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Unearthed: New Horror of Ancient Ruins

Print edition ISBN: 9781835413098

E-book edition ISBN: 9781835413104

Published by Titan Books

A division of Titan Publishing Group Ltd

144 Southwark Street, London SE1 0UP

www.titanbooks.com

First edition: September 2026

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead (except for satirical purposes), is entirely coincidental.

‘Editor’s Note’ © Dan Coxon 2026

‘Introduction’ © Philip Fracassi 2026

‘The Obsession of the Adversary’ © Josh Malerman 2026

‘Burial Rights’ © Benjamin Percy 2026

‘The Empire Beneath His Feet’ © Ai Jiang 2026

‘Under Water’ © Tananarive Due 2026

‘Grasshopper’ © Eric LaRocca 2026

‘Oku-no-in’ © Priya Sharma 2026

‘The Angel of Time’ © Tim Lebbon 2026

‘Live Forever’ © A. M. Shine 2026

‘Radio Kraken’ © Christopher Golden 2026

‘The Bridegroom of Cumae’ © Angela Slatter 2026

‘Composite’ © Steve Toase 2026

‘Best Foot Forward’ © Gemma Amor 2026

‘Son of the Earth’ © H. Pueyo 2026

‘Dog’s Paw Drift’ © Hildur Knútsdóttir 2026

‘The Devil’s Sigh’ © Jonathan Maberry 2026

‘ReHistory’ © Cavan Scott 2026

‘AI Cathedral’ © V. Castro 2026

‘None Went Out’ © Premee Mohamed 2026

‘Lost Out Here in the Stars’ © Mark Chadbourn 2026

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EDITOR’S NOTE

How many of us have wandered around a ruined castle, or temple, or catacomb, and thought—I wonder what stories these stones could tell?

I know I have, and going by the stories Philip Fracassi and I have collected here, I’m fairly certain most other writers have too. There’s something about the depth of history beneath these ancient sites that gets our horror radar tingling. What if there are secrets buried in the past? What if strange energies linger from a time before records began? What if a timeless evil were dug up, spreading its dark wings into the light?

We intentionally kept the prompt for this anthology as wide as possible, encouraging our contributors to carve their own paths through many of the world’s oldest archaeological sites. There was no limit on geographical location, or the time period their site comes from—all that mattered was that there was a historical story to explore, and something to set fire to the author’s imagination.

As you’d expect, what we’ve ended up with is as widespread and varied as human history itself. Among the renowned ancient monuments—Machu Picchu, Chichén Itzá, Pompeii, Stonehenge—you’ll find some forgotten gems, as well as a handful of more modern locations (the Pine Barrens? The Maunsell Sea Forts?). Some writers have stayed close to home, while others have looked further afield and explored other cultures, uncovering new horrors to haunt us.

Just as the locations vary, so too do the secrets they reveal. From monsters to gods, artifacts to curses, you’ll find a museum full of dark treasures between these pages. Join us as we excavate beneath some of the oldest and most revered sites of antiquity. These bones have a tale to tell… just don’t forget your fedora.

Dan Coxon
LONDON
JANUARY 2026

INTRODUCTION

As I stood on the windswept plain staring at the world-famous stone horseshoe, my skin tingling with some unseen energy emanating from the strange monument looming before me, one question spun through my mind over and over again:

What is Stonehenge?

After finally fulfilling a lifetime dream to physically visit the Stonehenge site, the monolithic stones, set in a seemingly haphazard circle—surrounded by barrows chock-full of long-buried bones and the remains of Mesolithic-era monuments and walls—remained as much of a mystery to me as it had always been. A historical enigma.

But not just to me.

Like a stubborn dead tooth that—with preternatural wil l—refuses to be pulled from a mouth, Stonehenge continues to be one of the greatest mysteries in history to generations of scientists, archaeologists, historians, astronomers, geologists, and architects; a monument of head-scratching wonder to scholars, a catalyst of religious-level fervor for armies and kings, and a cathedral to ancient tribes long eviscerated from the modern world.

After my wife and I finished our time meditating on the stones and the surroundings, we hiked our way back to the Visitor Centre, eager for answers to what we’d spent the last few hours beholding; tromping through quadrangle fields of green littered with chalk stone, leery of the silhouetted Cursus Burrows straddling the top of a rise to our left, debating whether they looked more like flying saucers or water drops frozen in time.

After our return to the primary welcome center, however, I discovered not the answers I so desperately hoped for, but instead, more questions.

Even worse: theories.

A library worth of books filled with them. Massive wall displays splashed with unanswered queries that had been passed down through the centuries, suppositions and superstitions revealed in the same slide of boldly presented “information” that did nothing—absolutely nothing—to explain what Stonehenge was, why and how it had been built, or in what ways it had been utilized by peoples across time. The history of the site was so obtuse and jagged with presumptions and educated guesses that it was as if Stonehenge had simply erupted from the earth one day in 2500 BC, without warning or causation, and with no one any the wiser as to why and how it had presented itself to we ridiculous, befuddled (and sure, moderately entertained) humans.

Why did the people of the Neolithic Age first build Stonehenge? Was it a burial site? A place of worship? A sacred altar where bloody animal sacrifices offered at the right time of year meant thriving crops for nearby farmers? Was it built or inspired by aliens from outer space? Did the Romans use it for some form of dark arts? Did the stones have healing powers? Why had the sarsen trilithons been set up in such a deliberate shape? Why had the bluestones been hauled into the circle from so far away, using such inhuman effort? What’s the deal with the Bronze Age carvings of daggers and axe blades set into the stones?

As I read the booklets and studied illuminated graphic displays and walked the grounds and picked through souvenir store magnets and T-shirts and stickers, all I could think was that no one—no one in the world—knew, really truly knew, what Stonehenge was, why it had been constructed, or for what lost purpose it existed.

While driving back to our hotel in Bath (at night, in the rain—not something I recommend) I found myself in a state of uncertain wonderment. Partially because of the grandeur and borderline holy energy of Stonehenge itself, but more so because I found it so hard to believe that in the modern world, with the power of a global information network at our fingertips, and with literally centuries of meticulous study, no one had the answers I was looking for.

No one had unlocked the secrets of Stonehenge.

Being a storyteller by trade, I found this realization tantalizing, because if there was no settled-upon history of something as famous as Stonehenge, then it seemed to me that the history of this legendary site was—put lightly—fair game.

Put another way: story prompt heaven.

Which got me thinking: what if there were other cool archaeological/geological places around the world that had a somewhat “fuzzy” history? What if there were a slew of Stonehenge-type locations that were also shrouded in mystery, places that were ripe with speculative lore and riddled with an array of superstitions?

And how cool would it be to write stories about those places?

Even better, how cool would it be to have an entire host of horror writers, selected from countries all around the world, write stories about those places?

Excited about the possibilities, upon arriving home from our trip I immediately reached out to my friend, award-winning editor Dan Coxon, to pitch the idea. Together, we cast a global net to bring in some of the best and most exciting voices working in fiction today and, thankfully, Titan Books was as thrilled about the idea as we were. The result of all that hard work and belief and excitement is the book you now hold in your hands.

So strap on your backpack, lace up your hiking boots, and bring plenty of supplies in case you get lost among the catacombs, because these stories—these histories—are about to be unearthed, and the unveiling of the world’s ancient mysteries is only a few pages away.

Philip Fracassi
LOS ANGELES
JANUARY 2026

THE OBSESSION OF
THE ADVERSARY

JOSH MALERMAN

Our first movie had just come out, which is now a dreamy thing to say as Julie and I work diligently on the edit for number fourteen. We weren’t young then in years (both of us crested forty before we finally pushed that rock to the top of the hill, but once it was there, we were surely liberated), yet we were babies in spirit. The Cloth of the Mummy was never intended for ourselves: we had huge aspirations, we talked as if it would (at least momentarily) rule the horror landscape, we spoke of it like we would a classic. Still, we couldn’t have seen what was coming. Universal Studios on board was the first hint, of course, but even then our friends warned us against projects getting shelved, development limbo, the like. Good friends, at that, people Julie and I mulled over long after our parties and dinners were over, the two of us discussing the place for skepticism in an artistic life. Neither of us believed it belonged.

We wrote it together, as you likely know. I directed, Julie starred, and this has been the template ever since. Over a dozen of them now, out in the wide world, not a one we haven’t sat desk-to-desk enduring the process of writing the script, not a one she didn’t begin performing after I called “action”. Still, The Cloth of the Mummy, overly stylized as it is to us now, was our first and, likewise, our first hit. And hits have a way of doing more than opening industry doors for those who write them. Neither Julie nor I had seen anything of the world prior to that nascent success, and screenings in Bulgaria, Ireland, and Brazil soon followed the Los Angeles and New York premieres.

It happened in Rio, what we’re here today to discuss. A thing Julie and I have debated ad nauseam, volumes of theories, long after our guests had left our current Michigan ranch for the night.

We didn’t have much money when we visited Rio, the studio paid for our travel and hotels, but by then we could see more was coming. We dressed then much like we dress now (thrift stores are a godsend for those desirous of expression, and while Julie and I now agree we overdid things with The Cloth of the Mummy, we don’t worry one whit about overdoing our ensemble), and so we didn’t stand out so much as Americans as we did artists. Over forty, yes, but with the pep of newlyweds decades younger, we took to the beaches, the restaurants, the museums, lapping up every drop of that magnificent place. Eventually our lack of itinerary (never planned, never us) led us to the city’s most formidable tourist attraction, the spoke jutting out from the hub, Christ the Redeemer, standing nearly one hundred feet tall, much more than that if you include its enormous base. It’s a bit of a hike to get there, and monkeys ask for alms along the way, but we had the company that day of two fellow auteurs, two Brazilian filmmakers, both of whom you know and so both of whom I shall rename for the sake of leaving them out of this in full.

The four of us witnessed the same thing that afternoon, though only Julie and I now admit it.

So… the hike. Did you know the statue is atop a mountain? Yes, Corcovado. Might’ve been a worthy thing to have learned prior. Since the four of us dressed less for physical labor and more for a waltz in the theater district, we paused often, leaning against trees and wood fences, nodding to the hundreds who passed us in both directions, either having just experienced the craning of the neck (decent title, that) or preparing (and thrilled) to do so. We ate fruit, we languished, we dried out from the prior evening’s Ipanema festivities. But we did not smoke grass nor sip from a flask. This is of course important to note in cases such as this: we had a flask on us (when have we not?), but the four of us filmmakers were movie-set sober for the duration.

About halfway up the trail (and it is a trail, that walk: “Exercise enough for a week,” Julie said) we reached a sort of halfway point, where a restaurant for tourists operated close to the launch pad of a helicopter for those thirsting for more. We observed the glass vehicle as we ate, and felt pity for the salespeople who tried in vain to gather riders for a closer look at the city’s tallest man. The pilot was either reading or sleeping, it was difficult to tell from our vantage point, but with no desire to walk any further, and with adventure steeped into our recent days, I had an idea, obvious enough, inevitable you might say, that the four of us were destined to take that very ride up to and around that very statue.

“On us,” I told Maria and Francoise, much to their delight, even if Julie looked momentarily confused as to how we could afford four helicopter rides at two hundred American dollars a rider. In an attempt to convince her our finances would work out, I winked at her. Somehow, that’s always done the trick.

And so, surefooted (though, mercifully, no longer needing to use our own feet to reach the landmark), we gave the salespeople what they wanted, times four.

It was a blurry experience from the get; rushed, it seemed, as if the pilot had others waiting in a line that did not exist. Barely time to decide who would sit where, but Maria and Francoise climbed into the back, and I followed, allowing Julie the front seat beside the (now wakeful) pilot. The doors were closed without us having ascertained duration, route, or speed. No knowledge for us, but that was understandable, as we hadn’t the time to ask questions. And just like that, as they say, the four peacocking professional artists were locked into a glass bubble, a whirring blade above, loud and ferocious.

Julie smiled at me over her shoulder, a half-second before I gripped the back of her seat.

We’d taken off.

Up.

And we saw it almost immediately.

Marcia said, “Oh, I didn’t realize it was underwater!”

