Laurel's Quest Read online

  LAUREL’S QUEST

  By Nancy M Bell

  ISBN: 978-1-77145-243-4

  Copyright 2014 by Nancy M Bell

  Cover Art Copyright 2014 by Michelle Lee

  All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  * * *

  Dedication

  For Hamish Miller, whose inspirational work, The Sun and The Serpent, helped me show Laurel the way. Last, but certainly not least, my husband, Doug.

  * * *

  The May Day song sung at Padstow is an old traditional folk song. The story of St. Tues and Uther is my retelling of a Cornish myth. All other verse and the tin mine story are the original work of the author

  Chapter One

  It’s a Long Way from Home

  Laurel curled up tighter on the train seat and pressed her face against the window. The passing countryside unfolding before her was a blur, as was the blue shine of the sea to the west. She swallowed hard and hoped she wouldn’t embarrass herself by hurling. What if Mom gets worse or dies while I’m in Penzance? Two fat tears crawled down her cheeks, and she squeezed her eyes shut to stop more from falling.

  It sucked being on a train in a strange country going farther away from home with each annoying clack of the wheels. A huge wave of desolation swept through her and threatened to break the slim hold she kept on her emotions.

  Worms of anxiety twisted through her stomach and she struggled to breathe normally. Why did she ever agree to visit her mother’s friend in England? It seemed like such a great adventure when Mom suggested it. Everything was already arranged when the doctors discovered the cancer. Dad insisted she take the trip as planned. He just kept saying Mom would be better soon. But, what if she wasn’t? Laurel smacked her fist on her blue jean clad thigh. I should be with her!

  A boy with sandy blond hair dropped a backpack onto the seat opposite her. “This one’s free, inni’t?” He indicated the window seat.

  She shook her head, not trusting herself to speak.

  “Excellent!” he exclaimed. With an easy motion he flung the backpack into the overhead rack before he hurled himself into the seat, looking out the window with obvious delight.

  “Nothing like heading home!” he said with a grin that revealed uneven white teeth.

  Laurel studied him through the curtain of her hair. He was about her age, she guessed, maybe a little older. His eyes were a vivid blue above prominent cheekbones.

  Without taking his eyes from the window, he said, “Name’s Coll. What’s yours?”

  The way he pronounced the name made it sound like kawl. Coll, what kind of a name is Coll? She would never get used to the odd-sounding British names. No one she knew in Canada was named Cedric, or Sebastian, or Coll. She put her feet back on the floor before she answered Coll, who was clearly waiting for her to speak.

  “Hi, I’m Laurel. I’m headed to Penzance. Are you from around there?”

  “Born and bred, lived in Penzance all my life.”

  “Is there much to do there? I’m visiting a friend of my mother’s for a little while.”

  Suddenly very aware of the scuffed boots on her feet and her long legs encased in faded, worn blue jeans, she realized it was painfully obvious she was not from Britain.

  “Where ya from?” he asked, his brow wrinkled in thought. “You don’t sound quite like a Yank, but I don’t know.”

  She sat up straighter and looked sternly at the boy across from her. Her smoky grey eyes met his levelly.

  “I’m Canadian.” Laurel spoke with more heat than she intended.

  On the long plane ride, the couple seated beside her assumed she was an American. When they learned she was from Canada, they wanted to know if she knew anyone in Toronto. As if! Alberta was a long way from Ontario.

  “North of the forty-ninth parallel,” she continued, “and no, I don’t know anyone from Toronto!”

  “Okay, sorry.” Coll held up his hands in surrender. “Who are you staying with in Penzance? Bet I know them. I know everyone in Penzance.”

  “Sarie Waters, she’s an old friend of my family. I’ve never met her before.”

  “Oh, Sarie, you’ll get on fine with her.” He paused. “You do like horses, don’t you?”

  “Are you kidding me?” Laurel smiled for the first time. “I love them! Does Sarie live on a farm or in town? How many horses does she have?”

  “She lives off the road out toward Marazion; she has Fell ponies and keeps a couple of old work horses.”

  “Do you live near her?” Coll wasn’t half bad to look at once she got talking to him, and he seemed nice enough.

  “Not far, ‘course nothing’s that far in Penzance. Handy like.”

  “Maybe I can come and visit you while I’m here? I don’t know anyone in Cornwall.”

  “How do you know Sarie then?”

  “She’s an old friend of my Gramma Bella’s. Her and my Gramma went to school together or something, I think. I’ve only talked to her on the phone a couple of times. Is she easy to get along with?”

  “She likes her horses better’n most people. Sarie’s all right when you get used to her, though. Talks to her horses like they understand her.” Coll shook his head and grinned.

  If Sarie liked horses and was kind to them, hopefully she wouldn’t be too hard get along with. Laurel released a tiny sigh of relief and shrugged the tension from her shoulders.

  “I can help her out with the animals. I have a horse back home, but I haven’t ridden him much since my mom got so sick. I miss him.”

  “Ya have your own horse?” Coll exclaimed enviously. “Your parents must be rich.”

  “Not hardly. Lots of people have horses in Alberta, some for fun and some for ranch work. I rode Sam in 4H, and I belonged to Pony Club, too.”

