by Adam Slater
Hunted
( The shadowing - 1 )
Adam Slater
Adam Slater
Hunted
Prologue
Rain drills the surface of the black canal. It’s too dark to see properly, but the girl can hear it. Ahead of her, the narrow footpath is nearly blocked with rubbish tipped over the motorway embankment. The girl doesn’t go any further. She’s waiting for someone.
This is a bad place.
She knows it in her bones. She doesn’t want to be here. Every nerve is telling her to run the other way. She peers ahead into the gloom, looks up at the dark windows of the warehouses, looks down in the gutter, looks over her shoulder. Her hands tingle as if they are on fire. She can’t shake the feeling there is something or someone watching her.
But she waits anyway.
*
It hungers, always.
It takes shape after shape as its own, and each body it puts on is as hungry as the last.
It crouches on slick tiles above the black canal. In the faint glow of the motorway lights, it can see the prey it has been seeking for the last three days. It makes the leap from slippery rooftop to wet street without a sound.
*
The rain is relentless: the thunder of it louder than the swish of invisible traffic passing high above. The girl shivers. Water is seeping down her neck. She pulls up the collar of her jacket and looks behind her again. Nothing there. She waits with hunched shoulders and wide eyes, straining to see in the dark.
The girl jumps when the silent shape comes towards her along the footpath. For a moment, instinct tells her to run. But then she sees the face. She gives a little cry of joy and relief.
‘You took long enough! What a place to meet!’
She holds out her hands as she steps forwards. It’s a face she loves, a face she’s missed. How long has it been? More than a year. But he’s here now. He’ll know what to do.
He holds his hands out to return her greeting as he approaches. They are nearly within touching distance before she can see him properly in the dim light. And then, in an instant of confusion, she realises something is not right. She knows the face, but not the eyes. She does not know the savage twist of the mouth, nor the hands that are growing black talons as they reach towards her. She does not know this creature wearing her friend’s face.
But she knows it has come to take her life.
The revelation is like a jolt of raw electricity, shocking her so much she can’t think straight. Her mind tells her to run, but her body can’t move. When she opens her mouth to scream, no sound comes out. At last, she manages to make one foot take a step backwards.
But by then it’s too late.
*
The Hunter looks down at its fallen quarry. The hunt is less satisfying when the prize is taken so easily.
It turns and walks away in its borrowed shape.
It is still hungry.
*
The girl lies by the black canal, her face turned upwards to the sky like a stargazer. But she will never see the stars again. Her eyes have been torn out. The rain fills the empty sockets until they brim over, spilling bloody tears down her cold, white cheeks.
Chapter 1
Callum Scott was miserable and cold. He sat hugging his rugby kitbag while he waited for his train, trying to ignore the ghost that stood beside him on the empty station platform.
The pale, blank figure didn’t surprise him. Callum had always been able to see ghosts. Lately they seemed to be everywhere he went.
Callum clutched his bag more tightly. The ghost couldn’t see him – they never could – but it still felt rude to stare. Even so, it was hard to take his eyes off the horrible figure.
It was a man, his body grey and insubstantial, as if it had been drawn in chalk on the empty air. He wore an army uniform that looked almost as old as the half-derelict Victorian station itself, but the jacket was tattered and frayed, and covered with dark stains. Through one gaping hole, Callum could see the wet glisten of torn skin and muscle, and the white gleam of exposed bone. Below his jacket, the soldier’s legs ended in ragged stumps just above the knee.
Callum shuddered. How had he lost them? In one of the wars? Falling under a train? Is that what killed him? Did he die down there on those very tracks?
These dark thoughts always seemed to fill Callum’s mind whenever the spirits were near him, but tonight he would have been gloomy enough without them. He’d missed his train home after an away match and now he was stuck with a long, cold wait. Callum shivered as the wind whistled and moaned around him. He willed the time to go faster.
