“Your wife on line 2.” Emily leaned to her left and looked through the open door into my office. Puzzled, I picked up the telephone. Caroline normally does not call me at work.

“Caroline, what a surprise.”

“Your sister called. Your father’s had a fall and taken a turn for the worst. The doctor is there now and says it is not looking good. Your father’s asking for you.”

You know it’s going to happen sometime. We all get old, parents just get there faster. It had been 43 years since I’d seen him. It wasn’t intentional. There wasn’t any animosity. I left home in 1917 at the age of 17 for the meat grinder hell on the Continent. Then those of us who survived were just so happy to be alive that I think we partied for five years. Then whirlwind romance, the Depression, the next war, rebuilding from that… I always meant to go home for a visit, but it would be a grueling all day trip just to get to Andras Hill from London. There was always something else that got in the way. You turn around and suddenly 43 years have gone by.

“Philip? We should go. I’ve never met your family.”

“Yeah. Let me talk to Glen. I’ll call you right back.”

“Emily, is Glen in his office?”

“Yes.”

I got up, walked to the office next door and knocked.

“Come in.”

“Glen, I need to take the next week off. I just got a call that my father is dying.”

He leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. I knew he was doing the mental juggling of schedules and calendars that he does so well. He finally looked up and said “All right. But I’ll need you back the following Monday for the Porter thing. They won’t be in for another week, but we need time to prepare.”

He leaned back across his desk. “I can’t remember you ever going to see your parents. I seem to recall your mentioning you’re from a small village in the northwest, but that’s all.”

“Yeah, tiny village in the back of beyond in Cumbria. It will take us all day just to get there.”

“Well, the weather seems to be holding. You driving?”

“Yes, the train doesn’t seem to think that sheep farms are a viable destination.”

“Good luck. Your job will still be here when you get back.” He waved a pencil in the air to indicate his part of the conversation was done, and looked back at the papers on his desk.

I walked back to my office. Emily, of course, has heard my conversation with Glen and inferred my wife’s side of the telephone conversation. “I’ll reschedule your calendar and clear you for next week. Mr Johnson is supposed to meet with you in an hour, but I’ll reschedule that as well. Do you want me to get your wife back on the line?”

“Thank you.”

A moment later I heard, “Mrs Rede? This is Emily. One moment before I transfer you to your husband. I’m sorry to hear about your father-in-law. I’m clearing your husband’s schedule for the rest of today and all of next week. Make sure that he pays attention to his family responsibilities and doesn’t think about us. Transferring you now.”

The telephone on my desk rang, and I picked up in time to hear my wife laugh and then say, “Is she in charge or you?”

“You should hear her and Glen’s wife. The two of them probably run the company as much as he does.”

“So he gave you the time off?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll call your sister back and start packing. Are you coming home early?”

“Apparently that is Emily’s intention.”

“If you get home early enough, we can leave immediately and get some hours on the road. That will make tomorrow less painful.”

“Alright. Love you.”

“Love you too. Bye.”

I sighed and looked down at the folders on my desk. I grabbed the top five folders and turned to my briefcase. “Put those down.” Emily the all-seeing was leaning over, looking through my open door again. I sighed again, laid them carefully back on the desk, arranging them carefully to align with the edge of the desktop, and looked at her. “Good. Now go.”

I grabbed my briefcase and got.

The miles rolled by and the roads kept getting narrower. We spent last night in a serviceable inn after driving four hours. That meant only six hours of driving today unless we run into a livestock roadblock before we get there. With an early start, we should be there by two.

The last ten miles were dirt road, but decently graded, with no ruts. We finally pulled into Andras Hill proper - just a cluster of houses surrounding a church, a pub and the Village Shop. Memories started coming back. It didn’t look like much had changed. We parked in front of the pub, pushed the door open and went to the bar. The publican was polishing a glass and looked up.

“I think my sister Clara Rede reserved a room for us.”

