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He had dressed, gone down to his car and got in. But instead of driving to his surgery, he had taken the road out of Gwydyr towards Llanfer Ceiriog. And then the calling had made him drive down the road that led north out of the village. The road ended at a pair of metal gates which were padlocked shut. He had used his hoof-cutters to break the chain that secured the gates and had then driven through. The road converted to a track once through the gates and he had put his foot down on the accelerator. He had been rather lucky that when he had reached the stone circle he hadn't done his car any damage. But he didn't have long to think about that, for he suddenly found himself transported to the land of Tír na n-Óg, The guards around the circle hadn't been able to stop him, but the gates of Dinorben had. He had had to get out of the car and had been captured by the soldiers who had taken him before the Tuatha de Danaan. At this point, General Nuada had searched him and found the unicorn horn in his pocket. As soon as the horn was confiscated, Stuart's dream-like state had vanished and he had found himself plunged headfirst back into reality.

He had been given the same choice as the Doctor and Ace, which is to say that he had been given no choice at all. At noon the next day, he had driven out of Dinorben and had taken a rather circuitous route across Tír na n-Óg. He hadn't encountered any difficulties until he had come across the herd of Daffyr .

He had been brought before Daffyr in much the same way as they had and had almost been put to death for trespassing on the land. But he had noticed that Daffyr was walking badly and had been able to diagnose laminitis ('It's when the laminae of the hoof get inflamed,' he explained to Bathsheba - she looked blank and he simplified to, 'something wrong with a horse's feet'). He had been able to relieve some of Daffyr’s suffering by bleeding off a couple of pints of blood. He injected some antibiotics ('never mind,' he said to Bathsheba.) and told. Daffyr that he would have to spend a couple of hours a day with his feet kept cold and with luck the problem would be cured over the course of a few weeks ....

'It's going well so far,' said Stuart, 'so Daffyr is grateful to me. I suppose that's why he let you two live.'

'The treatment's a bit primitive, isn't it?' the Doctor asked.

'Yes, well, the people at Dinorben took a lot of my stuff so I couldn't do any better.'

'And now?'

'What do you mean?'

The Doctor placed his mug on the table. 'What do you plan to do now?'

'I hadn't really thought about it,' Stuart shrugged. 'I suppose I just intended to stick around until I could come up with some way of getting back to Earth.'

'Is your car still in working order?'

'Yes. I'm running a bit low on petrol, but there's enough to get me back to Dinorben.'

'Good. It'll do.'

'Do for what?' asked Bathsheba.

'Yes, Doctor, do for what?'

The Doctor smiled and his dark eyes sparkled. 'Why, for the last approach to Goibhnie.'

There were thirty-three Ceffyl in the herd that Ace had joined. They were without a herd stallion for the moment the only male being a young colt: Leaderless, they had no course of action in mind beyond going to Dinorben to help the situation there. Ace rode on Bat's back, because through Bat she co communicate with the other members of the herd.

The horn of a Ceffyl was a very special thing. It was a direct extension of their brain outside the cranium and contained everything that distinguished a Ceffyl from an ordinary horse. By touching her horn to Ace's. forehead,. Bat had bestowed a great gift which could only be given once in a Ceffyl s lifetime, a link was forged between the two of them which could not be broken.

‘It affects different people in different ways, Bat explained to Ace as they galloped across the semicultivated fields. 'My dam, Rush, gave her gift to a young girl human. In her case, it only gave her the ability to talk to Rush. But you have also received