I can’t vouch for the pilot, but the four of us looked to the nearest body of water at these words. I later learned it’s called Rodrigo de Freitas Lagoon. I also learned it’s almost six hundred acres in size.

So the body, clearly visible to us, just beneath the surface, lying on its side, nearly ivory in color, curled almost embryonic, its eyes closed, must’ve have been close to half that.

Julie and I would later agree (often mid-edit she’d look to me, lower her glasses and say, “It had overslept”) that the thing did not mean to be seen.

“What is that?” I asked the pilot. But whether he misunderstood me, ignored me, or was operating from a place of rote duty to his current profession, I did not know. He spoke about the statue, the giant white rendering of Jesus Christ, arms out, as if driving a bus through Piccadilly Circus, or the streets of Detroit that housed the original minds behind Motown. Our pilot was a tour guide and nothing more.

Francoise cried out when the giant thing opened its eye.

And us, still on the way up, only seconds into the air, the glass bottom of the helicopter rendering all of Rio shrinking.

It saw us.

There was surprise in that eye, human intelligence in that eye, and, as Julie would come to point out countless times, alarm.

No, that sleeping giant, blanched and smooth, did not mean to be seen.

And just as quickly as we gasped, it sunk deeper into the lagoon, certainly with a sense of embarrassment, at having made a mistake, an emotion so human it struck me for the first time that what we were seeing was the form of a giant man, one that dwarfed the one we’d taken the ride to see.

“It’s sinking!” Maria said.

“It’s hiding,” Julie said.

I’ll never forget that, though I suspect I’ll never forget the smell of the vehicle, the sound of the whirring blade, the exact blue of the sky either. Still, Julie was the first to point out that the thing, whatever it was, must be fallible, for having made a mistake.

“Did you see that?” I asked the pilot.

But he went on, giving us the history of Christ the Redeemer, even as we reached our peak and approached the famous landmark. The lagoon was behind us now. But that didn’t matter. The sleeping giant had fled, sunk, until only the gradations of blue and green water remained visible to our (or anybody’s) eyes.

Later, I would learn a channel connects the lagoon to the Atlantic, and I would try to imagine the giant squeezing its way to its preferred place of slumber. But no map and no topography would make sense of this vision.

What we saw had either climbed across the city to get into that water… or had come from a place much, much deeper.

The pilot circled the Redeemer, but the four of us were no longer interested. We looked into each other’s eyes more than we eyed the work of art. And on the return trip to the pad, none of us looked anywhere but at that lagoon.

The hike back down the mountain was done mostly in silence, save the moments Julie said something about what we’d seen, breaking through my own frightened thoughts. But already Maria and Francoise seemed to want nothing to do with it.

We went public with it, as you know. And we were not believed. Nor were we backed by our fellow artists, who eerily (and it seemed legitimately) refused any admission of a memory; the sight of that smooth, naked leviathan man, curled up, asleep beneath the placid surface of that lagoon.

Julie and I would talk about it ceaselessly across the coming years, and while every conversation felt like the first, we always drew the same few conclusions.

I was the first to suggest we weren’t believed because we’re the very people who invent such things. After all, didn’t our third movie feature a naked man, curled up beneath the surface of a pond? And didn’t that man, that thing, also wake to find it had been found, discovered… seen?

One night, long after the crew had gone home from a lively wrap party, Julie and I sat alone on vintage couches, drinking champagne from plastic party cups. She said something then that cracked the repetition of our repeated talks, the cycle of us bringing the subject up before putting it to bed for the night. She said:

“I don’t believe in the tenets of any religion, and I don’t believe in the man whose likeness draws thousands of visitors a year to that steep mountain. But I do believe the thing in that lagoon does. I believe the thing in that lagoon might even believe the statue is the man himself, and so it remains close, either to the physical man or to the spirit of the thing, always at hand. I believe it expects a final and eventual confrontation.”

And I had to ask her,

“Julie, do you mean to say that sleeping thing was—”

But she held up a palm to quiet me, even as she sipped deeper from the cup.

“I didn’t say that,” she said. “I didn’t name it. All I’m suggesting is… that thing keeps close to the spirit of the place for a reason. And for as little as I saw of it, I am convinced that reason is born of the platitude: keep your enemies close. I saw all that and more in the half-second I looked into its eye. I saw the hunter… waiting for the right moment to leap.”

BURIAL RIGHTS

BENJAMIN PERCY

Peter looked rather fashionable—in his black wool jacket and corduroy slacks, a gray scarf looped around his neck—but only from a distance. Upon closer inspection, his jacket had been torn and stitched in several places, the knees of his pants were worn through, and his leather shoes were scuffed and barnacled with dirt. His fingernails were bitten down. He needed a haircut and a shave, and he hadn’t showered for several days. He wore a canvas backpack slung over one shoulder, and its weight was enough to make him lean to one side and trade it regularly from arm to arm.

This is what he was living out of—for the moment. His situation didn’t allow for the slow burden of a suitcase. He was supposed to fit in—in the 14th Arrondissement of Paris—and as long as he didn’t speak, revealing his clumsy accent, no one gave him more than a passing glance. The cold probably helped. Everyone hurried from one place to the next, breathing out veils of steam. The pigeons huddled among the gargoyles on the cathedrals. This was late January, and the sky was a concrete gray.

He checked in to a hostel called L’Ourse. The lobby smelled like cloves and urine. The woman at the front desk had a deep voice, a long braid that coiled on her shoulder, and a mole the size of an eraser growing out of her eyebrow. When he tried to speak to her in French, she flinched in offense and shook her head and said, “We will speak English. How many nights?”

“Two for now,” he said. “Is that all right? Can I stay longer if I need to?”

“Yes, of course. No tourists this time of year. This is a strange, quiet time to be in Paris. Especially so far from the Left Bank.” There was an uplift at the end of her sentence that implied a question, but he only responded by asking if he could get a single room.

“Only one other in your room,” she said, “so almost all yours.”

“But aren’t there any empty rooms?”

“We use fewer rooms, we get less mess. So everyone together. Okay?”

“Fine.” He paid in cash. She asked him for ID, and he offered up his passport. She didn’t even look at the booklet, for which he was grateful. His hair was grown out and so was his beard, both a bristling brown. But more concerning was the data page. There was a clear laminate sticker over the top that changed his last name from Eisner to Bisner, and so on, every line of letters and numbers slightly altered. The clerk had a shuffling way of walking, sliding her feet across the tiled floor when she made her photocopies.

On the counter she set his passport, along with a key card. “First floor. Room 113.”

“Bon soir,” he said, and she said, “Do not speak French. You are not allowed. It is very bad. In English.”

“Good afternoon, then.”

“Good afternoon.”

He climbed the stairs. The carpet was stained. The walls were inked with graffiti and scarred from luggage. There were several lights staggered down the hallway and only half of them were working. He moved past the first door and heard the muffled chatter of a social media video. He moved past the second and smelled marijuana puffing around the seams. Room 113 had a sticker of a screaming face on it. Someone had unsuccessfully tried to peel it off, scabbing its edge. He tried the keycard and a light bleeped green.

He pushed open the door to find a ten-by-ten room. The blinds were shut, so the space was visible only by the pale light of the hallway. There was no toilet, only a sink. Bunk beds were stacked along either wall. A body was curled up on the bottom of one. A blanket covered the sleeping figure, making him visible only as a dark shroud. He made a mewling sound that might have indicated a restless dream.

Slowly, Peter backed out of the room. Just as the door closed, easing into its frame with a click, a voice called out to him. “What are you planning on digging up?”

The clerk stood in the hallway. In her arms she carried a folded set of white towels topped with a thin bar of soap.

“Excuse me?” he said.

“The shovel in your bag. What are you planning on digging up?”

The backpack slid off his shoulder. The black blade of the foldable utility shovel was visible, sneaking out of a gap in the main compartment. He squatted on the floor, rearranging the bag so the zipper could close.

“Are those for me?” he said, nodding at the towels.

“Oui,” she said and handed them over. “The toilet and shower are at the end of the hall. Hot water only between seven in the morning and seven at night.”

“Do you know anything about the man? The one I’m rooming with?”

“People who stay in places like this don’t share their reasons why.”

*   *   *

Peter grew up in a town called Iron Bottom in northern Minnesota. It existed because of a mine. The Lakeland Mine. In the open pit—which was as red as an old scab and which grew wider and deeper every year—low-grade iron ore was extracted by shovel and truck, and processed into pellets that were shipped to steel refineries the world over.

His grandfather worked for the mine. His father worked for the mine. And then, when Peter was in elementary school, the mine closed.

*   *   *

It was not officially listed as the Street of Dreams, but that was what the locals called it under their breath: Le Rue des Rêves. Not too far from the Montparnasse Cemetery, this particular block of Hausman architecture—with its decorative stone facades and wrought-iron detailing and balconies and angled gray zinc roofs—was gated and bordered by gardens that pushed the rest of the city away. Its many chimneys ribboned smoke that seeped into the belly of the low-hanging clouds.

The Street of Dreams stood out, looking more like the architecture you would find along the Seine, its color a bone white at odds with the winter grime of its neighbors. A bus moaned by. A siren wailed. Rats scampered. Trash blew in the wind.

Peter kept his distance, studying the buildings from an alleyway and then a café and then a bar and a patisserie. Strolling the perimeter took close to twenty minutes. The windows gave nothing back but a reflection of the surrounding city.

Except once, when he thought he saw a pale face staring back at him—but when he looked again, it was gone.

Every now and then he would pause and pin his coordinates on his map, recording the GPS. Steam rose from the gutters and shimmered the air. When he walked past their breath, they warmed and dampened him, carrying a fungal smell.

In the three hours he lingered in the vicinity, he spotted only a few cars going in and out of the gates. A red BMW. An obsidian-black Mercedes.

The cold was beginning to creep into his marrow, so when bells clanged out a melody in the near distance, he followed their call to the Paroisse Notre-Dame-du-Travail. He climbed the steps and pushed inside the tall wooden doors to warm himself.

The interior was high-ceilinged. Rows of chairs filled the sanctuary. The walls were strangely columned with steel and lined with candlelit arcades. The frescos watched him pass. He paused at one with a red skull painted at the center. Surrounding it were rings and rings and rings of white skulls, expanding outward and interrupted by what appeared to be femurs arranged in tight striations. He lifted his phone to snap a photo.

He walked the center aisle to the altar and took a chair. In the emptiness he sat and rubbed his palms together. The air had a hushed watchfulness to it, as if it were holding its breath.

A silver-haired priest appeared from behind the altar, walking briskly. He paused when he spotted Peter and then changed his direction, offering a soft smile. “What brings you here, my son?” he said in French, and when Peter responded in kind, the priest waved his hands as if banishing a foul smell, and changed over to English.

“You are very welcome here, of course. But we don’t get many tourists.” One of his eyes was blind and appeared like a boiled egg with a spot of gray at its center. He spoke with excitement, as if he hadn’t had an audience in some time. “Please take pictures if you like. Are you interested in history perhaps? Architecture? Are you a student?”

“I am, yes.”

“Did you know this is the working man’s cathedral? It was built in such a way that the factory and train station workers would feel comfortable and at home. That’s the kind of neighborhood you’re in. It’s not like the Paris of the movies, yes?”

“But not everyone here is a worker.”

The priest had thick, bristling white brows and he raised them now. “How do you mean?”

“There’s a block nearby that looks rather exclusive.”

Here the priest’s mouth pinched and his voice lowered. “Ah, le Rue des Rêves. It is true. It is, as you say, exclusive. But even the smallest village has the big house on the hill, no? That is the way of the world.”

“Have you ever been inside?”

“No.” His faced darkened and he shook his head. “No, it is not a place for a man of God.”

“What do you mean by that?”

The priest’s good eye flicked upward, finding its focus on something at the rear of the sanctuary. “I must go.” He turned back toward the altar then, hurrying off, his footsteps echoing in the space.

Peter turned in his seat, the wood groaning beneath him.

In the back row of chairs sat a figure dressed in black rags. They had the appearance of someone who might have slept in the street. Their face was hooded and no part of their skin was visible except the dirt-rimed hands brought together in a steeple of prayer.

