Late again so I’ve made it a bit longer.

He then tried to make it look like he was losing his cool and threw down a two thousand bet instead of his normal one thousand size bet. That won, doubled to four, won, added two and took two, won, took four added two, won, took six and added two, won took eight and added two and lost. Thirty thousand up. Ha! Did a few more win, lose, win, win, lose, lose, win, etc., sequences and then quit at a point when he was back to thirty thousand up. Worn out, he made his way over to the cashier in the now rather packed room where he cashed the chips. Most went into his casino account, although he took some in cash. He had them transfer twenty thousand from his casino account back to his bank account as he joked about not letting himself lose all he’d won. That done, he headed to his hotel, where he managed to undress before collapsing on the bed, totally exhausted both from the magic and the adrenalin.

The casino didn’t open till two in the afternoon, which gave time to have a late breakfast or early lunch, ah, yes, brunch was the term, he remembered, and then he did some shopping for some decent attire to mix in with the upper classes better than he had. Men’s tailoring was not at all cheap in Monte Carlo, and he settled for three outfits, a very off-the-shelf suit for that night, a tailored suit that would be ready the next day, and a tuxedo in the current style to have in case of need. He listened to the man closely and realized he’d need a couple more sets of clothes to really mix in. It wouldn’t do to be seen wearing the same two suits day in and day out!

The afternoon he spent wandering around the normal floor area where he made a slow and careful twenty thousand by the time he broke off for an early dinner. He relaxed over an overpriced, somewhat slow to arrive, but very enjoyable meal before ambling around the casino for a bit before he found a private salon where he could play roulette along with only a few other people and went to work. The table limit was only ten thousand, so he decided to repeat his method of the first day, only with five thousand bets. So, five out, double up to the maximum when it won, and leave ten thousand out there while taking his ten winnings off. And by carefully controlling the winning and losing spins, he built his profit up to fifty thousand slowly with lots of ups and downs to confuse things. He took a break as he was getting mentally exhausted, hit the cashier, and deposited the money in his account. He then transferred another twenty thousand back to his bank.

After relaxing at the same bar as he had previously and enjoying the passing parade of casino patrons, he felt ready to resume. By this time, the casino had become a good deal busier, but he found another private room containing a roulette table with a fifty thousand limit on the bets like the one he had played at the previous night that wasn’t too packed. He repeated his other betting system of bet one unit, upping the bet by one unit each win, except instead of the one thousand unit bets of the previous night, he intended to use ten thousand unit bets!

He became so engrossed that he played for hours without realizing how much time had passed as he slowly gained by carefully controlling the winning and losing colors. He conversed with the supervisor several times and even the pit manager as they happily watched him bet on either red or black, depending. Their smug friendliness reflecting their knowing that however lucky Jason was in the short run, eventually, the built-in bias in the odds would result in him losing. No one can beat a roulette wheel betting on the outside, even with the English single zero wheel. The house edge is two point seven five percent every spin. Jason smiled at their smiles.

By the time he got to the point of being too exhausted mentally to be able to continue, he was a hundred thousand up that night. Woot! He let his last bet run freely and won another ten thousand as a bonus before the bet finally lost! He transferred the whole lot to his American bank account, much to the cashier’s dismay, but no one objected, just as long as he paid the appropriate taxes. Which he had no hesitation doing as it was essentially free money as far as he was concerned. Even after transferring the hundred thousand euros back home, he still had twenty thousand in the casino account.

The next afternoon things were a bit quiet at the Casino, and there was only one private saloon operating. As soon as he entered the room and reached the table, he was surprised by the pit manager asking if he wanted the roulette outer bet limits raised from the ten thousand during the afternoon to fifty thousand? Certainly! He smiled at the pit manager. The pit manager smiled back at him. Everybody was happy! Ha! Watch out, sharks; the killer whale is here!

Kyron has finally returned to Marhingia, but there is still war to be waged. Before he can even think about putting his feet up and relaxing, he has to deal with what remains of the huge Allied army that Verenia and her troops have so valiantly fought off during his absence. Winlan, Southia, Swadingi and Dodridia are still intact and even Foroughi hasn’t been crushed completely, yet. All four Kingdoms will need to be dealt with, and quickly, before any other Kingdoms are foolish enough to form up against him. Even without further outside interference, Kyron and Verenia face a huge task integrating the lands they have conquered, and no doubt there will be new challenges for them to overcome.

