One Dark and Stormy Knight Read online

  One Dark and Stormy Knight

  The Avalon Café Book 1

  By

  © 2020 Hermione Moon

  All Rights Reserved

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is coincidental.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter One

  The crack of thunder is so loud it makes me jump.

  “Goodness,” Delia exclaims. “That was right overhead.”

  “They did promise thunderstorms this evening.” I walk across the café to the big front windows and look out at the view. “For once, the forecasters got it right.”

  A flash of lightning illuminates the ruins of Glastonbury Abbey. It’s March seventeenth—St. Patrick’s Day, and the clocks don’t go forward for another ten days, so at 5:45 pm it’s nearly dark, and it’s raining heavily, too. Once the lightning fades, the Abbey descends into gloom.

  I blink. I’m sure I saw a figure on the lawn in front of the Lady Chapel. Oddly, the person was standing still, unmindful of the atrocious weather. The lightning flashes again, and I peer at the murky scene, but the figure has vanished. I shrug and turn away.

  “We might as well close,” I advise Delia. This morning she told me she’d put a chicken in her slow cooker before she left for work, and I know she wants to get the roast potatoes on before her husband gets home. “There won’t be any more visitors to the Adventure tonight in this weather.”

  The Avalon Café is part of the Arthurian Adventure—an interactive journey back through time exploring the myth of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. It’s right next to the building housing Glastonbury’s museum, its archaeology field unit, and the library. In summer, at Christmas, and during bank holidays, the place is packed with visitors. But now the kids have gone back to school, and it’ll be quiet until their next half-term holiday.

  “Okay,” Delia replies. “The dishwasher’s stacked and I’ve wiped down the tables.”

  I smile. “You’ve done an amazing job, as always.”

  “Aw,” she says. “You work yourself to a frazzle. Someone has to help you out.”

  Delia’s worked at the café for over five years. Although her hair is grey and she has wrinkles at the corners of her eyes, she isn’t quite old enough to be my mother. However, since the death of my real mum six months ago, she likes to keep an eye on me.

  “I put aside a rosemary focaccia for you.” I push the wrapped loaf across the worktop. I know that the rosemary, topped up with a calming spell for the stomach, helps her husband’s indigestion.

  Her face lights up. “I thought they’d all gone. You do spoil me.”

  “I know it’s Brian’s favourite. Give him a kiss from me,” I tell her.

  “I will.” She collects her raincoat, pulls up the hood, and waves goodbye. Then, the loaf tucked under her arm, she scurries out of the café. Thinking about the lone figure standing in the rain, I watch her run through the puddles to her car and wait until she drives away.

  Finally, I turn back to the café, lifting some stray strands of hair that have come loose and tucking them into my messy bun. I think of Delia’s hair and wonder when I’ll first see grey in mine. I’m turning thirty in September, but so far, I haven’t found any in my red hair. Mum had plenty of grey by the time she died in her fifties, though, so no doubt they’ll start popping out soon.

  There’s not much more to do. I’ll sweep the floor, clean the counter, and then I’ll lock up and go home. I made a tray of small steak pies earlier today, and I saved myself one. I’ll heat it up and have it with mashed potato and some green beans and finish off with a slice of my best chocolate cake.

  I stop in front of the empty suit of armour that stands by the door, lick my finger, and clean off a smudge on the knight’s breastplate. “There,” I tell him, “all squeaky clean again.” The suit belongs to the museum situated behind the Adventure, but it’s stood here since I was a child, and I’ve always talked to him as if he’s a real knight.

  There used to be a separate kitchen in the café, but some time ago Mum made the decision to knock down the wall between it and the café and put glass in instead, as the customers like to watch the food being made, and it makes anyone working in there feel less isolated. I walk past the window to the break room where we eat our lunch and open the door.

  The dog inside stands up as I open the door and wags his tail. “Hello, sweetheart,” I say, bending to kiss his head. “You’ve been very patient, but everyone’s gone. You can come out now.”

  Merlin appeared on the doorstep to the café a few weeks after my mum died. I don’t know if someone left him there or if he’d always been a stray. He was certainly scruffy enough. He has a gorgeous face, long ears, and a light-brown curly coat. I’m not sure what breed he is; my best guess is a Labradoodle—a cross between a Labrador and a Miniature Poodle.

  It was love at first sight on my part. I gave him a sausage and a hug, and promised to help him get back home. I put up posters and tried to find out where he lived, but nobody came forward to claim him. Every day he lay outside the café, and people soon grew used to seeing him there. Not wanting to leave him out at night, and after a bath and a trim of his curly hair, I started taking him home with me, and that was that—Merlin adopted me.

  I say he adopted me and not the other way around, because he’s not exactly tame. He refuses to wear a collar and leash. He still disappears during the day sometimes; I’ve never found out where, but he always comes back. He won’t sleep on my bed, but lies in the hallway, at the top of the stairs, as if he plans to trip up any intruder in the night. I swear he understands what I’m saying, and his face is very expressive, like he’s trying to talk back. And he always sighs when I put proper dog food in his bowl, as if he’d much rather have steak.

