Magus of Stonewylde Book One

by Kit Berry

  ‘Look, Yul,’ he said softly. ‘Isn’t it beautiful? There’s something about this place, a bleakness that touches me. I’ve always loved Quarrycleave. I rode up here as a boy, dragging Clip along. We used to play down there and he hated it.’

  Yul sat silently, quaking inside and hoping his trembling wasn’t visible. Magus sighed, gazing out over the vast scene below. Yul saw how the quarry, for all its starkness, had become overgrown over the years as soil had blown in from the land around. In places a few stunted hawthorns struggled for existence, twisted into grotesque caricatures of trees. Ivy grew everywhere inside the quarry, swarming up rock-faces in great sheets of glossy leaves, cascading down in torrents of dark green over the steep cliffs at the far end. Nature was attempting to reclaim the place, trying to clothe the stone’s nakedness with green and cover her shame.

  But man had once again intervened. There were modern yellow machines crawling all over her: dumper trucks, an enormous digger with claws, a great drilling rig. Yul saw men moving about below them and an ugly assortment of old caravans parked around the shallow end. His heart filled with despair at the thought of spending two weeks here. The place invoked crushing fear and misery. How would he ever survive?

  Magus turned and Yul felt the power in the man beside him. The Earth energy coursed through him; he who’d always been the master. Magus’ dark eyes glittered with authority and Yul could not meet his gaze.

  ‘You will learn to obey me, Yul. You’ll once and for all abandon any rebellious inclinations you may have felt in the past. Sylvie is Hallfolk and she’s most definitely not for you. Your father must be respected and obeyed at all times. Buzz and any other young person from the Hall must be shown proper deference. You’ll keep your eyes down and your head bowed when a member of the Hallfolk is present. Do you understand?’

  ‘Yes, sir, I do,’ croaked Yul, feeling close tears.

  ‘And you’ll never, ever challenge me in any way again. In six months’ time you’ll be sixteen and an adult. If I haven’t seen evidence of your absolute subservience by then, I’ll cast you out of the community.’

  Yul nodded, his lips quivering. He wished with all his heart that he were at home now, in his cottage with his mother and the children, safe and loved.

  ‘Never forget, my boy, that living at Stonewylde is a privilege, and one which I may choose to withdraw any time I see fit. Better people than you have been sent packing in the past, and I’d have no qualms about kicking out an unruly trouble-maker like you. Be assured, I’ll tolerate no further trouble from you in any shape or form.’

  Magus looked hard at the boy, now barely recognisable as the good-looking young Villager who’d been dragged from the woodsmen’s hut five days ago. His face was so bruised and swollen, his body so hunched and shrunken that he could have been someone else altogether. Yul turned his battered face towards Magus.

  ‘Please, sir,’ he whispered, ‘please don’t make me stay here. I’ve learnt my lesson, I promise. I beg you, sir – don’t make me go down into that place.’

  Magus raised his eyebrows at this and shook his head.

  ‘Oh no, young man! You wouldn’t even dare ask me that if you’d really learnt your lesson – you’d just obey without question. You’ll stay here for two weeks. If you’ve worked very hard and if Jackdaw is agreeable, you may come back to the Village after that. But not before.’

  He switched on the engine and reversed, turning the Land Rover round and slowly heading back down the steep hill towards the entrance of the quarry mouth. Yul hung his head and began to cry silently, the sobs shaking his thin frame. He was too weak and confused to understand why he should feel so terrified of the quarry, but was unable to stop himself. Magus glanced at him as he drove carefully downwards along the quarry edge.

  ‘I see that Quarrycleave has the same effect on you as it had on my brother. He was terrified too, but I can’t see why. It’s a place of incredibly strong power and magic. Though I’ll grant you, the energy is strange here, unlike anywhere else at Stonewylde. I’ve considered celebrating a festival up here, just to see what sort of Earth Magic I’d receive. Interesting thought …’

  Yul shuddered and wiped his nose on his sleeve, having nothing else to use.

  ‘And Yul – if I were you I’d stop the snivelling now. Jackdaw will have enough fun with you over the next fourteen days without branding you a cry-baby from the start. Pull yourself together, boy – you really won’t survive this punishment otherwise.’