*   *   *

Many of the families in Iron Bottom moved away. The ones who stayed found other ways to patch together a living. They tended bar. They trucked. They plowed snow. They fished Superior. Peter’s father started splitting firewood. He came home smelling like chain grease. He always had sawdust in his beard and his fingernails were bruised with purple crescents. His mother chain-smoked and waitressed at the Bear Paw Diner until she complained of a pain in her ribs and started coughing up blood. They drove down to Duluth, where the hospital showed her a scan that made her lungs look like a garden of cauliflower. She refused treatment, said there was no point to it, and died three months later.

Peter was in middle school at this time. He was in the gifted program. He could solve math problems most needed a calculator for. He read his way through a novel or two a week, quickly depleting their small local library. After the funeral, after they shook his mother’s ashes into the lake, Peter’s father put a heavy hand on his shoulder and said, “You’ve been given a hard life. You deserve better. And I know you’re going to do something big. I know you’re going to get away from this place. Far, far away.”

That became a kind of promise. Everyone in the town said some version of it. You’ve been dealt a bad hand. You’re going to get out of here someday. You’re smart. You’re different. You’re going to make us all proud.

*   *   *

At Le Dome, he sat at a green leather booth and ordered a coffee and a croque monsieur. “Non,” the waiter said. “The coffee will come after.”

“But I want it now.”

“Non,” the waiter said. He was a middle-aged man who combed the few black hairs above his ears up and over the baldness of his scalp. “It will distract from the flavor of your meal.”

“I don’t care. I’m cold and I want a coffee.”

“After,” the waiter said and left him there.

The café was empty except for a few couples and an old man reading a newspaper. Their eyes seemed to travel his way too frequently.

A plate was brought out shortly. “Bon appetit,” the waiter said. When Peter smelled the toasted bread and melted cheese, his stomach ached with a sudden hunger. He had barely eaten over the past few days. The sandwich filled his mouth, and the ham was thickly cut and perfectly salted. He barely breathed between bites, and when he finished, his mouth and fingers were filmed with grease. He downed his glass of water and then unzipped his backpack and removed a map. He laid it out on the table, studying the streets and comparing them to the pins on his phone. He made several marks with a pencil.

Only now did the waiter bring the mug of coffee.

“There,” he said, setting it down. “You will enjoy it all the more now.”

Peter didn’t bother thanking him.

“May I ask what brings monsieur to the area?” His eyes traveled from the backpack to the map to Peter.

“Just seeing the sights.”

“Notre Dame and the Eiffel Tower and the Louvre, yes?”

“Maybe later. I have something else that needs to be done first.”

“If you are here, then the catacombs perhaps?”

“Yes. That’s where I’m headed next.”

“They are strange and terrifying, but beautiful in their own way.”

“So I’ve heard. Hey, can I ask you something?”

“Of course.”

“Are you from this neighborhood?”

“I am indeed.”

“Do you have any explanation why this paper map—and the map on my phone—don’t match the actual neighborhood?”

The waiter canted his head. “How is it, you say?”

“The maps are wrong. This right here—you see? This isn’t actually the way the streets are configured.” He showed the waiter the sketch he had drawn, overlying the paper map. “This is how it should look, if it included the Street of Dreams.”

The waiter pulled back then. He swallowed deeply enough that his neck surged. He reached into his apron pocket and withdrew the check and set it on the table. “When you are ready.”

*   *   *

His father was hefting logs into a trailer when he felt a knife jab of pain in his spine. He had herniated a disc. The doctor prescribed him oxycontin. A week on the couch became a month. A month became half a year. When the pharmacy wouldn’t refill his bottle, he found other ways to get numb. Whiskey. Fentanyl. His skin grayed and yellowed. The muscle and fat melted off him and he looked like a bundle of bones. He collected disability checks and Peter worked after school at the grocery store, stocking shelves and taking home the produce and meat that was going to get thrown out.

Peter was accepted to Yale, but received no scholarships, only financial aid. Every loan he could find, he took on. He understood that the interest rates were predatory. He understood that he would graduate hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt. But his father and his teachers and the librarian and the manager at the grocery store, they all said the same thing: “We’re proud of you,” and “We always knew you were going to do great things.” He had no choice but to go.

*   *   *

There was no line at the catacombs. There was a husband and wife, both wearing fanny packs and white tennis shoes, who spoke a little too loudly in their flat Midwestern accents, saying, “This is sure going to be creepy,” and “Marcy said to bring water, because it takes longer than you think.” Then there was a woman in a headscarf who wore sunglasses even inside. And two Asian teenagers in tracksuits. Peter walked with them through an empty maze of ropes meant to control a crowd. He paid in cash and took his ticket.

The stairs went down and down and down, turning this way and that, challenging his sense of direction. Lights were staggered along the descending corridor and they glowed a cancerous yellow. The walls were weeping stone. Footsteps and voices whispered and echoed.

Ten minutes later, he found himself in the ossuary. The ceiling was low and the floor was pebbled. This ancient stone quarry was stacked and puzzled with the skeletons of over six million people. It wasn’t an open space, more a series of shadowy rooms and alcoves interrupted by pillars of bone. The skulls held shadows in their sockets. Yellowed teeth smiled. Humerus and ulna, tibia and fibula. Femur and radius and skulls, skulls, skulls, some of them lined up in bands, others patterned to look like crosses. They were fitted together so tightly that they appeared jointed into one big animal. The air smelled of cellar puddles and old paper. A cold breeze blew as if the skulls were breathing.

The other visitors moved quickly, but he lingered. He clutched his phone. He had no signal down here, but he had downloaded a map of Paris so as to access it offline. Every few steps he pinned his location.

At one point he came to an iron gate. Through it he could see a stone passageway lost to darkness. He tried to open it, but a lock and chain held it in place. He set down his backpack and removed a short pair of bolt cutters. With them he bit through the lock. The gate creaked when he pushed through it. He checked behind him, and then snuck forward, using his phone to light the way. Another fifty yards and he came to an iron door with short spikes jutting from it. There was no handle. He pinned his location. Then he tried pushing at it—without luck.

Before he could try again, he heard the scuff of a shoe and a damp crackle of saliva. He was seized from behind and slammed against the stone wall. Once, twice, three times. A tooth chipped. His eyebrow split. His nose mashed sideways. His backpack fell. A knee dug into his spine and fist repeatedly bashed his kidneys. A bright red flash filled his eyes.

He fell to the floor, holding his side, struggling to breathe. He could taste blood. His phone offered a hazy green light. A black shape slid out of view. He listened to the scraping retreat of its footsteps. And then the catacombs were quiet except for his shuddering breath.

*   *   *

Peter had never traveled any farther than South Dakota and Wisconsin. He took a Greyhound bus to New Haven. The gothic spires of the campus looked like something out of a storybook. He was staring at the buildings, but he noticed others were staring at him. He wore what he always wore: Wrangler jeans and a white T beneath a Carhartt jacket, a camo trucker cap. When he keyed open his dorm room, he found his roommate sitting at a computer terminal that consisted of three screens. He had a blond wave of hair and wore a sweater that looked like it was spun from gold. The first thing he said to Peter was, “Oh my God, I’m rooming with a hick.”

*   *   *

By late afternoon night had fallen. Cars grumbled and scooters whirred as people hurried home from work. Peter limped between pools of lamplight, sticking to the shadows when he could. His face was tacky with blood. He stopped into a market to buy some water and a bottle of aspirin, and the clerk stared hard at him, collecting his money without a word.

At the hostel, no one was stationed at the front desk. His room was vacant. He dropped his backpack and leaned his elbows against the sink. He knobbed on the water, waiting for it to get hot, but it never did. He washed off his face and hands, gasping at the cold. Plugging one nostril, and then the other, he blew out two slugs of blood. The water swirled down the drain in a pink gurgle. His eyebrow was swollen into a shelf of flesh with a red line running down the center of it. He dried it tenderly. Some black and purple bruising fanned out of his nose and shadowed his eyes. One of his canines was chipped and throbbed with electric pain. His legs and hands trembled.

He took a deep breath to settle himself. That’s when he noticed the smell. It reminded him of a rotten potato found in the back of a cupboard. He followed it to its source: the bottom bunk where the man had been sleeping. The sheets were a tangle. He lifted them up and found the damp, muddy impression of a body stained into the mattress. He dropped the sheet and wiped his hand against his thigh.

Out of his backpack he pulled the map. He unfolded it and laid it out on the floor and flattened it with his hands. On his knees he studied his phone and the paper map, making notations with his pen, outlining the shape of the sepulcher hidden beneath the streets. When he arrived at the final coordinates, which he recorded on his phone before trying the iron door, he found his pen tapping the southern gate of the Street of Dreams.

His head felt heavy, drooping on his shoulders. His eyes were unfocused. He folded up the map and zipped it into his backpack. Wearily, he stood. Maybe it was a concussion or maybe it was jet lag, but when he shut off the light and climbed into the top bunk, he fell asleep before he could even pull the blanket over him.

*   *   *

Peter soon discovered that he was smart, but not that smart. Not compared to his classmates. Or maybe it had less to do with intelligence and more to do with exposure. He felt lacking in so many ways. He had never read Derrida or Foucault or bell hooks. He had never seen Shakespeare performed. He couldn’t speak Latin. He didn’t know how to code. He was regularly confused by the words other students dropped freely like hegemonic and solipsistic. He had never launched an app.

Work-study was part of his financial aid package, and he spent twenty hours a week in the cafeteria, refilling the salad bar, making omelets. Maybe manning the desk at the library or gym would have been easier, but he needed to fill his backpack with food at the end of every shift.

When people asked about his major, he would say he wanted to be a doctor or a lawyer without any conviction. The truth was, he didn’t really care. He just wanted to be rich. He wanted things to stop being so hard. He wanted that more than anything in the world.

*   *   *

His sleep was restless. He saw his town of Iron Bottom with half the stores empty and wolves running through the streets at night. He saw the deep pit of the taconite mine and the abandoned rusted equipment. He saw his father slumped over on the couch with vomit foaming down his chest and a Ziploc bag of pills beside him. He saw a lecture hall full of students pointing at him and laughing, the holes of their mouths growing wider and wider to reveal tunnels of bones and blood. He saw money burning. He saw a waiter serving him a dead rat on a white plate. He saw a figure dressed in black chasing him through gray streets. He saw a grinning red skull. He saw his body hammered to a cross above an altar of bones. He saw his body sawed up and arranged into oozing designs by long-fingered hands.

When he woke up, the window blinds were banded with morning light. His head ached and his tongue felt thick and dry. His pillow was stained with dried islands of blood. He sat up and his ribs throbbed.

A strange sound came from beneath him—somewhere between the bray of a donkey and an injured cat. He realized then that he was not alone. He could hear their breath—an open-mouthed panting. It was the man. The man in the bottom bunk.

Peter leaned over to see better, and the bed groaned with his weight, and the breathing stopped. It was then that he spotted his backpack. It had been emptied, all of its contents spilled and spread out on the floor.

“Hey!” he said, his throat rusty with sleep.

His map was torn into many ragged pieces.

“Did you do this? Did you go through my things?” He ignored the pain when he unfolded his body and dropped out of the bed. The shadows of the bottom bunk were thicker. The body lying there was motionless, cocooned in its blanket.

Peter began shoving his things into his backpack. “Hey, I’m talking to you.” He snatched up the last of the map and stuffed it away. Then he picked up the shovel, holding it like a weapon. “Are you hearing me, asshole?”

It was then he saw what looked like a hairless tail curling out from beneath the blanket.

*   *   *

At Yale, Peter’s favorite course was an archaeology lecture called “Myth, Ritual, and Symbology.” Professor Savini wore jeans and motorcycle boots. He had long black hair and a mustache. Tattoos sleeved his arms. He had a western drawl and cursed in class and slammed his hand down on the podium and threw chalk at students who were falling asleep. He was the only teacher that felt familiar to Peter. Like somebody from back home.