At last he heard the modern Sprinter train coming down the line, all bright lights and noise. For an instant the ghost’s gaze seemed to meet Callum’s. Then it was gone, like a blown-out candle.
The train was crammed with tired, grumpy people coming home from work. But even though he had to stand wedged between elbows and shopping bags, Callum was glad of the human company. Already his stomach was tightly knotted at the thought of the long, lonely walk down the hill from Marlock station to Gran’s little cottage in Nether Marlock. Callum especially dreaded the stretch of woods by the abandoned stone shell of Nether Marlock church – the dead always seemed to gather there.
When the train reached his stop, Callum forced himself to set off down the hill, through the housing estate at the edge of town. It was getting dark and the wind seemed to whisper an unearthly warning. The streetlights were already on, their acid-yellow glow casting inky shadows up the driveways. There were never any spirits in the tidy front gardens of these houses, though. The estate was too new to have ghosts. Well, except the one house, halfway down, haunted by the little girl who had been run over by a post van – but she could be avoided by staying on the other side of the road.
Callum trudged from streetlamp to streetlamp, drawn to the pools of light. He walked slowly, putting off the moment when the row of lights would end, leaving him alone in the darkness of Marlock Wood.
Beyond the estate, the road continued on, narrowing to one track as it disappeared into the blackness beneath the trees. Hardly any cars used this stretch of road through the woods, and Callum cursed under his breath as he realised that his torch was still hanging on the back of his bedroom door. He normally packed it when he knew he was going to be walking home in the dark, but of course he hadn’t expected to be getting home so late tonight . . .
Callum glanced longingly over his shoulder, back at the well-lit street behind him. A car pulled out of a driveway and headed up the road towards Marlock, tail-lights glowing red.
‘Just get it over with!’ Callum muttered to himself.
Gritting his teeth, he stepped forward.
It was like stepping into another world. Beneath the trees, the night crowded in on him. He looked back again. The road was empty now. He edged forwards into the darkness, stepping off the end of the pavement and on to the old, crumbling tarmac.
When he looked over his shoulder a third time, Callum swore aloud to himself.
‘For God’s sake, stop it!’
There weren’t any ghosts back there. He knew that.
But every bone in his body was telling him that there was something. Something else.
Callum knew better than to doubt his instincts. He didn’t know why, but they were always right. Sometimes it felt like he had some kind of sixth sense that warned him about trouble and danger – his Luck, he called it. He walked on quickly, shivering. He couldn’t see anything now, neither on the narrow road in front of him, nor in the inky depths of Marlock Wood on each side. But he wasn’t alone on this ancient path, he was sure of it. Something was watching him. Somewhere in the dark. He didn’t know if it was good or bad, but it was there.
Far away, a l
ong and mournful howl rang out, swelling to a deep, throaty rumble, then fading to a low moan.
Callum froze. What the hell was that? It had to be a dog. The ghosts never made any noise at all, and this sound carried over the dark treetops like the deep chime of a bell. He shook his head and set off again, quickening his pace. Gran’s cottage was only a mile away. Fifteen minutes. Less, at the speed he was walking. But first he had to get past the overgrown lane that led to Nether Marlock church.
It was always the worst part of his journey. The lane was like a magnet for ghosts. Whenever Callum passed, they were there, drifting eerily through the darkness – long-dead parishioners making their way to prayers, just as they had done a hundred years ago, or four hundred, or more. One figure in a long black cloak always stood just beside the turning, as if waiting for someone. Callum had never been able to tell whether it was a man or a woman, because no matter where he stood, the sinister figure always had its back to him.
The bloodcurdling howl rang out again, closer this time.
Callum stared wildly through the trees, but he couldn’t work out which direction the sound was coming from. It seemed to curl all around him, like the thick darkness that was pressing down on him like a blanket. As the noise broke off, he doubled his pace. He walked head down, fast, nearly jogging. It wasn’t a good idea to run from a wild animal, right? Whatever was making a noise like that, Callum didn’t want to tempt it to chase him.