US: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0HJM2515J
AU: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B0HJM2515J

Black this time. Bet a thousand on black, which left him six up. Let ball land. Got a black anyway, so double the bet up. Red. Bet a thousand on red, leaving him five thousand up. Red. Double up. Red take two off, back to seven thousand up. Black. Bet black with a thousand, so six thousand up, black, double up. Deliberately lose. Bet a thousand on red. Five up. Black. Bet a thousand on black and now only four up. Win. Double up and win again, so six up. Made the result black again, so eight up. Red. Bet red, so seven thousand up. Lose. Bet black, so now six up. Win. Double up and win, so eight up. Black again. Ten up. Lose on a red and stop. Go to bet, then hesitate. He was deliberately obvious about counting the chips he pulled out of his pocket, then smiled at the watching dealer and walked off.

Jason wandered over to a very elaborate bar that looked like something out of Hercule Poirot movie. There he was able to procure an overpriced scotch and spent the next forty minutes ogling the passing parade of the rich, and he presumed, famous, not that he recognized any movie stars. Some of the women were gorgeous, and even the men all looked very well-groomed and were wearing expensive suits. Mostly. There were a smattering of obvious tourists and a few intermediate types like himself wearing decent evening wear but nothing special.

He finished his drink and headed back to the grind. He meandered into a different area and found another roulette table with completely different staff in the pit, as the inner areas were called. He noticed a table with a couple of stacks of five hundred value chips and began the same game as earlier. Win, lose, win, win, lose, and so forth. He was trying to make it obvious that he was using the simple betting strategy of following the ball and betting the color it came up with last. He walked away finally with fifteen thousand euros in profit and headed for the cashier. He changed four thousand euros into cash to replace the two he had started with and then added the twenty thousand to his account, keeping three thousand in chips.

He then found somewhere to relax and have a much-needed break before approaching the tables again. He played a few spins, made a couple of thousand net after a lot of winning and losing, and then he noticed the supervisor near the wheel and asked if there were tables with higher maximums around. They called over a smartly dressed suit who explained the process of getting access to what they called a private parlor. Eventually, after taking down a few details and giving him a card, he found himself led to a very hushed room where people were betting huge amounts on the roulette wheel there. The minimum bet on the outside was five hundred euros! The maximum was fifty thousand! Woot.

He started with a thousand on black. Then he doubled it up when it won. He then upped it by a thousand when it won again and took a thousand off. He let that lose and swapped to red. He followed the same process. The three-chip bet won, so he took two off and added one, which made the bet four chips. So, he was now two thousand up. He lost that bet deliberately. Swapped to bet on black for a break-even two bet sequence. Back to red and lost deliberately, which meant he next bet black. Time for a sequence, he decided. He caused a run of black numbers allowing him to run the bet up to two, three, four, and five chips before finally causing it to lose. He was now up six thousand. He spent the next bit just marking time, win, lose, win, lose to lull any watchers, letting his winnings fall back down to zero. Time for another sequence of one color results. This time it would be a red sequence, and he progressively raised the bet up to eight before allowing it to lose. Ha! He was now twenty thousand up. He spent the next period deliberately winning and losing until he was down to only fifteen thousand up and then lost three bets in a row.

Damn! Forgot this on Monday. No excuse. Here is a double length snippet in compensation.


They left this grave area for the next dig as they lacked sufficient time to work through it and instead concentrated on the gate area. More finds produced Saxon and Roman belt buckles and broaches, some more Celtic type adornments, and then they were all surprised to find a folis of Honorius in amongst the Saxon and Roman-style material giving the fort an early fifth-century date or at least a terminus post quem for the building of the fort. Much argument ensued, but little was resolved during the dig. Which finally came to an end. Much to Jason’s regret, while he and Katerina had been getting along very nicely, they had not done anything more romantic than talk together after dinner during the dig period. They were both too tired by all the work to do anything more, anyway. He did feel that she was open to romantic suggestions once the dig was over, though!

      Unfortunately, she proved remarkably difficult to pin down privately, which belied his belief she was, like, interested in him. They had barely returned to the hotel for the last time than she announced that she was off home in the morning for a two-week visit before returning to Newcastle and her next semester at the university there. She was nearing completion of her Masters thesis, and with the dig over, she was now focused totally on that, as far as Jason could tell. Damn. Despite not sharing any more all-night talks alone with her, he enjoyed her company during the after-dinner round table discussion and was sure she was attracted to him. Well, he came away with her phone and email details, at least. If she was going to be otherwise occupied, he decided to re-arrange his own plans and booked accommodation in Monte Carlo, got a visa surprisingly easily, and headed to France.

