Talan and the Welsh Boy

By Lee Robertson

In the sixth century much of Europe was under great upheaval. The end of the Roman Empire meant that vacuums of power were being filled by Saxons, Angles, Vikings and other tribes. On the far west of the world the remaining Celts lived in the last of their isolation. Cornwall, Wales, Brittany, Ireland and Galicia were all similar communities with a relatively peaceful existence, the only invasion being that of the new faith, and the early Saints who preached a quiet asceticism and simple life.

Among the new communities Talan is living as a medic, instructed in the arts by both the old druidic system and the churches tuition he treads a fine path between those of the old and new faith.

In this introductory Novella, we find Talan after he has left the community at Hartland after the death of St Nectan. After treating Nectans sister Morwenna, he is instructed to treat a young boy with an illness in an isolated community high on the moor. His skills and deduction are tested severely in the difficult situation he finds there.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lee Robertson
• Release date: Sep 28, 2012
• ISBN: 9781301428168

Lee Robertson

Living by the coast in North Cornwall, Lee Robertson has worked as a chef, hotelier, and pub owner. More recently he works as a photographer, short film maker and location manager. He has been a lifelong surfer and currently enjoys teaching young people to be lifeguards. When he isn't by the coast he enjoys wandering the moors and lanes. The idea for Talan came from searching for the old Holy Wells and Celtic Crosses that crop up in obscure places over the Cornish landscape.

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Talan and the Welsh Boy

Lee Robertson

Published by Lee Robertson at Smashwords

Copyright Lee Robertson 2012

Read more about the author at

lee-robertson.co.uk

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Chapter 1

I have been in Cornwall this past six month, after leaving Devonshire and the Lady Githa who had been so very kind to me. But I go where I am needed and I packed up my meagre belongings to cross the border and aid Nectan’s sister, living in poverty high on a windswept cliff, battered by gales. The winter has been long, but I can see an end. The first signs of new growth are emerging and the morning birdsong becomes cheerier with the lengthening days.

Morwenna is often taciturn under her raven hair, her beauty had me interested in making her friendship, but she needs no company. She seems content under the leaden sky, tending her vegetables, feeding her animals. I arrived to tend an illness that she thought would kill her, but all she needed was rest, and little else. I watched over her, making sure she ate well and got out in the sunshine. I kept her home clean and tidy. I think it was only help she needed. I saw her as perhaps her father had seen her then, a shy girl, headstrong, keen to learn. Brechan had been good to all his children and if he thought he had done the right thing in sending them far and wide then so be it. I have enjoyed the travel this has entailed and am grateful, but in those days of Morwenna looking sick and frightened, I saw the girl who wondered what had led her to this place, alone and without family.

These last few weeks I have seen her gather her purpose. She is beginning to work the land again, and is soon to employ a labourer for a chapel. I am starting to feel she sees me as linked to her illness, and becoming unnecessary.

I have no wish to return to Wales, there was never anything for me there, only the shadow of my own father, seeming to envelop everything I attempt. My future lies in front of me, unknowing but without much hope. Self doubt, laziness and fear often grips me, I know it is acedia, I hope my prayers and faith can lead me from it.

Chapter 2

‘Talan!’ calls Morwenna from outside the hermitage. I am walking for no other reason than to keep warm. She has not spoken to me in a week. I can see her below with dog by her side, she waves, and I turn from the path to the cliff and take care through bracken and wet grass down the steep hill to meet her.

‘A letter’ She says loudly, and smiles and returns to keeping the dog. A letter could mean many things, my natural instinct is to fear the worse, news from home, perhaps. It may be I am needed elsewhere, or I am to return to the monastery at Hartland.

We sit against the wall out of the breeze in the low winter sunshine. Wheeling gulls, choughs and ravens above us squawk their songs of life, oblivious of the humans below.

‘It came yesterday’ she begins, ‘from Nonna on Bodmin.’ She unfolds a sheet of paper, and begins scanning. ‘It seems she has need of you. Her son David, a child, he may be dying, as soon as possible’. She puts the paper in her lap.

I look at the sky and clouds racing in from the sea, trying to remember about Nonna, another lady enduring the ascetic life, this time with a young boy, somewhere inland.

‘Be good to her,’ says Morwenna, ‘she has had difficult times, and I know she would not have called on my help for little reason’

I still haven’t said anything, I am looking at the floor now, and my thoughts are full of what I need to take and how I am going to make the journey.

‘I think, Talan’ she says slowly ‘that there is little left for you here, and I can see no reason for you to return, so take one of the ponies, and these coins and Godspeed’ she pauses, she appears to be waiting to say something, so I remain silent waiting. ‘I have been very happy to have you here with me, and so very grateful for your cure and help with the hermitage, I feel again that I can continue with my path now, and I will think on you often with hope for your future.’

And that was that, time to leave another home. I looked at her eyes, dark, almost beautiful, ageing, a little strain from a life on the edge of existence. I looked at her hands, wondering what to say, whatever I said would be worthless. Her hands were good, long fingers, a little dry, a beautiful ring. I stood up.

‘Thank you,’ I said, she touched me on the arm.

Chapter 3

A long journey on horseback alone, I left at first light with a cold wind from the east, stars still in the sky and the sound of booming surf from the

Reviews for Talan and the Welsh Boy

[nsalvatori_650713441 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Good plot, good story. I like the main character,an interesting man in an interesting g time.