Now, at last, he was approaching Church Lane. Caught between a rock and a hard place. Between a known and an unknown terror. Taking a deep breath, Callum looked up.
The lane was empty.
Callum’s footsteps faltered. He’d never, ever passed this way, even in daylight, without seeing some sign of the dead. The sight of the ghosts had always been unsettling, but their strange and sudden absence was worse. There was no reason for it, no explanation. Unless . . .
Unless the ghosts had been scared off by something.
Callum swallowed, his throat dry. He didn’t want to think about what that something might be.
Ahead, through the trees, he could just see a pinprick of light. Home. Callum and his grandmother lived in the only inhabited cottage in a row of derelict alms houses, all that was left of the village of Nether Marlock. Everything else – the church, the old mill and all the other cottages – had been abandoned long ago.
Callum fixed his eyes on the warm, welcoming light beckoning from the house.
‘Come on, not far now,’ he encouraged himself.
As if in answer, a chilly wind sprang up around his feet, clutching at his legs with icy fingers. The wood was eerily quiet now. Nothing disturbed the perfect silence, other than the crunch of his own feet. And yet Callum could feel footsteps behind him. Soft, padding footsteps coming closer, closer . . .
He whirled round.
For an instant, he thought he saw something – a red gleam in the darkness. But whatever it was winked out so quickly, Callum couldn’t be sure it had really been there at all.
Every cell of his being screamed at him to run, but his body seemed unable to obey. Slowly, Callum backed away, his eyes wide in the darkness. He could feel the prickle as the hairs on the nape of his neck stood up. His Luck had been right – there was something there in the shadows.
Moving painstakingly slowly, Callum backed down the road. He was drenched with sweat, as if he had run a marathon rather than walked a couple of miles, but he felt freezing. He almost screamed when he felt his legs bump into something, before he realised that it was just the low brick wall that ran around the cottage garden. He’d made it. Almost.
Keeping his eyes fixed ahead of him, Callum scrambled backwards over the wall and up the garden path. The light over the small porch was on, shining like a beacon. He yanked the latch upwards but – oh, hell – the door was locked.
Callum tore off his backpack and scrabbled in the outer pocket for his key. His fingers felt numb. How did it get so cold? Without taking his eyes off the road, he slid the heavy, old-fashioned key into the lock, and turned it sharply.
The lock jammed.
It often did – the mechanism was old and stiff. It didn’t normally matter, but tonight Callum knew that every moment he was outside the cottage, he was vulnerable. Cursing under his breath, he turned his back on the road for a split second to jiggle the key in the lock. With a click, he heard it turn. As he pushed the door open, he glanced back over his shoulder – and his breath caught in his chest.
Just beyond the rails of the old picket gate, deep black against the darkness of the road, stood an indistinct animal shape. Callum couldn’t tell exactly what it was, but it was huge.
It wasn’t just the size of the creature that took his breath away, though, nor the red glow of its eyes floating in the darkness. It was the waves of icy air that seemed to flow from it, so cold they threatened to stop his heart. Callum didn’t need a lifetime’s experience of seeing ghosts to know that the creature was not of this world.
For a long moment, he stared at the phantom. What was it? And why was it following him? Then Gran’s voice called to him through the narrow gap in the door.
‘Callum? Is that you?’
For an instant, Callum turned to glance inside. When he turned back, the black shape at the gate had gone.
Chapter 2
Walking inside was like waking from a nightmare. Warm and familiar, Gran’s front room felt like the safest place on earth. A coal fire burned in the old-fashioned iron grate, and a bunch of brightly coloured rowan berries and hazel leaves had been arranged in a jar on the drop-leaf table at the bottom of the stairs. Piles of books covered every other available surface. A creaky radio-cassette player was bouncing quietly to a big-band beat, the worn tape hissing faintly in the background. Normally Callum hated Gran’s taste in music – it was at least half a century behind the times, along with pretty much everything else she liked – but tonight he was actually pleased to hear the familiar tootle of trumpets. He leaned back against the door, fighting for breath as sweat trickled down his face.
