Birch Manor - 4 - Return to Unicorn Farm 2

The prompts are once again at Elephant's Child but are provided by Hilary Melton-Butcher.

This week's prompts are:
Paucity
Inglenook
Heft
Yew
Pergola
     and/or
Greed
Madness
Myth
Traveller
Visualise

     Next bit of the story. I promise more, but when? Only one word used.

They found a trail leading through the hedge, Susan thought she recognised it as the place where she went trough the trees on her very first visit, but she was still uncertain, The trees had grown, some had been cut down, new had grown in to fill the holes, and it had spread, it was no longer a nice line of trees and large bushes, but an unruly giant hedgerow. No more was it only one of each tree, but still the variety was bigger than in any other hedgerow.
  "If I am right," Susan said, turning to Knud, who followed her at a respectful distance, to avoid the swiping, long, thin branches, "the Farm building will be ahead and left of us when we get trough this thicket."
  She pushed away some more branches and wormed her way through. "Oh!" she exclaimed. "There's a small forest placed where I'd expect the Farm to be!"
  "Makes sense, Knud said, joining her, "If it was left to itself after burning, it would be very overgrown today. Let's have a look." And he set off towards the copse of trees. Susan walked slowly after him. Holding back. She did not know whether she wanted it to be the ruins of Unicorn Farm or NOT to be the ruins
  "Come here!" Knud called. "I think I've found something!" And he had. Between the trees a perfect square arose.
  "Susan looked at it. ""This is a chimney, she said. "From the placement, I'd say it's the kitchen chimney. Let me see, if it is, there has to be a wall connected to it there," she pointed to the furthest corner. Knud put down his backpack and had a go at the ground with his staff. Yes, here's stones under the turf, they turn here, he said, jabbing the iron spiked end of the staff through the grass again and again, marking the jabs that hit stone. "Yes,!" Susan said excitedly. "This is where the Nisser used to cook, they called it an inglenook." Do you remember that new years party?" Knud nodded. "we sat here, Kensuke and me, peeling that giant root. Now it's a normal thing, but back then Daikon were a new, strange thing to eat. Teiko prepared that root, and it tasted lovely. It was at that party, I overheard Tristan and Torben's plans for taking over the government."
  Something white fluttered in the gentle breeze. "What was that?" Knud asked.
  "What was what?" Susan asked, looking at him. She had been lost in the past recounting the happenings of that long gone party.
  "I saw something, something white, big and fluttery." He shook his head, "and I feel chilled. Like a cloud covered the Sun. Maybe it's just from thinking of Torben and Tristan."
  An uncanny laughter sounded from above them, and cold tendrils touched Susan's arm. Then the cold feeling enveloped her, and a moaning, dreadful sound came from behind her.
  "No," Susan said. "I think I know what, or rather who it is."
  "Percy!" Knud exclaimed.
  Susan just nodded smiling. "Percy, is that you?" she added. "Are you still here?" A white thing came rushing by and paused in the old chimney.
  "Yes, I'm Percy," a disembodied voice sounded from the whiteness. "But who are you, coming here and speaking of those terrible people here of all places? Why can't I scare you away?"
  "Because we know you. Don't you recognise us? I'm Susan, and this is Knud."
  "You're lying." Percy said flatly. "Susan is like 16 or 17 years old and you're what? 60? same goes for Knud."
  "How long have you been in these ruins?" Knud asked softly. "You do not age, for being a ghost, but we do. How many years have passed since this place burned down. Do you remember?" Knud's voice was deliberate, strong and soft. Percy began crying, and small branches and leaves fell from the trees around them
  "Stop it!" Susan commandeered. "You always made thing fall when you cried. Please stop."    
  "Some days have passed, maybe even some months or a year or two," Percy said. becoming steadily less transparent. "And I have been so lonely. The Farm was a happy place, filled with people, and then the Bad Man came, and The Very Old, Wise Man made him stop. He made it all stop. All the magic. all the fun. He died. But first he did some very bad things. He broke your wands, he threw people around, he was ungentle, very much so to all of you. I tried to stop him, but I could not. I went right through him. He did not listen, only stopped long enough to say he was busy. He disappeared. pulling people with him. He let out all the animals, he magicked all the books, cauldrons and so on down into the old well. And when he was alone ... then he ..." Percy started crying again, silently.
  "He put the Farm on fire," Susan finished the sentence for her. Percy nodded. and raised her head.
  "You knew?"
  "We guessed. And then he laid down and died?"
  "Yes."
  "He had drunk an antidote to the Mondrian. I remember Tristan asking him how he was going to explain away a barn full of idiots to the police, and I remember Gilvi answering that he had drunk an antidote, so as to keep his magic, but in return dying within 24 hours. That was why he was so busy, so ungentle. He had to clean up, get people away before he ran out of time."
  "And now you come here, telling me that you are my Susan."
  Knud spoke again: "Dear Percy. Look at the trees growing here, where the kitchen once was. They did not get this big in a year or two. Over 40 years have passed."
   Percy nodded, "I might begin to believe you. But first I am going to test you." She looked straight at Susan: "Where did you live. What was the name of your mother, my mother and who were my best friend ever?"
  "I lived in Elsinore, my mother's name was Edith, You never told me your mother's name, and your best friend ever was Sandra, the mom of Heidi, Tue and Lis." Susan answered. Percy nodded. "I believe you. But I'll need some time to get used to this. Just like I needed some time to figure out that Sandra had grown."
  "Sandra is a very old lady by now." Susan said quietly "I know that Kai, the father, died some years ago. Sandra is old, but I suppose she's still able to do magic."
  "No." Percy said, shaking her head and looking very sad. "Now I know who they are. They have come here recently, once or twice, when the sun is shining, three ladies, one very old, two as old as you are, and a man. They talk of magic, of the good times here, and bemoan the necessity of breaking their wands. I have never tried to scare them away. Like I normally do to visitors here. They make me feel so lonely."
  "Gilvi found them!" Susan smiled. "I'm sure he did not need to feed them Mondrian to make them renounce their magic!"
  "You said when the Sun is shining?" Knud said, "does that mean in the Summer, and have they been here yet? We would very much like to meet them, you know."
  "Yes," Percy said. "In the Summer. And it has been some time since they were here the last time. I would have liked to follow them, and I tried, but I have forgotten how to move anywhere. I'm sure Gilvi did something to me as well."
  "Gilvi did not do anything to us. We did. We spoke the words of the forgetting spell - all of us!" Susan said vehemently.
"I did too." Percy said with a surprised look at her face. Even if I had not drunk any Mondrian of course. Do you think it worked on me as well?"