Peter asked him to be his advisor and by sophomore year was a regular visitor to his office. There was a Metallica poster on the wall, but so were there photos of Professor Savini excavating a Mayan temple and riding camels through the Sahara and playing a guitar at an outdoor concert. Every inch of shelving was busy with some shiny gem or pottery shard or bronze curiosity. A taxidermied crow was perched on his filing cabinet.

There was a wood carving on his desk. A red skull the size of a crabapple. It had short horns and bugged eyes and a stuck-out tongue.

“What is that?” Peter asked.

“This?” Professor Savini said, laying a middle finger on it. “This is a totem I was given by an occultist in Paris. He said it would bring me good fortune.”

“Was he right?”

“Well, I was working on my graduate thesis at the time. That thesis ended up published with University of Oxford Press. And then I won some prestigious grants and awards. And I had offers from several universities. So, yes, I guess you could say he was right.” He patted the skull. “We’ve been together ever since. He’s sort of like Dumbo’s magic feather, I suppose. I can probably fly without it, but it’s reassuring to have clutched in my trunk.”

“You were talking about something like that in class. Objects and even places that cultures believe have power in them.”

“I gave you all the PG version of that lecture.”

“What’s the R-rated version, then?”

Professor Savini rolled his head on his shoulders, so that he could make sure the hallway was empty. “Well… How about this?” He picked up the skull and stared into its eyes and a smile crawled up his cheeks. “There’s a saint buried below the richest neighborhood in Paris.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Now, just as there are saints who represent good luck—St Christopher and his safe travels or St Joseph and his home-selling or what you have you—there are also darker and weirder representations among them. Levitation. Alchemy. Telekinesis. Speaking to animals. That kind of thing. Anyway, there was an old cardinal during the time of the French Revolution who was being considered for sainthood. The Crimson Cardinal, they called him, because he dressed all in red. He was a controversial figure because he believed in balance. So, he prayed to God and the Devil both. His touch and counsel were said to bring fortune and power. He was so revered that in his later years, when he became feeble and incontinent, he was nursed in the mansion of some royals who favored him.

“I don’t know how much you know about the French Revolution. I assume you’ve at least seen Les Miz. But many of the bodies buried in the Paris catacombs came from that time. I’m talking about noblemen and noblewomen. Aristocrats. Their wigs were torn off. Their powdered cheeks were smeared with shit. They were marched to public squares and beheaded at the guillotine, one after another after another. The spectators stood calf-deep in blood. Fun times. The Revolution was based on resentment and jealousy, you could say. A peasants’ revolt. There was too much power at the top—which feels very familiar to our current situation, I might add—and the Girondins and all the revolutionaries wanted it for themselves.

“So, this Crimson Cardinal, he was among the executed. But he wasn’t killed publicly. It was a private ceremony held in an antechamber of the catacombs. And the quarrymen were the ones who did it. The quarrymen who had worked in the underground mines, carving up the stone that built the city of lights.”

“My father was a miner.”

“Oh yeah?”

“My grandfather too.”

“What did they mine?”

“Taconite.”

“Taconite. I should know what that is. Help me out.”

“Iron ore.”

“You’re from Minnesota, right?”

“The Iron Range. It used to be the iron capital of the world. All the steel for the tanks and helmets and guns for World War Two came from the taconite up north.”

“Used to be? What happened?”

“Greed. Globalization.” Peter shrugged. “Everything shut down. There’s no work anymore.”

“From a dead mining town to the Ivy League. You’ve come a long way. You remind me of me.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. I’m from eastern Oregon. My parents ran a small farm. Horses, sheep, alfalfa.”

“You went to Brown. From the West Coast to the East Coast.”

“Wanted to get as far away as I could. Never looked back. College was a lot cheaper twenty years ago, though.”

“I obviously can’t afford it. It’s probably stupid of me to be here. I’m going to be buried in debt when I graduate.”

“I’ve seen you serving food in the cafeteria. There aren’t many work-study kids on this campus.”

“No, there aren’t.”

“That hard for you?”

“I’m willing to do whatever it takes.”

“Takes to what?”

“To make it. To have what they have. To have what you have.”

“You’re hungry. That’s good. Again, you remind me of me.”

Peter said, “Anyway—sorry. Totally got you off track there. You were talking about the catacombs? You were talking about the quarrymen?”

*   *   *

Peter found himself hurrying through the gray streets and looking constantly over his shoulder. A cold rain spit from the sky. There always seemed to be something tattered and black at the edge of his vision—retreating down an alleyway, sliding along a rooftop.

A golden light came from a shop window and he pushed his way inside. A small man with large glasses sat behind an old wooden desk. He was examining a book with a magnifying glass. The pages were yellow and brittle and he used white gloves to turn them. He said, “Bonjour,” without looking up.

Peter took in the antique shop. Clocks ticked. Porcelain figurines gleamed. Mirrors carried mossy reflections. Thick books—with raised bands and leather binding—lined shelves. Here was a painting of a wolf hunt in a gold leaf frame. Here was a bone-handled brush with some long gray hairs still in its teeth. He wandered about for a few minutes, glancing out the window now and then to make sure he hadn’t been followed.

“Do you have any maps?” he said, not bothering anymore with the little French he had learned from Duolingo.

The man looked up and blinked furiously, finding his focus. He set down the magnifying glass. “Most young men like yourself simply use their phones, no?”

“Not this young man.”

“What kind of maps interest monsieur?”

“I’d love to see some old maps. Of the 14th Arrondissement.”

At this the man’s face twitched. “The computers don’t know everything, do they?”

“No, they don’t.”

The shopkeeper smiled and revealed teeth as small and yellow as corn kernels. “There is a framed map on the back wall that may be of interest.” He raised a hand, pointing, and Peter followed the line of it to a scroll of parchment flattened beneath glass. Its quality seemed almost that of old cloth. It was both overhead and three-dimensional, inked in blacks and reds and greens and yellows. “That dates back to the Haussman era. Mid-nineteenth century. When Paris was reborn.”

Peter leaned closer to study the detailing. The Street of Dreams was the very center of the map, the axis around which everything else spread. It was painted red. Several fat devils danced down its avenue with wine goblets in their hands. All of the buildings and blocks surrounding it were populated with thin skeletons that peered out of windows.

“This isn’t simply a map,” Peter said.

“No, it is not.”

“Then what does it mean?”

“That’s in the eye of the beholder.”

“What do you think it means?”

“Along the bottom. There’s a bit of old French. Can you read it?”

“No.”

“It says No Man is Equal,” the shopkeeper said. “Only some can do well, yes? The rest of us suffer and scrape by. That has always been the way of things.”

*   *   *

“The quarrymen!” Professor Savini said. “Yes, the quarrymen. They dragged the Crimson Cardinal down into the place where they had labored. The rock was old down here. Of another time. It was like traveling into the past and making conversation with an elemental force. Dark prayers were uttered, and then the Crimson Cardinal’s head was cut from his shoulders. His skull—when they stripped the flesh off it—was said to be as red as his robes.” The professor held up the wooden skull. “It was placed in a private section of the catacombs. At the center of a design that rippled outward with the bones of the nobles who harbored him. His executioners—those quarrymen—soon came into money themselves. And with this money they moved into the streets above their cardinal’s sepulcher. As their wealth and power grew through the generations, they walled themselves off from the rest of the city, becoming the very thing they despised.

“This was the Street of Dreams—in the 14th Arrondissement of Paris—a place that had always been known for its farms and quarries and factories.”

“Where is it?” Peter had asked. “Exactly? This Street of Dreams?”

“You can’t find it on any map. Any modern map, at least.”

“What’s stopping somebody from just marching over there and taking the saint’s bones for themselves?”

“Oh, I’d guess that this would be a very difficult and dangerous proposition indeed. I’d guess there would be a great number of safeguards in place to protect something that valuable.”

“You believe all of this, don’t you?”

The professor smiled and closed his fingers around the skull, disappearing it from view.

*   *   *

In the antique shop, he found what he was looking for in an unorganized chest of papers. A utility map dating back to the early twentieth century. The oily, wrinkled paper folded into a neat rectangle. He knew the shopkeeper was watching him, so he pretended indifference but set the map carefully aside. He continued browsing the store. After another five minutes, he picked at the scab on his eyebrow so that it bled. Then he said, “Excuse me, sir? I’m so sorry. But do you have any bandages?”

The shopkeeper’s eyes were already magnified by his glasses, but they grew even wider now. “Yes,” he said. “Yes, of course.” He abandoned his desk and opened a paint-flecked door behind him and disappeared into the back of the shop.

Peter used this moment to dash the ten steps to the chest. He opened the lid, slipped the map into his pocket, and returned to where he stood a moment before—just as the shopkeeper appeared with a first-aid kit.

*   *   *

For close to a year, Peter heard nothing from his father. Then, this past fall, the messages began. Over email, social media. Voicemails. Even letters.

He had gotten help. He had gotten clean. He spent several months in a treatment center. Now he had a sponsor. And weekly meetings. He was working again—as a night guard at the mine. There were some Chinese investors who were thinking about reopening it, and so the controlling company had been cleaning up the facilities and refurbishing equipment. Maybe there was hope for Iron Bottom after all. He wanted to apologize to Peter for checking out. He also wanted some updates about his life in New Haven. He was so proud of Peter, and he hoped Peter was proud of him as well.

It was easier for Peter not to respond. It was easier to forget that part of himself. It was easier to pretend that both of his parents were already dead. That’s what he told people, when asked about his family: they died. He was an orphan. Everyone’s regard for him changed then, he noticed. What had initially been contempt transformed into sympathy and respect. A go-getter, they called him. A self-made man. Bootstraps became his nickname.

He had started to dress differently, buying polos and check-patterned shirts from thrift stores. He had modified his voice, so that his long vowels weren’t so obviously Midwestern. He grew out his hair into more of a curly flop. He had become a quick student, asking professors for bonus reading lists so he could fill in the gaps in his knowledge. He was being considered for an eating club. He worked thirty hours a week. The rest of his time was spent in class or the library. He slept so little that his eyes felt full of bees and his stomach was an acidic pit.

One time, after his father called, Peter blocked the number. He felt like he was kicking his way toward the surface of a lake, almost there, and his past was the pale hand reaching for his ankle and wanting to drag him back down into the black and crushing depths.

*   *   *

Peter studied the map in a restroom, unfolding it across his lap. At one point he heard a strange braying sound and lowered his head. The stall beside him was occupied. The frayed black hems of the pants gave way to boots that looked more like mud-caked hooves.

He ran, but not aimlessly. He knew where to go. He prowled the perimeter of the Street of Dreams. Night had come, and he could see better into the glowing windows. Most were curtained, but occasionally he caught a glimpse of a piano, an armoire, a chandelier, a beveled ceiling, a four-poster bed, a room of mirrors. Shadows moved, but none revealed themselves.

There was a gutter grate—geysering steam—that would give him access to the inner catacombs. But a car was parked there, its front right wheel pinning the entry. He waited an hour. Then he crossed the street and tried the car door and found it unlocked. He pulled the gear shift into neutral. He stepped out of the car and leaned his shoulder against the frame and pushed, straining until the car rolled a few feet, freeing the grate.

Peter hurried over and yanked up the grate. He had to take off his backpack to fit inside the gap. He dropped down into the murk. His shoes sank into a mess of trash and fallen leaves. Cold water instantly seeped into his shoes. He pulled the grate back into place, wincing at the scrape and clang of metal.

The way was tight, but he managed, sometimes hunching over, sometimes crawling through a throat of cut stone. Rust rained down. Slime coated him. Rats squeaked and scurried away. He stopped on several occasions to study the map further. There were cross tunnels with wires and pipes veined into the ceiling. He followed an older passage. Eventually he was spit out into a broader hall.

He could discern a wavering light up ahead. Eventually he didn’t need his phone and tucked it away. He turned a corner and the bones began. Their patterns were more elaborate here than in the public catacombs. There were spirals, star shapes, moon shapes. Ciphers he could not discern. There were thrones and tables. Some of the bones had writing on them. Some of the bones were painted. Some of the bones extended upward, wrapping the ceiling.