‘Callum!’ Gran gasped, looking up at him. Below her close-cropped grey hair, her clear blue eyes were tight with concern. She was curled in her favourite spot, a cracked leather armchair that fitted exactly into the space under the narrow stairs. In daylight, from the chair, you could see straight up the road into the heart of Marlock Wood. She often set up her easel there, splashing out watercolour paintings of the same scene in every possible weather and season. And keeping a sharp eye on the few people who came and went along the lonely road.
Callum fought to still his chattering teeth. ‘Hi, Gran.’
‘Callum, sit down!’ Gran uncurled herself from her chair and was at his side in a second. ‘You’re as white as a sheet! What’s wrong? Not that lad from school bothering you again?’
Callum shrugged off her concerned hands as she tried to take his jacket from him. ‘I’m not afraid of him!’ he replied quickly.
Gran steered him to the other armchair and made him sit. He hadn’t even taken off his boots.
‘Tell me what happened,’ she ordered in a voice of iron. She didn’t use that tone very often.
‘I don’t like that road at night,’ Callum said.
‘Well, at least you’re safe from traffic,’ said Gran. She looked at him sharply, like a ferret sniffing out a rabbit. ‘Did something frighten you?’
Callum shook his head. ‘A dog followed me, that’s all. It’s gone now. I don’t know where it came from.’
Gran gave a knowing nod. ‘Warren’s farm, maybe, on the other side of the wood. His dogs are always getting through the fence.’
‘Yeah, you’re probably right.’
Trust Gran to come up with a rational explanation. She’d never had any time for what she called ‘hocus-pocus’. But she hadn’t felt the eerie, freezing wind, nor seen the huge black shape that had appeared and then vanished at the gate. Callum didn’t know what it was, but he knew it hadn’t been a farmer’s d
og.
‘Well, thank goodness you’re home safe and the rain hasn’t come on yet. Listen to the wind rising out there. I was starting to worry! Trains late again, I suppose.’ Gran pointed to the grate. ‘Supper’s not ready, I’m afraid. I’m doing jacket potatoes in the fire and they take forever. Why don’t you have a bath? The water’s hot, I put it on an hour ago. I thought you’d need it after your match. Go on and fill the tub and I’ll fix you a drink to keep you going till the spuds are done.’
Callum smiled weakly. ‘Thanks, Gran.’
He stood up again, relieved that he was no longer shaking. He took off his coat and hung it on the narrow row of coat hooks by the door, and left his boots on the mat beneath. Gran’s cottage might be tiny, and the furniture old and battered, but she ran a tight ship. As long as everything is in its right place, there’s plenty of room, she liked to say.
While Gran set the kettle on the gas ring in the lean-to kitchen, Callum moved into the bathroom and began to fill the bath. Much as Gran’s fussing annoyed him sometimes, he loved this little house. One small sitting room, a miniature kitchen and a bathroom tacked on the back, two even tinier rooms upstairs: that was all there was to it. It was like a cocoon, small and safe. Callum had always loved it, even before it became his home. He wondered why he felt that way. Maybe it was because he knew his dad had grown up here too.
Callum ran the water scalding hot. Waiting for the tub to fill, he studied his face in the mirror for a moment, trying to see if there was anything in his own features that made him different from anyone else. But no, he looked pretty average: the broad cheekbones that Gran insisted were ‘dashing good looks’, smeared with mud from the match, and his tangled brown hair, too long and standing up at the back as usual. His face was a little anxious around the eyes, with a crease of worry between the eyebrows – but it was just a face. A normal face. Nothing to give away the fact that he was a freak who saw ghosts round every corner.
