The Stone-Cutter of Lyonesse

By Stephen Mossop

12 short stories. 12 very different stories: from myths and fairy tales to true 'tales of the unexpected'.....

‘The Stone Cutter of Lyonesse’:
A ‘Lyonesse’ myth, describing how the undoubted skills of a master stone-cutter enable him, assisted by his family, to create the most exciting and unusual monument of its time; and how his ambition and vanity, together with a couple of simple errors, combine to prove disastrous for the land he loves.

‘The Grandfather’s Tale’:
A kindly and inventive Grandfather teaches his grandson the value of money, by describing how his own grandfather had shown him an unusual way to make money.

‘The Captain’s Tale’:
A former sailor, a veteran of the Napoleonic wars, is now working as a waiter and finds an unusual way to get his own back on the ship’s captain whose meanness has caused him to limp.

‘The Counterfeit Reality of Toys’:
A brief monologue: through which I describe my juvenile relationship with toys, my parents, and my new baby sister; and my regrets at having to sell my collection later in life.

‘The Adventurous Miss Flowers’:
The adventures of Miss Flowers: a lady of ‘advanced middle age’, who decides to take an impromptu holiday to rural France. Trouble is, the lovely town she visits isn’t always as quiet as she imagined it would be - and, we discover, she is hiding secrets of her own....

‘The Librarian’s Tale’:
A tired librarian plays an unkind trick on an irritating patron.

‘The Miller’s Tale’:
A fairy tale: a miller receives an unexpected visitor in the middle of the night, and finds himself the victim of an elaborate con.

‘The Prince’s Fortune’:
A displaced prince is forced to go out in the world to find his fortune. This fairy tale follows his adventures as he makes friends with those he meets and gradually gives away all his possessions, and how he eventually finds his fortune in an unusual way.

‘As Night Falls’:
A brief snapshot description of a winter’s night falling over a valley in rural Cornwall.

‘Ulf’s Saga’:
A young American couple find themselves lost, separately, deep in the snowy Scottish highlands. Individually, they take advantage of the hospitality extended by an elderly couple in a remote valley. A story within the story hints towards a very unexpected twist to the tale.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Stephen Mossop
• Release date: Aug 24, 2020
• ISBN: 9781005221140

Stephen Mossop

Stephen Mossop is Head of Library Services at the University of Exeter, UK. He has published and presented widely on aspects of Strategic Organisational Development and Library Management, and has special interests in library design, RFID and customer relationship management. He is best known for his 2008 case study on RFID at the University of Central Lancashire (for the BIC e4libraries project).

Book preview

The Stone-Cutter of Lyonesse and other stories

Stephen Mossop

Copyright ©2020 by Stephen Mossop

Published by Stephen Mossop

Smashwords Edition

Smashwords Edition License Notes

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Cover artwork by Debbie Carter

Contents

Acknowledgements

The Stone-Cutter of Lyonesse

The Grandfather’s Tale

The Captain’s Tale

The Counterfeit Reality of Toys

The Adventurous Miss Flowers

The Librarian’s Tale

The Miller’s Tale

The Prince’s Fortune

As Night Falls…

Ulf’s Saga

Who made this book?

Other books by Stephen Mossop

For Brenda

Acknowledgements

Many of the stories in this book have been wandering around the deep forest of my mind for more years than I care to remember. All they needed was a home, and a little encouragement to bring them to life.

They would have found neither if it hadn’t been for the active encouragement of my long-suffering wife, Brenda, who allowed me the time and space I needed to get them out of my head and onto paper.

Brenda devoted many hours to patiently reading, correcting and re-reading the stories as they emerged. Her invaluable suggestions and eagle-eyed spotting of plot-holes and typos helped enormously to bring the stories to their current form. I really am so grateful for her time and effort. Any remaining mistakes are entirely my responsibility.

I’m very grateful also to Debbie Carter for creating such a brilliant piece of artwork for the front cover. Once you’ve read it, I’m sure you’ll agree that she has managed to capture the spirit of the ‘Lyonese’ story incredibly well!

∞∞∞∞

The Stone-Cutter of Lyonesse

Long, long ago, when the world was young, there lived in the land of Lyonesse a stone-cutter called Tallak.

Lyonesse was a fine, rich land, and its people were never hungry. They had an abundance of animals for hunting, nuts and berries for gathering, and plenty of fish within easy reach of the shore.

The people of Lyonesse were peaceful and content, and were happy to pay tribute to the two witches by whose permission they lived in such a wonderful place. They remembered, in all that they did, that they lived by sufferance of the Land Witch and the Sea Witch. The land witch gave them leave to build houses, to hunt the game she sent them, to grow crops from her earth and to drink from her rivers. In return, they gave back to her a portion of everything they caught or grew, and praised her daily for smiling kindly upon them. The Sea Witch gave them leave to sail wherever they wished, to hunt the fish that she sent them and to take salt from her waters. In return, they gave back to her a portion of everything they caught from her waters, and praised her daily for smiling kindly upon them.