  They parked by the shabby caravans. The area was a mess; rubbish and debris were scattered all around. An old minibus was parked next to a scruffy pick-up truck, and several dishevelled men hung about smoking and talking. As Magus pulled up, a large man emerged from one of the caravans, cigarette in mouth. Yul recognised him at once. The sight of Jackdaw filled Yul with further dread, for the man was infamous in the Village. He was enormous, heavily built with a huge barrel chest and exceptionally long legs. Unlike Alwyn his bulk was solid muscle. His large bald head was tanned nut-brown and both ears were pierced in several places. He was covered in tattoos and sported a few days’ beard growth. But most menacing of all were his eyes. Brilliant blue and bulbous, they gleamed with a manic light that spoke of an unhinged personality.

  He approached the Land Rover as Magus was getting out and gave a mock salute. He was even taller than Magus, which was unusual. He eyed Yul, huddled in the car, and spat on the ground.

  ‘Afternoon, sir.’

  ‘Good afternoon, Jack. Here’s the boy as promised. He’s yours for two weeks, although that takes us up to the Solstice and I doubt I’ll be taking time out to come and collect him before the festival. Work him hard and don’t spare him in any way. He’s in a lot of trouble and I want him broken in, once and for all. You get my meaning?’

  ‘Oh yes, guv. Work him to the ground and knock the spirit out of him. Easy enough to do here, I can tell you. These bloody immigrants are worse than useless. Still trying to lick them into shape but it ain’t easy. Don’t speak a word of bloody English. Look at the state of them! Slouch around doing bugger all. Don’t trust none of ’em an inch.’

  ‘Yes but you know why we’ve got them. They’ve come very cheap with no questions asked about health and safety, so make the best of it, Jack. Now watch this boy carefully. If he tries to run off you have my permission to punish him however you like. If he never came back to Stonewylde it’d be no great loss to the community, miserable little runt. Do you understand?’

  The man tapped the side of his nose and winked.

  ‘Yeah, I got you. Disposable, if push comes to shove. Don’t worry, I’ll sort the little bugger out well and good. Just the sort o’ job I enjoy most. He won’t be no more trouble when I’ve done with him.’

  ‘You’ll need to feed him up or you’ll get no work out of him. Normally he’s pretty tough, but he’s been starved the last few days and now he’s very weak. But don’t spoil him.’

  ‘You know me better than that, guv! I don’t do spoiling.’

  ‘Everything else alright? Supplies getting in regularly?’

  ‘Yeah, no problem. Food, drink, fags, laundry – all delivered regular to the Gatehouse and I go along every morning and pick ’em up. The small plant’s all on site now, and we’ve started the core drilling. We’re still looking for the working faces, and we’re clearing some of the backfill too. We’ll begin crushing it soon for aggregate.’

  ‘Good – it all sounds in order. After the Solstice, you can give me a proper report. Right then, I’ll be off. Any trouble, go to the Gatehouse and phone down to the Hall. Oh, and Jackdaw – get something done about this bloody mess.’

  ‘Mess?’

  ‘All this rubbish lying about. You should know better, even if those damn Outsiders don’t. We don’t desecrate Stonewylde with litter.’

  ‘Right you are, boss. I’ll have a word with ’em and the boy can get started on tidying it up now.’

  Magus yanked Yul’s door open and pulled him ou
t roughly, marching him over to Jackdaw.

  ‘He’s all yours, Jack. Have fun.’

  Yul very quickly got Jackdaw’s measure. Jump when he said jump and keep out of range of his hands and feet. Jackdaw saw that Magus meant what he’d said about treating him hard, for the boy had been given a thorough going over. His face was so swollen it was a miracle he could see or talk. He stumbled and swayed and was of little use to anyone in his present state.

  Jackdaw took him into his caravan, threw an old blanket onto the filthy floor by his bed, and told him to sit there. Yul was then given a large plateful of food which he had to eat sitting on the floor. It was horrible but he wolfed it down while Jackdaw sat on his unmade bed smoking. The caravan smelled disgusting.