On the train trip back to London, he realized that he not only hadn’t used any magic during the entire time on the dig but had he hadn’t even thought of using his magic! Ha. Good thing too, he told himself. He had no intention of drawing any unwanted attention to himself because he was pretty sure his treatment in real life would be very different from the way super people were treated in the comics and the movies!

Chapter 14

Bond, Jason Bond

The Casino de Monte Carlo was very much as he had imagined it would be. He went to the cashier’s desk and was directed to the section that dealt with foreign money exchange, where he asked for five thousand euros worth of chips and then had to set up an account at the casino. That completed, he transferred in the roughly five and half thousand dollars required to give him five thousand euros in chips. He then spent a great deal of time simply wandering around, looking at the décor and taking in the ambiance of the casino. There were the lavishly decorated ceilings, the paintings, and the polished wood panels. The sheer opulence was all very amazingly upper class, and he felt like he was in a Bond movie! And it was all so much more old-worldly and classy than the casinos in Vegas!

Two weeks working with Franny at the dig in England had improved his French considerably, undoubtedly helped by Urasmian’s spell. As he walked around the Casino listening to conversations, his fluency improved even more despite many of the conversations being in English or other languages, Spanish being common. Finally deciding it was time to earn some money, he approached a roulette table and put one thousand euros down. The croupier, none of that crass American terminology here, thank you very much, picked up the money and looked at him questioningly.

“Do you have a thousand-euro chip?” Jason asked.

The fellow glanced over into his float as the collection of chips at the rear of the table was called.

“No, sir. Only five hundreds, I’m afraid, sir.”

“Two of those then, please.” He responded.

The whole chips for cash process was carried out without issue. The procedures appeared to be pretty much the same in all casinos worldwide, even though the language was different. Chips in hand, Jason placed them on red. He then made sure the result was black. More euros.

“Same again, please.” He informed the croupier.

A thousand on black this time, openly following the color of the previous result. Black it was. Double the bet up to the table maximum of two thousand and made sure a third black came up. Took the two thousand payout chips away, leaving the two thousand bet out there. He was back to square. He made sure the result was red. The supervisor kept a close eye on things right from the start, so Jason was working to convince the fellow that Jason was following one of the simple betting strategies that everyone knew. And one that any fool knew would eventually lose despite any gains in the short term.

Back to a one thousand bet, this time on red. Red. Double it up and made sure the result was black. That put him down a thousand. He placed a thousand on black. Win. Double it up. Black. Take two thousand off while leaving two thousand out there, and he was square again. He made sure it was red so that he lost. Bet red. Double up again. Red. Take the two thousand off, which meant he was now a thousand up. Black result, so he lost again. Bet a thousand on black. Double up. Black. Take the two thousand winnings off. Let the ball land wherever. Red. Right. Back to red with a thousand. Black deliberately. Bet a thousand on black. Double it up when it won. Black again, back to two thousand up. Black again. He was now four thousand up. Red. Bet a thousand on red. Three up still. Deliberately made the ball land on black. Bet a thousand on black. Win. Double up. Red. Down to being up two thousand. Bet a thousand on red. Win and double up. Red. Take two thousand off, three up. Red. Five up. Let ball land as it would and got another red. Ha. Seven thousand up.

First off I have a short story about Bargan (Taroniah’s son) in this:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0HFSSFKPC/

Kyron the Conqueror is off to the editor and I have started writing The Kelad Return

I haven’t decided what will follow the Kelad Return – either the next Taroniah book or something new….

Been a bit slack with the writing over the last couple of months but will try and do better between now and the end of the year.

For what it is worth, apart from Pam Uphoff books I have been reading books by someone called peachRoad (sigh)
they are alt history books with the ordinary person from the future taking over a historical figure and changing things.
As a rule they are badly formatted and full of inconsistancies with a lot of obvious AI writing but the way the author changes the timelines is very clever. Can;t recommend them but they are interesting if you like alt history.

Jason had never done as much physical labor in his life and by the third day was stiff and sore, but got a break that day as the professors and senior postgrads all concentrated on the newly found corners of the two forts. The bottom extended maybe ten yards further than the upper one, and the digging to determine the nature of the structures they had revealed slowed as the afternoon wore on. Jason was too tired to give his full attention to what they were finding, but then the next morning, feeling a little more rested, he paid closer attention to the finds and the conclusions being drawn. Finds of armor fittings, horse bits, and other material left behind during the construction of the lower fort led to a firm dating of the late first century and almost certainly a mixed force of legionaries and cavalry, probably a cohort of infantry and an ala of cavalry.

