The Plague Stones

by James Brogden

  Then she heard the door to the anteroom open and Toby’s voice: ‘I was wondering when you’d get here.’

  Trish whirled away from the window. ‘Toby!’ she shrieked. ‘Get out!’ She would have rushed to shove him out of the room except that Hester was between them, and the dead girl’s presence was an impassable barrier.

  ‘It’s okay, Mum, I’ve got this,’ he replied. It was plain that he was terrified, but he kept his eyes locked on Hester. Got this? By what measure of suicidal insanity could he be said to have got this? While she stood with her mouth hanging open, her son was addressing their enemy.

  ‘I want to offer you a deal,’ he said.

  ‘No deals,’ Hester whispered. ‘No bargains. No pacts. You have nothing I want, save for your deaths.’

  ‘You want what Nash has,’ Toby countered. ‘Or you want it gone, at least, and I know you can’t or won’t take it from him. Raj told me everything.’

  Hester’s face contorted with disgust.

  ‘I’ll take his place,’ Toby continued. ‘I’ll find whatever this thing is and get rid of it.’

  Hester cocked Her head. If?

  ‘You leave my mother alone.’

  ‘No!’ Trish screamed. ‘Toby, you will not agree to do anything for Her! I need you here! I can’t lose you too!’

  ‘Mum,’ he said, in a tone she’d never heard before – the voice of the man he might become one day, if he survived this. ‘Please, shut up. I know what I’m doing.’ He turned back to Hester. ‘What do you say?’

  She frowned, considering. Then gave a curt, reluctant nod.

  When the duty nurse came to see what all the shouting was about, she found Trish curled up in a sobbing ball against the wall below the observation window, in an otherwise empty room.

  37

  BADASS MOTHERFUCKER

  STRIPS OF POLICE TAPE FLUTTERED FROM THE doorway of Lot 9 like the discarded streamers from an autumn village fete, and dim yellow light glowed from the empty sockets of its windows. Toby knew he shouldn’t have been surprised that this was where Nash had gone to ground, but he thought that the man would have chosen somewhere with a few more creature comforts to wait out the end of his world.

  Hester remained unseen, but he felt Her presence around him all the same, like a shiver that wouldn’t stop. He couldn’t recall exactly how they’d got here, and he didn’t want to.

  While it had been easy enough to sneak out of the busy hospital ward, he had no idea how he was going to steal the pilgrim badge off Nash. He thought about waiting until the man was asleep and trying to steal it off him. He thought about luring him out and smacking him over the head with something, and even went so far as to find a piece of scaffolding pipe – two feet of heavy steel which fit nicely in his palm. He thought about calling the police and making up some story about being abducted so that the cops would take the badge from him along with the rest of his belongings when they threw him in a cell. He thought of a lot of different things, each as implausible as the other.

  ‘Fuck it,’ he said finally, and walked in through the front door.

  The light came from a battery-powered lantern, which had been set up on a small tower of bricks in one of the empty rooms. Nash was wearing a woollen beanie and a thick down jacket against the chill, and he was in the process of jumping up from a folding camp chair in front of a kettle on a gas stove. Over the top of the jacket hung a small metal pendant, gleaming and flashing in the light of the lantern as he moved.

  ‘Jesus Christ, Toby Feenan!’ Nash barked. ‘You scared the shit out of me!’

  ‘I’m sorry!’ said Toby, hoping that he sounded surprised to see Nash here. ‘I saw the light and I didn’t know who it was. I thought it might have been Her.’

  ‘What? Making a cup of tea? Don’t be obtuse. What are you doing here?’

  He didn’t have to feign his distress and anger in answering this one. ‘She’s killing everyone, and my mother’s next. I thought, I don’t know, I have nothing to lose by coming here and begging Her to stop.’

  ‘Where are they – your parents?’

  ‘Dad’s really sick in hospital. Mum’s looking after him.’

  ‘Oh. What about the others?’

  ‘The last I saw they were holed up in Ms Markes’ flat, but I haven’t heard anything since we took Dad to A&E. We think Reverend Joyce is dead.’