  ‘That’s where you sleep, on the floor right next to me where I can see you. Any trouble and you won’t live to tell the tale, boy. You think you’ll be free to go in two weeks. But if you ain’t satisfied me I’ll keep you for longer. Magus won’t care. He don’t give a toss about you. Understand, boy?’

  He shoved Yul hard with his boot and the boy nodded vigorously, keeping his head down.

  ‘If you don’t look out for yourself, you won’t survive the two weeks anyway. Quarries are dangerous at the best o’ times, and we don’t do things by the book here. Magus wants the stone as cheap as he can get it, and so he shall have it. Corners are being cut, I can tell you. You and those miserable sodding foreigners out there are nothing to me or Magus. Your lives ain’t worth shit. Just remember that, boy.’

  And so, as Mother Heggy had predicted, began Yul’s torment and suffering in the place of bones and death. Yul worked from sunrise until sunset; coming up to the Solstice this was a long time. He worked twice as hard as everyone else. Jackdaw was constantly on his back and kept him busy every second of the day. The other labourers had come from abroad and were working illegally. They soon realised that Yul had even less status than they did, and could be bullied into doing many of their jobs too.

  The quarry work was hard and dangerous. The great digger lurched around moving stone, and the dumper trucks scooted all over the place clearing debris. Using picks and mallets, rock had to be prised away from the faces. Jackdaw and another man, a dour Portland quarryman who’d been drafted in for his expertise, were investigating the whole quarry and planning the future areas to work.

  Despite the dumper trucks, much of the rock had to be shifted by hand and Yul moved far more than his fair share. He thought at times his back would break from the sheer effort of carrying or dragging the stone. There was no sympathy from anyone; nobody telling him to be careful or take a rest. His hair and skin were soon white from the stone dust and stayed that way. His fingers, sensitive and used to working with wood, were raw and bleeding from contact with the unyielding rock. He used to enjoy stone-carving but this was different. This was like smashing up the very bones of the earth; an act of destruction rather than creation.

  Labouring in the quarry was only a part of Yul’s work. He also had innumerable duties around the caravans doing all sorts of unpleasant jobs. He must empty the chemical toilets, clean the caravans after the men, wash up, help with food preparation, serve the men, bag up the dirty clothes and generally be everyone’s dogsbody, at their constant beck and call. He was permanently exhausted. Sleeping on the floor by Jackdaw’s bed wasn’t such a hardship for he was asleep before he hit the ground.

  But sleep held its own torture. Yul’s initial dread of the quarry remained even when he became accustomed to the place; if anything it increased. He couldn’t understand what it was that filled him with such terror. It was intangible and illogical. But he sensed evil all around them, not from Jackdaw or the men, but from the very quarry itself. He felt it stalking, always just around the corner. He tried never to be alone but to work within sight of others, even though it meant tolerating their abuse. On the occasions when he was by himself, the feeling of something malevolent creeping up on him was overwhelming.

  At night he was tormented with terrible nightmares. In his dreams he felt the evil rising up from the ground and seeping through the floor of the caravan where he slept. It enveloped his body and began to drag him down, swallowing him into the maw of the quarry bed. He frequently awoke shaking and sweating in terror, and his shouts and screams earned him a good kicking from Jackdaw. As the endless days and nights rolled into each other, Yul began to give up and allow the bleak despair to engulf him.

  Sylvie took a while to recover from her illness, and all the time she was cooped up in the house she pestered her mother about Yul’s whereabouts. Miranda knew nothing, but Sylvie hoped that she in turn would bother Magus and find out where Yul had been taken. Her plan didn’t work and Sylvie became increasingly worried. She knew he was suffering. She was haunted by flashes of despair and terror, snapshot images that disappeared as soon as they’d entered her mind. She felt his exhaustion and humiliation. The bright darkness that was Yul in her soul dimmed, becoming dusty and weak. She had to get to him, had to save him. The need was becoming desperate as she sensed his despair and his loss of the will to fight.

  When Magus called at Woodland Cottage to check on her recovery, she confronted him. Her concern for Yul over-rode any natural caution or deference.

  ‘Please, Magus, just tell me where he is.’

  ‘No, Sylvie, you must let him go. You’re making me very angry with this persistent interest in a Village boy. He’s beneath you and you will not continue this liaison.’

