by Wes Markin
The Killing Pit
A Jake Pettman Thriller by
Wes Markin
About the Author
Wes Markin is a hyperactive English teacher, who loves writing crime fiction with a twist of the macabre.
Born in 1978, Wes grew up in Manchester, UK. After graduating from Leeds University, he spent fifteen years as a teacher of English, and has taught in Thailand, Malaysia and China. Now as a teacher, writer, husband and father, he is currently living in Harrogate, UK.
Praise for One Last Prayer for the Rays
“An explosive and visceral debut with the most terrifying of killers. Wes Markin is a new name to watch out for in crime fiction, and I can’t wait to see more of DCI Yorke.” – Stephen Booth, Bestselling Crime Author
“A pool of blood, an abduction, swirling blizzards, a haunting mystery, yes, Wes Markin’s One Last Prayer for the Rays has all the makings of an absorbing thriller. I recommend that you give it a go.” – Alan Gibbons, Bestselling Author
By Wes Markin
DCI Yorke Thrillers
A Lesson in Crime
One Last Prayer for the Rays
The Repenting Serpent
The Silence of Severance
Rise of the Rays
Dance with the Reaper
Christmas with the Conduit
Jake Pettman Thrillers
The Killing Pit
Fire in Bone
Blue Falls
Details of how to claim your FREE
DCI Michael Yorke quick read, A Lesson in Crime,
can be found at the end of the book.
This story is a work of fiction. All names, characters, organizations, places, events and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to any persons, alive or dead, events or locals is entirely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2021 Wes Markin
First published: 2021
ISBN: 9798721034015
Imprint: Dark Heart Publishing
Edited by Brian Paone
Cover design by Cherie Foxley
All rights reserved.
No part of this book should be reproduced in any way without the express permission of the author.
For Carly and Warren
1
BLAKE THOMPSON DIDN’T want his family to die, but he knew there was very little he could do about it. They were already at the killing pit. He stared at his kidnapper.
Just like his father, Ayden MacLeoid had eyes which gave nothing away—hunter’s eyes.
“Please,” Blake said. “Whatever you think―”
One of the MacLeoid soldiers swung his Remington 700, and the butt stock set Blake’s world on fire.
He fell to his knees and tried to focus through the flames. He heard the yapping of dogs far in the distance, one of his sons weeping next to him, the snigger of one of the thugs, and God-knows-what shuffling in the pit behind him.
When the fire dissipated, Blake spat out a tooth. It wasn’t the first this evening. If anyone saw fit to look for him, they could follow his teeth like breadcrumbs to this dark hollow in the woods.
He glanced at his two trembling sons, Devin and Sean, on either side of him. On this cold April night, the wind blustered over the vast MacLeoid land before being slivered into spears by the branches of the twisted trees and their foliage. To say it was these spears that made his children quiver would be a falsehood. It was the yawning hole behind them and the armed thugs blocking their escape route that made them shake.
The kidnappers wore charcoal foam nose plugs. He recognized them because he’d used them before to dispose of animal carcasses in his own farmyard. Blake couldn’t smell the stench coming from the fifteen-foot circular pit behind him, because a Remington butt had smashed his nose back at his home. Beside him, Devin winced, while Sean had already vomited down his front.
One of the three soldiers—all mid-twenties, same as his sons—checked his watch. “It’s almost ten―”
“Shut up, Cole,” Ayden said, fixating on Blake.
Blake, a religious man, broke eye contact with the younger MacLeoid and looked for support from beyond the clear skies. He found none, and instead watched a flurry of birds draw dark veins on the full moon before lowering his eyes to earth and the present moment.
Jotham Quimby MacLeoid stepped from the woodland, wearing a deerstalker and a fur hunting jacket. A rifle was slung over one shoulder. He clutched the rifle strap with one hand to stop it from bouncing. The ends of his shoulder-length gray hair rose on the spears of wind and across his heavily bearded face. This farmer, like Blake, was also in his sixties. They’d been in the same class at school. Blake was aware this would entitle him to nothing.
Jotham’s son, Ayden, and his three soldiers shuffled backward to allow the property owner to walk between them and the three captives like a guard of honor. He kept his head down. After passing Devin, he stopped beside Blake, who was still on his knees, and turned to look down at him.
Blake looked up into eyes framed by rough, knotty skin. Familiar eyes. Hunter’s eyes.
Jotham had not opted for nose plugs.
Because his hands were lashed behind his back, Blake tried to use his shoulder to rub away the blood and spit running down his chin but failed. He wasn’t flexible enough. “Jo, I think there’s been a misunderstanding.”
Jotham removed a hand from the strap of his rifle, ran the palm of it down the front of his hunting jacket to dry it of sweat and placed it on Blake’s right shoulder. It was a strong grip but not one intended to cause pain and so seemed to carry the same meaning as a firm handshake. “Agreed.” Jotham squeezed Blake’s shoulder. “And we’re here to put it right. But first, I’m sorry. I didn’t expect them to treat you so badly.” He took his hand off Blake’s shoulder and eyed Ayden, who immediately looked away. “Seems it’s an evening of many misunderstandings.” When he turned back, he was smiling. His eyes narrowed, and his flesh wrinkled and swelled around them, but they continued to pierce. He opened his mouth to speak―
“We haven’t done anything,” Devin said, weeping. “We wouldn’t be that stupid.”
