by Frazer Lee
Frazer lee
Hearthstone Cottage
FLAME TREE PRESS
London & New York
This one’s for Alan Stewart,
who always has an eye for a story.
Part One
Under dark, dark skies
There are dark, dark mountains
And beneath the dark, dark mountains
Is a dark, dark road.
Chapter One
Mike opened his eyes and saw the looming shapes of the Kintail Mountains through the sunroof.
He yawned, stretched and sat up in the back seat. His mouth was dry, and he reached for the bottle of spring water that lay in the space between him and Helen. As he picked it up, his fingers brushed her hand. She smiled at him, and he reciprocated through his yawns.
“Welcome back to the land of the living,” Helen said.
He took an enormous thirst-slaking gulp from the water bottle. Feeling more awake now, he became aware of the talk show chatter on the car radio.
“Of course nonhuman animals feel pain and emotions just as keenly as we do,” a woman was saying. She sounded annoyed. The male presenter cut her off and began inviting listeners to call in. Mike drained the rest of the water from his bottle. He belched, then dodged Helen’s backhander as she made a swipe at him.
“Pig,” she said.
“Sorry,” he yawned. “Whereabouts are we?”
“Nearly there. Another twenty minutes or so, Alex reckons.”
A huge Ordnance Survey map lay partly open in Helen’s lap, just as it had before he’d fallen asleep. A Google Maps smartphone app didn’t fare so well in the Highlands, where the signal was as unpredictable as the weather. Mike had watched Helen diligently follow their progress across the map, unfolding and refolding it as she went, before he had fallen asleep. Now he saw her trace a line with her finger to a dark outline indicating the foot of the mountain range. The map elevation was emblazoned with the legend ‘KINTAIL MOUNTAINS’.
“Blimey. How long was I asleep for?”
Alex’s gruff voice boomed from the driver’s seat. “Too fucking long, man. I could do with a kip myself.”
Mike laughed. “You’re forgetting – he who drives the first leg gets to snooze for the second. You missed your chance to sleep earlier.”
“Oh, you mean when you were playing Guns n’ Roses at full pelt? Fat chance I had to sleep then, man.”
“You and me both,” Kay said. She winked at Mike and Helen from the front passenger seat. “I have to admit a fondness for a bit of hair metal, though.” She made devil horns with her right hand, teasing Alex with them.
“Pipe down, woman, I’m bloody well trying to drive here.” Alex hit the off button on the steering wheel column and silenced the advertisements blaring out of the radio.
“Both you men were bloody well asleep when Kay and me took turns to drive,” Helen countered.
“Yeah, curled up together on the back seat like lovebirds,” Kay said, before adding, “The bromance continues.”
They all laughed at that, except for Alex, who scowled ahead at the winding country road. Mike knew the constant grump act was a bit of a put-on, but he also knew Alex could get spectacularly grouchy if the girls teased him too much. He suspected that was why they did it so often – just to get a rise out of Alex.
Mike reached into the seat pocket in front of him and pulled out his tobacco tin. The friendly marijuana leaf design on the lid greeted him as it always did, along with the legend ‘Born to… Born to… No, it’s gone’. He took out a couple of rolling papers and started building a joint, using the lid of the tin to offset the movement of the car as it weaved along the country road. Mike heard Helen exhale just a little too loudly between her teeth. She had made it clear several times that she did not approve of his smoking. But it was happy holiday time and Mike needed it to relax. And relax he could – he had graduated with upper second class honors, and now all he had to do was build a nice, fat doobie, kick back and wait for the job offers to come rolling in. Mike sparked up and breathed out a little cloud of smoke. It drifted across the back seat, toward Helen. Her heavy-breathing act turned to loud tuts of disapproval as she made a show of waving the smoke away from her face.
“Open the window, you bloody menace,” Helen said.
Mike activated the little window switch set into his armrest and watched the smoke escape. It curled up and out, creating the illusion of yet more mist above the mountains as it went.
“Want some?”
Helen rolled her eyes and turned her attention back to the map.