He removed the utility shovel from his backpack and gripped it two-handed. He had to duck through an archway to enter a bright chamber. Candles glowed inside of skulls, their sockets flickering with an intelligent light.

He barely had time to register his surroundings before he was tackled from behind. He fell to the floor. A heavy body clung to him. It was grunting and braying. He couldn’t see the figure fully in the struggle. Only flashes of black cloth, a clotted beard with yellowed teeth, an eye like a bubble rising out of a boiling stew. A heavy, sour smell choked his lungs.

The shovel had fallen and skittered across the floor. He offered a series of short punches followed by the point of his elbow. The figure squealed and fell back. Peter scrambled on his hands and knees. He snatched hold of the shovel. He spun around and swung it hard. The metal connected with bone.

The hooded figure fell. Peter swung again, and again, and again, the blade of the shovel cutting through cloth and sinking into meat. At first the man raised his hands and kicked his feet. But then he did not protest any assault, and his body lay as it did in the bunk, a motionless heap that might have been sleeping.

Peter bent his body in half, resting his arms on his thighs, heaving his breath. Eventually he calmed himself enough to take in his surroundings. The bones here were newer. Some of them were still patched with meat and roughly hatched from blades.

Then came a mewling sound. The man was alive after all. A puddle of blood spread slowly around him. Some of his face was visible, the eye staring accusingly. His nose had a familiar bump on its bridge. Peter mouthed the word no. Then, slowly, he crept forward and kneeled beside the body. With trembling hands, he pulled back the hood and fully revealed the face of his father. “No.” This time he said the word out loud. “Dad?”

His father opened and closed his mouth, revealing a gumline of missing teeth. When he spoke, there were only guttural sounds. His tongue—it was gone.

“I told you he’d make it,” a familiar voice said. “He’s as hungry and stubborn as they come.”

Peter looked up to see a line of men and women enter the chamber. They wore red robes. Among their number was Professor Savini. “This one’s willing to do just about anything to get what’s his. Isn’t that right, Peter?”

Peter gaped at them as they continued to file inside, maybe fifty of them altogether.

“Who are they?”

“They’re just like you and me. Fellow quarrymen. They come from all over. And they all want the same thing. A chance to dig their way out of the disadvantage. An opportunity to hack an unfair system that favors generational power and wealth. That’s what the bones can offer. I don’t know if any of us can say definitively whether we were recruited or called to be here.”

“Or baited,” Peter said.

“You chose to come here.”

“Where is it?”

“You want to see the skull?” Professor Savini withdrew a dagger from beneath his robe. The blade was as long as his forearm. The metal caught the candlelight. He examined it before offering it to Peter. “Then you have to sacrifice everything.”

Both their eyes dropped to the floor, where Peter’s father stirred and whimpered.

“He said he was doing better,” Peter said.

“Once an addict, always an addict. He started using again.”

His father gaped at him, opening and closing his mouth with an animal cry.

“I barely recognize him,” Peter said.

“Then this will be easy.”

Peter reached for the knife.

THE EMPIRE
BENEATH HIS FEET

AI JIANG

1974

A group of farmers from Litong County plunged their drills into the ground to dig a well, but instead of water, they found a hollow subterranean chamber pounding with persistent echoes that were not unlike the screams of those who had fallen into one such well, a sound trailing the body all the way down.

Inside the tomb, they unearthed the broken fragment of a soil-eaten face, a piece of armour green and scaled like a dragon, and a dismembered hand missing its index at the middle joint, with a pinky broken off altogether along with a part of the palm—all made of terracotta: a warrior, they would later come to realize. Or more accurately, the first of eight thousand undocumented terracotta warriors slumbering beneath the land.

*   *   *

2,200 Years Ago

The first emperor, Qin Shi Huang, commanded his messengers to scatter across the empire to deliver scrolls of conscription—though not one of war, but one calling for convicts in particular, along with farmers and builders, numbering over 700,000, for the construction of his tomb on Li Shan. One such convict was Mang’s elder brother, sentenced for the murder of a woman who he believed caused his own mother’s death five years prior.

The conscripts streamed towards the mountain, both willing and unwilling, for some had been promised a reduced sentence while others were on the verge of release yet corralled as though their close-to-grasp freedom never existed. In lines, they marched like ants to a hill, bees to a hive, waiting for instruction with expressions glazed, nervous, irritated, or indifferent altogether. Mang’s brother, defiant, stared back down the mountain towards a village unseen, wondering what had become of his father and younger brother.

“It must look exactly like the palaces in which I reside, the pavilions under which I have strolled, the same rare findings and extravagant vessels displayed in my halls,” the emperor had commanded of the guards chosen to supervise the construction. The aging Qin Shi Huang wrung his hands, rings scraping against bones, hoping his plans for immortality would indeed come to fruition so his tomb would never be used, never be filled, but paranoia devoured every inch of his mind, and he could never let go of the fear of death until the last breath he would later take.

Lining these tombs were arrows and crossbows that also filled the emperor’s palace armoury, traps meant to shoot down those with overflowing greed, hoping to steal from the tombs dug from springs and lined with bronze molten and cooled.

But of course, something was missing, for every empire needed its people, and every empire needed its ruler, and this tomb was a hunger, empty and yearning under the land of the living, waiting to be fed.

*   *   *

1976

Two more tombs followed the discovery of the first. Along with further figures of warriors, excavators unearthed horses—some, when pieced back together, appeared mid-run, legs curved at the knees, hooves curled as though having just pushed off the ground, airborne, with nowhere to run, fleeing from something unseen. A strange sight, given all the other horses discovered were lined in neat, uniform rows—much like the warriors themselves, left in battle formation to mimic how the emperor’s real army may have positioned themselves in war—with straight legs static, bound by an unseen chain.

Though in neither the still nor stampeding terracotta horses did the excavators see freedom, and in their stony eyes, pupil-less, there was a certain fear that seemed both primal yet also a little too human.

*   *   *

2,200 Years Ago

The emperor rounded up a hundred artisans, one of whom was Mang’s father. It had always been his dream to craft for the emperor, though it meant having to leave his remaining younger son behind for the project. He had also hoped he might be able to see his elder son, even if only to catch a single, fleeting glimpse, knowing the emperor had conscripted convicts for the construction of his tomb as well.

All the artisans rested on their knees with their heads bowed in front of the emperor in his court, arms raised in front of them with their palms facing upwards, awaiting the portraits the royal attendants placed in each of their hands.

When Mang’s father rose and returned to his quarters along with the other artisans located within the imperial palace, bundled under the crook of each of his long-robed arms and clutched in his callus-thickened hands were several scrolls, each holding the likeness of a living warrior in the emperor’s army. Mang’s father wondered if the rest of the emperor’s staff would also be immortalized in terracotta form and buried with him upon death, as he passed servants rushing about and those who started on the emperor’s dinner well before it was time for the meal. If so, a hundred artisans would not be enough for the task.

In a workshop dedicated to his craft, Mang’s father laid out the first of the portraits on the table. He considered the warrior’s goatee, wide-set eyes, and thick low brows, as well as his armour that consisted of a bright array of reds, purples, and greens. In an elegant script, Mang’s father began to first note down the details of the statue before beginning work—jotting each step he took in crafting his very first warrior in careful calligraphy. This was the first time he had tackled a project of this size and scale, but he knew that out of all his commissions, this was one with the slimmest margin for error.

Mang’s father used lacquer of processed tree sap on fired clay before layering on mixed pigments in protein-based binders that consisted of milk, egg, and animal glues, each colour based on the warriors’ ranking.

But both the warrior and general cracked in the kiln and fell apart. They would have to be made again. Even after exchanging notes with his fellow artisans, warrior after terracotta warrior fell, pieces crumbled and scattered on the ground, as though their flesh had been flayed and left to rot, abandoned on the battlefield that took the form of the workshop’s ground.

Mang’s father picked up a fallen fracture that had his name stamped into the clay, and realized then why every artisan had failed, including himself; but they had been given days not weeks, and it was too late.

On the night prior to his and his fellow artisans’ execution, he sent a letter back to his son, awaiting his return in their home village, with that same piece of broken warrior:

Make first the body parts of the warriors from thick coils of clay. Then kiln separately.

Make separately the head. Fire the head separately as well.

Add details of the face, hair, and armour by hand before the figure has dried.

Construct the warrior after all parts have been made and kilned—separately.

Do not forget—each part must be crafted separately.

*   *   *

The next morning, at the same time as Mang’s father’s letter left the Forbidden City, he and the other ninety-nine artisans were pulled from their rooms half-awake—though Mang’s father was among those who didn’t sleep a single wink—and lined up in ten neat rows beneath the steps leading to where the emperor was stationed. The emperor gazed down at the lines of men from the tip of his nose, chin tilted upwards, like a god passing judgement upon mortals for their inadequacies.

Behind each artisan, kneeling in white with their heads bowed low—much like the way they had when they first took audience with the emperor, though now their hands were not outstretched in front of them but bound behind, rope biting into their flesh rubbed raw—was a guard with a sword unsheathed, held at the ready.

One by one, the heads of the artisans were lopped off, rolling forward towards the steps of the imperial palace with blood spurting from their necks, exposed throats, spine ridges sliced clean, exploding upwards in a sputtering foundation, like the remaining sparks of celebration fireworks; except here, nothing was being celebrated.

The emperor watched with indifference, then slight frustration, as each artisan’s body fell like warriors in war fields at the weapons not of their enemy, but of their own, who had snuck up behind their backs and snuffed the light from their eyes before they even had a chance to turn and look at the face of their reaper.

Mang’s father’s head stared into the sky, not yet lifeless, blinked once, then twice, then a third time before a guard picked him up by his unbound hair and tossed him into a burlap sack separate from his body—an irony when thinking about his note to his son and his emphasis on constructing the parts of the warriors all separately before making them whole.

Though he fought no physical battles, Mang’s father wished his sons would think of him, too, as a warrior.

*   *   *

1981–1982

Surrounding the mirrors of the pavilion and palaces in the emperor’s tomb trailed waterways of mercury, flowing intersections mimicking the great sea, the Yellow Rivers, and the Yangtze River. The roof of the tomb chamber was decorated with constellations—a sky beneath the emperor’s very feet.

*   *   *

2,200 Years Ago

“Bring it to me,” the emperor rasped, hands tremoring harder than earthquakes, so much so it had been weeks since he was last able to hold his own cup, sip his own tea and wine, and had shattered the most expensive porcelain in his collection. Sweat showered down from his dishevelled hair as though a typhoon had arrived and never left. Bruises below his eyes sagged until the folds of skin kissed the tops of his cheeks, his thinning flesh pulled taut over the protruding bones.

Next to him rested his favourite concubine, who was pregnant with her third child, dabbing at his hairline with a damp towel; and though her expression was rearranged into one of despair, the advisor could glean the cunning hint of eager anticipation, of an almost fevered joy in her wide and falsely innocent eyes—the vixen hadn’t allowed any of the other concubines near the emperor for months.

“Your Imperial Majesty, this has been your fourth cup today,” the emperor’s advisor whispered, with a bowed head but fervent glances flicking upwards regardless of the presumed rudeness of the act, because all in attendance knew the emperor no longer noticed.

“Fourth? No. Don’t be silly. I haven’t had my liquid of immortality today. My lips are parched. Do not feed me such lies!” the emperor howled, flinging himself away from the concubine, his fingers scattering to scratch with irritation at the skin of his wrist, but missing its mark several times before abandoning the attempt altogether.

Though the advisor spoke no further, the emperor acted as though the elder man had, and sputtering laughter escaped along with spittle from his cracked lips looking more shrivelled than sunbaked prunes. The emperor began nodding his head, bobbing up and down, side to side, sometimes slow, sometimes so vigorously it was a miracle his head remained on, as though he was listening to someone unseen explaining the secrets of the universe.

“But my Imperial Majesty—”

“Bring it to me.”

Then, as he was fed his liquid of immortality, a little too impatiently by the concubine, with mercury dribbling from the corners of his mouth, the emperor said: “Tell them I will reward them all!”

“Who? What reward…?”

“Yes. Reward.”

