This is the sequel to 'The Night of the Stag' - thanks so much for those reviews! - and a prequel to Tanya Reed's story 'Megan,' although all can be read separately. Part of the K and A shared universe. Pleeeease review :)

Disclaimers: I don't own the characters from Relic Hunter. The references to the legend of Tristan and Iseult are loosely based upon my (brief!) reading of the 12th century text by Béroul, and the commentary on Cornish relics by Joy Wilson. The rest belongs to me. Please do not reproduce it in any form without my permission.

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The Legend of Sydney and Nigel

By Katy

'So, Sydney - if you're not wearing white, what are you going to be wearing?' asked Nigel.

Nigel watched his fiancé intently as she steered confidently down the narrow, hillside road that twisted spectacularly through the mountainous, forested and rain-sodden New England landscape. The car was going rather fast, he felt, but he had the utmost faith in her abilities – Nigel was almost confident they wouldn't go spinning off the road.

'Not that I mind what you wear,' he continued, disguising a gasp as they veered particularly close to the edge. 'I mean, you'd look wonderful in anything…or in nothing!' He shot her a cheeky, sidelong glance.

Sydney thwacked him on the knee with her free hand, not taking her eye off the road. 'I'm not marrying you naked, Nigel!' she retorted, mock anger betrayed by a smile. 'I'm going to wear something interesting, stunning, and, err, eminently suitable for the whole… wedding err, thing.'

Nigel narrowed his eyes, glancing down at the slender hand that was now hovering, and twitching slightly guiltily, over his thigh. 'You haven't chosen anything yet, have you?'

The honest glimmer in Sydney's eye was more than enough of an answer. 'I've ordered a few outfits in my size to be delivered to the hotel today,' she admitted. 'I'll select something special, I promise.'

Nigel grinned, always pleased at his increasing ability to find chinks in Sydney's nigh-infallible image. 'Well, I can't really blame you,' he conceded. 'We only got back from Venezuela three days ago, and then there was the whole affair with the um, 'Stag Do,' and the Pilgrim Fathers relics. But you've still got plenty of time to decide on, err, something 'you'.' He winced, recalling Sydney's usual time-consuming reticence in the selection of dresses.

'Yeah,' said Sydney ruefully. 'And Claudia arrives this afternoon! If she finds out I've not chosen yet…' Sydney's convivial, wide eyes, once again conveyed more than enough.

'Oh dear,' sighed Nigel, with a sympathetic cringe. 'This will definitely be classified a 'fashion emergency.' You might even be dragged back into the city for a very urgent shopping spree! I take it she's picked her bridesmaid's dress?'

'Yup - she's got, err, seven, I think she said. She just couldn't decide!'

'Seven!' blurted Nigel, thrusting his hand back through his hair in horror. 'What does she intend to do? Wear them all at once or keep changing? At this rate, tomorrow will resemble a Paris catwalk more than a wedding!'

'I have no idea what she intends to do!' confessed Sydney. 'But she was so excited when I spoke to her on the telephone; I didn't have the heart to complain. Weddings and Paris catwalks are two of Claudia's favourite things, and a combination of the two…'

'Claudia's idea of heaven!' finished Nigel, with a little, ironic laugh. 'Weddings are not quite your idea of heaven, though, are they?'

Sydney smiled through thin lips. 'I never saw myself as the blushing bride in white, that's for sure.' Her grin broadened. 'On the other hand, showing all my friends and family that I've finally worked out who 'Mr. Right' is, and want to spend the rest of my life with him – now, that's a bit different. I can't wait! And I could hardly turn you down when you proposed, could I?'

'Sorry,' he said quietly, recalling a beautiful starry night two years ago, when he'd dropped down on one knee, on a spotless, white sand beach, and asked Sydney to be his wife. Granted, this was not a holiday island but an isolated, godforsaken sandbank in the middle of the South Pacific, where they had been dumped by an irate rival relic hunter. And, yes, the tide had been coming in fast.

Nigel had been pretty sure they were both about to drown, but the characteristic 'we're about to die' speech, which he'd delivered so eloquently on that fateful night, had taken on a life of its own. It may have been fuelled by a fatalistic, romantic impetuosity, but it swept them both away to isles of sublimity that no tide could ever reach…

'I wasn't really thinking about the long-term consequences,' admitted Nigel, the recollection of that incident causing his stomach to clench with a mixture of ecstasy and dread - in addition to the lurching caused by the current continuous swerving of the car.

