by Jenna Grey
Finn let out a terrifying scream of rage, the sound of a wounded animal. Bert laid a hand on Finn’s back and rubbed around in circles as if comforting a small child.
“I keep thinking that this is my fault,” Polly said. “If I hadn’t come to you and Bert, dragged you into my problems, this would never have happened.”
Finn looked horrified.
“Don’t you ever say that! This fight is an old one, started fifteen years ago when Winchard came to Dad, asking him to find the stone. You just stumbled into it. You are not to blame for any of this – two people need to pay for this, and dear God, we are going to make them pay!”
Polly was trying to stay calm, to be strong, but her mind was a wasteland of thoughts and feelings. She realised she was shaking violently and knew that shock had set in. Bert went and got a blanket for her, wrapping it around her shoulders and hugging her.
“You need it more than I do,” Polly said, trying to pull it off and give it back to Bert. He waved a hand at her.
“Please, allow an old man some dignity. You wrap that around you and go and sit in the car. There’s nothing you can do here.”
“What are you going to do?” she asked. “I mean are we going to take Bram’s body back? We can’t go to the police with something like this; they’d lock us all up in a psychiatric unit.”
Finn looked as if he was going to be sick again.
“No, we can’t. We’ll have to bury him out here and make up some story to account for his disappearance. He doesn’t have any family, so they’ll be no-one to miss him.” Polly was quite sure that Finn didn’t mean it to come out the way it had. She knew that Finn loved Bram as much as Bert did.
“You and Bert will miss him,” Polly mumbled. She would miss him.
Finn began to cry, hot tears spilling down his cheeks and he sank to the ground, sobbing uncontrollably. Polly knelt beside him, trying to comfort him, but there was no comfort for any of them. She wanted to cry, wanted to howl, but she couldn’t. Finn finally pulled himself together and smeared the tears across his face, still hiccuping sobs.
“Go and sit in the car, love, Dad and I can bury him.”
Polly really wanted to give in and get back into the car – the thought of getting any closer to those terrible remains was unbearable, but she knew she couldn’t chicken out, she had to help lay him to rest.
Bram’s body was far, far worse than they could ever imagine. As she got closer, the terrible stench of death filled her nostrils, like copper pennies, a tangy sharpness that assaulted her and made her gag. She stumbled over the uneven ground, trying not to lose her footing. The first thing she came across was a great swathe of bloody tartan, Bram’s kilt, ripped to shreds and spread out over the ground. The rest of his clothes were little more than scraps of blood-soaked rags. Polly stepped around them, finally approaching the body. She looked down at what was left of Bram; it reminded her of the dummies that medical students used to study anatomy, just muscles and sinew, all knotted together. It was just fresh red meat – the carcass of a recently butchered animal. The most macabre thing of all was that his skin had been taken in one piece, even the flesh of the face, it lay beside the body, an empty shell that was still recognisably man-shaped.
“How is this possible?” Polly asked.
“The Djinn are a terrible race, capable of far worse,” Bert said. “They’re a ruthless breed, demons of the worst kind, older than time itself. They have hated humankind with a sublime hatred since man first appeared on the earth and will gladly take a human life in the foulest of ways if they are summoned to do it.”
“Did you kill them?” Polly asked.
“Unfortunately no, just banished them back to where they came from, probably Helheim. With the Hellstone, Gaunt can bring anything he likes from that place to do his bidding.”
Polly looked down at Bram’s lidless eyes; he stared up at the sky, his teeth bared in a rictus grin. His long white hair and beard were a gory red tangle, still attached to his flayed flesh.
Polly felt the bile rising in her throat and fought to keep it down, but couldn’t; she emptied the contents of her stomach, retching so hard she thought she’d done herself serious damage. Finn joined her. Bert was the only one who managed to hold out, but even he looked like death.
“Get the shovels out of the car, and we’ll find a nice quiet spot for him,” Bert said, when they had both recovered. “He loved this area, so it’s fitting that he spends eternity here.”
