The Wolfstone Curse

by Justin Richards

  Peter hurried to catch up. “Sorry – did I do something wrong again?”

  She gave him a sympathetic look. “No. Something right.”

  Before long, the trees thinned out and the bare ground tufted with grass. Daylight broke through and they emerged into sudden sunshine.

  Carys pointed the way across the field to where Peter could see Wolfstone Manor in the distance. He could use that as a landmark to find the circle easily enough.

  “Thanks for walking with me,” Carys said.

  “Thanks for showing me the wolves.”

  “No problem.”

  “I’ll see you later, then.”

  She nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, you will.” Then she set off along the path that ran beside the hedgerow.

  “Weird,” Peter muttered. But good weird. Definitely good weird.

  So close to the manor, Peter couldn’t resist the urge to check the tower. He didn’t really believe he would see the girl again. He didn’t really believe he’d ever actually seen her in the first place. Maybe what he had heard was a howl from one of the wolves at the Lupine Sanctuary on the other side of the woods. But at the time he had been so sure…

  The windows of the tower were empty blanks. “Hello!” he called. He wasn’t really sure why, and his nervous, tentative voice was whipped away by the breeze. “Hello!” he called again, louder.

  There was a sound. Like someone knocking on a door to be let in… or to be let out.

  It was the wind – it had to be. Catching at one of the boards. Knocking it against a window frame.

  More knocks.

  Had to be the wind.

  Then silence.

  He jumped down from the raised terrace and made his way through the remains of a rose garden. The house loomed above him, casting its shadow over the stunted plants and overgrown paths. Peter emerged from the shade, crossing the angular shadow of the roofline.

  Once part of the shadow reminded him of the wolf that had stared back through the fence. The hint of a jawline, the shape of the head. One ear was standing upright, but where the other ear should be was a ragged stump.

  He looked back at the terrace. Up at the roof. But he couldn’t see what was making the shape.

  When he looked down at the ground again, the sun had dipped behind a cloud and the shadow was gone.

  “Do you think there could be someone trapped inside Wolfstone Manor?”

  Peter’s father looked at him. “What, you mean like a tramp or squatters?”

  Peter didn’t know what he meant. “I thought I heard noises from inside.” He wasn’t about to mention seeing a ghost-girl.

  “Probably something falling down. That whole place is about ready to collapse. You should keep well clear. Now come and look at this!”

  He led Peter over to where Mike was digging, on the far side of the circle. The stones glittered in the sunlight.

  “If the circle was complete, we’d be digging inside it,” Abby said.

  “One of us would,” Mike said. He was leaning heavily on a spade, his face streaked with mud.

  “Come on. You got to drive the digger.”

  “Forrest let us use one of the diggers from the construction site to scrape off the top layers,” Crichton explained. He jangled a large bunch of keys. “Must remember to give him these back, though I guess his construction manager will have spares.”

  “I doubt he’ll be needing them any time soon. And anyway, those probably are the spares,” Mike said. “Except – a bit like me – they’re only spare until some digging’s needed.”

  “Have you got down to the skeleton yet?” Professor Crichton asked, ignoring the sarcasm.

  “Just hit bone. Well, not hit – carefully uncovered.” He took out a packet of cigarettes, looked at them, then put them away again without taking one.

  “It’s all brush and trowel from now on,” Abby added. “Have you shown Peter the model?”

  Crichton’s iPad showed a three-dimensional model of the Wolfstone Circle built from digital photographs. Sitting in the Range Rover, he showed Peter how you could move around it, changing the perspective and viewpoint.

  “It’s just like being here,” Peter said. “But we are here, so what’s the point?”

  “We won’t always be here. This saves us trekking back from the university just to check a measurement or see how something looks.” Crichton adjusted some settings, and the view of the stones changed to night-time. A full moon shone across the circle.

  “That’s cool,” Peter admitted. “So you can check out the alignment of the sun and moon.”

  More adjustment filled the stones with bright colours – mainly blue, but with flecks of red and orange.

  “Composition. The orange is quartz, for example. The red is silver compounds. That’s mainly an extrapolation of Sir Gerald Swift’s analysis from the 1950s, so it’ll need refining. There’s a copy of his report on the department server.”

  “Fascinating.”

  Crichton smiled. “Liar. But you’ll like this… look.”

  The image changed again, this time showing a view of the stones from above.

  “You can see it’s half of an ellipse. It’s parabolic. There’s Wolfstone Manor, directly in line with the open end of the ellipse. Now, watch.”

  More stone faded into view, completing the flattened circle.

  Crichton switched back to a view inside the circle at ground level, with the missing stones there as well. “Now we can see how the circle looked when it was first built. We know where the missing stones were, though we haven’t found any geophysical evidence yet.”

  “Where did they go?” Peter wondered.

  Crichton switched off the iPad. “Probably taken for building, centuries ago. Maybe some of the oldest parts of the manor are built from them. There are reports of other standing stones that have gone too. Like the so-called Rogue Stone.”

  “Which was?”

  “Like its name suggests, it was just a single large stone, outside the circle. A long way outside, so possibly unconnected. Though one version of the legend suggests it was the remains of the poor enchanted Henry du Bois himself.”

