The Old Sycamore Tree

That he was a younger son, had nearly no dowry, and at nearly six and twenty, was practically on the shelf, affected his hopes that someday a woman might take an interest in him not at all. After all, look what he’d already accomplished despite his family’s station in life – a Sergeant in the Royal Welsh Constabulary in Cardiff. Which is not to say that he was complacent when he was sent out to look into the matter of a boy having wandered off – as if there were something unusual about boys wandering off – though to be sure, the disappearance of a tree was something new.

Though the Witch Chief Superintendent was of marriageable age, she felt no immediate need to do so, she had plenty of time to manage the three or four children a woman of her station might expect to have and there was certainly no shortage of eligible men about. Still, the boy had vanished and preliminary reports suggested the influence of Elvish magic.

It was his birthday, and for some reason his parents wanted him home, and then he wasn't.