“Shouldn’t we burn him? I think he’d prefer that.” Finn said.
Bert shook his head.
“We’d need to use most of the petrol, son, and we’re going to need it.”
Finn gave his father an unpleasant look.
“Why, what’s the point of going on? We know that Gaunt’s got the Hellstone. What the hell is the point in going on with this farce? We should go back and try and find a way to get the bloody thing from him,” he said.
Bert took hold of Finn by the shoulders, making him face him.
“He may have the Hellstone, my boy, but he hasn’t got the Torinstone. The Hellstone isn’t our quest. It never was.”
Finn considered it for a moment.
“You think that the Torinstone is still there, at the burial site?”
“I know it is,” Bert said. “Now go and get those shovels.”
It took Finn a long time to dig through the stone hard earth; the downpour of rain had made mud of the surface, but beneath that, it was hard earth. They found a sheltered place to lay Bram’s body, and there was very little chance of it ever being found. Bert and Finn stripped down to their underwear – moving the bloody carcass would cover them in Bram’s blood. Polly just sat watching, clutching her knees to her chest, shivering and terrified. They wrapped his bloody body in a tarpaulin and covered it with the tartan car rug, lowering it into the grave.
“This was Bram’s family tartan – a fitting burial shroud for a proud Scot,” Bert said.
Finn laid Bram’s possessions, such as they were, next to the body. He hadn’t brought much with him, but there was a photograph of his dead wife, which they placed over his heart, along with his flask and bottle of whisky.
“Goodbye, old friend. You were the finest of men, and whatever rewards you receive in the next life, you truly deserve them.” Bert was on the verge of tears, but he held it back, struggling to get the words out. Finn began to shovel the earth back in, and Polly took the other shovel to help him.
Finn opened his mouth to protest, but Polly shushed him.
“I want to do this,” she said.
Their hands were blistered and bloody by the time they had finished, another few injuries to add to Polly’s ever-growing catalogue, but this time she was glad to have them. Job done, they made their way back to the Range Rover, filthy dirty and sick to death. Dawn was just breaking over the horizon, and it couldn’t come soon enough.
They packed up the tents and sat for some time in the Range Rover, just sitting and staring out at the Yorkshire countryside. It was a beautiful morning, the sunrise glorious; it should have made Polly feel better, but it didn’t. It was Polly who broke the silence.
“I hate to bring this up,” Polly said, “but what are we going to do now? Bram was the only one that knew how to drive.”
“I can drive,” Finn said. “It was just better that I didn’t, that’s all, but I do know how to drive.” Polly frowned but said nothing.
“Finn has been known to have the odd blackout – if it happened while he was driving...” Bert explained.
“Oh, I see. Of course not,” Polly said, but she was puzzled. Finn gave her a quick peck on the cheek.
“I’ll be okay; it’s so deserted here, I don’t think there’s much chance of an accident. And it’s not as if we have much choice. I can get us where we’re going.”
They started to drive again, through the wild Yorkshire countryside, following Bert’s instructions, although Polly knew as well as he did where they were goin
g. Finn was a better driver than Bram, although Polly felt guilty thinking it. They were all very subdued, still in shock, Polly supposed.
They were just reaching the edge of the Yorkshire Moors, and it was beautiful; Polly could imagine Kathy and Heathcliff out in this wild, rolling landscape, exchanging vows of love. Polly thought that if things were different, this was the sort of place she would love to live. There was a wildness about it, a kind of freedom that she’d not felt before. Perhaps that was just her channelling Bram’s spirit, but she could see why he had loved it so much.
“Anything?” Finn called back, over his shoulder. For a moment Polly thought that Bert had dropped off in the back seat because his head was resting back and his eyes closed. At the sound of Finn’s voice, he opened his eyes, and Polly realised that he’d just been concentrating, trying to pick up whatever vibes he used to work his magic.