'You know I would have accepted you, wherever we were! But it was so beautiful and romantic – I'll never forget that low-hanging, Polynesian moon!' Sydney all but purred with rapture as she recalled the lustrous gold crescent, reflected in Nigel's fearful but ardent eyes, as he looked up at her imploringly. 'Besides, I never thought we were going to die.'

Nigel shared a little, knowing smile. 'You never do, Syd. I'm glad you're always right!'

'I'm not so sure I always am! I just hope I have been right about this wedding venue. I came here a few years back for a conference on Minoan culture, but I just haven't had time to check it out again since Karen booked it for the wedding. I remember it was wonderful, though – Carraghmount Castle was moved, brick by brick, from County Waterford, Southern Ireland, by a motor millionaire in the 1920s, before the Wall Street crash. Its origins are mediaeval, oh….here we are.'

Still with one hand on the steering wheel, Sydney accelerated the car through an enormous ironclad gate. The opening was flanked by two formidable, castellated gatehouses, each two storeys high; both roofs were surmounted by a pair of large, stone lions, their jaws frozen open in mimicry of earth-shattering roars.

At the end of the drive, tucked beneath the American mountains, was Carraghmount Castle. With her high facade, and soaring towers, she stood every bit as proud and austere as she had done, in various guises, for over a thousand years in her native Ireland.

'It's amazing!' Nigel's tone was hushed and reverential. 'It looks mainly like a 19th-century rebuild, but look!' He pointed to a spartan, keep-like square tower, with castellations and narrow, arrow-slit windows. It marked an asymmetrical end to an otherwise neatly structured mock-Gothic façade, distinguished by large ballroom windows, and cone-topped turrets. 'That funny looking tower at the end could date back to the early mediaeval period!'

'I thought that too. I'm glad you like it,' said Sydney warmly. 'I know you like 'modern' in your home life, but this place is just alive with mediaeval legend!'

'It's wonderful,' gushed Nigel, and then paused as an alarming thought struck him. 'It's wonderful for a visit…but it is rather, um, large for a wedding. How many people have you invited?'

'Oh, just a few family and friends!' Sydney's beguiling, opened lipped smile suggested otherwise. 'They'll all be surprised to find this place amongst the pine forests of New England, huh? Oh, this is where I wanted to stop.'

Despite being only halfway up the drive, Sydney pulled the car onto the wide grass verge, and turned to observe Nigel as he spotted something else she remembered from her previous visit, and that had clinched her believe he would love this place. It was an ancient cross, standing about six foot high, crudely hacked out of granite. His fingers were already on the door handle, and in a second he was out of the door, desperate for a better look.

'A real Celtic cross!' he breathed, his feet squelching across the sodden, muddy turf. 'They're found in remote parts of Ireland and Cornwall, but I never thought I'd see one here!' Irresistibly drawn, Nigel pushed his glasses on his nose, thrust his face in close and his traced his fingers over its rough, cold surface. 'Christianity flourished in Ireland and in the western extremes of what would become England and Wales, even when it had foundered in the post-Roman east of the islands. This is from that era,' he murmured. 'It could date back to the sixth century.'

'That old?' questioned Sydney, although bowing to his superior knowledge of this particular topic. 'Apparently it was bought over with the castle… what is it?'

Nigel's brow was furrowed in thought, as he traced the remains of an intricately carved pattern, resembling interlinked knots, down the stone shaft. 'I'm not sure it was. I don't think this cross is Irish Celtic - it lacks the characteristic circle that intersects the branches of the Cross and the granite is of a variety that I'm fairly confident was found only in Cornwall.'

'So you think it is from the west of England?'

'I think so…Syd, take a look at this?'

Nigel was now crouching at the foot of the cross, pulling some dripping stems of grass away from the front of what appeared to be an inscription. The script was ancient, nearly rubbed away completely, but had apparently been made visible by a recent attempt to clean it – or, possibly, the morning's heavy rainfall.

'I didn't notice that last time,' admitted Sydney. She squinted to read the timeworn words, which she identified as in an early form of mediaeval Latin.

''TRISTANUS HIC IACIT MARCUS FILIUS CUM DOMINA ISEULT': Here lies Tristan, son of Mark, and his wife Iseult.'

Nigel turned to her, eager with the boyish enthusiasm that a spark of mediaeval myth always kindled within him. 'Tristan and Iseult! He was a 6th Century Prince of Cornwall, and she a Princess of Ireland. Despite their two kingdoms being at war, they fell in love and their affair spawned a saga with more twists and turns than the road to this castle! It was one of the legends my father told me, when I was young.'