“Yes. Christopher!” he called to a young man cleaning a table-top that was probably older than all four of us put together. The young man looked up.

“Get these people over to Clara’s right now.”

The publican turned back to me and said “We’ll take your things to your room for you. Best get to your sister’s right away.”

The young man wiped his hands on his towel and said “This way.” pushed open the pub door and started down the street. Caroline looked at me with raised eyebrows.

I said “I think it’s a fairly short walk.”

“Good thing I’m wearing my walking shoes then.”

It actually was only a short walk - four houses down from the pub. All the places were old and small but in good repair. Christopher knocked on the door, looked at us, touched his hand to his cap and started walking back.

The door opened and a young woman looked out. “Uncle Philip?”

“Yes.” Niece, grandniece? My mind frantically started flipping through Christmas cards in my head.

“I’m Rosalyn, Grandma Clara told me to bring you into the bedroom. You must be Aunt Caroline. Just follow me please.”

We walked through the main room, into what was clearly an add-on in the back and entered a bedroom. A half dozen people sat on chairs surrounding the bed and my sister looked up. I think it must be my sister. She looked older than I remember. Of course, I must look older than she remembers as well.

I think of the pictures of Caroline when we got married and how she looks today. Time molds us so gradually that I never really noticed the changes. That girl forty years ago is a different person from the woman I love and snore next to every night. Looking at my sister now, the changes are hammer stamped by time all at once. The shift is abrupt, but she is still recognizably my sister. And my mother, looking incredibly frail sitting next to her. And my father, frailer still, lying in the bed.

“Philip!” My sister got up rushed over and embraced me. “It’s been so long.”

She looked at Caroline and said “He never should have kept you away from us. We don’t bite.”

I stepped to the bed, my father turned his head and I took his hand. “I’m glad you could make it.” It was just a faint croak.

“I’m sorry I never came back.”

“The world does that. You grew up. You look older.”

“I look older? I guess it happened when I wasn’t looking.”

My mother came around the bed and took my arm. I looked at her, her eyelids trembling, and hugged her.

We were eating in the pub in the morning when Rosalyn came in looking for us. “Great grandfather passed away overnight. You got here just in time.” Caroline reached out and squeezed my hand, glanced up and said, “We’ll be there shortly.”

After a minute, Caroline asked, “I assume a service in the church right here?”

I responded, “Unlikely. I don’t think the church has had a service since the 1600s. No Vicar or Curate. Probably just a graveside service at the cemetery about a mile from here. Unless things have changed. I’ll have to ask Clara.”

“Wow. This really is the back of beyond.”

We finished what was left on our plates, went back to our room to grab our coats and headed to my sister’s.

“Faster than expected.”

“Yes. I wonder if he was just waiting for you.”

“Now off on another adventure.”

“No. I think he’ll find a sitting room and wait for Mother.”

“Probably true. What do we need to do about arrangements?”

“The doctor is arranging for the mortuary to pick him up. Then we’ll have a service Tuesday at the cemetery. I can take you and Caroline to the Stones on Thursday.”

“Still no services at the church?”

“No. No one is in any hurry to remind anyone it exists. We take care of our own.”

“What does the mortician say?”

“Nothing. He knows there aren’t enough vicars to go around and it’s not his problem.”

“How is Mother?”

“She accepted the situation last week, so I think she is just waiting for her turn.”

Caroline turned to one of the nieces we had been introduced to yesterday. “What can I do to help?”

The graveside service was short but intentional. Andras Hill has a population of maybe 200 and probably half the village turned out. It rained. Apparently even the weather felt bad about my father’s passing. We then filled the pub and I was reintroduced to people that I hadn’t seen in forty years. And their spouses and children and children’s children. Funny what stories you remember that other people don’t and what stories they remember that you don’t after all those years.

I had told Caroline that there was a henge in the hills beyond the village and that I wanted to revisit it with her, but we would need Clara to lead us and keep us from getting lost. She looked thoughtfully at the shoes she had packed for us both, then said “I think they’ll do if it’s not too steep.” I replied “It’s a three-hour hike each way over three crests, but no, it’s not mountain climbing.”