“Nothing,” Bert said. “I think that we must be close, though, but I can’t feel anything. What about you, Polly?”
Polly shook her head.
“I can’t feel anything any more, sorry.”
I think we need to be on foot from here on in,” Bert said.
Polly’s heart sank at the prospect of traipsing for miles across the moors in all weathers, but one way or another she was going to suffer – blisters on her feet or an aching back from the car seat. She supposed it didn’t matter if it was an Indian or an African elephant standing on your foot, it would still bloody hurt.
“Why will that make a difference?” Polly asked. “Can’t we just keep stopping the car and getting out?”
“Oh, I wish,” Bert said, “But I need to be touching the earth, sensing the energies that flow through it. Like the old Native Americans – you wouldn’t expect them to ride in a car and jump out every so often to follow a trail, now would you?”
Polly managed a smile.
“So we walk.”
Finn pulled the car to a halt, and they allowed themselves a few minutes to get the feeling back in their legs and have a cup of lukewarm tea each. Polly’s bum was so numb it had long since disappeared into the Twilight Zone; her legs felt like dead wooden stumps, but the feeling was beginning to return to them. It was a bright sunny day at least, pleasant, even allowing for the blasts of cold wind that assaulted them every so often.
“I can feel we’re near, but it’s just out of reach to me,” Bert said, tipping the rest of the dreadful tea out onto the ground. “I think it’s because I’ve used up too much psychic energy, fighting off those demons.” He did look desperately tired. This really couldn’t have been good for someone of his age. Bert looked across at Finn, sheepish. “I think Polly needs to use the dagger hilt again.”
“No,” Finn said, without hesitation.
Polly laid a hand on his arm.
“Surely that’s up to me,” she said.
Finn gave her a very unpleasant look.
“I can’t stop you, but I’m not going to give you my blessing,” he said. When he saw her face, he relented and managed a feeble smile, and a mumbled ‘sorry’. She stood on tiptoe and pressed a kiss on his lips.
“I know, but I think we need to do this. I can feel that we’re close as well. I want to get this over with,” she said.
He nodded, understanding, she thought.
“But what if you feel Sigurd’s death? You felt the axe blow, his pain. If you feel his death...”
“It will pass,” Polly said. “I’ll be okay.”
“Let me try to get us as close as we can,” Bert said, “try and avoid using Polly if possible.” He closed his eyes and drew in a few deep breaths, and the tiredness seemed to slip from his face a little. “That’s better. Now let me see.” He closed his eyes again and turned slowly around on the spot. “That way,” he said, tipping his head towards the north.
They took what gear they needed from the Range Rover: food, water and first aid kit and began walking. Most of the heavy equipment they left behind. Polly was wearing sturdy hiking boots, and they were quite comfortable, but she was so tired, she hoped they didn’t have to walk far. Bert stopped every so often to complete a full circle, doing a strange little pirouette, to make sure they were still going in the right direction. The bag Polly was carrying wasn’t heavy, but her feet were starting to hurt; she didn’t complain, after all, compared to what had happened to Bram, what did she have to complain about? She didn’t expect them to find anything, not today at least.
After they had gone some way, Finn went back and got the Range Rover, driving it to them, allowing them to have a rest while he was gone. At least they wouldn’t have to walk back again. Polly could hardly believe Finn’s stamina; he seemed to be able to keep going, on and on, a relentless attack on whatever task he had to perform.
They must have travelled a good eight miles this way, walking, then waiting for Finn to catch up with the car. Bert seemed no nearer to finding a trail.
“I am so sorry,” he said. “I do think that I need your help, Polly. I’m really not myself today.”
“I’ll go back and get the car,” Finn said, “It’s only a mile or so back, and we can set up camp here for the night. You need to get some sleep; we all need to get some rest. We can start again fresh tomorrow.”
Bert nodded his reluctant agreement and then stopped, a surprised look on his face.
“My word,” he said. “I do believe that I’ve got something.”
“The burial site?” Finn asked.