'I know the tale,' said Sydney, smoothing her hands speculatively over the partially eroded monument, following a natural urge to seek out secret hidden compartments. 'The origins of the myth, if I recall, were lost in the mists of time - like so many of the best stories! I wonder if there is any chance that this cross could be authentic?'

'That would be a superb wedding present… what is it?'

Sydney had looked up suddenly as a soft but deliberate rustling sounded from the woods; a squirrel scuttled up a tree. A gut feeling caused her to straighten and poise her hand above the knife that still nestled in her calf-high leather boots, despite her otherwise casual garb of a tight, pencil-cut green skirt, and matching jacket. Hairs pricked on the back of her neck: there was nobody there, but something told her they were being watched…

She swiveled viciously at the sound of a polite cough, only to find herself confronting a red-liveried butler, carrying a silver tray adorned with two glasses of champagne.

'Excuse me Madam, sir,' he began. 'Carraghmount Castle would like to welcome the happy couple. Would you like an aperitif?'

Sydney instantly suppressed her suspicions, while quietly admitting that, for some reason, she was glad she had brought her knife. She took a glass with thanks, and handed one to Nigel. Relieved at the apparent false alarm, he also acknowledged the man gratefully, before asking him: 'Do you know anything about this cross?'

'I'm afraid not, sir,' said the butler mundanely, 'except that it was transported from Ireland in the 1920s with the castle and all the other relics on the estate.'

'But I don't think it's Irish!' insisted Nigel. 'And this inscription about Tristan and Iseult - somebody must know something?' His preoccupation caused him to take an unthinking swig of his champagne; he choked slightly and grimaced, wondering why anyone gave you such a pungent fizz at 11 o'clock in the morning.

The butler regarded him serenely. 'One of our costumed tour guides ought to be able to help you. I will find someone suitable to answer the inquiries of such eminent guests. While I am doing so, would you like to see your rooms?'

Sydney smiled enthusiastically and said they would, despite her pervasive curiosity, and the tug of Nigel on her sleeve, that urged her to instantly find out more about the cross. Still, she mused, it would be nice to see the bedroom, and she could think of a few things that might entertain them until they could find out more…

……………………………….

Not half an hour later, a tall, blond Englishman strolled into the grand, wood-panelled castle lobby, his tartan travel bag in one hand and a large hatbox in the other. Putting down his luggage, he donged loudly on the service bell at the desk, completely oblivious to the leather-jacket-clad gentleman, who was peeping at him doggedly over the pages of last Tuesday's copy of 'Le Monde.'

A neatly dressed, bespectacled brunette emerged from behind a heavy oak door to serve at the counter. 'May I help you sir?'

'I'd like to check in, please,' said the newcomer. 'My name is Preston Bailey. I'm here with the wedding party.'

'Of course, sir,' smiled the woman, opening a heavy, red appointments book. 'Ah, yes, here you are: Mr. P. Bailey. You must be the bridegroom's brother?'

'Yes, that's right!' said Preston, straightening with importance. 'I'm pivotal to the whole proceedings. Obviously, I have a lot of crucial, brotherly duties to perform…huh?'

Preston's spiel was interrupted by a loud, indignant snort that sounded just behind his shoulder. He turned, startled, to find himself face-to-face with a particularly fiery looking man, nearly as tall as he, with closely cropped, curly hair and two days growth of roguish stubble on his chin. The receptionist, assuming that they knew each other, said 'One moment, Sir,' and disappeared back through the heavy wooden door to locate Preston's key and find somebody to carry his luggage.

As soon as the door slammed behind her, the second man shoved his face close into Preston's. 'So! You are the brother of the stable-boy who presumes to marry my Amazon Princess!' The words were drawled in a lugubrious French accent

'Excuse me?' asked Preston, more bewildered than offended. 'I am Nigel Bailey's brother, if that's what concerns you. What did you just call him?'

'A stable-boy!' said the Frenchman forcefully.

The edges of the older brother's mouth twitched in amusement. 'A stable-boy, huh? That's a new one on me! Can't say I can imagine Nigel mucking out too many muddy stables, but if you mean that the delightful Sydney Fox orders him around like a stable-boy – well, you could have a point there!' He favoured his conversant with a wary smile, unsure whether to offer him a handshake. The Frenchman, however, introduced himself anyway.

'I am François!' he said, jabbing himself aggressively on the chest. 'I am the man who Sydney Fox really loves, and I have come here to make sure she does not make a terrible mistake.'