When the emperor smiled, the space between his teeth was lined with bright red blood turning pink with collecting saliva—behind rested a tongue falling lax. A wonder he had not yet choked on his own lolling organ.

*   *   *

When the emperor once again called for artisans, Mang answered. Even having not been told about the end of his father, he could guess by the contents of his letter. The younger son vowed to succeed where his father failed. And then—?

Upon arriving in Beijing, on his way to the imperial palace, a merchant waved Mang over to her stall, beckoned him with a steaming bun extended in the air. As soon as Mang placed his payment in her labour-worn hands, she closed her fingers around his, pulling him closer, so the pair met eye to eye. Instead of pulling away, Mang remained still. The merchant reminded him of his late mother in the way her eyes crinkled, looked from side to side, as though always holding a secret waiting to be uttered.

“What is your dream?” the merchant whispered, eyes hooded, sleepy almost, blinking as though her lids were lined with molasses, never leaving Mang’s.

“My dream…” Mang mused with his free hand scratching at his stubble, the way his father used to. “It has been buried… or if not buried, then lost.”

“Maybe you could unbury it,” the merchant said before suddenly letting go of Mang and leaning back.

“Or maybe…” Mang whispered as he continued on his path towards the palace, where his father’s murderer awaited.

In the imperial workshop, among all the new artisans, many young like Mang himself, Mang laboured well into the night, until rosy dawn curled her fingers towards him, and he refused her allure when she caressed the lids of his eyes, beckoning him to slumber, knowing his body demanded it. Still, he refused fatigue, its desire to rest.

After trial and error, he succeeded with his father’s notes.

Separately.

A warrior adorned in crimson cuffs and collar, plum protectors over his legs, overcoat the colour of deep forests, beneath rested royal blue trousers; a general with an inner coat scarlet in colour with a dark plum overcoat, paired with trousers tongue pink and lotus leaf green. He wondered if his father made these exact same figures, was handed these exact same portraits, and was killed because he had failed to bring them to life.

*   *   *

1979

The emperor’s tomb opened to the public for the first time and visitors swarmed in their masses, clamouring over one another to enter the space of the unalive. In the same year, a graveyard was also discovered—not of the terracotta army, nor of horses and chariots, goods and weapons and fineries, but one of bone remnants, powdered history ground down and scattered like ashes waiting to be found.

The excavator inhaled the staleness of the tomb, caught the scent of mercury mixed with the dead air and packed earth, and coughed as their eyes trailed along the dusted metal poured in the shape of rivers and streams, like watching mirrors left unused for a very long time.

*   *   *

2,200 Years Ago

“A celebration” held within one of the chambers of the newly constructed tomb was what the builders and farmers and convicts were told by the messengers, and Mang’s brother both hoped and dreaded that he would see his father and younger brother there, knowing it was likely that the artisans, too, would be invited.

“A reward bestowed upon you for all your hard work by the emperor,” the messenger said to the masses as guards escorted Mang’s brother and his fellow farmers and convicts and builders towards the chamber, or rather, they were herded like cattle towards their destination. Though Mang’s brother noted, following close behind were the attendants, among others of the emperor’s court.

His instincts had never failed him before, and he knew as soon as he entered the tomb that this would be his end. His suspicions were further confirmed when he heard whispers from those around him about the emperor’s recent passing, not yet announced publicly. And he knew his suspicions to be truth when the guards exited the chamber and closed off the tomb passages as soon as the last of the workers entered.

As Mang’s brother was pushed deeper and deeper into the chamber, further and further from the blocked entrance, he thought he saw the back of his younger brother’s head, but crammed into the space, it was difficult to tell anyone apart with bodies pressed against one another so close even perspiration uncomfortably mingled.

Mang’s brother stumbled against a concubine holding her stomach, the protrusion small, almost unnoticeable. The crowd threatened to swallow her small stature, and if not for Mang’s brother catching hold of the young woman’s arm, she would have fallen and been trampled in the stampede of the rapidly panicking horde that swarmed towards the blocked entrance.

“Why are you here?” Mang’s brother asked.

The concubine shook her head. “Because they don’t know I’m pregnant,” she said, clutching tighter onto her belly with both hands, as though offering herself the comfort of an embrace she couldn’t find elsewhere.

Among the frenzy, Mang’s brother escorted the concubine to an area where the attendees dwindled, a small pocket of space where one could take a breath, even if musty and sour.

They pressed against the wall and held onto one another, knowing that this would be the last time they would stand whole in this world.

*   *   *

Mang’s brother spat into his free hand and rubbed the dirt from his face. His nose burnt with the fumes of mercury and his lungs cried for fresh air. At the centre of the chamber, wails began, and what followed was the spread of smoke, and wafting towards Mang’s brother and the concubine on the verge of fainting were uncomfortable waves of heat that quickly became visible ripples in the air—though he was uncertain whether what he saw was reality or an illusion of delirium from being close to suffocation.

Some willingly held the flames lit upon whale-fat candles over their own clothing and bodies, burning off their own flesh, because what was worse? To suffocate or to burn?

Many had fallen into the mercury rivers, coated in metal as though becoming statues themselves. It was difficult to say whether they plunged themselves to escape the flames or in hopes of drowning.

Both Mang’s brother and the concubine closed their eyes, both hands now clasping one another’s, and took a long, deep breath.

*   *   *

1995

Stories spread about one worker who had escaped and survived from the graveyard.

In that same year, excavators discovered a fourth pit, but it was empty, appearing as though abandoned before it was finished.

*   *   *

2,200 Years Ago

Mang slunk along the spirit road towards the secondary tombs adorned in a guard’s armour. The brief trek felt far too long. From the bottoms of Mang’s feet, even though it was covered in cloth, it was as though the lingering fingers of the dead crept under the roads, reaching up to tickle Mang’s skin, trailing uncut nails along his bare flesh.

Mang stared hard at the closed passage of the tomb that held all the dead workers before entering the abandoned fourth, wondering if it might ever be finished, and if so, with what it might be filled.

He thought about those buried alive while the emperor’s body and soul rested, laughed, celebrated his cunning in another tomb—his body unmarred.

Mang heard there had been fire, and in his mind festered the image of flesh scorched, baked as though the chamber were a kiln, as though all those herded within its confines of rising heat were the terracotta warriors who now rested dry, cold, in darkness, in a different chamber.

*   *   *

2050

With the rise in holographic analysis technology, an excavator used the new program to map out what the tombs looked like in the past. But they noticed something strange beneath the fourth empty tomb—five terracotta figures, complete and whole, stuck in the earth as though they had never been touched, but it seemed impossible that they could have been buried and left undiscovered.

The first—what appeared to be the body of an elderly man without his head, holding out a letter without a recipient to receive it.

The second—a younger man with his face and limbs smeared in dirt, eyes searching.

The third—a woman holding onto the younger man with one hand, wearing extravagant robes in a mixture of blush pink and snow white, her other hand atop the head of a small child.

The fourth—the small child with their hands extending upwards as if waiting to be received.

And the fifth—a man adorned in armour of jade green, burnt sun, taupe sand, but he was not a warrior, not quite, though perhaps he was, of a sort. He held no blade nor shield, but in his hands were a scroll and a tool for sculpting.

The excavator zoomed in closer to the five terracotta figures and in his ears began a deep pulsing, like a faraway heartbeat, and the touchpad under his fingers vibrated as though words were being hummed against his skin. Transfixed, the excavator reached forth in the air towards the holographic image of the terracotta artisan as it blinked in his direction—once, twice, and a third time.

UNDER WATER

TANANARIVE DUE

Open Double QuoteThis is some bullshit.” Trey huffed out his annoyance as he tapped the combination for a third time on the rental house’s keypad. As before, the light glowed red with a chiding beep.

Which part? Leesa thought. The drive with Trey up from Atlanta should have taken her less than an hour, a quick jaunt north on US-19—until they hit the rainstorm in Alpharetta, which had been the stuff of nightmares, her tires sloshing over the near-flooded road. Now they were getting soaked as winds speared them with cold rain on the large lake house’s wooden porch. The owners must have paid more attention to the forecast, since a tarp nestled the bench beside the front door, sagging from rainwater. The thin pines surrounding the cabin were a poor shelter from the storm. With the driveway empty except for her Kia, they were the only two team members who had arrived for their production company’s weekend retreat in Cumming. And who the fuck plans a retreat in a nowhere town called Cumming?

Trey was six-three and lifted weights like muscles were armor, so he towered over her. He shook his printed reservation sheet with irritation. “Why is there always an extra layer of bullshit? And why are we even here? They should have canceled this mess.”

Leesa rarely allowed herself the luxury of bitching, since she thrived on finding solutions. But she smothered a small wave of guilt, remembering what she had revealed to Franks about Trey the year before, when Franks surprised her in the hall with a candid question about him when Trey was still a development assistant fresh from Howard. The rare experience of having her boss’s full attention spilled out her words before she could think: He gets easily frustrated sometimes. She and Trey worked in different divisions—she was in film, he was in TV—but she’d heard his diatribes at company socials. (Black company socials at nearby bars, which meant three people, sometimes four, if Kofi from Legal came through.)

The guilt flaring now wasn’t because what she’d said to Franks wasn’t true; it was because she’d told the cookout business to their boss, and about the only Black queer employee, doubly marginalized. She wasn’t exactly leading the Revolution. She’d tried to clean it up with an email, and Trey had been promoted by the skin of his teeth. She always wondered if her comment reinforced the version of Trey that Franks might already imagine about the Black employees. Hotheaded. Churlish. Sassy. Rumors of layoffs were flying, and she worried that Trey might be on the list because of her.

“Maybe it’s an old code,” Leesa said helpfully. “Did they send a text?”

“The really fucked-up part?” Trey went on as if he hadn’t heard her. “It isn’t my job to be standing here in the rain figuring out how to open this door. It damn sure isn’t your job. This is why interns exist.”

“Truth,” Leesa said, indulging his bitchfest to be polite. But damn, she was getting wet. Leesa shielded her hair from stray droplets of rain with her laptop bag.

Trey finally sighed and scrolled through his texts. One caught his eye, and he compared the text to his rain-sodden page. “It is a whole different code.” Imagine that—it’s a simple mistake. “…Please let this work.”

He jabbed in five numbers, and this time the light on the panel shone green. A loud click slid back the deadbolt. The door cracked open on its own on the aged frame.

“Halle-fucking-lujah,” Trey said.

Inside, the lake house was bigger than it looked, its narrow, rectangular living and dining areas stretching back toward glass sliding doors to a deck. It also wasn’t as rustic as it seemed from the outside, updated with a widescreen TV on the wall and shaggy pillows and Seventies kitsch; a turntable and eight-track player like her grandmother’s. New wood laminate floors gleamed. On the dining table, someone had already laid out bags of chips, bottled water, and a large cardboard cutout of the company logo for Dreamscape Productions.

Without being asked to, Trey lifted her overnight suitcase to bring it inside for her, since he was only carrying a backpack. She chastised herself again for saying such a thoughtless thing about Trey to their boss. Bitching might feel like the next closest thing to healing, and Trey had to wrestle with being physically intimidating to his smaller white co-workers on top of everything else.

Dreamscape’s hiring practices already had been abysmal, and the national pushback against diversity had killed three of her pet projects last year as company memos stressed they were looking for stories with “wide appeal.” (Which meant white appeal, never mind that Jordan Peele and Ryan Coogler had shown the world that stories centering Blackness were also universal.) She might get her current dramedy project, Poor Little Me, over the finish line—it was in active pre-production with a director and star attached—but only because it wasn’t Black.

“Maybe an intern beat us,” Leesa said. “Hello?”

Trey sniggered, his bad mood broken. “Total cliché,” he said. “Calling out ‘hello’ in a lake house in the woods? We can do better.”

She laughed too. “Right? If I read that in one more script…”

Still, the lack of an answer bothered her. Stairs to the left of them with an open door descended to the daylight basement she’d seen in a brochure photo, which she planned to claim if she could, away from everyone. A winding stairwell ahead led upstairs. The lake house looked empty but didn’t feel empty. She almost called out again with her voice raised.