“Don’t know what you’re missing,” Mike said.
“I know what you’re missing, smoking that all the time – a fair few brain cells.”
Now it was Mike’s turn to roll his eyes. Much as he was into Helen, he wished she would lighten up sometimes. She, like his friend Alex, had studied law. Mike had started out on a law degree too before switching to business partway into his first year – a decision that had incurred the wrath of his parents, who were paying his fees. He had enjoyed the business course much more than he had law, though he was thankful he had started out on that track since he’d met Helen in classes. Watching her through the haze as she pored over the map, he noted how tired and strung out she looked. She’d been that way all through her finals, but they were long over and Mike was still waiting for her to snap out of it. He took another toke, hoping she might ease up later, after a couple of drinks and a sizeable dose of fresh Highland air.
“Mike!”
“Shit, Helen.”
Lost in thought, he’d allowed the joint to go to ash and had inadvertently hot-rocked the seat upholstery between his legs. Mike patted at the angry orange nugget of burning ash, but that only made it worse. His heart sank as he saw the cinder smoldering into the plush seat cover. He looked up, and his eyes met Alex’s in the rearview mirror.
“Idiot,” Alex said. His quiet tone carried more dread than any exclamation ever could. “The rental company told us it was no smoking when we signed the form – when I signed the form – and you said—”
“I said I’d be careful. I know, I know, I’m sorry. Pass me that bottle of water, will you, Kay?”
Alex’s girlfriend hailed from Palo Alto on the west coast of the USA. She had studied classics, also in Edinburgh, and had met Alex through a mutual friend. Mike liked her, though she could be a bit aloof sometimes. Her bookish ways softened the often by-the-book approach adopted by Alex, who was a natural-born lawyer if ever there was one. Mike’s and Alex’s fathers both worked at the same company, The Consortium Incorporated, which had a regional office in Glasgow. Mike’s dad was in business development, or ‘Biz Dev’ as he called it, and Alex’s dad was high up in the legal department. While their respective fathers had fallen prey to office politics – they no longer went for after-work drinks together – Mike and Alex had remained friends all through university. And Mike and Alex often joked about how, in spite of themselves, they had followed their fathers into the same line of work.
Mike knew how bitterly disappointed his father had been when his son, his only child, had opted to switch courses. He suspected his dad had really wanted to be a lawyer like Alex’s father. Every Christmastime for the past three years, Mike had to endure lengthy lectures from his father about how the legal profession had better prospects and job security. Still, he had graduated now, and he hoped his father might chill out a bit in the knowledge that Mike had achieved a B+. He doubted it, however, and felt sure he’d get ‘the lecture’ again come next Christmas about how a first class degree in law would serve Alex much better than Mike�
��s mere upper second in business.
Mike unclipped his seat belt and reached forward to take the water bottle from Kay. He shuffled aside, eliciting more protests from Helen, and surveyed the damage. It was a small burn mark, but it had gone deep. He splashed a little water onto the burn and rubbed at it with his thumb.
“Shit!”
His attempts had only made matters worse. He had made the black stain bigger, making the burn look worse than it was.
“Who makes seat covers this beige anyhow?”
“Oh, so it’s the car’s fault now, is it?” Alex’s voice bubbled with anger.
Mike tried to cover the damage with his hand as Alex craned his neck around to see. But Kay pointed out something through the passenger window.
“Is that it?!”
Mike felt relieved to hear the excitement in Kay’s voice, hoping it would be enough to keep Alex’s mind off the singed seat cover.
“Aye, that’s the place all right,” Alex murmured as he returned his attention to the road. They each craned their necks to get a better look out of the passenger side.
The landscape on the left-hand side of the road had opened up, giving a full view of an enormous, stunning loch. The still surface of the water was like a mirror, reflecting every detail of the sky above it. Tall, ancient trees lined its banks, and, between them, the stark white of a small building stood out from their dense green foliage. Mike tilted his head with the car’s movement around the loch and peered out at the building he knew so well.
“Hearthstone Cottage,” he said, “venue of legends!”