'Oh,' said Preston, repressing a spark of alarm: if this was one of Sydney and Nigel psychotic rivals, his life could be in danger - maybe he should be running for the hills? He decided, bravely, to try repelling him gently.

'Well, good luck to you, old chap,' ventured Preston. 'But, I'd have to say you probably have as much hope as the Devon Ladies Cream Tea and Cricket Association have in regaining the Ashes from Australia! Don't you think just about every fellow this side of Outer Mongolia has given it a good batting?' He leaned forward confidentially. 'Believe me, I would have made a play for her myself, given half a chance. But, the amazing thing is, the lovely Professor really has been bowled over by old Podge! And well, you know, he is my brother…'

'Yes! Nigel … Podge… whatever you call him, is your brother!' cried François, brandishing a finger in the air accusingly. 'And I assume he has asked you to be his Best Man?'

'Um, well…' Preston hesitated. He certainly had not been asked to be Best Man. However, he had selflessly stepped in to fulfill the role of Nigel's bachelor party organiser and, seeing as his brother's archaeologist friend, Joel, still had not emerged from the forests of Peru, there was a small chance that a request might come his way. He swallowed and answered half honestly. 'You could say I play a rather important role in these ceremonials, yes.'

'So!' spat François with an angry delight. 'You are Best Man! You could not conceal that from me - you are as weak as your brother! That would mean that you have the wedding rings, huh?'

'Um, not on me,' stuttered Preston. The Frenchman fixed a steady glare on him, as Preston clanged the bell again, this time in slight panic. Did this strange foreigner really want to rob him, right here in the hotel lobby? 'I don't have the rings… or anything valuable!' he pleaded, looking desperately towards the closed door in vain hope of rescue.

'Hey! He doesn't have the rings!' The female voice rang out with a feisty authority. 'What the heck do you think you're doing?'

Both men turned, and their jaws dropped, at the sight of the curvaceous blonde standing in the doorway, dressed in tight jeans, and an impossibly low-cut and skin-hugging orange blouse. In her left hand was a neat, black suitcase. Her right fist was rested, in a no-nonsense fashion, on her hip.

'I asked you a question,' repeated Karen to the instantly captivated Frenchman. 'What the heck do you think you're doing? Preston, are you okay?'

'Quite…quite fine,' said Preston, straightening his shoulders and attempting to evoke some unruffled dignity. 'But I think this man wants to rob us!'

'I do not!' cried François. Before she had time to speak, he dashed for Karen, seized her hand from her waist, and kissed it. Karen, despite her wariness, given little gasp. Her steely blue gaze wavered a little, but she did not smile. Snatching her fingers away and turning, she subtly drifted her hand across her luggage, confirming the safety of a little pink purse, tucked in a pocket on the front of her suitcase.

'I did not come to rob you, Mademoiselle!' protested François, his tone seductive, even as his eyes followed her furtive actions. 'I came to stop an injustice - to prevent a beautiful woman from marrying the wrong man! But I see Sydney Fox is not the only beautiful woman here today…'

Twisting back to face him, Karen's lip curled in disgust. 'Oh, I see. You reckon Sydney should marry you, huh?'

'Maybe,' said Francois, shrugging in a noncommittal fashion. 'Maybe not!' he reached again for Karen's hand. 'But she must not marry that English whelp!'

Karen whipped her hand away so fast that François thought she was going to slap him. Indeed, she was just on the verge of doing so, when the wooden door finally opened, and the receptionist returned, accompanied by a burly concierge.

'Hi,' said Karen, coldly sweeping François aside, as she confidently swayed over to the counter. 'You must be Martha? I'm Karen Petrusky - we spoke on the telephone?' The hotelier acknowledged her warmly. 'This man is not with our party,' said Karen emphatically, indicating François with her head.

'Is that so,' said Martha. She turned to the Frenchman sternly. 'I'm afraid the whole castle is booked for a private wedding party all weekend. I'm going to have to ask you to leave.'

'It is okay,' blurted François. 'I go!' He shot Karen a yearning gaze. 'Adieu, Mademoiselle… we meet again soon!'

'Go away, you French creep,' hissed Karen. 'Nobody is going to spoil this weekend for Sydney and Nigel!'

With that, she turned her back on the unwanted rival, casting a warm smile at Preston as he departed, relieved and a little confused, with the concierge. Despite her confident veneer, it was with relief that Karen confirmed, once again, that the little pink purse in her case - and its precious cargo of two wedding bands – was still there.