Bert gave them a broad smile.
“I do believe so. This way, this way.”
He led them to a small cluster of rocks, just a few hundred yards ahead of them, and there, hidden amongst them was a cleft in the rocks, perhaps eight feet across, and as dark as a moonless night inside. Polly knew, just knew, that this was the right place. She moved forwards with cautious steps, peering over the edge into the darkness. Her heart sank.
“Oh bugger,” she said, “Have we really got to go down there?”
Finn pulled her back from the edge.
“You don’t have to if you don’t want to. You can stay here with Bert, and I’ll go down on my own.”
Polly gave him the look that remark deserved.
“No bloody way, I’m coming with you. I was just... well, I’m coming, and that’s that.”
Bert gave a sad sigh.
“Poor Bram, he would have been so excited right now. This was all he ever wanted,” he said. “Finding this burial site would have been the culmination of his life’s work. Now I doubt we’ll ever be able to tell anyone about it because it will draw too much attention to the fact that Bram has gone missing. It’s a tragedy.”
“I like to think he’s here with us in spirit,” Finn replied. “I’ll go back and get the car. You two get your breath back; I shouldn’t be too long.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Polly looked around at the ground in front of the cave entrance to see if she could see any sign of previous visitors, but there was nothing – no boot prints or signs of disturbance. That didn’t mean much because there had been torrential downpours of rain that would have washed them away.
“There doesn’t seem to be any signs that anyone was here.”
“I know,” Finn said. “I’ve checked it out as well, no sign of disturbance, but we know he’s got the stone, so he was here, he had to be.”
Polly was alarmed when she saw the kinds of equipment Finn was unloading from the four by four. It looked suspiciously like potholing equipment, and she had visions of crawling through too-tight spaces on her belly in the pitch black.
“It’s all right,” Finn said, giving her an admonishing roll of the eyes. “You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do. But Gaunt managed to get the Hellstone, so whatever is down there must be negotiable. If it looks too unpleasant, I’ll go on alone.”
“You will not!” Polly said. “If you can do it, so can I.”
Finn laughed and fitted her helmet on for her, tightening up the chin strap and making s
ure she was comfortable. It felt heavy and unpleasant, but she could see the need for it. They had brought plenty of rope with them, and flashlights, although their helmets were fitted with a light that meant they could keep their hands free. The metal detector seemed an obvious necessity.
They clambered into the opening, moving downwards at quite a steep angle for a few yards and Polly didn’t mind admitting that she was bloody terrified. Finn went first, Polly in the middle with Bert following up the rear. To be honest, she wasn’t quite sure that Bert was going to be able to do this. He wasn’t a young man – she was finding herself getting out of breath and already tired. Finn stopped suddenly and put his hand out to halt her in her tracks. She soon saw why; they had reached a sheer drop, and they couldn’t go any further horizontally. From here the only way they could go was down. Polly peered over the edge and realised that she couldn’t see the bottom, even though Finn had switched on one of the powerful flashlights and was shining it down into the darkness. Memories of The Descent flashed through her mind. She had watched the film from behind a cushion, squealing her way through it and vowing she would never, ever set foot inside a cave. Now here she was, going down into the darkness to face a cave full of corpses.
“We’re going to have to abseil down it,” he said. “I’ll go first.”
Polly just stared at him in horror.
“The closest I’ve ever got to abseiling was hanging a sheet out of the bedroom window and lowering my teddy down on it!”
“It’s quite safe,” Finn reassured her.
Polly raised an eyebrow.
“What do I have to do then?” she asked, taking a deep breath.
Finn pulled out a large metal spike and a heavy mallet from the holdall, hammering the metal spike hard into the rock.
“You lower yourself down on the rope. I’ll feed it through this metal ring, and you can control your speed with this,” he said, indicating a metal gadget attached to it.
“Are you sure it’s safe?” Polly asked, jiggling it about.
Finn rolled his eyes and gave her an exasperated look.