Instead, Leesa walked to the far end of the room to stare out of the glass sliding doors, which were beaded with rain droplets. The deck furniture was covered too. The rain was coming down so hard that she could only vaguely see a long pier and a gray expanse of water that looked like fog instead of a lake. So much for the canoeing promised in the company email.

Brochures stood displayed on a table near the rear door, near a basket of beach towels and a couple of snorkeling masks: WELCOME TO LOVELY LAKE LANIER!

“What the hell…?” she whispered. Trey heard the cue that she finally shared his outrage, so he was by her side with quick steps. “Did you know this was Lake Lanier?”

Trey snatched up the brochure to study it. “I did not.” He sounded measured and grim, which made her more anxious than his usual tirades.

From Trey’s face, she didn’t have to explain why she had never expected to find herself vacationing on Lake Lanier. She had just read a Lake Lanier-based horror script where spirits from Oscarville—the town flooded to create the man-made lake in 1956—came back to haunt teenage vacationers who were clueless about the lake’s history. The script had piqued her curiosity to do some research: most Black residents had been driven out of Oscarville and Forsyth County by racism long before the flooding. But the cemeteries hadn’t been properly moved, leaving remains behind, and of course the flooded cemeteries were mostly Black. Her conjured images of unmoored skeletons at the bottom of the lake were scarier than the CGI-driven jump scares in the script she had passed on.

Nothing about this underwater burial ground had been treated as sacred. Why hadn’t she made the connection when she drove into Forsyth County? Her grandmother was still talking about a Black man, Keith Lamont, who had been dragged to death in Forsyth County in 1980. So, they were in a sundown county with a racist history near a lake with a track record of unhappy deaths, whether or not they were related to ghosts. If she had known this was their destination, she would have brought the sage her brother had given her to burn away the bad energy.

“Making us come here for a weekend retreat is a hate crime,” Trey said. “I’m just gonna say it. These people are out of their damn minds.”

“I knew we had no business leaving Atlanta. Every time we fly out here, these highway signs trigger the hell out of me—Montgomery, Selma. It’s like the Who’s Who of my family’s stories about the Civil Rights Movement.” After her parents left Florida, she had grown up in Rancho Cucamonga in Southern California and studied film at UCLA. She rarely visited the South except for shoots—or meetings like this retreat—mostly in Atlanta.

“I’m just a country ’bama from Charleston County, so I’m not scared of the South,” Trey said. “But I don’t do hauntings.”

Yet, here they were.

“We should say something,” Leesa said, but she knew that “we” meant her because she had been with Dreamscape for five years and had more seniority than any other Black employee except Kofi in Legal, who kept his head in his contracts. “Not just about how insensitive this retreat is—but we should let them know that whitewashing the slate is cowardice. And racist.” But with tact. She’d called out a racist teacher in high school, and her principal had been upset with her “irresponsibility” as if she’d accused her teacher of leading a lynch mob. The R-word was a bomb that blew back in every direction.

Trey made a sound like Good luck with that. “It’s every company in Hollywood, sis.”

“That doesn’t make it okay,” Leesa said. “You know what’s sad? My grandmother says she feels like all those activists in the Sixties got their heads bashed in and murdered for nothing. You get to the mountaintop and there’s a whole new mountain to climb. Every time.”

“For real,” Trey said. “My mom said she wishes it was like the Nineties, so we could see more Black movies and sitcoms again like when she was growing up. The Nineties? Damn. When Black folks start talking about ‘the good old days,’ you know hell has frozen over.”

“They want to erase us,” Leesa said. “Just like this town that got buried under the lake.”

As she thought of the drowned town, Leesa gazed out ten yards beyond the deck to the pier above the churning lake, which was agitated by the wind. The water looked angry. Leesa could swim well enough to avoid drowning if she fell into a pool—maybe—but she couldn’t imagine willingly swimming in a lake that looked so unfriendly in the storm. She was still traumatized by an undertow that had surprised her when she was at the beach with her family at ten, as if invisible hands had snatched her beneath the ocean. Nope, she didn’t like the water.

Leesa leaned closer to the glass, wondering if she was imagining how close the pier sat above the gray lake water. The water looked close enough to reach down and touch if she were kneeling on the pier’s wooden planks. A single canoe painted bright red bobbed, also under a tarp, tied with a rope. The canoe looked high enough to glide across the pier.

Or was it an optical illusion from the rain? Her thoughts escaped into soft words. “Should that water be so high?”

Trey didn’t hear her. He had other things on his mind.

“I think I’m gonna get fired,” Trey said. “I’ve been looking for two months. I interviewed with a company in Toronto last week, but it’s a long shot. Between us.”

Leesa didn’t pretend to be surprised or ask him why he believed he would be let go. Hell, she probably should be looking too. She’d had strong assurances from Franks at the beginning of the year that the company valued her great story sense, but she’d watched sister after sister she knew lose their jobs in the past year. It wasn’t compliance—it was wish fulfillment.

Something thumped on the spiral staircase behind them, a sound that seemed designed to get their attention. They both whirled around to look, and Trey slipped into a protective stance, moving in front of her.

Leesa’s insides curdled. She would have preferred a ghost.

The head of their company, David Franks, was descending the stairs in faded gray sweatpants and a Jaws T-shirt. He was in his early fifties and fit, with a stylishly trimmed salt-and-pepper beard. Franks had inherited the production company from his older brother, who died in a DUI, so David Franks had famously given up professional poker to learn the business. Franks held a bottle of Corona, sipping as he walked. He was trying to look casual, but Leesa could tell from his deliberate pacing that their voices had penetrated the walls. Nothing was casual about the way he looked straight their way.

“Hello,” he said, smiling. But also suppressing a wider grin. “Not alone at last.”

Trey grabbed one of the water bottles on the table near them. He cleared his throat as if his words were clogged, unscrewing the cap.

Leesa had done some acting in high school and one play in college, Viola Davis’s part in Doubt, but that hadn’t prepared her for the concentration it took to hook up her lips in a smile and keep the waver out of her voice.

“Hey, David,” Leesa managed to say. No one thought of their boss as David, only Franks, but he told everyone to treat him like “one of the guys.” He’d busted them, and now it was only a matter of the damage. She couldn’t feel more nervous if he were brandishing a gun at them, waiting for him to shoot. Her heartbeat tickled her skin.

“Guess we’re the last ones to get the memo,” Franks said. “The road’s flooding, so this retreat’s canceled. A car dropped me off way too early, before I knew this rain wouldn’t let up since yesterday. Just us here now.” He spoke so quickly, his words colliding, that Leesa wondered how many Coronas he’d had before they arrived. “Pretty sure we’re stuck here tonight.”

Trey’s sigh was a whisper in his nostrils, but Leesa heard it.

“Then I hope they have Yahtzee,” Leesa heard herself say. Truly, it was as if someone else had taken control of her mouth. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d played Yahtzee.

Franks laughed, a bit too loudly. Yep, he was buzzed. Was that good or bad? She started to hold out hope that maybe he hadn’t heard them—but his laugh choked off fast as he stared at them in that discerning way he had while he was climbing down the stairs.

“The answer is yes,” Franks said.

“What’s the question?” Trey said, finding his voice to play along. “We get a raise?”

Franks stood at the table across from them as if they should guess. Please don’t let it be—

“Yes, the walls are thin,” Franks said. “I heard you. I wasn’t trying to. Thought I’d wait it out since you didn’t know I was here, but… it felt voyeuristic. So…” He waggled two fingers to mimic the motion of walking down the stairs. “I didn’t want you wondering.”

“I would have been good wondering,” Trey said.

“Definitely,” Leesa said. “Wondering would have worked for me.”

Franks considered this like a story note to a screenwriter, arching an eyebrow. “Noted,” he said. “Next time. There’s more beer in the fridge. Grab one and let’s talk in the living room.” He turned to wait for them. Leesa didn’t like beer much, but it hadn’t been a question.

Alone in the kitchen, she and Trey both mouthed Fuck while thunder growled overhead. Leesa paced in a tight circle, her thoughts spinning, while Trey leaned into the fridge. They’d assumed the lake house was empty. They hadn’t seen any lights. A driver had brought him, so Franks didn’t have a car outside. Fuck fuck fuck.

“I ain’t apologizing for shit,” Trey whispered to the fridge shelves.

“For what? Telling the truth?” Leesa said, her head close to his. He pressed the beer bottle into her hand, curling his fingers around hers when she grabbed it by the neck. His cologne smelled like a beach she wished they could both escape to. She hadn’t considered Trey quite a friend before, but now they sounded like a married couple, ride or die.

Once they had closed the door to their shelter in the fridge, they gave each other a last look that their ancestors might have exchanged on their way to the Big House. They quietly clinked their beer bottles, wishing each other luck. She whispered one last “Fuck”—and they strolled to the living room like they didn’t have a worry. Shit, all Black people were actors.

“I love this one.” Franks was standing over the turntable with an LP in his hand. He flashed the cover to them: Stevie Wonder’s Songs in the Key of Life, her parents’ favorite album. The psychedelic orange and gold album cover swept her back to her childhood mahogany dinner table, the wood so much darker than the fake light and bright in this room’s decor. She didn’t want to ruin the sound of Stevie in the memory of this day.

Franks waited for their approval, so Leesa gave a curt shake of her head. He looked more surprised than disappointed, but he slipped the album back onto one of the two crammed shelves.

“You see any George Clinton?” Trey said.

Franks didn’t answer. Instead, he played The Eagles on the turntable. Better “Hotel California” than anything by Stevie, especially on that album. The music was low enough to talk over, at elevator volume.

“I didn’t pick the retreat spot,” Franks said. “So that one’s not on me.” He sounded conversational, not defensive, but he also wasn’t smiling. He sat at the end of the sofa, setting his Corona down on a coaster. He pushed the coaster away. He’d invited them to start drinking, but he was about to stop. “Maybe it was someone’s idea of a joke, since we do so much horror now.”

He’d heard everything, Leesa realized. He had listened for a long time. If he wanted to start rebutting, she had to step up too. She flicked her eyes to Trey’s—I’ve got this—and sipped from her beer to plan her approach. Corona was a purer version of the sourness she didn’t like about beer. But she didn’t mind taking a belt.

“Obviously, we thought we were having a private conversation,” Leesa said. Just the right hint of judgment without accusation.

“Sorry about that again.”

He had never said he was sorry a first time, but so far so good.

“We were wet, cold and frustrated,” she said.

“I’m still wet and cold, to be honest,” Trey said, nearly under his breath.

“So we were unfiltered,” Leesa said. “But I won’t lie and tell you the underlying emotions aren’t real. We just obviously wouldn’t put it that way in a conversation with you.”

“How would you put it?”

“In a meeting, another time,” she said. “After putting our thoughts together.”

Franks nodded. She and Trey both sipped their beer. Franks didn’t. For a few beats, they all pretended to be swept up in the nostalgia of the music. Franks hummed softly along.

“I hope we’ll still have that meeting,” Franks said. “After you hear what I’m about to disclose. I’m not afraid to hear anything you have to say, filtered or unfiltered. This is the worst possible timing, but I respect both of you too much to be rained in at a lake house without sharing what’s going on internally…”

Leesa felt Trey holding his breath and realized she was too. Gas cramped her stomach.

“We’re pivoting away from TV,” Franks said. “And we’re refining our focus in film. So we’re making some painful cuts. What we’re doing hasn’t been working. Models are shifting. Ugh—I sound like a douchebag. But the point is… layoffs are coming. They’re overdue.”

Was this motherfucker firing them on the spot?

“I’m not saying it’s for sure in terms of you two,” he said. “But a lot of people will go. I can’t tell either of you yes or no right now, sorry. It just feels more human to be open about it. I hope it’s not worse like this. I hate the way it usually goes down, people are trying to log in and suddenly, ‘Wait—my email doesn’t work.’ And guards at people’s desks to make sure they don’t freak out. Dan used to tell me the stories. It’s bullshit. Bottom line, I can’t do it that way.”

“Yes, definitely give me a heads-up on the email,” Trey said. “I need to save my stuff.”