Blake glared at his son. “Devin, mind your manners.” Blake focused on Jotham. “I’m sorry, Jo. Youngsters these days, you know.”
Jotham shrugged. “It’s fine. I’m sure we spoke our minds back when, eh?”
Blake smiled. It was excruciating; they’d made a mess of his face. He nodded, forcing back the pain, sensing some hope in the rapport he was building with Jotham.
“Do you know why I chose to dig the pit here?” Jotham pointed down.
A shiver ran down Blake’s spine. No, not that infernal hole. Let’s discuss anything but that. He shook his head.
“I’ve a lot of land. Too much, I wonder. It’s hard to keep control of it all. There’s so much energy in nature.” He raised a finger, commanding their silence. He kept it there for a short time. “Can you hear it? Crackling?”
All Blake heard was the wind in the trees and the shuffling in the pit behind him, but he nodded, desperate to humor Jotham.
“Here is where it is strongest, Blake. The energy. Right here, where you kneel. Something about these trees.” He pointed at the branches reaching like long, gnarled fingers, beckoning to them. “So, this is where I came to take control. Have I chosen right, Blake?”
“Of course, Jo. No one questions your authority.”
Jotham brushed long hair from his eyes. One of his eyebrows was raised.
“No one,” Blake said.
Jotham smiled again. He took a long, deep breath through his nose. He looked as if he was enjoying the stench that was repulsing Devin and Sean. He stepped alongside Blake so he was on the edge of his pit.
Blake realized he could throw his weight against the old bastard and send him sprawling into his own hellhole. But then what? Face down four rifles? He felt Jotham’s hand on his shoulder again—firm and tight.
“If you answer this question now, Blake, only one of your beloved family has to go into the pit this evening.”
Blake felt as if an invisible hand had reached in and clutched his heart. “Jo, I … I―”
Jotham shushed him. “Only one, Blake. My gift to you. Remember the importance of control? Please take the amount of control I’m offering you.”
Blake opened his mouth to reply, but nothing came out, and before he knew it, Jotham was speaking again. “Your sons’ contributions have been light. Maybe it was only one of your little bastards, maybe it was both, but it’s up to you to set the record straight.” His hand remained clamped to Blake’s shoulder.
The farmer still had his mouth open. “I don’t know anything about this. Jo … please. This is the first I’ve heard of it!”
“Again, that maybe so … maybe, maybe. Look, Blake. Sometimes the actual truth can be irrelevant. But what is relevant is we have something to maintain the illusion. Without it, I could lose control. I could lose everything.”
“Jo, they’re good boys …” Tears formed in the corners of his eyes.
“Blake. If you give one of your sons to the pit and we restore equilibrium, you and your other son get to go home.”
“Dad,” Sean said, crying harder now and struggling to speak, “I didn’t do anything.”
My most gentle boy, Sean, always so sensitive. Your mother’s favourite.
“I didn’t skim either, Dad. He’s wrong. He’s got it so fucking wrong.”
And then there was Devin. Headstrong. A man always on fire. He looked between his two sons.
“I must press you for a choice, Blake. I have to get back. My dogs are expecting their supper.”
Blake glared up at Jotham. Gone was any attempt to build rapport, to humor him. The rumours were true. The bastard reserved whatever compassion he did possess for his dogs. “It was me,” Blake said, crying as hard as Sean now. “I forced them to do it. I told them to keep some back for us. These last couple years have been awful. The farm is—”
Jotham took his hand from Blake’s shoulder and stepped backward. “Make a choice.”
“It was me!” Blake’s voice rose as he spit a mixture of saliva, tears, and blood.
Jotham sighed. “That’s not an illusion I can sell.”
Blake looked between the long, pale faces of his two boys again. He wished he could embrace both, draw them tight against him. He loved his children so very much. “You can’t make me choose between my boys. You just can’t.”
“I respect that. I genuinely do.” Jotham nodded and raised his hand. “I also anticipated it.”
Two people emerged from the same patch of trees where Jotham had.
Blake recognized the taller of the two —Anthony Rogers. His dad owned the general store on Main Street. Anthony had helped on the Thompson farm a few years back before he’d taken up work with Jotham—a fate that now befell most of the youth in Blue Falls.
Anthony held the arm of a much smaller person. A burlap sack was over their head.
A child? Blake thought. Surely not a child? As they neared, Blake saw her familiar dirty gray jumper and muddy white Converse sneakers, and he felt his world turning in on itself. “No … no … It can’t …”
Then, her cries—the final confirmation it was Maddie, even before Anthony brought her close and removed the sack. Her mouth was taped, and her cheeks were streaked with black eyeliner. Her eyes met Blake’s, and she broke away from Anthony. She managed to make it all the way to her father before one of the other soldiers seized her arm and dragged her back again.
