Foxglove Summer timeline

[sixthlight]

Imported from tumblr.

The last one. AHAH! After much back-and-forthing I had decided to go with the June date because it’s one of the only solid dates we get in these books (the others being June 21, the last day in Rivers of London, and Christmas in Whispers Under Ground), plus Varvara’s only been at the Folly for two months. Except then we get two references to August in the book, including a slightly obscure but specific date (the Glorious Twelfth, August 12, the start of grouse-shooting season.) And the days of the week for 2013 match up correctly for August, but not June. (Although in Whispers Under Ground the days of the week matched for 2011, so 2012 appears to have not occurred at all in this universe.) MAKE UP YOUR MIND, AARONOVITCH. I CAN’T WITH YOU.

Edit, 20 August 2015: He did obligingly make up his mind (or at least mentioned it on Twitter) and by inference this book takes place in August 2013.

Day 0, Thursday August 15th: Hannah Marstowe and Nicole Lacey are discovered missing by their parents. The search for them begins. Nightingale and Peter try plying Varvara Tamonina with vodka (unsuccessfully) in the hopes she’ll talk.

Day 1, Friday August 16th: Nightingale hears about the search on the radio while shaving, and suggests to Peter over breakfast that Peter visit Hugh Oswald and make sure he’s not connected to the case. Peter drives to Herefordshire, interviews Hugh, searches Hugh’s house after Mellissa Oswald agrees to it, and meets Mellissa’s hive, but otherwise finds nothing. He decides to volunteer his services for the search; Nightingale agrees. He goes to Leominster and meets DC Dominic Croft as well as DCI Windrow and DI Edmonson, who are running the search. They send him to the Marstowes to act as a supporting Family Liaison Officer. Dominic gets his mum to put Peter up in her cowshed.

Day 2, Saturday August 17th: Peter wakes up early. Dominic picks him up in Victor’s Nissan and they go to talk to Stan about her missing stash. She found it gone “on Thursday”, “the morning the kids were discovered missing”. They go back to Dominic’s mum’s, where Peter’s stuff (and a lot of other things) has arrived from the Folly. (Dominic says “the Glorious Twelfth was Monday” in reference to the shotguns.) A backpack is found, but it doesn’t appear to be connected to the girls.

Windrow and Edmonson ask Peter to do a formal Falcon assessment on the case; Nightingale agrees. Peter goes over the case action list and requests to restatement Nicole’s friend Gabriella, who mentioned an invisible friend. He has a minor encounter with some racist locals while on the phone to Nightingale and nobly does not fry their car’s computer. This reminds him to get the girls’ phones checked for magical damage. He also goes to the Lacey house and checks their bookshelves for evidence of interest in the supernatural.

Day 3, Sunday August 18th: Peter gets an email telling him the girls’ phones were indeed fried by magic and goes looking for vestigia. He and Dominic survey the entire village and find nothing. At lunch, Peter gets a call from Beverley’s mobile. He goes and picks Beverley up from the Teme girls. She says Nightingale sent her. Dominic calls with a new lead. Peter drops Beverley off at the inn in the village and he and Dominic go to Bircher Common. Peter finds vestigia there - something magical happened and killed the phones.

Day 4, Monday August 19th: Peter calls Beverley and gets her to come with him to visit Hugh and Mellissa Oswald again. Beverley and Mellissa get on fabulously. Hugh tells Peter a little about Nightingale at Ettersberg, and gives Peter a book on local folklore. As they’re leaving, Dominic calls to tell Peter about the dead sheep. They investigate it and have the remains packaged to be sent to Dr Walid. Beverley leaves to talk to the Lugg. Peter visits her briefly at the inn and then goes to restatement Gabriella, who tells him about the invisible Princess Luna the unicorn. He does paperwork and research, and then Lesley texts him. He contacts Inspector Pollock and Nightingale before replying.

Day 5, Tuesday August 20th: Peter wakes early after dreaming of ghost trees, and uses the camp stove that Molly sent up to Herefordshire. He talks to Windrow and Edmonson and gets permission to talk to the families about Princess Luna. He speaks with Andy and Derek, then Joanne and Victoria, then goes to find Beverley. In Pokehouse Wood, they find a bloody strip of cloth matching Nicole’s trousers. Peter calls it in, and Pokehouse Wood is searched. Lesley texts again. That evening Beverley gets Peter to beat the crap out of a tree in the hope it will make him feel better about Lesley.

Day 6, Wednesday August 21st: Peter wakes up, speaks with Walid about the sheep - almost definitely gored by a unicorn, then Windrow and Edmonson, and calls Beverley to tell her they’re going unicorn hunting. He goes to a computer shop in Hereford and orders components for impromptu magic support and magic detectors. Then he goes back to Rushpool for a nap, and he and Lesley text back and forth some more.