      The upper fort was more ambiguous. The corner had been built up with a wooden tower from the post holes left behind when the tower was burnt down. Careful excavation throughout the day resulted in a few hard to define burned bits and pieces and a shield boss, the date of which was hotly debated, with Professor Schmidt favoring a seventh or even eighth-century date with Germanic provenance. At the same time, Professor Armstrong thought it was fifth or sixth-century Romano-British. The shield boss was so damaged and too nondescript for any certainty in its identification, and the rest of the bits and pieces too badly burned to be easily datable. Several of the large pieces of charcoal that had been tower timbers were sent off for lab tests, but the team only had a limited budget for those sort of expensive dating methods.

      Normal digging resumed the next day as efforts were made to find the western side of the forts and the southern ends. After two days of carting muck and finding nothing exciting, they finally found the southern end of the lower fort. They found the southern edge of the upper fort the next day a good distance further south. The corner there was also found to have had a wooden tower on top of a substantial base, and this tower had also been burnt to the ground. It took another two days to find the western edge of both forts, which finally gave them some idea of the size of both. The older, lower fort they now revised to hold at least two infantry cohorts and the cavalry cohort or an even larger force, while the upper fort had clearly held an even bigger force given its rather large dimensions.

      Gradually more and more bits and pieces from the upper fort came to light. Some fittings looked Saxon, found near the middle of the east side, where they were now undertaking a slow search for a gateway. A coin was found that, after some work, proved to be from the reign of Valentinian the Third, which dated the upper fort to at least the late fourth century. It took several days to finally zero in on a gate on the east side as it was actually off-center to the south, not to the north as everyone had expected when nothing was found in the center of the wall length. The gate had been a substantial structure, with wooden towers on a sod base, and the left side was not quite as burnt down as all the rest of the remains. A mass grave was found just inside the gate where a large number of bodies had been thrown in a hole and then burnt before being covered with a mound of dirt.

His plan for an early night was foiled by the fact that Katerina was happy to sit and talk about almost anything! She played video games a bit and knew something about a lot more; she could talk science fiction and fantasy books of all sorts. They spent a lot of time comparing their favorite authors and then their favorite science fiction and fantasy films. Before they knew it, the place was empty, and the clock on the wall said it was one-thirty! Oh shit. They headed to their rooms on different floors, unfortunately, and Jason made sure his phone alarm was on, and the volume turned up!

The buzzing of the alarm did manage to rouse him barely three hours later! After a quick shower, a hot and not very good coffee made from the ingredients in the mini bar, which he only half slurped down, he raced downstairs clutching the two water bottles he’d grabbed from the tiny bar fridge in his room. He wasn’t the last to arrive out the front where he found a small bus was waiting, but it was close! One of the undergrads was right behind him, and a quick headcount confirmed they were all present. The bus lurched into motion even as Jason was heading for a seat. Franny was sitting with Katerina, damn, so he was forced to take a spot two rows back. A quick survey confirmed most of the crew were in shorts and t-shirts, although several had brought jackets of some kind as well. A jacket was something Jason hadn’t thought would be needed in the middle of the English summer! And sunscreen. Shit! In the rush, he’d left his behind. Oh well, hopefully, someone would let him share today.

The dig site was on a farm in a wooded area. The previous season they had made one deep vertical trench ninety degrees to the line of the upper fort’s wall, and while digging that out, they had dug a couple of further, smaller, trenches northeast along the wall to find a corner. They hadn’t found an actual corner, but the fourth trench had been beyond the wall extent of the top fort and probably the older fort as well. The main trench had been extended outwards when they found the lower fort, which had been their main focus the previous summer. In addition to the two fort walls, they had found two adjoining ditches. In the case of the lower fort, the ditch seemed to have provided much of the material for the wall base, which would have then been topped with wooden stakes.

The upper wall was different and appeared to have been made of reinforced turf sods and logs with a protective palisade then erected on top of that. The dirt from the ditch seemed to have been only a small part of the wall construction. Although how they determined that from the nondescript mound of remains, Jason wasn’t sure. This year they were going to resume their search for a corner and then try and see how far the forts extended to the southwest. Oh goody. Lots of wheelbarrow work for the ‘technical assistants’! In practice, over the next few days, he found there wasn’t that much wheelbarrowing, but making up for the lack of wheelbarrowing, there was shoveling, digging, and carting tree refuse. The farmer had agreed to chain saw a tree that was in the way and used his tractor to pull out the stump and then cart off the bulk of the tree, leaving the bits and pieces that had broken off or otherwise come adrift for the ‘technical assistants’ to remove from the work area.

