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Journey 2

I am in a very bright white room with windows on all sides, open. Each window has curtains of fine white material wafting in the breeze. I sense that it is very hot outside. Inside it is cooler. I am sitting on a cane chair with my long white hair draped over the back of it. I am wearing white cotton trousers and nothing else.

On my lap in my hands is the pencil case I was given by the red bird. It is made of tinned metal and is mainly silver coloured with a black design and letters spelling 'YORK'. I open it and inside there are ten pencils each without a point: they have not been sharpened. Just hexagons of plain wood with pencil lead inside.

I close the pencil case and raise my head to look outside. The room is on the ground floor of a house on the top of a hill. The ground slopes down on all sides to a plain shimmering in the heat. I stand up and walk outside to look over the plain. All I see is heat haze.

A soldier appears attired in an old fashioned red tunic with a three cornered hat. He salutes me and beckons follow him. We go down the slope towards the plain. When we reach it we find a wall stretching as far each side as we can see. A little way on there is a door. The soldier rushes at it and breaks it down, then disappears.

I am in a kind of medieval street with market stalls selling wares such as leather jerkins and boots, jars of honey, soap and bolts of cloth. I walk along between the stalls until I see one decked out in yellow and white bunting with a flag fluttering above it upon which is the word YORK. Behind the stall is an old man bent over a grinding wheel – he seems to be sharpening knives.

A very tall girl, which I take to be his daughter, dressed in a black and gold full-length dress, addresses me and I feel obliged to offer her the pencil case. She opens it and smiles hugely – showing the contents to the old man. He calmly takes it from her and starts to sharpen the pencils.