Thus everyone lived in harmony. The people were well fed and happy, and the two witches, though never seen, basked in their praise.

Now, in that land, stone-cutters were considered very important. They quarried rocks from the sides of hills and cliffs. Tallak had learned from his father how to find seams in the rock and how to use those seams to crack great chunks of granite from the bedrock. It was difficult work, since the rock they worked with was so hard, and it could take many hours of painstaking effort to extract it. The chunks they hewed were roughly shaped to size and used to build the houses that the people lived in and the hedges that marked their field boundaries. Tallak became very skilful in his work, and over the years he had discovered new techniques to cut and shape the rock. He was the first to use sand to help them cut straighter edges, and to carefully grind away the rough evidence of their hewing to give a more pleasing finish.

Tallak’s skills were much sought after, since sometimes, when he had time and leisure to do so, he would use his new sand-grinding techniques to carve into door lintels and gate posts the shapes of all the things that were important to his people. In this way he carved images of the animals they hunted, the fish they caught, and the berries and nuts they picked, so that those things would be honoured and remembered. His notoriety was such that he was always very busy. Every household wanted the best stone-carvings with which to honour their land, their families, and to celebrate special events.

****

Tallak had a son, who he called Kensa, who had green eyes and brown hair. Tallak was very proud of his son and had taught him all he knew. He taught him first how to make the special tools they used to work the fiercely hard granite stones. Then he taught him how to choose stones carefully and to shape them well, and then how to create carvings that would be both beautiful and meaningful. Kensa learned quickly, and through hard work became both very proficient and very strong. He grew so strong that by the time he was fully grown people called him Kensa Krev, which meant Kensa the Mighty.

When Tallak was almost an old man, his wife gave birth to a daughter who had blue eyes and hair so blond it was almost white. They called her Dewetha. Even as a child she was very beautiful and sweet-natured, and everyone loved her. She brought great happiness to all who knew her. Even at four years old, Dewetha loved to dance and to swim, but the greatest of all her talents was her voice. When she sang, even birds would listen and be still. Tallak felt that both of his children were special gifts, and thought that he could not be happier.

****

One evening, after his day’s work was done, Tallak sat on a hillock near the entrance to his quarry. The sun shone bright above him as he gazed fondly across fine forests on the low hills to the east that bordered the valley in which his house was hidden. Through this valley a wide, shallow river meandered westward on its way towards the sea. His eyes wandered across to the seven peaks in the west which lay more-or-less halfway to the hills of Syllan, which, though too far for him to see, he knew marked the southernmost extent of the land. And, though he couldn’t see it clearly from here, he also knew that on top of the tallest of the seven peaks was the monument he had raised to his wife Goelann, who had passed away giving birth to their daughter Dewetha, some fourteen years before. He had been heart-broken at that time, and was desperate to do something important to mark her life. He wanted her to be remembered forever - so he and Kensa had hewed out a long, slender slab of granite, cut its surfaces as square and flat as they could and smoothed and polished the granite as finely as they were able. With their team of workers, they had spent a week dragging the slab on rollers across the country and then uphill to the very top of the highest peak. There, Tallak had spent another week carving the shape of a seagull, her symbol, into the four surfaces of what would soon be the very top of the slab before his team returned and helped him to lower the bottom of the slab into a deep pit. By the time they had completed their work, the slab stood proud and upright, with the seagull symbol seeming to fly high above them. Tallak was very satisfied with the result, knowing that he had positioned it so that he knew it would gaze across the miles to watch him at work in his quarry.

He was so engrossed in his thoughts that he hadn’t realised that Kensa had settled down quietly beside him. Finally, sensing his son’s presence, he turned and smiled at him.

‘That was a good day’s work, Kensa’ he said. ‘We did well today.’

‘We did, father! Three slabs cut today. It won’t be long before we’re up to date with our orders. Then I guess we’ll be able to cut some ready for future orders, so that we can deliver them faster!’ Kensa replied. ‘You were lost in thought just now - what were you thinking about?’

Tallak looked back at the landscape thoughtfully. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘I’ve been thinking of the future myself.’

It was Kensa’s turn to smile this time. ‘I had a feeling you might be. That’s why you’re a good businessman!’

‘Mmm,’ replied Tallak. ‘But this time, I was thinking not so much of business, but of my life. And yours and Dewetha’s’

Before Kensa could respond, a bright voice caught their attention. Dewetha was climbing