  “And where was it?”

  “Over near the manor somewhere,” the professor said vaguely, pointing past where Mike and Abby were busy in the shallow pit.

  The outline of the skeleton was revealed, pale bone sticking out of the receding soil. Abby and Mike were cleaning it gently with paintbrushes. Peter knew from boring experience that the process would take for ever.

  “If it’s all right with you, I’ll head back to the pub,” Peter told them. “I want to check my email and Facebook. See you later.”

  There was a coach in the car park, and the bar was full of elderly tourists. From overheard snippets of conversation, they were fresh from a morning in Bath and heading for an afternoon and the theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon.

  So Peter decided to take refuge in his room. As he reached the stairs, he passed Mr Seymour.

  The man looked up, startled as Peter greeted him.

  “Sorry,” Peter said, and immediately cursed himself and wondered what Carys would say. “I just wondered if you could tell me the password for the wi-fi?”

  The grey-haired man stared at Peter without moving. His forehead was wrinkled into a frown. His pale eyes showed no sign of understanding.

  “So I can connect my laptop?” Peter offered. “Computer?”

  “Computer password,” the man said. His eyes flicked sideways, to the wall under the stairs. He stepped away from it. “I don’t know.”

  “Do I need to ask Mrs Seymour? Or Carys?”

  “I’ll tell them you need it.”

  Peter thanked him, but the man didn’t seem to hear. He was staring at the wall, and backing away. Abruptly, he turned and hurried back along the corridor.

  Peter hesitated at the foot of the stairs. Was the man ill? Old age taking its toll? Or maybe he was just awkward round strangers?

  He seemed frightened as w
ell. Not by Peter, but by whatever was on the wall under the stairs. But there was nothing there. Just a plain wood-panelled wall.

  Carys saw Peter look into the bar, hesitate, then leave again. She didn’t blame him. The place was busy and noisy today, and given the choice she’d rather not be in a room full of pensioners either. But then, she didn’t have a choice. She forced a smile and took another order for a cup of tea and a glass of sherry.

  Eventually the tour leader and the driver managed to herd all their charges out of the Red Fleece and back onto the coach. Relieved, Carys set about clearing the tables.

  “Password,” Mr Seymour growled in her ear as he helped.

  “I don’t think I need one just to get into the kitchen,” she told him.

  “Your boyfriend – he wants the computer password.”

  “He’s not…” There wasn’t any point in trying to tell him Peter wasn’t her boyfriend. So instead, she said, “Okay. I’ll go and tell him. Can you finish here?” They were almost done.

  Mr Seymour nodded and moved to the next table.

  She knew he hadn’t eaten, so Carys took Peter a ham roll. He called for her to come in as soon as she knocked. He was probably as bored here as she was, Carys thought.

  “And Grandad said you wanted the wi-fi password.”

  She took Peter’s laptop and typed in the network password.

  “What do you want to do on the internet?” she asked.

  “Just Facebook. Are you on? I’ll be your friend.”

  Was he mocking her? She didn’t really understand the boy – but maybe he was as straightforward as he seemed. “Thanks.”

  “I was going to Google those flowers too,” Peter went on. “Maiden’s tears or whatever they were called.”

  “That’s right. But actually, you could try looking under “wolf’s blight”. I doubt you’ll find much information on them though. Want some help?”

  She was surprised that he did. She kept her expression as neutral as possible. No way did she want him to know that the most exciting prospect on her social agenda was sitting in here with him, browsing the web. He must think she was so weird already.

  They sat together on the side of the bed, Peter holding the laptop. He finally found a short mention.

  The Vale of Wolfstone is an area of outstanding natural beauty. It is, for example, the natural habitat of that rarest of plants, maiden’s tears (also known locally as wolf’s blight) – which is noted for its healing and restorative properties as well being unique in that it flowers only in moonlight.

  There were other references too, but none of them said much more than this one.

  “You could make it a tourist attraction,” Peter suggested. “You know, advertise it. Moonlit tours of the car park.”

  “More coaches of OAPs dribbling their soup on the table,” Carys said. Her idea of hell. Best to move on… So she asked how the archaeology was going.

  “Slow and boring.”

  “Bit like here then,” she said before she could stop herself.

  But he smiled. The uppity David Forrest would have laughed at her, not with her. Pitying, not amused.

  “Dad’s got this computer model which is pretty clever though,” Peter said. “It can show the stones as they used to be, and you can even model the angle of the sun and phases of the moon.”

  “It’s full moon in a few days, anyway,” Carys said. “We’re on the cusp.”

  “Cusp of what?”

  Something else she didn’t want to get into. Why was she saying this stuff? She was usually so careful. But there was something about Peter that made her trust him – made her want to tell him about… “So, you going to be an archaeologist?” she asked. “Is that what you’re off to uni to study?”

  “I’m doing history. So I could be, but I doubt it.”

  “Aren’t historians just archaeologists who don’t like getting dirty?”

  He actually laughed at that. Carys laughed too. She felt more relaxed than she had for ages.