“It looks…smaller than I’d imagined,” Helen said.
Kay hissed through her teeth. “It’s beautiful!” she exclaimed. “It looks freaking beautiful!”
Alex cracked a smile at her enthusiasm, playfully tousling her hair.
“Thank you for bringing us here,” Kay said softly and kissed Alex on the nose.
Alex’s eyes were taken off the road for just three seconds.
But three seconds was all it took.
“Alex!”
Helen’s horrified scream jolted Mike from the stunning view. He almost screamed too from the sudden pain of her fingernails as they dug into the flesh of his forearm. The gasp died in his throat when he glanced through the windscreen. A massive, dark shape loomed dead ahead on the dirt road in front of them. It was a stag. Mike saw, almost in slow motion, steam rising from the creature’s back in subtle wisps like the smoke from his joint.
“Christ!” Alex yelled, gripping and yanking the steering wheel to the left.
The car drifted as it went into a skid. Mike felt the entire rear end of the vehicle lift from the ground. He saw the stag’s eyes, twinkling dark in the daylight. Then the car hit the dirt, righted itself on its new trajectory and clipped the stag as it hurtled onward. The car shook from the impact. Mike pressed his hands over his ears at the grinding of metal and the sickening crunch of bones. Helen dry screamed, a hollow croaking sound that did not stop until the car had trundled to a halt.
The engine died, its death rattle giving way to the sudden hiss of steam escaping from the ruptured cooling system. Steam billowed from beneath the crumpled bonnet, cloaking the cracked windscreen in vapor.
“Shit!” Mike saw the joint at his feet, now smoldering on the mat in the footwell. He stomped it out and, on instinct, opened his door and climbed out of the ruined car.
“Are you okay, babe?” he said through the open door. But Helen’s gaze was fixed dead ahead, as though she was replaying the point of impact over and over in her mind.
Mike heard a click and saw Kay frantically trying to climb out after him. Her seat belt was still on. Pinioned like a butterfly beneath a pin, she struggled against it for a few seconds. Then, with a trembling hand, she reached for the seat belt clasp and thumbed the catch. Kay tumbled out of the car and staggered past Mike toward the roadside. Mike watched her stop dead in her tracks when she saw the massive deer lying in the road.
“I’m sorry,” she sobbed. “I’m so sorry. If I hadn’t been so.… It’s all my fault.”
Alex caught up to her and put his arm around Kay, holding her upright as she convulsed with each sob.
“Are you…okay?” Mike heard himself say once more.
His words trailed off as he realized he had wandered over to where the stag lay. Plumes of steam still rose from the animal’s powerful back and haunches. A dark slick of blood had streaked from its nose across the rough surface of the road, like a chef’s statement flourish over slate dinnerware. Mike moved closer through the silence and saw that the animal still had a pulse. One of its legs was twisted beneath its huge body, the yellow of bone poking out of a tear in its hide. An angry gash, between the struts of the stag’s ribcage, spurted blood in time with each beat of its ailing heart.
“My god, it’s still breathing.”
Helen’s voice at his ear shocked Mike from the quiet. He hadn’t even noticed her leave the car and join him. No sooner had she spoken than the deer trembled.
It’s cold, thought Mike. I’ll get a blanket from the car.
He wondered if it felt afraid. Wondered if it knew it was dying. He recalled the voices on the car radio, discussing sentience—
Of course they feel pain, of course they experience emotions like we do!
Mike swallowed dryly and wished he could somehow ask the stag. To know for sure if it felt and, if so, what it felt. But then he heard a death rattle emanating from between the creature’s bloodied teeth. The animal’s eye widened and fixed Mike with its gaze.
You did this, it seemed to say. You and your friends.
“What are we going to do?” Kay’s distraught wail pierced the silence.
Alex sighed, his expression grim. “We’ll have to walk if I can’t get the car running again,” he said.
Kay slumped to the ground, defeated. Alex wiped the tears from her eyes with his thumbs, then let her be.
Mike tore his gaze from the creature’s accusing eye and glanced across the loch.
