“What?” I asked.
“In the darkness Ally started screaming, started to tear at herself, her clothes, and her hair. She jumped up, pushing off Isabel who was trying desperately to calm her, Craig too, and almost hurling them across the room. Her strength was superhuman, Craig said, but then he had been drinking. She continued to scratch at herself, to spit and snarl, and then she stopped. Started howling instead, falling to her knees, her hands covering her face, as if trying to protect herself, all the while screaming No! No! No!”
My teeth began to chatter. The room was like an icebox.
“It took almost all of them to drag Ally out of this room, every single one shitting themselves by now, unsure of what she’d seen but knowing she wasn’t playacting, that whatever was going on was genuine. They’d also had their own terrifying experiences to go by. As another boy said, Murdo, the air was like a firecracker, he could almost see it sizzling in front of him. They got Ally into one of the cars, three of them in the rear seats pinning her down and drove her back to her house. They were scared of what her mum and dad’s reaction would be, but they’d rather take a chance with that than stay at the lighthouse. By the time they got her home she’d calmed down… and I mean seriously calmed. She was virtually catatonic. Gradually the kids dispersed, some made their own way home, others wanted their parents to come and fetch them, and Ally’s mother obliged by calling them. They were shaken. They still are shaken. No one knows what happened here really, especially to Ally, and she’s not saying. Ness, tell me, what can you feel?”
“Something.”
“What kind of something?”
I looked around yet again; the darkness as thick as ever, the wind still moaning.
“Something that’s gone back into hiding, but not for long.”
Things like that never hide for long.
Thirteen Chapter Six
After several more minutes spent acclimatising, I reached a decision. If this thing was proving elusive, then perhaps there really was little point in hanging around further, especially as doubts had been planted in my mind as to the nature of what it actually was. I needed to find out more about the history of Minch Point – knowledge was armour too – and it’d be handy to have more light, daylight that is, to get a proper grip on where I was.
“Come on,” I said. “Tomorrow I’ll—”
The door that I’d asked Angus to leave open, slammed shut.
We both swung round to stare at it.
“It’s the wind,” Angus said finally.
“Not this time.”
“How do you know?”
“I’m a psychic, remember?”
Right then the tension in that room was mounting, like a rubber band being pulled tight at both ends, and bound to snap.
“First things first,” I decided. “Try the door.”
It must just yield, and if it did, we’d scarper.
No such luck.
“It’s stuck fast,” Angus said. “I don’t understand it. There’s no lock on it or anything.”
“Damn,” I muttered under my breath. There was nothing for it but to turn and face the darkness again. Bright light, Ness, visualise bright light. I had to surround both Angus and myself in it, head to toe. And stop being afraid. That was imperative. I mustn’t show fear. “Whoever you are, whatever you’re doing here, we mean no harm. We’ve come to help.”
“We?”
I shot Angus a glance, one meant to silence him.
“My name is Ness Patterson, I’m what’s called a psychic. I can see those that reside in the spirit world. If you’re trapped here, if you’re bewildered or you’re in pain, I’ll do my best to help. Communicate with me, tell me why you haven’t passed, why it is that you remain.”
Here’s the thing: it’s hard to know what to say to a grounded spirit – so often they’re wary, they’re terrified, they’re the ones that are afraid of us. I’ve witnessed other supposed psychics go steamrolling in, baiting them, blaming them almost for having the temerity to remain. They make no effort whatsoever to understand the reasons why. I’ve seen too how the spirit reacts, how it strikes out, plays to the gallery, no matter how unwittingly. I’ve seen it and I don’t like it. It doesn’t solve a thing. And so I’ve developed a different technique: to go in with light, love and understanding, to realise that fear is often at the bottom of the problem – no not often – it always is. Fear is key.
Whatever I was addressing showed no sign of responding.
“Please talk to me. Not out loud, I don’t mean that, I can hear thoughts well enough. Aren’t you lonely here? There’s no need to be. You’re spirit now, and that’s where you belong, in the spiritual world. Tell me, in the darkness, can you see a light? A bright light that is, like no light you’ve ever seen before, can you see it shining?”
No response, the tension still at breaking point, the wind around us as agitated as ever.
Perhaps what the entity needed was time to consider my words? That was okay, that was understandable. A two-way communication could take time.
With Angus still standing obediently beside me, I reiterated what I’d said previously.
“I really do want to help. I’m here for no other reason than that. I certainly don’t want to upset you. If you let us go, I’ll return – that’s a promise. I won’t abandon you.”
Exhaling, I turned to Angus. “Perhaps the door will open now.”
“I bloody hope so.”
He gave it a yank, but it refused to budge. He tried several more times. “It’s not moving,” he complained, just as it flew open. “Oh,” he exclaimed. “It’s not stuck anymore.”
Stuck? Surely he must have realised… Instead of contradicting him, I muttered “Good”, sighing in relief that my words had had an impact. I started to make my way over to the door. We’d be out of here soon enough and I could breathe again.
Breathe?
