by Matt Hilton
But what’s this?
Helicopter? Swooping from the heavens like Odin’s iron-wheeled chariot. Who is this that comes uninvited to the game?
Ah, I see now. Soldiers. With guns. And dogs.
Little matter. It is time.
I have decided.
Four of nine, I come for you now.
Wait!
Carter Bailey. Where are you going? Are you running away?
That’s all right. You may go. Our time can’t be now. Our time will come later.
Now it is Professor Hale’s time.
I have decided.
THIRTYONE
Trowhaem
Relaxing under a hot shower sounded like a good idea to Janet Hale. The mud and the grit, even the salt-laden sea air had permeated her clothing, everything. But that was the least of it. The stink of the dead man was clinging to her clothes and her hair like a gelatinous second skin. She could actually taste the foulness of the air she’d breathed making her want to retch. Odour, she knew, was particulate. She’d actually been breathing in the rotting cells of the dead man’s body. Motes of death were collected in the corners of her eyes, in her nostrils, and on her lips. Yes, a hot shower would be excellent. Plus a gallon of mouthwash and a round dozen tubes of toothpaste.
The problem being, in the caravan she used whilst living on site was the pokiest of cubicles that only played at being a shower room. To use the cubicle was a test of moral fortitude. Try banging your elbows, your hips, your head, as many times as she did without losing patience and swearing out loud like the most foul-mouthed of troopers.
As a concession to their comfort, the university had hired a cabin that they’d fitted out with shower cubicles that had been designed with adult humans in mind. It was a long walk from Janet’s caravan, but she’d grown used to the eyes on her as she crossed the shantytown in her dressing gown, weighted down by towels and bath products. The thought that there were strangers in the camp tonight gave her a moment’s pause, but her need to be clean outweighed the discomfort of a possible ogling from men in uniform. Under other circumstances, the thought of men in uniform might actually appeal to her sense of fantasy. But not tonight. Tonight she desired only to be clean.
Curtains closed, she stripped down to her underwear. She shrugged into her heavy bathrobe that came belted round the waist and with a hood that gave her the look of a medieval monk. She slipped into a pair of cut down Wellington boots. The camp wasn’t fit for walking around in anything less sturdy. She grabbed towels and the necessary cleaning products, pondering only seconds over a bottle of bleach from her kitchenette cupboard. Instead, she took her toothbrush and paste as normal.
She was heading for the door when the lights went out.
“Damn it!” she sighed. “Not again?”
Power cuts she was used to. It wasn’t the thought of darkness that bothered her. It was the thought that the water heater wouldn’t be working in the shower stalls. It was going to have to be the damn shower in the caravan. Hers ran off a gas burner rather than relying on the camp’s generators. She reached for a torch she kept as back up for just such emergencies as this. She found the drawer that housed the torch, rummaged inside it and pulled the torch free. She flicked the switch and weak yellow light played around the confines of the caravan.
Wind tickled her back.
She turned. Brought up the torch.
Saw the caravan door closing as if an errant breeze had plucked it open then shut it again. Furtively.
Her brows pinched.
“Hello? Is someone there?”
There was no reply.
Suddenly she was bothered by the dark. Her meagre torchlight only lent the shadows a deeper foreboding than logic could argue against. Her need to shower was no longer a consideration. She placed down her toiletries, clutched at the front of her gown.
“Hello?”
A creak. Like a solitary footfall on the step outside the door.
“Who’s there?” She tried to sound confident, but even she could hear the warble in her voice.
Another creak. This time from behind her. She jerked towards the noise, her torch beam bouncing on walls and ceiling. Nothing there. Only leaping phantoms given life by the torch. Quickly she spun. Something large had loomed at her shoulder. She was positive of it. But, no. There was nothing there. The door creaked open again. Was pushed to by whatever breeze had given it life.
Janet sighed. She shook her head at her foolishness.
“What is wrong with me?” It was the discovery of the dead man, of course. She could be forgiven for feeling jumpy tonight. He was the first murdered person she’d ever seen. It would be practically wrong not to feel jumpy.