Clara met us at breakfast and had brought three walking sticks and packs. “Hey, we’re all getting older.” She went to the bar and picked up a take-away lunch that she had apparently ordered the day before. “We’ll have a picnic when we get up there.”

The track up into the hills was the same that I recalled from childhood. By the time we reached the top, our muscles were reminding us that they were no longer the muscles of our childhood. We huffed and puffed and stood for a moment at the top of the third crest and I pointed towards the meadow off to the left, on the other side of the crest.

“Wow. They are massive.” Caroline exclaimed. “How did they get up here?”

“Giants.” said Clara “Actually no one knows. They’ve been here longer than the village.”

We caught our breath, then wound our way through the tall grass and around bushes to get to the meadow. Twelve standing stones, all nine feet tall, surrounding a black center stone. I led Caroline around the outside of the circle while Clara pulled the picnic paraphernalia and food out of our packs. Finishing our circuit, we joined Clara, sat down on a blanket and passed around the food.

“Welcome back” sounded in my mind. I looked at Caroline. She was trying to decide what to eat first. Clara, on the other hand, had looked up and towards the Stones.

“Should I assume you brought your wife here to meet me?”

“Yes.” I thought rather than spoke aloud to the voice.

“Caroline?” This I said aloud.

“Yes.”

“You might want to put the sandwich down.”

She looked puzzled, but did so.

“Hello Caroline. Welcome to the hills.”

She looked frantically around, then at me, then at Clara and back at me.

“Uh. What?”

Clara reached out and took her hand. “Welcome to the village secret. I’d like you to meet Anthracyda.”

Caroline looked around again, then back at Clara. “Who or what is Anthracyda?”

“You can call me a hillside spirit or small god. Of course that’s just a noun rather than a real explanation.”

“You’re in my head?”

“A bit. I don’t have a physical body for you to talk to.”

“Are you a ghost?”

Clara laughed. “No. No one died up here. In the witch hunting days, the question was whether it was a demon. It’s not that either. It’s just what it is. And a neighbor to the village.”

“Only the village knows? What about all the people who leave the village.”

I responded “There was a time, in the witch hunting days when anyone leaving the village would be brought to Anthracyda and it would make adjustments to your memory so that you thought it was just stories for children. Nowadays, they don’t talk because no one would believe them. The supernatural only happens in books and movies these days.”

“So you trust me to keep my mouth shut.”

Clara said “Philip wanted me to bring you up here because he wanted Anthracyda to meet you. Because you’re important to him and, even though he left the village, some part of the village never left him. And Anthracyda is important to the village.”

I said “Anthracyda, I know I didn’t bring Caroline when I should have, but I’ve brought her here now. Can you, please?” Caroline looked at me, not certain what was going to happen next.

A quietness fell over the meadow. Or rather, I was now aware of that quietness. Colours started to coalesce around Caroline and me and glow like auras. Caroline gasped. The surrounding glow started to expand and, when our glows intersected, sparkles began to appear and started to float around the meadow, some flying into the circle, others just floating around us or in the grass. Caroline laughed like a small child, trying to catch some from where she was sitting. Then the colours slowly faded away.

“Was that what you were hoping for?”"

“Yes. Thank you.”

Caroline asked “What was that?”

Clara responded “Anthracyda likes you and likes you together as a couple. If it thought you were a bad match, you wouldn’t see sparkles, you’d see bruises.”

“How often does that happen?”

Clara chuckled “With teenagers, often enough. Hormones are not a measure of compatibility.”

“Wow.”

The sounds came back to the meadow. I took that to mean that Anthracyda had chosen to leave.

Clara looked at me “Now, my brother. I want to see you more often than every forty-three years.”

I took a deep breath. “I’ll try.”

Next - Rev. Jonathan Cary’s Diary (April - June, 1996)

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