  He trots past me into the café, and I pick up my broom and follow him. He sits and looks up at the mural on the wall opposite the door, and I follow his gaze. My aunt—my mother’s younger sister, Beatrix—painted it. The picture shows King Arthur sitting on a horse, Excalibur in his hand, looking out over the Isle of Avalon, which many scholars think was located here, in Glastonbury. On the Isle, a woman stands with her hands raised, shrouding the Isle in magical mists. If you look closely, you can see that she bears a striking resemblance to the women in our family, with her long red hair tumbling to her waist, her bright green eyes, and her freckled nose and cheeks. It’s not a coincidence. All the women in my family are witches. Beatrix added ground eggshell and snail shells to the paint before she began, and the picture holds a protection spell for the café.

  “Yes, Mum,” I say to the painting, as I do every night. “Out with the old, in with the new.”

  When Mum used to run the café, before she got too sick to work, the last thing she would do was sweep the tiled floor at night. Ostensibly it was to brush away the dust and crumbs, but for her it was also a spiritual cleanse, ridding the café o
f any negative energy it might have attracted during the day, and I’ve continued the tradition. The broom was hers, too, a proper witch’s besom, made from twigs and herbs bound to a long pole. I’ve renewed the herbs a few times, but I’m sure it still carries some of her magic.

  I switch on the radio and, humming along to the old folk song that’s playing as the rain patters on the windows, I start brushing the tiles. I inhale with pleasure as the scent of lavender and rosemary from the broom rises to fill the café.

  My back is to the door when it jangles, and I shiver as the cold breeze brushes across my neck. “The café’s closed,” I call, trying to reach beneath a chair for a cupcake wrapper that tumbled off the table.

  “Surely you can make an exception for an old friend.”

  I straighten at the woman’s voice and turn, my heart sinking at the sight of Liza Banks. Tall, slim, and beautiful, wrapped in a classy cream raincoat, Liza surveys me with the slight sneer she always seems to bear whenever she’s talking to me.

  “I need a cake for a celebration,” she says. “I’m sure you have something I can use.” Somehow, she manages to make it sound as if it’s unlikely that anything I make would fit her high standards.

  My first instinct is to tell her to stick her cake where the sun doesn’t shine. My second is to fish out the two-day-old stale raspberry sponge from the rubbish bin, tidy up the frosting, and put it in a box for her.

  But then my gaze falls on the witch in the painting, and I feel a twinge of guilt. Mum taught me that no matter how you feel toward a person, they should never be able to fault you on your politeness.

  “Of course,” I say, putting the broom aside. “Let me see if I can find you something.”

  I go behind the counter, conscious of Merlin still sitting by the painting, except now he’s facing Liza. He’s not growling, but I can tell from his expression that he disapproves of her. He’s probably picking up on my irritation. I try to suppress it and concentrate on the couple of cakes that remain in the cabinet. The chocolate cake I was saving for tonight sits next to a lemon-curd sponge. I take out the lemon-curd sponge. I’ll be polite, but I’m not giving her my chocolate cake.

  “How about this?” I place it on the counter. “Fresh today, and the lemon curd is homemade.”

  “I suppose it’ll do.”

  Gritting my teeth, I busy myself with taking out a flat cardboard box and clipping the sides together ready for the cake. “So, what’s the big occasion?”

  She gives me a smug smile. “I’ve got a new job.”

  “Oh?” I pick up the cake.

  “I’ve been made Head Archaeologist at the Field Unit,” she says.

  I lower the cake into the box, then lean on the counter. For a moment, I’m so consumed with envy that I feel nauseous.

  Liza and I went to the same high school. Liza was one of those cool girls who had everything. She was beautiful, with long straight blonde hair, she was rich and clever, and she was never short of boyfriends. I was tall and skinny with ginger hair, sticky-out teeth, and glasses, and Liza and her friends intimidated me. But despite this, for some reason I’m sure she was jealous of me. I think it was something to do with our shared love of history and archaeology. No matter how hard she worked, my grades were always a shade or two above hers, and I know that rankled.

  She could have been a model, or an athlete, but she decided she wanted to be an archaeologist, just like me. At eighteen, we both went to the University of Exeter, and ended up in several of the same classes. Whilst doing her best to ignore me, Liza sailed through the first year, the life and soul of the party. But her grades remained steadily a fraction below mine, to her continued annoyance.

  Eventually, braces straightened my teeth, contact lenses replaced the glasses, and my ginger hair took on gold highlights that some men appeared to find attractive, including a gorgeous history student called Luke Mathers, and we started dating. I was crazy about him for a while. But the rest of my life wasn’t going so well.

  My father died when I was young, and Mum was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis a few years afterward, so leaving her to go to university was hard for us both. The café wasn’t making much money, so I existed on a pittance, and Mum’s health gradually deteriorated. Halfway through my second year, it became clear to me that Mum could no longer cope on her own. Confined to a wheelchair, she was often too ill to run the café, and when she told me one day that she thought she was going to have to sell it, I knew I couldn’t let that happen. Beatrix told me to stay at university and that she would help run the café and look after Mum, but Beatrix’s art gallery was flourishing, and it didn’t seem fair to make her give up her dreams. Against both their wishes, I left university and returned home.