Thankfully the generators chose that moment to stir back to life. The halogen strips on the ceiling flickered, strobing momentarily, then blazed to full strength.
Janet brayed a single laugh, sounding a tad manic. She clicked off the torch. Reached for her towels and stuff. She returned the torch to the drawer and headed for the door.
The lights went off again.
Disarmed, she gave a groan. Reached again for the torch.
And that was when the darkness snatched at her.
She felt a large arm wrap round her throat, lift and drag her off her feet. Before she could scream, a hand slapped hard over her mouth and she felt jagged nails rake her cheek. Her senses where filled by a sour stench as a face leaned in close to hers. Hot breath burned her eyes.
“It is time, Professor Hale.”
The voice was raw and dripping with mucus. As though the speaker was unused to speech, or was suffering a virulent and wasting disease of the larynx. The arm that encircled her and lifted her as though she was weightless had the power of a gorilla. The nails that raked her flesh were the claws of a beast. But these things failed to register with Janet. Horror placed a clamp on her mind.
She tried to scream again. The hand was enough to stifle her, but her body rebelled, and all she could issue was the faintest of squeaks. Her fingers were useless against the corded muscle squeezing her throat. Her heels may as well have been kicking at a tree trunk. In her ears laughter tolled.
“It is pointless fighting me,” the voice said. “I have chosen you. You are four of nine. I have decided.”
Janet’s next scream was no more effective than the first. She felt her throat tighten in reflex as panic surged within her. Air. She couldn’t get air. Her attempts at screaming were serving only to push out what little oxygen remained in her lungs. It was only seconds since she had been clutched in this monstrous embrace, but already a deeper blackness than the night draped over her vision. In contradiction, blinding white spots danced beneath her eyelids. Unless she did something fast she was going to be unconscious. Then she may as well simply give up.
But Janet’s parents hadn’t raised a quitter. You only had to ask Jonathon Connery if Janet was a fighter. The black eye she’d given him the fateful day she’d discovered his infidelity would convince most folk.
Sucking strength from some hidden reserve, Janet thrust back with both hands. She stiffened her fingers, drove them into her attacker’s eyes. She was vaguely conscious of leather-hard skin, pulled taut over ridges of bone. She dug deeper, finally feeling her nails scraping at less-resistant skin. A low growl stirred the hair clinging to her face, then the thing behind her pulled away, the arm round her throat loosening perceptively. Those self-defence classes she’d taken at university did hold some validity - even after all these years.
Trying to summon from distant memory what she should do next, she thrust back with an elbow, seeking her attacker’s diaphragm. Whenever she’d delivered this blow on the guys she’d partnered in class, they’d all folded over, winded and gasping for air. But all she found now was a body as tough as rhinoceros hide. Pain screamed through her elbow. It didn’t matter. Not after she’d won a small victory that allowed her to suck in some air. She battered back with her sore elbow a second time.
She may as well have been bea
ting on an asylum wall. Her elbows were inefficient against the tough body bearing down on her. However, her finger jab to the eyes must have caused some damage. If nothing else, her attacker wasn’t as intent on throttling the life from her. Didn’t mean she was in any better position than she had been seconds before, but it did mean she could breath again. And scream.
She did so with every atom of her being.
“Silence.”
Janet screamed again. Screamed at the indignity. Screamed in defiance.
Her attacker spun her, slapped her with the back of a hand.
Janet was thrown backwards. She felt weightless. Then she caromed off the caravan wall, her momentum sending her down to her hands and knees. Her head rang from the slap. She moaned. Looked up. Her attacker was an indistinct shape looming over her. Vaguely it was shaped like a man. But huge. Misshapen like the chimeras of Greek myth. Head too large and bristling with wiry hair and bony protrusions. Massive shoulders. Clawed fingers reminiscent in that split second only of a Hollywood-inspired monster, as though it wore Freddy Krueger’s claws.
