The Colour of Time - Part 11

 

Dora took another walk down memory lane. After the last encounter in the Temple with the kitchen aid girl and the thundering guardian many years past before she came back to the City of Earth and the spring and the well of forecast.

She wanted to become a healer, a medic, a herbalist, maybe an astronomer and so she began her travelling and studying, her apprenticeship and journeywoman years.

She started searching for knowledge wherever she could find it, whoever could give it to her. She learned about herbs and nature in general from fairies in the forests, from Moss Women and enchanted does and smiling lynxes. She studied the fish in the creeks and rivers and finally in the oceans. She learned about the underwater world from watermen and mermaids, a nymph in a crystal well in the mountains and a frog in a pound who had lost his golden ball. She studied astronomy with the astronomers in the High Castles. She even got to the faraway City of Lutetia and got a taste of the secrets of the forbidden science of alchemy.

And all she learned she wrote down in the little book of hers, just as the guardian of the Temple of the spring and well of forecast once told her, 'Write that in your book, little Dora.'

And from time to time she thought about the colour of time. And was quite sure it was not Amber.

'Bromford,' said the llama, 'I want to tell you a story about a bard named Jackson. His first name was Michael. He had six brothers, Jackie, Tito, Jermaine, Marlon, Brandon and Randy, and three sisters, Rebbie, La Toya and Janet. And they were known all of the kingdoms as the Jackson Five.'

'Stop it, animal,' said Bromford, the bard. 'You cannot tell a story in a story. That would be too much story-ception. And you are mixing things up here. This is not about a person called Jackson. We are in a city called Jacksonville tonight.'

And the llama mumbled something that would have sounded like 'Beat it!' if this was not a fairy tale before Christmas.

"Bromford"

Nobody left in the airport lounge
They cleaned the ashtrays
TV's just wound down
I've got to wait till morning
I've got to last the night
I've only got one book
To see me through my flight

But when I get to Bromford
We'll paint all our portraits
In brush-strokes of yellow
And christen the canvas
The left bank is crying
For colour to crown it
Like the roof of a palace
We'll drink in the amber
When I get to Bromford

You were the best of Montmartre Street life
You signed the tablecloth
Art has its price
It's so hard to hold on
To the ghost of your breed
It takes ambition
To call the colours you need

I've got to wait till morning
I've got to last the night
I've only got one book
To see me through the flight

Today is Thursday, the 11th of December 2025.