Time for the usual again! Six Sunday is a chance for writers to showcase their work and for readers to sample lots of different styles and genres. Click on the link to find a list of websites, then knock yourself out reading all the different bits and pieces on offer. Some will have you coming back week after week, desperate to see what happens next.
As usual my six come from my work in progress A Fierce Reaping, the true [ish] story of a Romano-Celtic warband who challenged the advance of incoming Anglo-Saxons sometime around the year 600 AD. It didn’t go according to plan! However, my lads haven’t set off yet and, as often happens, men who have been trained to the peak of fighting trim need someone to spar with. Between friends it’s not so bad but when other people get involved it can get serious.
“Five coppers to the man who kills the other,” someone shouted and Cynfal snarled as he recognised Moried’s voice.
That shout must have reached other’s ears too because Cynfal heard other yells and crashing in the undergrowth. It also brought a look of shock to Aeddan’s face. He removed his arm from Cynfal’s neck and his knee from his balls and gave him one last sharp punch. “That’s for calling me a thief,” he whispered as he levered himself up.
“And that,” Cynfal whipped up a foot and kicked Aeddan hard in the thigh, taking his leg out from under him, “is for calling me a whore.”
I had a request last week for some clarification on pronouncing character names so here goes. Emphasis is placed on the second to last syllable in most cases :
Cynfal – K’n-vawl
Gwion – Gwee-on
Aeddan – Aye-than
Cynon – Kunnan
March – Markh [the final hard K sound slightly aspirated like the ch on the end of loch]
Ceredig – Kare-edig
Aneurin- Ann-eye-rin
Tudfwlch – Tid-voolkh [oo to rhyme with look]
Rhufawn – Rolled R-vorn
Hyfaidd – H-vaydd [the th as in this]
Llif – almost impossible to describe. Sort of like trying to say cliff only you keep the tip of your tongue against your gum behind your top front teeth and say the ‘cl’ sound out of the corner of your mouth. For those who worry abut such things it doesn’t matter which corner but, statistically speaking, 80% of Welshman ‘cl’ to the left.
The website for the White Horse in Weston Stanage proclaimed that it was “the quintessential English Pub”, its qualifications comprising a lovely view over the village green, a proudly independent selection of superb real ales, simple well-cooked food and quirky architecture. Including the exposed beams in the ceiling of the publican’s bedroom, of which Hugh had a sudden and unwanted view as Tom pushed himself up and stared, appalled, at the bedroom door.
Here are the rules:
Elin Gregory 