Feeding off the terror of the haugbonde curse, only one word went through her mind: Skeklar. The devilish trow that the islanders warned did the hogboy’s bidding.
She didn’t believe in the Skeklar. It couldn’t possibly be true. The Skeklar was no more real than the bogeyman, the tooth fairy, or Santa Claus. The Skeklar did not exist. This shape-shifting demon that fed off the flesh of children was a figment of primitive superstition.
Which all went to prove that it couldn’t lift her from the floor and fling her bodily over one shoulder. It couldn’t throw open the caravan door and bound outside with her carried across its back like a sack of feathers. It couldn’t lope through the campsite with her face bumping against its knobby hip with each stride.
She must be caught in a hallucination. Yes, that had to be it. Or maybe a nightmare. Perhaps she’d returned to her caravan and fallen asleep. Her preparations for her shower had all been part of the dream; mundane everyday chores lulling her before the stress of the day finally took over and brought forth this monster.
She had experienced vivid dreams before. She had dreamt in colour. Had smelled odours, which she believed was very unusual. She had even felt mild discomfort. But never had she been trapped in a dream as real as this. Not where her pain was so intense. Or where she could taste the blood in her mouth, the swelling of her jaw where she’d been struck.
There were other details, too. She could feel the sharp pinprick of the Skeklar’s claws in her thighs. The rigid bones of its shoulder jabbing into her midriff. The hairs on its hip rubbing at the tender flesh of her face. And she could smell the stench of its hide clouding her senses.
It took these finer points to convince her.
This was no dream!
The Skeklar did exist.
And she was its victim.
When she screamed this time it wasn’t with the same righteous fury as before. This time it was one long wail of desperation.
Caravans and tents flashed by. Behind curtains and tent flaps, shadows moved against torch and lamplights. People energised by her screams were coming to investigate. Emboldened by this, Janet screamed again. From somewhere off to her right she heard an answering yell. A male voice, followed the baying of a dog.
The Skeklar slid to a halt. Swung side-to-side. Loped to the left. Directly ahead of them, Janet saw a tent flap lift and one of her male students - Terrence? - blinked in confusion. In that moment he couldn’t begin to understand what it was he was dealing with. For all he knew it was simply the latest of a long line of drunken pranks his fellows regularly engaged in. His mouth actually formed the beginnings of a smile. Then blank horror pasted his features.
Without stopping the Skeklar swiped at Terrence. There was no tempering of the blow as it had when it had struck Janet. This was a strike of full intention. Terrence’s head was whipped backwards, which gave Janet a full view of the gaping wound opening in his throat.
“Oh my god,” she yelped. Then her captor was beyond Terrence and leaping past his tent and all that Janet could see of her student was his twitching feet.
“Noooo…” Janet howled.
“Quiet,” the Skeklar grunted. To punctuate the command, it dug its fingers into her thigh. “Your screams will not help you. All they achieve is to bring others hurrying to their deaths. Continue to scream and I will be forced to kill them all.”
“Let me go,” Janet whimpered. “Please. Let me go.”
She did not scream. Did not want another death on her conscience. But neither did she want to die. More than anything she wanted to live. But who could protect her from this thing? No one could if she didn’t shout for help. No one except…
“Carter.”
The word whispered from her.
The Skeklar reacted like she’d screamed the word directly in his face.
He came to an abrupt halt. Threw her down at its feet. He remained wreathed in shadows but she could still detect the burning fury in its eyes.
“Forget Carter Bailey. He is useless to you. He is gone from here.”
Janet didn’t answer. Couldn’t. Didn’t even know why she’d spoken his name. Except that it had just felt like the correct thing to do. Like a child calling out to its mother in the night. Or like a lover caught in the throes of passion.
“If Carter Bailey was here, I would show you just how useless he is to you.”
Then the Skeklar grabbed her again.