  ‘Ah.’ Nash lowered himself into the camping chair again, hands in the pockets of his jacket. Although the June evening wasn’t especially cold, there was a chill in this half-built house that came from something more than just being surrounded by bare concrete. Nash glanced down at the length of scaffolding pipe that was still in his hand. ‘You plan on doing something with that?’ he asked carefully.

  ‘What? Oh, no, sorry.’ Toby laid the pipe on the floor, close to his foot. ‘So what are you doing here? This isn’t exactly the kind of place I expected to find you.’

  ‘How the mighty have fallen, eh? Don’t worry, this is just temporary. Just until things die down.’

  ‘Things. People, you mean.’

  Nash shrugged. ‘If you like. Fancy a brew?’ He set out two tin mugs and produced a packet of biscuits from a rucksack against the wall. The kettle was starting to hiss as the water in it approached boiling.

  ‘But you could hide out anywhere,’ Toby pointed out. ‘You’re here for a reason. It’s to do with Her, isn’t it?’

  ‘Huh,’ Nash snorted. ‘Everything’s to do with Her. But you’re right, sharp little soul that you are. She needs to learn Her place. Specifically She needs to learn that Her place is now my place.’ He took one hand out of a pocket to stroke the shining pendant.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Oh cut the bullshit,’ Nash sneered. ‘You know exactly what it is, and I know exactly why you’re here.’

  Toby picked up the pipe again. ‘I’m only here for my mum. I don’t want to hurt you.’

  ‘Yeah you do.’

  Toby thought about this. ‘Actually yes, I do. Maya and her family died because of you. The Trustees are dying and you’ve found something that could help but you’re sitting here nice and safe until “things die down”. Yes. I want to fucking hurt you. Even if you get away with it, what do you think will happen? You can’t keep this a secret. The Deliverance Ministry are going to be very interested in what you’ve found. They’re not going to let you keep it.’

  Nash snorted contemptuously. ‘Deliverance Ministry my left bollock. Do you know why the Deliverance Ministry always reconsecrated the stones after each time that She managed to break through and kill everyone? Why they put another group of Trustees’ lives at risk? We’re bait, boy, nothing but fucking bait. If you’ve got a wild tiger prowling around your town and you can’t get rid of it, the next best thing is you give it a nice distraction to play with. The Trust is nothing but a goat tied to a stake in the woods to keep the tiger away from town, and that’s all we’ve ever been, for six hundred years. Except now, because of this,’ he stroked the pendant again, ‘everything’s changed. She had Her lair and Her prey, but now Her prey are all dead, or as good as, and She can’t come back to Her lair. So what does She do now?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Neither do I!’ Nash laughed, his eyes bright with glee. ‘Maybe She’ll just give up and disappear. My best guess is that She’ll still try to come for me, but won’t be able to because of this.’ He waved the badge. ‘If the village is run by just one person from now on, and that one person wears this, nobody ever needs to get hurt again. But who knows? Maybe She’ll go absolutely batshit and kill everyone. It’s going to be interesting either way.’

  Toby shook his head, more awestruck than angry. ‘You really are a complete psycho, aren’t you?’

  Nash’s laughter vanished as quickly as it had appeared. ‘And you really are an arrogant little shit, aren’t you? Look at you, swinging that pipe around like you think you’re going to do something with it. Think you’re a badass now?’ He laughed, his
mockery scorching. ‘I hope you’ve got your inhaler with you this time…’

  Toby didn’t hear whatever it was that Nash said after that because his head was suddenly ringing and the world was tipping in lazy circles around him like a drunk carousel. I will fuck you up in ways you can’t imagine.

  He tottered backwards, eyes wide. ‘You…!’

  Nash stopped in mid-flow and frowned at Toby as if he genuinely had no idea what had just happened. ‘What?’

  Toby could barely speak. It felt like someone had punched him hard in the guts. The ringing was getting louder. ‘You were Green Skull!’ he gasped.

  Nash’s laugh was genuine this time, huge and rolling. ‘Oh and there you go,’ he said, wiping his eyes. ‘Just when I think you’re too clever for your own good you go and say something asinine like that, just like your father. Of course I wasn’t your dreaded Green Skull!’ He shrugged. ‘That was just some thug I paid, but he did bring me back a very accurate report.’