“Let go of my daughter!” Blake lurched forward on his knees. “She’s fifteen!”
Cole, another of the MacLeoid army, stepped forward and kicked Blake in the side, knocking all the air from his body.
He folded over, pressed his face to the cold soil and gasped for air.
“It may seem cruel, Blake, but smaller empires than this one were built on crueller acts,” Jotham said.
Taking another gulp of air, Blake sat upright. “Please … not my daughter … not my daughter, not my Maddie. She never hurt anyone! Please, Jo! I’ll give you anything!”
Jotham pushed back Blake’s damp, thinning hair. “There is nothing you can give me, Blake. I gave you the opportunity. I told you one of your family would go into the pit. You could have chosen.”
“I’ll choose then. Take one of my sons if you must! It’s their fault! But not her … Anyone but her!”
“But this suits me now, Blake. Don’t you see? It makes no sense to rewind the clock and change the outcome. The punishment is just, and I get to retain both of my mules.” Jotham turned to his son. “Ayden, the blade.”
Ayden shook his head.
“What?” Jotham said.
“Cole wants to this time.”
“I didn’t ask Cole.”
“I don’t mind, sir,” Cole said.
Jotham held up a finger in Cole’s direction without looking at him. He kept his eyes firmly on Ayden’s.
“Please, Father, let Cole. I don’t feel so―”
“Cole,” Jotham said without breaking eye contact. “Give my boy the blade.”
“Yes, sir.” Cole handed the hunting knife to Ayden.
“Now, Ayden …” Jotham paused to take a deep breath. “I want you to cut her.”
“Dad, I―”
“Cut. Her.”
Blake screamed from the ground and tried to get to his feet.
Another of Jotham’s men pressed him to the ground by his shoulders.
“Get your fucking hands off me!”
“Isaac, keep the rifles on the two brothers,” Jotham said.
“Yes, sir,” Isaac said, readying his rifle.
“Do something Devin! Sean! This is your sister!” Blake shouted.
“They’ll shoot us,” Devin said.
“Fucking cowards,” Blake said and writhed when he felt the soldier’s knee in his back, then he was pinned face down. He managed to raise his eyes to see Anthony still holding his trembling daughter, and Ayden was on his knees, holding her foot, with the serrated edge of the knife next to her heel.
Jotham said, “Slightly higher than last time. Less mess.”
When Ayden looked up at Jotham, Blake noticed Ayden’s hunter’s eyes were no more. They must have been for show. He was as scared as he was.
“Do it!”
Ayden sliced. Blood bubbled from her heel.
Maddie threw back her head. The wail rumbled deep inside her but never found the air because of the tape across her mouth. Her leg buckled, but Anthony held her upright.
“No! Stop … please!” Blake shouted.
Jotham looked at Anthony. “Throw her in.”
Anthony’s eyes widened. He looked down at Ayden kneeling.
“What are you looking at him for?” Jotham asked. “Throw her in.”
Blake pleaded. “Anthony … remember, you used to play with Maddie on the farm. You used to chase her around the barn―”
“Throw her in!” Jotham shouted.
Anthony swallowed. His Adam’s apple bobbed up and down. He threw her. There was a moment of silence and then a thump.
“Maddie …” Blake said, wanting to reach toward the pit but unable to because his hands were bound. “Maddie.” Tears streamed down his face. He pinned his face to the soil and squeezed his eyes shut. He heard his
daughter’s loud moaning from the pit. He heard the shuffling noises from earlier intensifying. He didn’t want to hear. He rocked his head from side to side, rubbing dirt into his face. But he could still hear.
Rustling, movement, moaning …
“No! God, no! My Maddie! What have you done?”
He could hear the bastard’s voice. The hot breath on the back of his neck was the only evidence that it wasn’t coming from within himself. “And now, Blake, we will take you home. But remember. The killing pit is always hungry. To anyone who asks, your daughter is out of town, now living with relatives. Should the story change, then we might just find ourselves back here … feeding the earth all over again.”
When the acoustic band started to ruin a Bryan Adams classic, Jake Pettman decided enough was enough. He finished his drink and winced. It was one of the worst IPAs he’d ever tasted.
“I’ll get that,” the barmaid who’d served him earlier said.
He put down the glass and kept his hand over the rim. “It’s fine. You’ve got your hands full.”
She smiled. “Wow. Have I stumbled upon a British gentleman?”
Jake nodded at the stack of glasses in her hand. “No. I just don’t want to end up in hospital.”
“Go on,” she said with another smile. “Let me impress you.”
He shrugged and took his hand off the glass.
She picked it up and added it to the stack.
He smiled. “Impressed. Now, can you juggle them on the way back?”
“If you want a show, there’s a band over there.”
“Is that what they are? I thought they were here to repair the instruments.”
“Don’t let old George hear you talking like that. He’s been playing here for as long as anyone can remember.”
“I guess if the customers could remember, they wouldn’t be here?”
She raised an eyebrow.
“Sorry, just being an idiot.”