It was only when I realised my breath was caught in my throat that the visions started – so many of them; an assault, filling my mind, one after the other. Horrific visions. Images I couldn’t bear to see, but couldn’t escape either. It’s easy to shut your eyes, but your mind’s eye? I hadn’t learnt that trick yet. I was an easy target – a sitting duck. Whatever was in the room with us was having such fun. God, those visions, they made me quake in my boots. Torture, people, animals – children – being torn apart, mutilated – innocent things, vulnerable, their eyes wide open in terror, mouths screaming.
“Stop. Stop. STOP!”
I didn’t know what Angus was doing while this was happening, probably looking at me with that bemused expression of his. He couldn’t see what I could see. At least I didn’t think so.
“Angus,” I croaked, my voice sticking in my throat, “get out. We have to get out.”
“What is it, Ness? What’s happened?”
So he was oblivious. Thank goodness.
“Have to get out,” I croaked again.
“Aye, of course, the door’s open now.”
“Please, help.”
What I want is for him to drag me out. I can’t seem to move of my own accord.
“Angus!”
“Aye, lass, I’ve got you. It’s okay, I’m here.”
With his hand on my arm, he forced me forwards. These visions – when would they end?
Stop it! Please! Why are you doing this?
Mentally I implored, but whoever was responsible, wasn’t listening. On the contrary, it was as though they thrived on this sort of thing – the sick and the twisted. How could they? I don’t understand and I’m glad that I don’t. But seeing is torture too.
The threshold of the doorway is too far away, every step it takes to get there nothing less than agony. Come on, Angus! Come on. These visions are going to kill me. Why is it always the children that suffer the most? I’m sure my airways are on the verge of closing completely, that my heart will beat too fast, will buck like a wild horse. Angus!
I lashed out. Doesn’t he
know the pain I’m in? The fool!
“Hurry! I’ve told you to hurry!”
I want to hit him, hurt him, claw at him, and draw blood. Stupid man! Stupid, stupid, man!
“Ness, for God’s sake, calm down will you.” As my fist connected with his jaw he yelled out. “For Christ’s sake, what’s wrong with you?”
“I… I… GET ME OUT!”
His grasp on me tightening, he hurled us over the threshold, one hand releasing me temporarily so that he could close the door behind us.
“Come on.” His voice is a mixture of so many things, shock, fear and anger. “You can explain what’s just happened, why you attacked me, later.”
Looking into his eyes, I can’t see the colour of them in the darkness, but I can see how wide they are – probably as wide as my own.
Explain?
How do you explain hell?
* * *
“There now, there now, get this down you.”
Angus’s mother, Eilidh – pronounced Ay-lee I’d gathered listening to Angus referring to her previously – had tried to get me to drink a cup of tea, but I could barely hold the cup I was shaking so much. Having eyed me for a few seconds, she clearly thought something stronger was needed and handed me a tumbler of whisky instead.
“It’s Talisker of course, Skye’s own. My advice? Knock it back.”
I did as she suggested, the fiery liquid initially burning my throat and making my eyes water, but gradually giving way to a more pleasant smoky warmth, one I was grateful for – in the confines of Caitir’s room I thought I’d never be warm again.
I could feel Angus staring. He was sitting across the table from me, in a room full of chintz: his mother’s dining room. I could barely lift my eyes to meet his, but I had to.
“Angus,” I began, but then stopped. His jaw looked pretty bruised and there was a scratch under his left eye. “Oh God, I’m sorry, I’m so, so sorry.”
“What happened? Why’d you do it?”
His bewildered look made me feel even worse. Eilidh, I noticed, turned her gaze away, leaving it to us to sort out. I was grateful for that at least.
“Just before we left the bedroom I started to see things, terrible things.”
“Like what?”
I was curious. “Did you not see anything at all?”
“Just you, going ape.”
“I… well… yeah… They were visions…” I couldn’t bear to recall them, but somehow I had to try. “Terrible scenes of torture and degradation. Things I could never imagine, not in a million years. They just… flooded into my mind, one after the other.”
Eilidh was looking at me again. “Why?” she asked, as bewildered as any of us.
“I don’t know why,” I answered and it was true, I didn’t. I’d never dealt with anything like this before. “I think whatever’s there, it’s bad. It’s…” How could I say this? “It’s pure evil.”
“Pure evil?” Angus repeated. “Isn’t that something of a conundrum?”
A wry laugh escaped me. Yes, I supposed it was. “What I’m trying to say is, I think it’s some sort of—”
“Demon,” Eilidh finished. Her voice, the kind of voice you hoped belonged to a woman such as her, petite, in her early to mid-sixties, and so very homely, no longer sounded soft and sweet. The solemnness in it echoed my own.
Even so, hearing her actually say the word, I backtracked. “I don’t know whether it’s a demon or a spirit. If it is a spirit, it’s a very disturbed one. Eilidh, Angus, the history of that place, the ‘real’ history I mean, that only the islanders know, I have to find it out.”
“Aye, lass, you will, you will,” responded Eilidh, back to being homely again, “but not tonight. It’s rest you need. Now come on, away to bed with you. I’ll show you the way.”
Rising from my chair, I started to follow her, but not before offering a still perplexed Angus another apologetic smile. Thankfully he smiled as well.
“Sleep well,” he said.
