The statue 12/15

She was able to see perfectly well immediately. Looking downstream in the tunnel, she could see a light almost as bright as the day outside, where the magic disappeared straight down into the ground. She didn’t dare reduce her weight to swim along, as she had before at home, so forced her way slowly and carefully as close to the hole as felt safe. Looking at the other side of the hole where the Ley line should have run, she couldn’t see any obvious obstruction. The magic flow just turned straight down into the huge hole where the castle had collapsed.

There was nothing else she could do at the moment, so she made herself light enough to come back to the surface, Major galloping up to her happily, neighing with relief.

“Whatever do you think you’re doing, come to that how did you do it anyway?”

“I’m sorry, I should have warned you. It must have been a bit of a shock seeing me sinking like that. I’m trying to help the witches at the Home find out why magic doesn’t work any more and I think I’ve just found out! Now I’d like to go and have a word with Freda in the cave down the hill. You’re not scared of dragons are you?”

Major obliged and began grazing quite happily on the grass just outside the cave mouth. Jennifer Jane went inside, woke Freda and Angharad from their lunchtime snooze and asked if they could remember when the castle had fallen down.

“A terrific row it was,” said Angharad, “shook the whole cave one night and frightened us out of our wits!”

“Must have been T least fifty years ago I guess,” said Freda, “everyone in the castle and the dwarf workshops underneath was killed. A dwarf came round two days later and told us that there was an underground river running under the castle that no one had known about. He said it had been slowly washing away the rocks for hundreds of years, but we weren’t to worry because we were quite safe down here.”

“Have you found out how to make magic work properly again?” asked Angharad. “I really would like to go home as soon as possible!”

“I don’t think there’s any reason why you can’t go home right now,” said Jennifer Jane. “There shouldn’t be any problem if you go through the Home. I’ve come to the conclusion that the witches here aren’t very bright. Just because they can’t make their own magic work, they’ve assumed that it doesn’t work anywhere and that’s not true.”

Angharad immediately said goodbye to her friend, then gave Jennifer Jane a lift across to the Home, Major trotted along behind them trying to keep up.

“To be quite honest I’m not too sorry to be going,” she said. “One or two days at a time are usually quite long enough for a visit. We only need to catch up on our news, we’re too old now to do anything much besides spend our spare time eating and sleeping!”

Matilda had been called by the witch on guard duty and came over the drawbridge to meet them, as the dragon landed just by the entrance to the Home.

“Jennifer Jane says I can go home, just by walking through to the other side of the Gate!”

Matilda looked rather surprised and began protesting.

“It really is quite alright,” said Jennifer Jane. “The last time magic failed, the other side of the Home disappeared as well, this time it’s still there, so some magic must be left which should be enough to see Angharad home again!”

Angharad galloped off happily into the Home, loudly calling out “Clear the way!” in case she trampled someone in her hurry.

“I’ve found out what caused the problem,” Jennifer Jane explained to a puzzled looking Matilda, “but at the moment I’ve no idea how to fix it. I’ll go into the library to have a good think and maybe check on a few spells at the same time!”