That evening, Dominic’s boyfriend Victor drives Dominic, Beverley, and Peter to Whiteway Head. They have a picnic, then Victor leaves. They go into the wood to try and attract miscellaneous supernatural beings with Peter’s werelight. They get a unicorn. Beverley also gets a no-go zone feeling and they leave the ridge post-haste, chased by two unicorns. In Pokehouse Wood they find Hannah and Nicole; once they cross the Lugg the unicorns can’t follow them further.

Day 7, Thursday August 22nd: They call and say they’ve found the girls; Beverley gets a lift back to the inn, Dominic and Peter have to stay and give statements. Peter gets permission from Nightingale to stay and tie up loose ends. He talks with Windrow and Edmonson about how the Folly handles reports, then goes back to the cowshed and sleeps. He wakes up in the afternoon and Beverley takes him to the celebration for the girls’ return. Afterwards, they go back to the Lugg and catalyse it a bit.

Day 8, Friday August 23rd: Peter and Beverley wake up naked in the Lugg, then get some clothes from the local steam funfair, where Beverley has made contact, presumably via her connections with the upstream Thames rivers. Lilly, daughter of the Teme, picks them up and returns them to Rushpool. Peter gets Beverley to admit exactly what they were doing the night before, apart from having sex.

Beverley stays at the cowshed; Peter is called to a meeting with Windrow. Nicole remains withdrawn. Peter goes over Hannah’s statement at hospital (this is where the June 22 date comes from.) Peter calls Mellissa and asks to go over and use Hugh’s library; she agrees as long as Beverley comes too. Peter does some research. Hugh gives him his old staves and tells him why the wizards of Britain went to Ettersberg. Peter goes to interview Joanne Marstowe again about the invisible unicorns and finds Derek Lacey there as well. They tell him about Derek’s elder daughter Zoe, who also once ran away. Peter returns to the cowshed and Beverley.

Day 9, Saturday August 24th: Peter picks up his magic detectors in Hereford, then goes to Leominster nick and does UFO research. Lesley gets in touch again. Peter goes to see Zoe Thomas and ask her about her UFO encounter/runaway incident. On the way back to Rushpool Beverley calls to say the Marstowes want to speak to him. Hannah is claiming Nicole isn’t really Nicole. Windrow arrives to speak with the Marstowes; Nicole claims they orchestrated the girls’ disappearance.

Day 10, Sunday August 25th: Peter is woken by a text from Lesley. He, Beverley, Dominic, and Stan go to plant the magic detectors in Pokehouse Wood and other locations. He tells Windrow he thinks Nicole is a changeling. Windrow says he can take DNA samples if Nightingale authorises it as an official Falcon enquiry; Peter calls Dr Walid and gets him to talk to Nightingale. He also goes to get more magic detectors. Nightingale gives the okay for the DNA collection. Peter gets DNA from Hannah and her parents easily, but when he goes to see Nicole she tries to glamour him into going away; he gets her DNA by taking bottles she’d been drinking from. Nightingale says if they don’t hear from Lesley again in the next day he’ll come to Herefordshire. Peter has dinner with Beverley, Dominic, and Victor. Later that evening a magic detector goes off in Pokehouse Wood, but Peter and Beverley don’t find anything; they replace it and leave.

Day 11, Monday August 26th: Beverley and Peter go to Pyon Wood Camp to look for Hannah’s castle. Beverley goes to the steam fair afterwards; Peter goes back to Leominster nick to do research on woodland clearing and watch a press conference, where Sharon Pike accuses Dominic and others of orchestrating the kidnapping. She’s been glamoured by Nicole. Peter rescues Sharon from Nicole. The DNA results come back; this Nicole is a changeling, but also Derek and Victoria’s biological child, and Hannah’s half-sister.

Peter checks in on Derek, Victoria, and Nicole, then waits for the supernatural to arrive - it’s linked to the moon and tonight is the last quarter. Lesley calls and warns him he has a year before it “kicks off”. He’s forbidden to call in Nightingale for backup by Pollock. The magic detectors start going out one by one. Nightingale calls; Lesley has escaped them, and he’ll be in Herefordshire in a few hours. The Marstowe house is attacked by a unicorn; Peter deals with it, but Victoria kidnaps fake!Nicole and tries to trade her to the fairy Queen in Pokehouse Wood for the real Nicole. Peter offers himself in trade for both girls and is accepted.

Day 12, Tuesday August 27th: Beverley rescues Peter from the fairy world via steam train; Nightingale is waiting in Aymestrey. Peter is ready to go back to London.

Notes:

Another dense book after which Peter probably needs to sleep for a week. Apart from the whole June/August Thing the timeline checks out and there’s no missing days or anything.

He and Lesley are in contact for about a week; it’s been two to four months since she left, does that have any significance?

Nightingale tells Peter to wrap the loose ends up in a week, and he does it in five days! Good job, Peter. (Apart from the whole bargaining yourself away thing. DON’T DO THAT.)