  “Did you ever punch cows, like in the movies?”

  “Punch cows? You’ve been watching too many old western movies; nobody uses that term much anymore. I help my folks move the cows from the home quarter to summer pasture and back in the fall. Sam is so good. He just pushes the cows back into the herd when they try to stop and wander. It’s fun to chase them when they try to run off.”

  “You said your mom was sick. What’s wrong with her?”

  Holding her breath and willing away the tears she could feel burning at the backs of her eyes, she bit her lip and looked out at the sky and the sea.

  She spoke without turning her gaze from the window. “She has cancer. I don’t know if she’s going to get better.”

  There it was out, she had said it. The fear she hadn’t been able to acknowledge until now.

  “Wow, I’m sorry. That must be hard. I live with my Gramma. I don’t even remember my mom and dad. I was too young when they died.”

  It felt natural to share her worries with Coll after he told her about his parents.

  “My dad doesn’t have time to look after me or the ranch right now. He spends all his time in Calgary with Mom. They thought it would be better for me to be somewhere new and have other things to think about. This trip was already planned, so both of them really wanted me to go. Nobody asked what I think. They just keep saying everything’s going to okay. I want to be home with my mom!”

  The last sentence came out mixed with quiet sobs, abandonment and loss breaking the tenuous hold on her emotions.

  Through her tears, Laurel saw Coll’s look of dismay, crying girls were apparently not his area of expertise.

  “Don’t cry,” he s
tammered. “We can have lots of fun while you’re here. We can go pony-trekking and swim and sail. Do you sail? And maybe go out to St. Michael’s Mount.” Coll trailed off.

  Laurel wiped her eyes on her sleeve and dug in her pocket for a tissue. Finally giving up the search, she wiped her nose on her sleeve as well. “What’s pony-trekking?” she asked in a steady voice with no trace of the tears from a minute ago.

  “You take the horses and just go for a ride, wherever the track takes you,” Coll explained.

  “You mean like trail riding?”

  “What’s trail riding?”

  “You take your horse and bedroll, pack some stuff to eat and just ride. We stop, cook lunch or supper, and swim if we’re near the river. Sometimes, we put the horses on the trailer and go to ride in the mountains. There are horse campgrounds with trails leading in all different directions. You can ride one trail for a while, come back to camp, and ride a different trail the next day, or that afternoon. Lots of them start and end back in the campsite. There are maps and everything, so you can’t get lost, even if you don’t ride there all the time.”

  Coll’s blue eyes widened. “What mountains do you ride in? Are they really high?”

  Laurel wrinkled her nose at him and named the two places she knew most people associated with the Canadian Rockies. How can he not know about the Canadian Rockies? “The Rocky Mountains in Alberta, where Banff is, and Lake Louise.”

  Laurel really preferred to ride in the Kananaskis country near Bragg Creek, but the National Parks were beautiful, too.

  “Can you ride by the lake?” he asked disbelievingly.

  “You rent horses from the outfitters at the corral behind the hotel. They take you on a guided tour along the lake trail, up into the mountains to the Lake Agnes Teahouse. It’s pretty cool, but not as much fun as riding your own horse.”

  “I don’t think pony trekking is that exciting,” Coll said doubtfully, “but it is fun, and we can gallop along the ocean. If we go as far as the moor, it’s a great place to race. We can visit the Dancing Maidens and Men An Tol.”

  “Who are the Dancing Maidens and the Men An…what?” This might be an adventure after all.

  “The Dancing Maidens are a ring of standing stones, sort of like Stonehenge, but smaller. Legend says they were mermaids who were dancing on the moor in the full moon and were caught by the sunrise and turned into stone. There are two other stones a little ways from them called The Pipers. They’re supposed to be the musicians who supplied the music for the maidens to dance to, so they were also turned to stone as punishment. Other old stories say they were fairies who angered some sorcerer who turned them into stone. There are lots of old tales and folks who keep the old ways in Cornwall. The ‘Obby ‘Oss festival is coming up. It’s been celebrated for centuries. You’re gonna love that!” Coll ran out of breath.

  “What’s the Men An…whatever you said?” She refused to be distracted by guessing what a Hobby Horse festival was, picturing dozens of people on stick horses parading down the road. It couldn’t be that could it?

  “The Men An Tol is a standing stone all by itself. I think it’s called a dolmen stone or maybe a menhir. Sarie will know. Anyway, it has a hole in it large enough to crawl through. Legend says if you pass through the hole nine times at the full moon you can enter the otherworld of the fairies. Other tales say if you do the same thing, especially on one of the old fire festivals, it will heal sickness. Sarie knows more of the legends than I do. That’s where I heard them,” Coll finished.

  “Do you think it’s true?” she asked, “It can heal sickness, like cancer?” Hope leaped in her chest. “I wonder if I crawled through thinking about Mom really hard, if it would work, even just a little bit. I could keep doing it over and over until it all kind of built up, and then she would be okay.”

