebrows up. Some understanding starting to dawn.

     "I'm not sleeping with him, if that's what you mean." Fiona's not quite blustering, though she's now going quite red in the face, colour heightening even to the back of her neck. "And no, he's not married. But he -is- in a relationship, and I don't ... date married men, or taken men, or ... well, hell, I don't date."
     She takes a deep breath, letting it out slowly. Calm blue ocean, Fee. Calm blue ocean thoughts.
     "I'm most recently from London, yes," Fiona agrees, more serenely, though by no means peacefully. "I work there, and I live there. I've known Davydd a few years now." Two, two and a half, pushing three... Long enough. "Trust me - you don't want to hear the whole story. You wouldn't believe it anyway."
     Then she shrugs, picking up the guitar case and lugging it up to her hip. "But yes, Davydd Llewellyn is my ... particular problem. Men are more trouble than pets, I swear."

     Wendy nods, "He just kept talking about the lady of the castle so I thought..." She shrugs, obviously indicating exactly what she thought by the entirety of that statement, "That bloody sucks." Wrinkling her nose a little, she says, "Sorry, didn't mean to pry."
     She shakes her head, "I don't know what that one wants." Nodding towards the... now vacant spot where Lowe was. She blinks and leans forward a bit, sighing and shaking her head, "Or anything, really. He insists on making up stories. And he's a horrible liar." Somehow, that would be hard to swallow about Lowe, most likely. What with his complete dispassion in general.
     "But, yeh, men are definitely problematic." She shakes her head, "I wanted to paint his tower." Lowe again, "And he gave me some shite about wanting royalties. I gave him a perfectly good drawing. Everybody else was happy with having one. It was a pretty nice one, all things. Not as nice as the one of Powis... but... I had more time to do that one."

     "That'd be Sandrine - his girlfriend. I quite like her." Fiona smiles faintly, then shrugs. "Very bloody civilized, isn't it? Makes it all more difficult." She shakes her head again, the bells ringing in her hair.
     She turns, blinking as well, and mutters, "Oh, bloody hell... he didn't. Did he?" She glances around, then looks simply resigned, turning her attention back to Wendy.
     "He seems to want you to go visit him, though," Fiona observes, "rather badly at that. Even if in a rather rude way. What're you going to do - keep ducking him? How'd he know you were here, for that matter?"
     And one eyebrow arches upwards. "Heaven and earth..."

     "Awful's what it sounds like. You don't sound as though you really fancy him much though? Maybe it's better?" Wendy hazards, shrugging, "Not that I'd know anything, myself."
     "Who knows what he does." Wendy says with a sigh, looking back from the circle, "And he told me he did." She shakes her head, "I have no idea why. He doesn't even like me, from the way he's spoken to me before. And it wasn't like he sounded as though he wanted to invite me in the first place when he told me to come over." She wrinkles her nose, "Loony."
     She shrugs at the last question, "He said he was coming to visit someone? Maybe he had an appointment to meet someone here?" She looks back over to the circle, "One of those tourists or sommat?"

     Fiona laughs faintly, shaking her head. "I don't know how I feel. It's the situation. If he were available ... I don't know what I'd do, to be honest," she admits, voice dropping. "There's ... some old threads that sort of keep things muddled."
     She's not quite willing to just up and say exactly what she feels. If, of course, she even knows...
     There's a slight frown, and her eyebrows arch upwards. "If he had an appointment on the 29th of February at Stonehenge," Fiona murmurs, "I'd be very curious about who with, indeed. But it's not my business, I suppose." She shrugs.
     "Anyway..."

     "Who knows. He probably wouldn't tell you who it really was anyway." Wendy wrinkles her nose, "Anyhow. I should go meet with him someplace. I'll send him a card or something setting it up. Probably not at his tower though, I'm not that slow in the brain."
     "He won't leave me alone about it likely otherwise. Or he'll make things difficult for me with getting the rights for the pictures for the books. Which I still have to do in paper for Powis." She doesn't seem to think he's above it certainly.
     "That's my bit, though, nothing really to worry on." Picking up the board again, she puts it over her lap. Not unlike picking up the guitar earlier as Fiona did. Maybe a good shield from... whatever. Or whomever.

     "Or take someone with you, at least, who seems halfway capable of handling him," Fiona agrees. "I wouldn't describe everyone Davydd knows as being 'safe', and I don't know that they're great friends, exactly. Very mixed bag, that lot."
     She shifts her hold on the case so that it's half-cradled across her arms. "Anyway, I really ought to be heading back - work on Monday and all that. If you like, I could give you my card, though god knows what you'd do with it."

     "Llewellyn said they were close. And he defended him a lot when I wasn't too happy with what he'd said to me." Wendy shrugs, "So, I get the thought that they are fairly. Not that it means much for my well-being, all in all."
     She raises her eyebrows slightly and nods, "Sure. I don't use phones, but I could drop you a note or whatnot. Can't hurt." She takes the drawing of the castle off the board and turns it over, writing her name and an address outside of Caermarthen on it to hand over, "Here, keep this one to go with your story."

     "...Thanks, you shouldn't." Fiona is utterly sincere in that as she takes the drawing exchanged for the card. "And yes, you can send me a note either at my work or home - either way."
     A glance is given back towards the center, then the journalist shakes her head. "Well, if you want, I'd go in there with you. I'm not terribly worried about him - he's unlikely to try anything, I'd think. Davydd's odd in some ways, but ... oh, never mind, I don't want to try to understand them."
     Fiona grins faintly, adding, "It makes my head hurt. Anyway, talk to you sometime, Wendy." Turning, shaking her head again, she begins to make her way towards the waiting buses.

     Wendy waves after taking the card and putting it safely in her pencil box, closing the lid, "Nice to meet you, Fiona. Thanks for... I don't know." She shrugs and smiles, "Thanks."
     She shrugs, "I'll see. If I think I need somebody, I'll ask. Or I might just meet him in town." She gets a moment of thoughtfulness on her features, "If he goes into town."
     Another exasperated sound comes out of her mouth and she shakes her head, "No fooling. Bye."

Posted by rowan at March 01, 2004 06:13 PM