  A week later, Luke broke up with me. He said it was because traveling from Exeter to Glastonbury was too difficult, but I know it was because he didn’t want to be with someone who had to look after a sick mother, because a week after he finished with me, he started dating Liza. I can’t be sure, but I’ve heard that she made a beeline for him as soon as I left, and I know he’d never have been able to resist her charms. That was eight years ago, and they’re married now. No doubt there will be beautiful babies on the way soon.

  I’m nearly thirty, still single, and unlikely to tie the knot in the near future. But I’m not complaining. I don’t resent their happiness. I don’t want a man who won’t stand by me when times are hard. And although I’d love to have been an archaeologist, I adore the café, and I’m content with my lot. I’m only human, though, and I do admit to feeling envy whenever I see Liza, who was immediately taken on by the Glastonbury Field Unit when she graduated, and who has obviously done a great job there, if she’s been offered a promotion. She has everything a modern, successful woman could wish for.

  I swallow hard, then close the lid on the cake box. Looking up, I meet her gaze. Her smug smile has spread—she’s enjoying this.

  “I’m very pleased for you,” I tell her. As calmly as I can, I tell her how much she owes me. She takes out her money purse and counts out the coins, and I put them in the till.

  “It’s going to be amazing,” she says. “It’s just what I’ve always wanted—to head my own field unit. I knew you’d understand, because you had the same dream at one point, didn’t you?”

  “I did.” I pass her the box.

  She picks it up. “Well, I’m sure I’ll be seeing you around. You know you’re welcome to come over to the field unit anytime now that I’m in charge. We can always find something for amateurs to do.”

  “Goodbye, Liza,” I say. “Enjoy the cake.”

  “We will. Luke loves lemon curd.” She peers out at the rain. “I’d better go. I’ve got to call in at the library for something before I head home. I can’t hang about; Luke can’t bear to be without me in the evenings.”

  With a last, smug smile, she heads out of the café, leaving me with the lingering smell of her strong perfume, as the wind whips in and scatters the crumbs I’ve just swept up across the tiles.

  Chapter Two

  I watch her go, gritting my teeth. How come she can still get under my skin so easily?

  I look down at Merlin. His eyebrows draw together.

  “I know,” I say. “She’s not worth it, right?”

  He comes over to me and nuzzles my hand, and I drop and put my arms around him. “I don’t actually think I miss Luke,” I murmur into the dog’s curly fleece. “I miss the idea of him, you know? I mean, you’re lovely, and you give really good hugs, but it’s not quite the same.”

  He licks my face, and I laugh and kiss his nose. “All right. Let’s forget about Liza and get on with sweeping the floor.”

  I collect the broom and continue brushing the crumbs into a pile, then use my dustpan and brush to pick them up and put them in the bin. Lastly, I take a cloth and go over to the counter to wipe it down.

  That’s when I notice the small money purse sitting in front of the card reader. It’s Liza’s. I pick it
up. What should I do? I could lock it in the safe for the night, and hopefully she’ll come back tomorrow to collect it. Then I remember that she said she was going to the library. I scowl. I don’t owe her anything. It serves her right to be without her purse for the evening.

  But once again, my gaze falls on the painting, and I sigh. “All right,” I mumble, going through to the break room to collect my raincoat. “I’ll be nice.”

  I pull it on and do up the buttons, pick up my umbrella, and walk back into the café. “Stay here,” I tell Merlin.

  He barks and jumps up at me. No doubt the storm is making him restless. “It’s okay,” I soothe, pushing him down gently. “I’ll be back in a minute.”

  I walk past the knight and touch the pommel of his sword for luck, as I always do. Then I open the door and go out into the dark and stormy night. Merlin barks again, but I ignore him, pop the umbrella, and walk quickly along the path, past the entrance to the Adventure, toward the library and the field unit.

  There’s nobody about. Through the front window of the Adventure I can see Helen behind the reception desk, pulling on her coat, so she’s obviously about to leave. The library’s front doors are still open, though, as it’s not quite six o’clock, and I go inside, shaking the drops off my umbrella and leaving it in the stand by the table with the vase of roses by the door.

  The library is quiet and cool. Patience, the head librarian, is probably in the archives at the back. Everyone else is either in their offices or has already gone home.

  I walk along the corridor that runs down the centre of the bookstacks, looking for Liza. Why did she come here? Maybe she needed a couple of reference books for one of the projects she was working on in her new role. Refusing to think about it, I call out impatiently, “Liza?” There’s no reply, although there is a muffled sound from the reading room ahead of me, so I enter it through the open doors.

  It’s a large, circular room, with stairs up to a mezzanine floor that runs around the edge of the room, so anyone up there can look down on those studying quietly at the rows of desks. They’re empty now, but I definitely heard something.