“You too.”
Upstairs, on the narrow landing, one that was bathed in the warm glow of a sixty-watt bulb, Eilidh stood in front of my room, smiling too. “I’ve put a glass of water by your bedside. If you’d like me to leave the landing light on tonight, that’s fine, I can do that.”
I shook my head. “It’s okay; I don’t mind the dark normally.”
“Not you, no, but…” She stopped what she was saying and gave a little cough. “Well, you’ve a lamp in your room anyway, you can leave that on if you’ve a mind to.”
“Thanks,” I whispered, still staring at her as she turned and made her way back down the stairs.
I was curious. If it wasn’t me that’s afraid of the dark, who did she think might be?
Thirteen Chapter Seven
Still the images come. Even in sleep there’s no escape. They’re not as bad as when I was in Caitir’s room, they’re more diluted somehow and a part of me realises that I’m asleep – that this time it’s a dream, not real at all, and that at some point I’ll wake up. I’m trying so hard to wake up, to walk through the door that separates the world of dreams and reality, but every time I approach it, every time I get close, the door slams shut, traps me again.
I’m not going to be at the mercy of whatever’s causing this. I refuse to be.
I remind myself what I have to do: imagine white light, pure and impenetrable.
Pure?
Hadn’t I mentioned the word ‘pure’ earlier?
Pure evil.
Oh, the things I’d seen. Had Ally seen them too?
The things I was seeing…
Instruments of torture, ancient and rusted, forged in fire with the sole intention of causing pain. Agony, the screams and cries of all those that had ever been subjected to such instruments combining to form one single terrible sound that never faltered, that rang on and on and on. In the dream I hold my hands to my ears, attempting to drown that sound out, all the while knowing it’s in vain. I fear for my sanity – such images have the power to destroy you, they can leave you a gibbering wreck confined to a white-padded cell for the rest of your life, they’d torment you, ceaselessly, in the lonely reaches of the night, and during daylight hours too. Was the light strong enough to combat this?
Of course it is! The light is all-powerful.
But do I believe that, do I really?
If only I didn’t feel so alone.
You chose to be alone.
No, I didn’t, not like this.
I’ve got to wake up. I have to. This dream is dangerous. This dream will… change me. I’m vulnerable whilst asleep. I’m a victim, waiting to be devoured, to be swallowed whole.
I have to reach the door, just as I did before, although there’s no Angus to help me.
You attacked him!
Yes, I did, but I didn’t mean to. I didn’t even wholly realise… My hands just… struck out.
You lost control.
I shake my head. Control was taken from me – there’s a difference.
The door, Ness, focus on the door. I’m trying to, but what waits on the other side? More darkness?
It’s okay; I don’t mind the dark normally.
I’d also said that earlier. Who to? A mother. Not my mother. My mother’s dead.
Angus’s mother!
Of course, I’m getting so confused. It’s hard to think straight, to think at all.
I’m not afraid of the dark, but someone doesn’t like it; Eilidh was right about that.
No, no, no, I can’t think of her now. I mustn’t.
But her voice is suddenly all I can hear.
Ness, Ness, is that you?
I must wake up.
Ness, I don’t like the dark.
Pinching is supposed to wake a person up; I’ll try pinching my hand.
You know how I hate it.
Pinching harder, I’m clawing at my skin.
My dark isn’t like your dark. There are things in it.
My hand feels sticky. Wh
y is that? Is it because I’m bleeding?
I can’t see them, Ness, but I know they’re there. Just because you can’t see something, doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. These things, they wander round, looking for someone to latch onto. They’re relentless. They need constant feeding; they need nourishment.
There is blood; I’m covered in it. It’s dripping onto the floor, surrounding me, so much of it. Not dripping, it’s pouring.
If they see me, Ness, if they see you… Ness, please, don’t leave me alone in the dark.
I have to wake up! I have to!
I’m going mad trying to hide from them. If I had a name, an identity, it might be different, but I’ve neither. So I’m lost too, as lost as they are. Ness, what’s my name?
NESS!
Thirteen Chapter Eight
Sitting at the dining table with the morning’s post-storm light doing its utmost to brighten the room, my body is shaking as much as it ever did last night. Clearly this wasn’t lost on Eilidh, who was busy setting three places for breakfast.
“There’s no law against having a wee dram in the morning too, not in Scotland.”
“What? Oh, Eilidh, I’m sorry… no thanks.”
She waved her hand in the air. “Och, take no notice of me, I wasn’t being serious. Now, what would you like for breakfast? I’ve sausage, a lovely bit of bacon, black pudding—”
“Oh God, no.” I couldn’t help but grimace – after the visions, and the dream too, with helpless people treated as nothing but meat, the blood there’d been, there’s no way I’ll be able to eat what she’s offering. “I don’t mean to be rude. It’s not that I’m a vegetarian…”
Continuing to stare at me for a few moments, those grey-green eyes of hers so penetrating, her smile returned. “Scrambled eggs it is.”
“Thank you,” I muttered, intrigued again. It’s as if she knows the details behind my refusal. She doesn’t. She knows the bare minimum. If anything, she’s resisted being told.
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