  “I don’t think it works like that,” Coll said warily. “Sarie says you have to be careful dealing with the Good Folk, or you can end up promising things you really don’t want to. Or they give you exactly what you ask but not what you think you’re asking for. You need to talk to Sarie or my Gramma before you try anything like that.”

  “Do you think Sarie will take me there? You’ll come too won’t you, just to see it with me?”

  “We’ll ask her after you get settled in. You’ll have to convince Sarie you ride well enough and can take care of her pony before she’ll even consider letting you go that far,” Coll cautioned.

  Laurel settled back in her seat feeling more hopeful than she had since leaving home.

  “What’s the ‘Obby ‘Oss Festival?” Laurel could never let anything go undiscovered once it tweaked her curiosity, and a town full of people parading along on stick horses was certainly worthy of further exploration.

  “Big party, sort of, in Padstow,” Coll answered. “It starts early in the morning on May Day, that’s May first,” he elaborated at her puzzled look. “People go out into the woods and fields and bring back green things, flowers, or leaves, and such. Then they go through town dancing and singing to show summer has arrived.”

  “Doesn’t summer begin on June twenty-first?” Laurel asked.

  “Nope, by the old reckoning May first is the start of summer and June twenty-first is actually mid-summer. Like Shakespeare’s A Mid-Summer Night’s Dream,” Coll replied. “Anyway, a man dresses up in the ‘Obby ‘Oss costume. It’s all white, with black and red, the parade winds all through town. Everybody lining the streets sings. The horse chases and catches girls and young women, the tales say if the girl isn’t married, she will be soon, or if she is married, that she’ll have a kid within the year. Every so often the horse does this weird dying thing. He falls down, and all the singers change their song to really sad one. Then the horse leaps back up, alive again, and the song changes back to the happy one. They repeat the whole thing all over town. It’s fun though with lots of good fair food.”

  “What do they sing?”

  “It’s a crazy, old song. It goes:

  “Unite and unite and let us all unite

  For summer is i-cumen today

  And whither we are going, we all will unite

  In the merry morning of May.”

  Laurel giggled, the song sounded funny coming from the boy sitting across from her kicking his heels against the seat.

  Coll grinned back at her. “Just wait till you hear the whole town singing it. It’s like there’s no other sound in the world.”

  “Where’s Padstow? Is it far from Sarie’s?”

  “It’s up the coast a ways, toward Arthur’s Castle. Sarie goes every year, so I think she’ll take you with her this year.”

  “What’s Arthur’s castle? You mean like King Arthur and his knights and all that?”

  “That’s him. It’s actually called Tintagel, and it’s where King Arthur was supposed to have been born according to the old stories. Sarie might take you there if you really want to see it. It’s just a bunch of old stones and ruins,” he finished doubtfully.

  “I’d rather see the Hobby Horse Parade if I had the choice.”

  “You say it ‘Obby ‘Oss,” corrected Coll.

  “Whatever, a horse is a horse.” Then she giggled. “Or ‘Oss in this case, I guess.”

  He grinned and lapsed into silence. Laurel watched Coll out of the corner of her eye, while she pretended to read the book she picked up from beside her. He was so different from the kids she knew at home. From what he said, he seemed to hang out with adults more than kids his age. He hadn’t mentioned anybody their age. Not so different from her in that regard. She preferred her horse and the barn cats and didn’t have a lot of close friends.

  But she did miss Carlene and her brother, Chance. They always met up on the range road half way between their home quarters. Most times they would spend the day riding the wide prairie. They liked to picnic by the Old Man River which wound through the coulee, sheltering behind the big rocks if the Chinooks were blowing hard. Laurel could almost smell the hot dry dusty scent of
prairie grass and wind with an edge of sage mixed in. And horse, she missed that most of all. The scent of prairie dust, clean horse, and sweat mingled with dried manure. It was just horse to her nose.

  Coll’s voice brought her back to the present; she noticed he rushed his words. There was a panicky look in his eyes. She guessed he was hoping she wasn’t going to start crying again.

  “Did you know Sarie doesn’t live right in Penzance? She lives out toward Marazion. Her place is about halfway between. She says that’s why she likes it so much, ‘cause it’s a between place.”

  “A between place.” There was something appealing about the idea. “Between what?” she wondered out loud.

  “Don’t think it matters,” replied Coll. “It’s like in between places are openings to new possibilities. Like doors, I think, without them you can’t come in or go out.”

  The sun was setting on the Cornish countryside, its light slanting across the interior of the rail car. Outside the glass pane, wind bent the grass and low shrubs against a backdrop of strong sunlight and blue sky with clouds piling up in the west. Unnoticed, the blue of day faded to the iridescent royal blue of early evening, as the light leaked away with the setting sun. White stars shone in the night, and the moon etched the moors with silver light.

  Coll stretched up to reach his backpack down from the baggage rack. He rummaged around for a bit, muttering under his breath. Finally, he produced a bag of somewhat crumpled sandwiches, along with a couple of bags of potato chips.

  “Want some?” Coll offered her a sandwich and a bag of chips.

  “Sure.” She accepted the food gratefully, not having realized just how long the train ride was and neglecting to bring any snacks. The British money was too confusing still and she was reluctant to purchase anything from the canteen in the next car.