  And immediately she felt guilty. She should be helping Mum finish sorting the kitchen, and setting up for the evening. She checked her watch, hoping he wouldn’t think she was just bored.

  “Hey, I need to get back. The oldies have gone, but Mum”ll want help clearing up. And there’s a barrel that needs changing in the cellar. You okay?”

  “Dad mentioned some study of the composition of the stones. I might try and find that.”

  Carys stood up. “I’ll see you later, then.”

  “I’ll tell you if I find anything interesting.”

  “Yeah, because that’s so likely.”

  She grimaced as soon as she was out of the door. Why did she have to be so sarky? Peter was doing his best to be friendly. She must irritate the hell out of him.

  Peter was sorry that Carys had gone, but to be honest, he was surprised she’d stayed at all. He probably bored her out of her skull. Why couldn’t he talk about normal stuff? Trouble was, he didn’t know what to say or how to interest her.

  To take his mind off things, he went to the university website and found the archaeology department pages. Sure enough, the entry he was looking for was in the archived research section.

  The web page was headed Wolfstone Circle – Analysis of Composition. There was a short explanation, then a scanned page of typewritten material.

  The following is the page of summary results from Sir Gerald Swift’s Analysis of Composition study of a fragment of one of the stones in the Wolfstone Circle, October 1954.

  The fragment analysed was found to be granite, probably originating in North Cornwall. It has therefore been brought some significant distance to its current location in the Cotswolds. The composition of the stone is broadly as one would expect, although the stone fragment has an unusually high quartz content. It has been suggested that it is the quartz crystals that make the stones at Wolfstone appear to gleam or shimmer, particularly in moonlight.

  That is not the case.

  Small quartz crystals do indeed catch the light (from the sun or the moon, or any other light-source) and gleam. This phenomenon can be observed in most samples of granite.

  However, the peculiarly strong nature of the phenomenon in the Wolfstone sample is due to the presence of silver. While metallic silver does occur naturally as crystals, the silver in the sample examined is especially pure. In its crystalline state it seems to resonate, not unlike the quartz, possibly due to some symbiotic bonding between the crystals. The effect is to make the crystals shimmer, and thus appear to shine even more brightly.

  From observation at different times of the lunar cycle, this resonance is especially marked when the sample is subjected to high gravity waves. These are the waves that produce the tides, and which have in the past been supposed to affect the brain by resonating its fluid content. In short, the gravity waves produced by the moon. These waves wax and wane as the moon moves around the earth, and are particularly strong at the full moon – which is when the silver crystals will resonate, and therefore shine, the most.

  Peter skimmed through it, deciding that Carys would probably have been bored to tears if she’d stayed. At the bottom of the page there was a handwritten note. He had to zoom the image quite large to make it out. There was no way of knowing who had written it, and it could have been added at any time.

  Worth noting that silver was seen as a magical defence. Th is may be because of its very real medicinal properties. Silver is a powerful antimicrobial agent, only recently superseded by modern antibiotics. (Silver was used as late as WW1 to combat infection in wounded soldiers.) Silver has a toxic effect on some fungi and algae, as well as viruses and bacteria. Silver nitrate has now been replaced by silver sulphadiazine in prepared dressings, bandages and gels.

  Another search on “silver sulphadiazine” suggested that the handwritten note must have been written in the last twenty years. Peter also found an explanation of how silver fights infections.

  It is probably effective because in ioni
sed form (Ag+), silver forms strong molecular bonds with those elements the bacteria need to support their life. For example: sulphur, nitrogen, oxygen. Denied these, bacteria, for want of a better term, suffocate.

  Again, he thought Carys would find that boring as hell. But what would interest her?

  Without really thinking, he searched for “Sebastian Forrest”. He got back a load of hits. Most of them corporate news or links to websites of Forrest’s various companies. But halfway down the second page, a headline jumped out. Short, shocking and to the point.

  Millionaire’s Wife Brutally Killed

  He hardly dared click on the link. When he did, Peter could only read the first paragraph. No wonder David had reacted when Peter asked about his family. He felt sick.

  Katherine Forrest, wife of millionaire businessman Sebastian Forrest, was found dead in their Kensington flat yesterday morning. There has been no official statement on the cause of death, but it is understood that she suffered multiple lacerations and stab wounds in what unofficial sources are describing as “a frenzied attack”. Mr Forrest is currently out of the country and the couple’s two children are away at boarding school.

  The article was over five years old. Numbed, Peter closed the lid of the laptop. Then he opened it again – two children? David had said, “There’s just me and Dad now.”

  It didn’t take long to find a recent picture of the Forrester family. It showed the three of them arriving for the premiere of a film that Forrester had helped finance.

  Sebastian Forrest was instantly recognisable. Over his shoulder, David was grinning at the photographers. Beside him, looking less comfortable, was his sister – Annabelle, according to the caption. The photographer had got a good shot of her, even though she was furthest away. Peter guessed she was about sixteen, with long, fair hair tumbling down her back. Even in the small photo she was beautiful. Distinctive. Unforgettable.

  She was the girl he’d seen at the tower window of Wolfstone Manor.