Jason nodded. The Professors then asked Geseppo about some personal matters, and Jason drifted apart, not feeling entitled to hear reports on the fellow’s family. He felt his arm grabbed, and Franny smiled at him while she dragged him over to where her boyfriend was talking with the younger members of the dig. There were about ten all told, mostly males but two other females besides Franny. A slim brunette was facing away from him as he was brought over, and when addressed by Franny, the brunette turned and, seeing Jason, smiled. Ah. The brunette from the video call last year! Jason decided she was even prettier in the flesh, especially as he could see a lot more of her very nice figure.

“Katerina, you remember Jason?” Franny purred smiling, at something Jason clearly didn’t understand.

Katerina blushed and nodded, glanced at Franny with a frown, then turned back to Jason.

“Hi.” She offered, looking tentative.

“Hi, yourself,” Jason replied. “I finally get to meet the girl in the phone!” he tried to make it sound light and humorous.

Katerina’s smiled increased, and she bobbed her head.

“You look different somehow.” She offered. “He looked fatter in the phone call Franny.”

“Camera angle.” Franny put in, although she gave Jason a good once over.

 “Have you lost weight?” She asked, looking slightly puzzled.

Jason felt himself blushing slightly. “A little. I have been doing a lot more exercise recently, although I haven’t so much lost weight as toned up.”

Franny took hold of her boyfriend’s arm. “That is what it is. Oh, tell me. What happened on that island? Didn’t you get food poisoning or something?”

Jason nodded. “Ate something that didn’t agree with me. Nearly died, in fact. All good now, though. So, tell me, how far is it to the dig site?”

Franny might have wanted to ask more about the food poisoning from her expression, but Katerina piped in. “Only about thirty minutes or a bit less, depending on the traffic. We leave pretty early in the morning, though. Did Franny warn you?”

Jason play acted gulping in trepidation. “Um, no. How early is pretty early?”

“Bus leaves at five-thirty, so you need to be up and out front by then. They get a bit miffed if you hold everyone up by being late.” She nodded over to the professors. “Breakfast and lunch are supplied on-site by a contractor at seven-thirty or so and around one-thirty. The food is a bit expensive but not bad with a good range for such a small truck. Make sure you have lots of water handy.  It gets hot and dry this time of year!”

He found her slight Scottish accent rather charming as he listened to her. Mind you, Jason’s first reaction was to scoff at it being hot here in the north of England. As he was from southern California, he didn’t think English hot would be anything like Southern Californian hot! However, he decided not to say anything as he had no real experience of performing manual labor all day in the sun. He had packed sunblock cream, at his mother’s insistence, so that wouldn’t be too much of a problem if he was careful. He hoped!

He was then introduced to the other technical assistants. Most were post-graduate students, but there were two undergrads as well. They were Both from the University of Liverpool and obvious fans of Professor Armstrong. A couple looked a bit intimidated by having an academically famous person in their midst. Still, he was very careful to play down his achievements and point out he was as inexperienced as the two undergrads! Which was true. This admission helped ease the situation, and soon they were all on easy terms with each other.

Jason could hear the capitals in The Expert and understood why the German would be a little puzzled. He waved a hand in a deprecating manner.

“Franny was telling me about it, and I’ve never been on a dig before. I sort of feel that participating in a real dig is important for a history academic, even if it is only mere Roman stuff.” He winked very obviously at Franny and smiled at the two professors. “I am quite happy to be one of the slave laborers, I mean technical assistants,” He paused, and both professors smiled at the joke. “With no experience, I could expect nothing less. Besides, all the Minoan sites have been done to death over the last two centuries, and I was intrigued by what Franny told me regarding the dig last year. Being on a site with at least one person I know to show me the ropes can’t hurt either.”

Heinrich nodded. Just then, another person arrived and was greeted warmly by the German. “Andria Geseppo, good to see you. Allow me to introduce one of our, um,” He paused and smiled at Jason. “Technical assistants this season, Doctor Jason Lerner.” The tall fellow shook hands readily enough, smiling as he did so.

“Ah. A Doctor as a technical assistant, eh? You are a brave man.” He commented.

He had a strong southern European accent, and from the name Jason assumed was Italian. The dark hair and southern European complexion reinforced the impression.