  ‘You’re not my father! You can’t tell me who I see and who I don’t!’ she retorted, to Miranda’s dismay.

  ‘I am the magus and what I say goes,’ he said quietly.

  ‘Why? Why should you dictate everything? That’s what you are – a dictator! Like Hitler or Stalin.’

  ‘SYLVIE! How dare you speak to Magus like that! You apologise now or—’

  ‘It’s alright,’ he said, although Sylvie noticed a muscle in his cheek twitching tightly. ‘She doesn’t know what she’s saying.’

  ‘Yes I do! I want to know what you’ve done to Yul. Where is he? Why are you punishing him like this? You can’t go around acting like God!’

  ‘I can, actually,’ he murmured.

  ‘Mum! How can you even listen to this rubbish? What’s happened to you? You used to believe in equality and justice, yet you stand by while an innocent boy is punished just for being my friend! You’re brainwashed!’

  ‘I’m sorry, Magus, she’s not herself,’ gabbled Miranda, horribly embarrassed by her daughter’s passionate outburst.

  ‘I think she should go to her room,’ said Magus coldly. ‘We don’t tolerate children speaking to adults like this at Stonewylde. If she doesn’t like the order of things here, she’s free to leave. If she wishes to stay, she’ll do as she’s told. And she’s being told to forget the Village boy.’

  With that he stalked out of the cottage, and Miranda had the most blazing row with her wilful daughter.

  But Sylvie didn’t forget the Village boy. She couldn’t. She was haunted by visions and dreams which pursued her even in daylight. She began to have nightmares about a strange and terrifying place. It was made of stone, littered with boulders and the bones of ancient creatures. In this place of bones and rock lurked evil; a malevolence so monstrous it made her quake. It had been sleeping, lying dormant, but now it had awoken and was yawning and flexing. She knew that soon it would go in for the kill. Yul was in terrible danger. She must find him and help him escape.

  As soon as she was well enough Sylvie began to go out walking again, determined to regain her health and vitality. It was different in the woods knowing Yul wasn’t there; that he wouldn’t materialise from behind a tree, grinning at her with twigs and leaves in his hair and a smudge of lichen on his cheek. One day she heard men’s voices and came across Greenbough with a couple of the woodsmen. Sylvie thought that maybe he’d know what had happened to Yul, but he shook his head sadly.

  ‘Sorry, miss. I know he were taken up to the Hal
l and that brute of a father gave him a terrible whipping. Every night down the pub he talks o’ nothing else. Right proud of himself, he is. That man’s the one who should be whipped, the bloody great porker! Yul’s a good lad and we miss him in the woods. I hope ‘tisn’t too long afore he’s back with us again.’

  Sylvie’s face crumpled at the thought of Yul’s suffering and the old man patted her arm kindly.

  ‘You could try Tom up at the stables, miss. He might’ve heard something.’

  But Tom didn’t know any more than Greenbough. He still felt guilty that he’d stood by and let the cruelty to Yul go unchallenged. He’d never forget the shocking and pitiful sight of the boy stumbling out of the byre after his five day ordeal and being made to wash in the yard. He too shook his head, trying to banish the awful image of that battered, almost unrecognisable figure from his mind.

  ‘All I know is Magus took him off in the Land Rover and he weren’t away for that long, so I don’t reckon he’s gone far. Somewhere on the estate I’m sure.’

  ‘I do hope so,’ she said. ‘This punishment is for being my friend, and it’s so wrong!’

  ‘Aye, miss, I’ve always respected Magus but this ain’t right. That boy didn’t deserve what they done to him. If you find out anything of his whereabouts, do let me know. I want to help him, like I should’ve done when I had the chance. I’ll not forgive myself for that.’

  Sylvie’s worry was that Magus had taken Yul to the main gates and handed him over to someone waiting there. But somehow she thought she’d have known if he’d left Stonewylde. She was sure her nightmares were a clue to his whereabouts. In the end it was gossip in the Dining Hall that led her to find him. She overheard some older Hallfolk talking one lunch time.

  ‘Did you know? Magus has opened up Quarrycleave! He spoke about it this morning.’

  ‘Opened Quarrycleave? Well I never! I thought the place was closed for good after what happened there – that terrible accident.’