……………………………..

'This is a very big bed,' whispered Nigel. 'It almost seems a waste that we're only using this tiny spot in the middle!' He extracted himself from Sydney's tight embrace, leaning up on one elbow and brushing light, loving fingertips down her the tender skin of her chin and throat, tracing the line of her curves through her snug-fitting black top.

Sydney laughed breathily, reaching up and sweeping a tumbling lock of chestnut fringe from his brow. 'The hotel did think it was a little irregular that I wanted to spend the night before the wedding with you,' she teased, 'But, hey, I never did like convention! Besides, after your little performance at your bachelor party, I daren't let you out of my sight!'

'I don't have a problem with that…umph!'

To emphasise her point, Sydney grasped the back of his hair and pulled him back down for a hungry kiss. Nigel reciprocated enthusiastically, pulling her close with a grip that revelled in her silky, tumbling hair, and clutched needfully around her waist, melding into the sweep of her back.

After a minute of soaring towards heaven, Sydney broke away with a knowing giggle, rolling from underneath her pink-faced and very excited fiancé. 'If we're going to tour the property with an elderly volunteer guide in a moment, I need a cold shower,' she stated.

'Oh, um, excellent notion,' said Nigel, nodding seriously as he mastered his flaring passions. 'I'll just, err, put my shirt on, then… I really do want to look around the castle! And the guide just might know about the cross, or even the whereabouts of more clues about Tristan and Iseult. My father would have been so proud if we could find something to shed new light on their tale…' The sentiment caused Nigel's eyes to mist over with a very different form of affection.

Sydney, who had paused to run a comb through her hair, regarded him fondly. 'I hope so,' she said, wistfully happy. 'I've got a good feeling about this weekend – and maybe it will be memorable in more ways than we might have imagined.'

She slipped into the bathroom, shutting the door behind her, leaving Nigel to button his shirt, yank back on a grey-blue pullover, grab a book on ancient Egyptian calligraphy from the top of his still-open case, and settle back down on the bed. It had been an interesting read so far and, after popping his glasses back on his nose, he eagerly thumbed to the page he had left it at.

After absorbing just a few lines of text, however, he was unexpectedly distracted by the sensation that somebody was watching him. Indeed, somebody was!

Nigel's focus was drawn to a Pre-Raphaelite-style portrait of an early mediaeval King, a ferocious, bearded, goliath, his axe savagely raised in the throes of battle. Nigel stared - he had noted the portrait admiringly when he came into the room and wondered who it represented, but he could have sworn that the rabid combatant had then looked only towards his rival: a younger, blonde Knight, armed with a fragile, silver sword. Now the warrior was looking out into the room - directly at him!

Nigel shrugged - he must have remembered wrongly, he told himself. Nevertheless, he felt uneasy. It was then that he heard the voices from the bathroom…

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After tearing herself away from her future husband, Sydney had listened to the latch click, and then paused in front of a sink and a large gold-rimmed mirror. Splashing water on her face she mused on a sunny irony: since the attraction between her and Nigel had boiled over from simmering attraction to the joyfully blazing fireball that was their relationship, it had occasionally - just occasionally - been difficult to keep their minds on the more labourious aspects of relic hunting and study! Now, at their wedding party, the tug-of-war between ardour and the hunt was still at play and, at that moment, the promise of an unexpected relic hunt appeared to be winning…sort of.

She reached for a tissue to dab away some smudged mascara - then stopped dead. In the corner of the window of the first-floor bathroom - or rather, in its reflection in the mirror - she detected the tiniest glimmer of movement.

Sydney turned in a flash and hurled up the heavy, sash window frame with a screeching grind. The voyeur swore in French and nearly lost his grip on the drainpipe. Sydney snarled and seized him by the collar, hauling his body towards her.

'You again?'

'Sydney!' pleaded François. 'This aggression, it is most unbecoming! I have come to tell you… I still love you! Remember Panama? The Peruvian jungle? The heat! The passion! You saved my life - surely you can never forget?'

'I have forgotten, François,' she hissed, lying only slightly. 'Everything!! I love Nigel, and I'm marrying him tomorrow. No other man will ever hold a candle to him - especially one who gets itchy feet every time he sniffs the value of a relic!' She tightened her iron grip, so her victim was on the verge of gasping for air. 'Now, you have two options. Either you climb down that drainpipe right now and head straight for the State border in one piece, or I hurl you straight down onto those rose bushes and then jump down on top of you to make sure gravity has done its work!'