  ‘But… why…’

  Nash sighed, as if having to explain something idiotically obvious. ‘Because your wonderful mummy and daddy were fucking cowards, that’s why, and they needed a push. They were given every incentive, every possible reason for leaving that shitty little rat-hole of a flat and their shitty little zero-hours jobs, and taking up a life with some actual meaning. But no. It was all, “we’re not sure if it’s the right move for our son”, so I made it the right move for them. You were never in any actual danger. If you think about it I’ve actually done you a favour. Look at you now, every inch the badass—’

  ‘Stop saying that—!’ Toby threw himself at Nash. All through his speech the ringing in Toby’s ears had been getting louder, just like when he’d punched Rajko, and shoved George Cox’s head through the classroom window, and every one of the other times he’d been unable to stop himself flying into a rage since the break-in. Correction: since Nash’s thug had broken in. ‘You put this in me!’ he screamed, swinging wildly with the scaffolding pipe.

  Nash was older and outweighed him considerably, but had obviously been prepared for intruders of some kind because he stepped smartly away, knocking over the folding chair, and pulled from the pocket of his down jacket a small, black, torch-like object. He thrust it at Toby just as Toby brought the pipe down and the two connected. There was a loud crack and a bright blue flash, and Toby felt the pipe smashed out of his hands as if he’d struck solid concrete, the blow numbing his arms to the shoulder and making him fall backwards onto his arse with a thump that jarred his coccyx and made his teeth snap shut.

  Nash advanced on him. He was shaking his hand as if it had been stung. ‘No,’ he said. ‘No, I didn’t put anything in you. It was already there, thanks to Daddy dearest. What you have to understand, boy, is that at the end of the day we’re all just puppets, dancing to the same tunes that our daddies did, and their daddies before them. Someone else is always pulling the strings.’ He reached for Toby with the Taser again.

  The only thing that was within reach was the kettle on the gas hob by his feet. He hooked out with his left foot, kicking the kettle towards Nash so that its lid fell off and near-boiling water splashed over Nash’s ankles. A hissing cloud of steam flew up and Nash danced away, screaming. Toby levered himself to his knees with arms that were no more than jelly filled with pins and needles, but managed to exert enough control over his hands to pick up the camping stove. It was one of those low, blocky square stoves which had a single hob and a compartment down the side to slot a butane canister – low and solid enough that it hadn’t toppled over when he’d kicked the kettle, and still burning with a fierce blue flame. Nash was coming for him again, bellowing, so he raised the stove with the flame burning out in front and slammed it into Nash’s stomach.

  The polyester covering of his jacket melted instantaneously and caught fire. It was obviously too well designed to go up in flames completely, but Nash screamed and batted in panic at the patch of localised burning, smearing molten plastic all over his hands, which made him scream even more shrilly. Toby dropped the stove and reached in close, choking on the stench of burnt plastic and human flesh, grabbed the cord which held the pilgrim badge, and yanked it free with a snap.

  He stumbled to the other side of the room. Nash fell to his knees, moaning, scrubbing his hands on the concrete floor to scrape off the plastic. The battery lantern was knocked from its pile of bricks and rolled across the ground, casting shadows that swooped and pitched like the wings of some vast beast flying low overhead, and out of the rolling billows of darkness stepped Hester Attlowe and the murdered villagers of Clegeham. They stood close about Nash, with their scythes and pitchforks and billhooks.

  ‘Please,’ Nash sobbed. ‘Toby, help me! You can’t let them do this!’

  Hester turned and looked quizzically at Toby, inviting him to stay and watch.

  Clutching the pilgrim badge, Toby ran from the house.