Jason shrugged and smiled. “Everyone has to start somewhere.”

Heinrich smirked. “True. Very true. Andria is doing his Doctorate largely based on our finds at Brampton, so he is especially keen to find something interesting or at least unusual. He is not satisfied with just finding a pair of previously unknown Roman forts.”

“Unknown?” Jason prompted.

It was rare to find a previously unknown Roman site these days. Well, not large ones like forts anyway.

“Yes. Most of the forts along the Wall are well documented, but there is no mention of this one that we have found near Brampton. The older, lower one can be explained because it appears to date from the Late First Century, probably Agricola’s campaign. At least the few bits and pieces we have found point to the first century for a date. The newer, upper one, is different and later but how much later we have not been able to determine. Hopefully this year.” The Italian offered as he shrugged and smiled. His English was actually rather good, and although accented, Jason was having no trouble understanding him.

Professor Armstrong chimed in. “Yes. So far, we have not been able to date the later fort. It might be from the Antonine period, the Severan, or possibly even later. Initially, we thought it near contemporary with the lower one, perhaps dating from a campaign a few years later, but the more we have dug, the less likely that seems. In fact, it is possible the builders of the later fort were not even aware of the earlier one at all, or at least not when they first laid it out.”

“Really?” Jason prompted the Englishman, finding himself intrigued.

“Yes. It is laid out on a slightly different alignment and seems to take no account of the earlier fort at all.” Armstrong replied, shaking his head to reflect the bemused tone in his voice.

Probably the most interesting thing he took out of the casual meeting with Daiyu and the follow-up was the fact that despite being a nerd, at least one pretty woman had found him attractive. He hadn’t really noticed it before but thinking about it on the way home from the airport, he came to the realization that things had changed. Whereas his usual treatment at the hands of pretty women was polite indifference, since the, ahh, magic revolution, yes, that was the term, it was clear that women tended to be friendlier towards him generally. There was nothing overt, and he quite obviously hadn’t suddenly become a hunk! But even so, he was getting the occasional smile here and there rather than the usual polite indifference. Daiyu had gone out with him repeatedly, and when she was all dolled up for an evening out, she really was a glamour, no two ways about it. Hmm. He was beginning to really like this sorcerer caper! Of course, it was his much fitter body, toned muscles from gym workouts with the team, and so forth, which probably had more to do with the apparent change in his attractiveness to the opposite sex than the magic he hid from everyone!

Chapter 13

Work’n for the man

England was cold and damp. At least that was his first impression coming from California. He stayed a night in London and was glad he had a week at the end of the ‘dig’ to do some sightseeing as there was so much history in the city. He chose to take the train to Carlisle, which was fast, not as fast as flying, but still pretty damn quick, and he got to see more of the countryside. Besides, The County, where the team was staying, was literally around the corner from Carlisle railway depot, or station, as they called them here in England. They were supposed to meet in the bar area about seven that evening, and he had arrived relatively early. As it turned out, he had no trouble booking in, being shown to his room, and still had time for a quick shower before getting down to the bar on time. He spotted Franny almost immediately, with her boyfriend, and a small group of young people, and a couple of older ones.

Everyone appeared to have a drink already, so he wandered over to the bar first, procured a scotch then headed over to the group. When he’d mentioned he was going to England to some of the lads from the Australian football team, they’d told him in no uncertain terms to be wary of the beer. Piss weak and warm were the most common terms used to describe English beer!

Franny happened to turn in his direction as he approached the group. “Jason!” Franny almost screamed, clearly delighted to see him! She rushed up and got the obligatory hug and kiss on the cheek before she dragged him over to the boyfriend, who shook his hand.

“You remember Louis, Jason. Yes. He is not staying for the dig but will come over on the weekends. Ah. Professor Schmidt. This is Doctor Jason Lerner.” She presented him to the older, more grey-haired of the two senior members of the group. “Jason, this is Professor Heinrich Schmidt of Berlin University. He is head of the dig.”

“Herr Professor,” Jason said, taking the man’s hand.

“Ha. Call me Heinrich.” The Professor said in German and was obviously watching Jason’s reaction.

“Yes, Heinrich. Please call me Jason.” He answered in German, then swapped to English. “That exhausts my German; I am sorry.”

“That is not a problem. And this is Professor John Armstrong from the University of Liverpool.” The Professor replied in faultless English. Jason shook hands with the slightly younger academic. “So. You are ‘The Expert’ on Linear A, and now you want to dig a Roman site?”