“It’s a long walk,” Mike said.
“Yes, it fucking well is,” Alex replied. He was already on his way back to the 4x4.
Mike heard a torrent of further expletives as Alex wrenched open the bonnet, engulfed in steam from the engine cooling system. He approached the car to offer Alex a hand, eager to be away from the dead stag and its dark, accusing gaze. He felt something knock against his shoe and paused. Looking down, he thought it was a rock. But then he noticed the blood and stooped to pick it up. Roughly six inches in length, it was the curved, pointed tip of one of the stag’s antlers, bone yellow beneath the blood spatter. The shard felt warm and heavy in his hand. On instinct, he pulled a tissue from his pocket and wiped away the blood spots. Mike tucked the antler into his pocket and ambled over to the car.
Chapter Two
Daylight was fading by the time they reached the cottage. Alex had, with Mike’s help, patched up the coolant leak, but the 4x4 was on its last legs. The engine groaned its last as Alex steered the car into the narrow dirt track that led to the drystone perimeter wall.
“That’s us, thanks tae fuck,” Alex announced. He sat back in the driver’s seat for a moment and breathed a sigh of relief.
“Come on,” Helen said, reaching out and squeezing Kay’s shoulder over the seat. “I’ll help you with your things.”
Mike climbed out and stretched, clicking out the vertebrae in his neck. He looked over the rough, low wall at the cottage. It was exactly as he remembered it, though it had been several months since his and Alex’s last fishing vacation. The cottage was set back from the loch and built into the curve of the land. Constructed in the classic crofter’s style, the low building always looked to Mike like it was hunkering down, huddled away from the icy water just a few hundred meters away. The narrow windows of the ground floor reflected the d
arkness of the landscape, while the upper windows were mirrors to the dusky sky.
Mike craned his neck to try to see inside, but he knew the cottage would betray none of its mysteries until it was opened up. He took a deep breath of moist lochside air and caught the rich, bracken scent of an open fire. Glancing up at the roof, he noticed wisps of gray smoke billowing from the chimney stacks at either end of the cottage.
“Someone knew we were coming,” Mike said, nodding to the chimneys.
“It cannae be,” Alex replied. Then he, too, spied the smoke. He pushed open the gate and started up the winding, paved path to the front door of the cottage.
Mike watched as Alex tried the front door latch. It was locked. Alex then opened the combination lockbox that housed the front door key.
“Fucking key’s gone!” Alex cursed. “Hello?” Alex called through the letterbox. No answer came, save for the echo of his own voice.
Alex looked back at Mike, who saw his friend’s confusion. No one else was meant to be at the cottage. Though Alex’s parents rented it out sometimes, they had arranged that it would be theirs – and theirs only – for the week.
“Oh, no. It’s not double booked?” Helen asked.
This seemed to further trouble Alex, who darted around back, calling out again to whoever had lit the fire. Mike caught up to him and found him hammering on the back door with his fist. Mike peered in through one of the rear windows. The interior of the cottage was in darkness, save for a flicker of orange firelight from the hearth within.
“D’you think it’s squatters?” Mike asked.
“I hope not, for their sakes,” Alex seethed.
They both turned away from the rear of the cottage and made their way across the muddy yard, past a rusty, old brown Fiat Panda that sat half-covered by a tattered tarpaulin, and toward the outbuilding.
“Maybe we can get Meggie’s old banger running, at least,” Alex said.
His sister, Meggie, was a fine art undergraduate at Glasgow School of Art. Mike had happy memories of drinking and chatting with Alex and Meggie beneath the sloping roof of the wood store, watching the cloud formations over the landscape, during his previous visit. They passed the wood store, beyond which was a wicker enclosure for the bins and recycling boxes. Mike followed Alex’s path as he strode past these and arrived at the door to the outbuilding. Alex’s family used the structure as a studio space and for storage. Alex’s mother, Shona, was a keen painter, no doubt the source of Meggie’s artistic DNA, and Mike could just make out a half-finished canvas standing on an easel through the grimy windows.