  38

  WHAT WE INVITE IN

  HE RAN HOME TO STONE COTTAGE THROUGH A neighbourhood which didn’t seem to know that it was dying. He saw ordinary people going about their lives – heading out to the pub for a drink with friends or coming back from meals with loved ones, dressed up or dressed down, going to corner stores, walking dogs, riding bikes, jogging. There were kids still sitting under trees at the Rec as he ran past, aching to stop and warn them of the plague that was brewing but knowing exactly how he would have looked. How many of them had Rajko passed it on to? Where had She infected him and how long ago? This was how it began, he realised, right at the start. Not with ambulances in the streets and soldiers in hazmat suits and machine guns. It began with people feeling a bit under the weather, certain that it was just a summer cold, or at worst a touch of the flu. They would take over-the-counter remedies which would mask the worst of the symptoms so they could get an early night, and sleep through the hours while the Yersinia pestis bacteria raged through their lymphatic systems so that by the time they woke up they were already in need of hospitalisation. And even then they would make the best of it, put on a stiff upper lip, call in sick to work but not want to visit the doctor because it was just a case of flu after all, wasn’t it, and all the advice they were given was to stay at home to avoid infecting their neighbours in the waiting room. Nobody wanted to trouble the Accident and Emergency departments because there were so few of them nowadays and they were so understaffed and there were bound to be people worse off than themselves and the doctors would just send them home anyway. And by the time that they started vomiting blood, and the buboes were huge and hard in their throats, armpits, and groins, and patches of their skin were starting to blacken with gangrene and somebody finally called for an ambulance, the emergency system would be so overwhelmed that they’d begin to die in their homes.

  He didn’t sprint, as an asthma attack now would delay him catastrophically; he took it easy, or as easy as he dared, and texted his mum as he ran: Am at home. Plz can u come get me? His phone started buzzing immediately but he ignored her attempts to call him because then he’d have to explain what had happened, and he wasn’t up to that yet. He didn’t know how long he had. If Hester’s bloodlust blinded Her to the fact that Toby still had the pilgrim badge, and if She took Her time over Nash, and if She decided to chase him rather than go straight for his mother…

  He couldn’t do anything about ifs. All he could do was try to ignore the growing tightness in his chest, and run.

  * * *

  He stumbled through the gate of Stone Cottage, clutching a runner’s stitch in his side and wheezing. The house was still locked but there hadn’t been time to arrange for the broken windows to be boarded up yet, so he climbed in through the study window and headed for the upstairs bathroom. His spare inhaler was in the medicine cabinet and he jammed a couple of puffs with trembling hands. When his breathing had steadied he went back down to the kitchen. The floor was littered with cutlery and smashed crockery and glass, but there were still plenty of the things he needed, and h
e hurriedly set them out on the table.

  Waiting was torture. He paced the house, went up to his room and looked at his books, his posters, his games. It was like a different world now.

  A few minutes later he heard tyres crunching on the gravel of the drive and saw headlights washing the side of the house. He ran downstairs as the front door opened with a jingling of keys and his mother calling out, ‘Toby? Toby, are you here?’

  ‘I’m here!’ he called. ‘I’m okay!’

  ‘Oh thank God!’

  They met in the hall and she gathered him up in a rib-crushing hug, sobbing with relief into his shoulder. ‘Don’t you ever…’ she said. ‘Don’t you ever…’ Then she pulled away, taking him by the hand. ‘There’s a taxi waiting outside. Come on, let’s get you back.’

  ‘No,’ he said, and took his hand back. ‘It’s not finished.’

  ‘What do you mean it’s not finished? Toby, we are going back to the hospital now, to be by your father’s bedside. You can tell me all about everything that happened on the way.’

  Toby retreated down the hallway. ‘I’m sorry, but I don’t have time to explain,’ he said. ‘We have to do this now. I can’t risk Her getting here before.’

  ‘What are you talking about? Before what?’

  ‘Before I’ve invited Her. Don’t worry, She can’t hurt us if She accepts an invitation. If She lets Herself in it won’t work.’ He went into the kitchen.

  ‘Toby!’ She hurried after him, but by the time she caught up he’d already started.

  ‘Hester Attlowe!’ he called. ‘I invite you into my home, to be honoured as my guest, to eat at my table and to rest beneath my roof!’

  ‘Toby, what in God’s name are you doing?!’

  He ignored her and called again. ‘Hester Attlowe! I invite you into my home, to be honoured as my guest, to eat at my table and to rest beneath my roof!’

  His mother seized him by the shoulders and shook him. ‘Stop it!’ she yelled.