'Sydney…' began François pleadingly, then broke off, catching the vitriolic fervour in her eyes. Sydney Fox wasn't joking.

'Okay, okay… I understand, Sydney. I will go!'

She snatched away her hold on him as viciously as she took it, and he began to descend. Once just out of her reach, though, he paused.

'I understand everything Sydney,' declared François with a romantic flourish of the arm that did not cling to the drainpipe. 'You are scared, are you not? You, the great Sydney Fox, are scared of admitting your true feelings!'

Sydney rolled her eyes in disbelief, and slammed the window closed. Her erstwhile lover slid to the base of the drainpipe shouting: 'We will meet again, ma chérie! A bientôt!'

'Sydney? Is everything all right?'

She sighed deeply as she heard Nigel's concerned call. 'Damn,' she muttered to herself. 'He must have heard.' François didn't scare her: he was a harmless and rather charming pest, not a threat. On other occasions, she would have at least heard him out - but not today. Knowledge of his presence, here at the wedding, would upset Nigel a little, even if he didn't show it, much as it had just unsettled her. Still, they had no secrets from one another.

'Oh, nothing important,' she began, opening the door a crack to catch him hovering with his hand inches above the handle, his hair still ruffled and uncombed from her 'loving', and looking slightly mystified. She took him by the hand, and was about to pull him into the bathroom to explain it all calmly as she showered, when there was a knock on the bedroom door.

'It can't be François,' thought Sydney quickly. 'Nobody could run around that fast. It must be the guide.'

'You'd better answer while I freshen up quickly.' She relinquished her hold of her fiancé. 'I'll just be a sec.'

She vanished into the bathroom again. Nigel quickly stole a glance at the painting, to check no more changes were apparent, and then leapt for the door.

Swinging it open with a cheery 'hello,' Nigel registered the sight of an extremely strange little woman. Standing barely five foot high, her hair was braided in a long brown-grey plait, which dangled over her shoulder to the front, reaching beyond her waistline. She was dressed in a plain, dirt-coloured tunic, hewn of a primitive, rough looking fabric, and which swept nearly to the ground. Her eyes were a silvery blue, her skin deeply lined and weather-beaten. Despite this, she did not look that old - fifty, or sixty at most - but she had the air of somebody of great age.

Raising her chin, the woman stared curiously at Nigel, who offered her an uncomfortable half smile.

'Um, are you our guide?' he asked. She said nothing.

'I'm very excited to know all about the castle?' he tried again. 'Do you know anything about the Celtic cross? I think the inscription might be a reference to the legend of Tristan and Iseult…'

He trailed off, wondering if he was making a fool of himself; the woman's eyes thinned into slits, as if she was conjecturing very deeply upon her response. Nigel shuffled his feet awkwardly. He glanced over his shoulder for Sydney but, seeing only the bearded villain in the painting, he was relieved when the woman finally spoke.

'Your guide,' she said slowly. 'Yes. I can be your guide.' Her accent was odd, tinged with an Irish brogue, but she enunciated carefully, as if English was not her first language.

'Oh, good,' said Nigel, slightly relieved, but still wishing Sydney would hurry. He held out his hand politely. 'I'm Nigel Bailey. Very pleased to meet you, I'm sure.'

The woman reached for his fingers, in an apparent recognition of the greeting, but then drew away again quickly, as if he would burn her.

'My name is Brangain,' she said suddenly. 'I will tell you all I know of the castle and the Cross, Nigel Bailey, and the lovers that you ask of. But I must speak with the great huntress, the one they call Sydney Fox.'

Nigel was greatly comforted when the answer sounded from behind his shoulder.

'I've not been called that before, but I guess the, err, 'great huntress' would be me,' interjected Sydney, observing the woman amicably but with great interest. 'It sounds like there are many questions we can answer for each other.'

'I hope so,' replied Brangain, peering timidly into the room. 'There is something, a secret of undying love that has been lost for centuries, that I must beg you to find.'

'There is?' replied Sydney, stilling as intrigue swelled within her. 'Well, as long as it won't interfere with a certain short ceremony in the morning, you've come to the right team!'

Nigel turned with a grin, understanding the impact of what Sydney had just said. Marrying him was even more important than an impromptu relic hunt! Nothing could stop them tying the knot tomorrow. Nothing…

Thanks for reading. Please review, and I will do my best to get onto that wedding - and a bit more relic hunting - soon! I might even try writing that engagement story if anybody's interested…