Janet flinched. Not at the Skeklar’s reaching hand but at the black and tan blur that injected itself between them. The blur became a dog. A German Shepherd that leapt and clamped its jaws around the Skeklar’s forearm. The Skeklar reared back and the dog was lifted off all fours, suspended in mid air. The dog didn’t loosen its grip. It growled as it ground its teeth into the Skeklar’s arm. The Skeklar roared. It whipped its arm up and back, shaking the dog out of its flesh. The dog rolled on the floor, but immediately renewed its attack, snapping at the Skeklar’s legs. The Skeklar kicked out and the dog yowled as it was bowled over.
Janet knew the dog was badly hurt. Knew that the Skeklar would again grasp her. She kicked backwards on her haunches, scrambling through the dirt like a beetle. The Skeklar lunged at her, snatching at an ankle. Janet yelped, threw herself to one side. The Skeklar rounded on her, breath ragged in its throat.
Bang. Bang. Bang.
Gunfire.
Flashes lighting up the creature’s face as it lurched back from her. A strobe effect that showed its leathery countenance and tusked teeth: Halloween mask ugly.
“Armed police,” someone shouted. “Do not move or I will shoot.”
Finding her voice, Janet screamed. “Help me.”
“Armed police.”
Another dog barked.
Three more warning shots went into the sky. Not exactly procedure. But what does an armed officer do when confronted with the unbelievable?
All around Janet there was movement. Others racing to the scene. Police. Navy. Archaeologists who had no right - or sane - reason to be there. All that was missing was the Seventh Cavalry and the tableau would be complete.
Behind her a woman screamed. Someone had discovered Terrence. Janet wanted to scream, too. She looked for the Skeklar.
It was gone.
Instead of screaming she wept.
She wept for Terrence. But most of all she wept for herself.
THIRTYTWO
The moor above Trowhaem
Intuition is a fine commodity. You don’t need to be a cosmic star child, a seer or a psychic medium. All you require is the flood of adrenaline into your veins and your perception of impending danger grows tenfold. The old fight or flight response kicks in and you begin to notice things that wouldn’t normally impinge on your conscious mind. Running across a moor in the dark is never a good idea. Tufts of grass, sinkholes and ditches all conspire to bring you down. But in my heightened state I negotiated all the pitfalls of a headlong r
un with preternatural agility. I ran with my arms pumping, swerving and jumping, making ground in a fashion I would never have credited before.
I can’t remember the last time I ran at any speed; probably when I’d hurtled out of my office at Rezpect Sports that day my entire universe fell apart. Surprisingly I was in better shape than I should’ve been. I ran half-a-mile at almost full sprint without losing my breath. My heart was racing, yes. But this was more down to my anxiousness in reaching Janet than down to the exertion.
I’d abandoned the road a good way back, electing for the direct route to the archeologists’ campsite across the moor. Now I was racing up the rise in the land that marked the promontory that formed the bay. The abandoned Viking port was to my right, the shantytown to my left. Ahead was a craggy formation of rocks that loomed against the nighttime sky like the spiked crown of a prince of hell.
It made sense that I didn’t hurtle headlong into the camp. Chances were I’d be caught up in the confusion and shot at as an interloper before I could explain my presence there. I chose instead to climb amid the crags and reconnoiter the scene below before making my move.
Fortuitous that I did. There were a large number of armed men in the area. Confusion continued its reign, but at least the shooting had stopped. Most of the activity was to the extreme left of the camp, and I could see uniformed men fanning out across the moor with torches dancing through the shadows. A couple of them had leashed dogs and they had taken up pole position on the hunters. The dogs didn’t seem that enthusiastic for the search, or maybe they were confused. They spent more time looking back at their handlers than forging ahead. I could hear their whimpering from where I leaned against a boulder.
Over on a grassy swathe near to the cliffs over the sea, lights were blinking on the helicopter, the rotor blades sweeping slowly. The engine was building to a high pitch, and I guessed it would be less than a minute before the helicopter joined in whatever search was kicking off. Even as I considered this men headed towards the copter, each doing a duck walk with an arm shielding their faces from the down draught.