The Garden of Forgotten Wishes - Trisha Ashley Page 0,26

that same kind, generous and outgoing person underneath, he’s just warier these days.’

‘Aren’t we all,’ I said, thinking that the past was a burden you might think you’d put down and left behind but, like Terry Pratchett’s Luggage, it kept jumping up and running after you.

The path had been growing steadily narrower and steeper as the valley closed in and we now had to pick our way round outcrops of rock and clumps of gorse.

To our right, the drystone wall that seemed to hold back the steep and wooded hillside had drawn closer.

‘I have no idea when, or how, they built the old walls that enclose our bit of land along the river,’ Myfy said, pausing to unhook a fold of her coat from a snatching branch of gorse. ‘But perhaps there weren’t the trees there before and it was sheep grazing.’

‘You do see walls on steep, rocky mountainsides that make you wonder the same thing,’ I agreed.

The valley now felt more like a ravine and the water, constrained in a deep channel, louder.

We had already crossed two small iron bridges over difficult areas and now the path took us onto a metal walkway that actually projected from a stone outcrop over the water, which felt perilous …

‘Iron. Victorian, like the turnstiles and bridges – they made these things to last, so long as you look after them, of course,’ Myfy called back over her shoulder. The bright tassels on her hood and the back of her coat swung out as she turned a corner and I followed, to find myself standing on a viewing platform below a thundering cascade of water that seemed to spring directly out of the rock face high above us.

‘The Fairy Falls,’ Myfy said, with a somewhat ironic inflection and we stood at the edge, looking up, the dark trees crowding down close on either side of the river and shutting out much of the light, so that it seemed a very mysterious and dark spot.

Spray dampened my face and my head was filled with the rushing of water, which sounded like beating wings …

7

Flights of Fancy

Eventually I pulled myself together and found Myfy looking at me in amusement. ‘There’s something about waterfalls that draws in and mesmerizes us all,’ she said. ‘This one has more legends around it than most, though. Some of it’s on the information board over there.’

I went over to look at the brightly painted board, which had a map of the falls with bubbles here and there, containing nuggets of old legends and information. There were also little ambiguous winged creatures near the top of the waterfall, which I thought were probably Myfy’s work.

Myfy, who’d followed me over, confirmed this. ‘I did the artwork and Elf wrote the info. She’s extremely interested in old legends and folk history and has had lots of articles published.’

She named a few esoteric-sounding magazines I’d never heard of and then added, ‘She’s written a book about the history of Jericho’s End, too, which was published recently.’

‘That sounds interesting,’ I said, thinking I’d google it later … among other things. I hoped Aunt Em’s ancient laptop was going to be up to that evening’s research.

‘Right, on we go,’ Myfy said briskly. ‘From here, the path is unmade and much more difficult, since it’s quite a climb, too. Although the sign warns visitors, they still attempt it wearing silly footwear. Elf’s forever treating people for sprained ankles and cuts and bruises – she did a first-aid course, but as far as I’m concerned, if they’re daft enough to go up there wearing flipflops or stiletto heels, they can deal with the consequences themselves.’

By now, I’d realized that Myfy, despite her long, dreamy and melancholy face, was a much tougher cookie than she had appeared at first glance.

‘I suppose most people now have a mobile phone and can ring for help,’ I suggested.

‘Not right up here they can’t, with the trees and the sides of the valley closing in like cliffs. You have to get much further down towards the turnstile before you can get any kind of signal.’

Myfy headed up the steep track like a mountain goat, but I followed more slowly, picking my way between huge rounded boulders and jagged, mossy rock outcrops. The waterfall thundered down on our left and we were close enough to feel the spray blown in our faces and the roaring in our ears. The valley was now little more than a cleft in the rocks, the branches of the