He had recovered fast, Leesa noted, moving on to housekeeping, but he’d been worried about being laid off for a while. She, on the other hand, apparently had been in denial. She’d believed that landing Poor Little Me would build her cred for at least another year. But hell, now that she’d done all of the foundational work, some other exec could take over her plum project. No need for a voice of “cultural sensitivity” now.

Thunder overhead boomed so loudly that windows clattered in their frames.

Franks jumped. “Shit,” he said. “I’ll never get used to thunderstorms. It sounds like the sky is falling down.” He reached for his Corona again and took a long pull. “Honestly, it pretty much feels that way too. I wanted to protect Danny’s legacy, not…”

He didn’t finish. He sounded as heartbroken as Leesa felt.

Rain drilled the rooftop, vying with the thunder’s noise. If Leesa had felt like sharing, she would have told Franks that she loved the majesty of summer storms when she visited her grandparents in Tallahassee as a child. Trey for sure had grown up with raucous storms in South Carolina, but apparently he didn’t feel like sharing either.

“Your company will never be relevant unless you make it relevant,” Leesa said. “That means telling stories that aren’t just yours.”

“And what stories are ‘mine’?” Franks said. “If you don’t mind.”

“Can I ask you a question instead?” Leesa said.

Franks gave a nod while Trey listened with equal parts curiosity and dread. He probably was long ready for this conversation to be over.

“When the layoffs happen and, say, if all your Black employees were suddenly gone, caught in that net…” Leesa began.

Franks fidgeted for the first time. He smelled the R-word coming. “I didn’t say that.”

“But I have seniority and you said I might not be safe, right? So let’s just pretend,” she said. He nodded again, but more warily this time. “If that happened… what would that say about which stories are ‘yours’? The ones you want to nurture and claim?”

“That’s a beautifully phrased question,” Franks said. “You should be a writer.”

Trey lowered his chin to give Franks a pointed look that spoke for her too: Excuse me?

Franks set down his beer again. “Okay, sorry. I thought we were waiting to dive into this, but… I understand. You’re asking me, ‘Do you really want to cling to a world view that only centers you?’ Believe it or not, that gives me a lot to think about, Leesa.”

Leesa didn’t believe him, but she found herself wanting to—and not just to save her job. She had barely touched on what she could say to Franks, but that was enough for today. Whether or not Franks laid her off, hope might lie down the road for the next sacrifices at the altar of Hollywood. Last hired, first fired was a saying for a reason.

Franks read their faces and decided to grant them mercy. “Meeting adjourned, I guess, guys. Sorry if this was weird.”

Trey went to the front window to stare outside. “We better hold off on leaving,” he said to Leesa as if Franks weren’t there.

Leesa stood up to join him, distancing herself from the weight of the conversation with Franks. I just lost my damn job, she thought in disbelief, trying out the idea. Even in an industry rife with layoffs, she’d only been promoted in the past, never fired.

“Ain’t this some shit?” Trey muttered, and neither of them cared if Franks knew he wasn’t talking about the rain.

If not for the driving rain, which gushed down the gutters near the porch, Leesa would already be walking out of the door to escape this retreat from Hell. Franks’ revelation had sent her off-balance; she hoped Trey couldn’t feel her trembling beside him. Was she more afraid to go, or more afraid to stay? She knew she should compose herself and try to salvage their situation, but she felt drained from the drive, the storm, and her helplessness. Her father had advised her to go to law school instead of working in Hollywood. She still might have to. But the thought of taking out more student loans cramped her stomach again.

Franks turned on the TV with a remote, flipping around for local news stations. A newscaster covering the storm mentioned that the US Army Corps of Engineers was opening a “spillway gate” to prevent the nearby Buford Dam from overflowing from the sudden dumping of rain. That sounded pretty fucking bad.

“My driver just texted and said the Highway Patrol is diverting traffic away from here now,” Franks said. “Otherwise, I’d give you a lift.”

“You wanna try it?” Trey asked her quietly. He wanted to leave as much as she did.

Leesa tried to will the rain to slow down, but the deluge refused to heed her. If this was anything like Florida, the storm might pass and leave clear skies within an hour. She sighed and shook her head. “Let’s wait it out a while,” she said. “I think I’ll lie down.”

“Four rooms upstairs,” Franks said. “I’m in the one facing the water.”

“I’ll grab the basement room,” Leesa said. “That okay, Trey?”

“Sure—but you good?” His concern reminded her of her older brother.

Hell, no. But she nodded. As long as Franks was here, she wanted to be as far away from him as possible. She and Trey would have plenty of time to talk during the drive back to Atlanta.

“I’m wiped,” she said. “I’m gonna close my eyes and let the rain die down.”

*   *   *

The basement was more like a suite designed for Franks, the entire length of the upstairs. Leesa was relieved that it felt like a separate residence. The blackout blinds were closed against the massive picture window that would have showcased the chaos outside, so the storm seemed far away except for the pounding of the rain on the deck above her. She walked past the full-sized bar, L-shaped desk, leather sofas and mounted TV with sound bars straight to the king-sized bed near the picture window. She laid her laptop case beside her on the pillow next to hers—her true lover, if she were honest—and stared into the dark room of a rich stranger’s home.

She hadn’t bothered to turn on a light, so the only light was from the basement stairs, vaguely illuminating the luxury surrounding her while she wondered what the hell to do next. She wished she could take back every late night and weekend she had given to Dreamscape. She would be thirty in a couple of years, with nothing to show for that passage of time. She had abandoned her Black projects for nothing. After all the great scripts she’d read, the white-led project that might make it to the screen, her immortality, would likely come to life without her.

Lake Lanier was cursed, all right. Nothing good could come from a retreat mocking the resting place of the dead.

Although it’s a great place for a career to die, anyway. Five out of five stars.

Leesa heard Trey and Franks still talking on the main floor above her, surprisingly jovial although their voices were muffled. Franks was tipsy and didn’t have great filters, so was he revealing what she had told him about Trey? Was that laughter she heard? Or was she half dreaming their voices?

Leesa only knew for sure she was dreaming when she tugged on the metal beads of the pulley dangling near her to open the blackout blinds. Through the massive window, a flash of bright lightning illuminated a cemetery spread before her, what must be acres of flat, pale grave markers with occasional taller crosses from families who could afford them. But unlike most lightning, this light never wavered, unflinching and overly bright. Yes, it’s just a dream, then.

The grave sites were overgrown and neglected, ringed by thirsty weeds. No one had visited these graves in generations. The mourners—the survivors—had been driven away from everything and everyone they knew, running for their lives. Yet, somewhere outside, she heard wails and sobs, a sound beyond simple grief. The wails rose to a shrieking, like gale winds.

Something thumped against the window, hard. Leesa stared with shock: her grandmother had died when she was a freshman in college, on Christmas Day, but wasn’t that snow-haired Nana Mae standing outside her window with her palms flat against the glass, her eyes wide in the unnatural lightning that wasn’t lightning? She was dressed in the pink dress and matching hat she had been buried in, her face overly puffy from the morgue. Leesa couldn’t hear her in the noise, but Nana Mae exaggerated her lips’ motion as she mouthed two words again and again:

Up.

Wake.

Up.

Wake—

“Leesa!”

A deep male timbre, not Nana Mae’s, returned Leesa to the dark basement suite. She sat upright in the strange bed. For an instant, recognizing nothing in the flickering light from the hallway, she didn’t remember where she was. She couldn’t place the voice right away. Trey?

How long had she slept? Her confusion held her in paralysis as her mind floundered.

Her heart shaking her, Leesa touched the laptop case, her anchor to the world.

Trey’s voice was still shouting, and another man’s (Franks?), but she couldn’t make out what he was saying over the rhythmic pounding against the wall-sized window beside her. The blinds were down again, as they had been when she first drifted to sleep. She imagined Nana Mae outside in her burial dress, but Nana Mae would never sound so furious and insistent as she banged on the fragile glass.

This sounded more like the cemetery. The abandoned grave markers.

The lake.

Leesa stepped down to touch the floor with her sock foot. The floor was wet. And cold. At first, Leesa drew her foot back with surprise, ready to retreat to the bed. Only then did she notice a gentle sloshing beneath the bed, as if it were a rocking boat. A bolt of clear rationality told her to run.

Run like a lynch mob had found her. Run like the house was on fire. Run like the world would collapse away beneath her feet.

And in a way, it did.

A writhing beast chased Leesa, shattering the window’s glass to bully its way inside with an ear-ringing roar. That beast was brown, muddy water. Lake water raced behind her on the floor, step for step, until it overtook her, wrapping around her shins with a grip of unnatural cold.

With impossible speed, the water climbed to her thighs, sending the coffee table beside her spinning. Leesa screamed until she tripped and fell after the table hit her hip, when water gushed into her nose and mouth with the taste of drowning in cemetery soil.

Leesa’s panic felt like pure death. Her thrashing arms collided with submerged furniture and floating remnants of stripped decor.

“Hold on!” she heard Trey call out through her clogged ears, the first time she realized her head was above the rising water. Her contacts were blurry, but she saw Trey’s white shirt on the stairway. He waded toward her, arm outstretched. Franks was visible behind Trey, holding tight to the wall as if the house’s foundation might break.

A terrible cracking of wood made Leesa feel sure the basement rooftop was about to collapse on them, but instead muted light glowed from the side opposite the staircase.

The basement door leading outside was now wide open, sucking at the current from the shattered window, carrying Leesa off-balance again, away from Trey’s reaching arm. The current flipped her onto her back, stealing her away, but her vision was clear enough to see the alarm on Trey’s face as she was yanked beyond his reach. Behind Trey, Franks was now running down the stairs with newfound courage, yelling something Leesa did not hear before her face was beneath the water again.

The only sound was water jamming her ears. She tried to swim, but the lake water seemed to pin her in place, her legs useless, as if encircled by a snake. This was the undertow Leesa had been assaulted by when her grandparents took her to the beach, pulling her feet from beneath her, flinging her at the ocean’s mercy. But this water tasted of silt, not salt. It tasted like the dead.

This water outside was deeper than in the basement, everything submerged in a kaleidoscope of distractions denied by the lake. An overturned barbecue grill. Foam patio cushions. Reflective sunglasses. Fast food wrappers. A child’s colorful beach bucket. All of it floated past Leesa as she held her breath, hoarding life. In her shock and terror, Leesa barely noticed the sewing loom, storage barrel and wagon wheel mingled with the rest of the flood’s debris, tumbling through time.

A single cemetery cross with no adornment, someone’s meager savings for a loved one lost in the old town of Oscarville, now sank beside her with its aged wood, a mask of bulging cracks. Leesa watched the cross tumble toward a shadowed maw beneath her, which she knew could not be real even if the water was real enough to choke her. The void of The Forgotten.

Leesa was about to be sucked down there too, if she didn’t fight.

“No!” she said aloud, and water flooded her mouth and throat.

As if she’d been electrocuted from a trance, Leesa untangled herself from the garden hose that had been holding her in place, still tied to its coil on the house’s wall. If not for the hose, she might have been swept farther toward the lake.

But she was still here. Still at the lake house. And no one else was here to save her.

A plane of daylight shimmered above Leesa, nearly close enough to break simply from rising to her feet from the solid soil that had replaced the void. Nearly. But poor swimmer or not, Leesa knew enough to launch herself with her legs and stroke with her arms to propel herself higher, higher, toward the storm-gray light.

GRASSHOPPER

ERIC LAROCCA

To the unwary spectator, Alma Catherick might have resembled the proverbial sullen and temperamental thirteen-year-old brat—her permanently dour expression, her visible restlessness, her easily frowning mouth, the abrupt, almost unpolite way she answered every question she was asked. One might be unsettled at the thought of a young girl displaying so much disrespect, especially when the Sweeney family had been so accommodating, so kind as to invite the wretched girl on their holiday tour of Italy. Alma had no discernible reason to be upset while vacationing with the Sweeney family. It wasn’t as though they had relegated her to traveling with the luggage in the cargo hold or forced her to dine at a separate table when it was time for supper. In fact, the Sweeney family—both Gavin and Mary Lou—had done everything in their power to make certain that their guest was as comfortable and well attended to as possible. Even the Sweeneys’ only daughter, Lydia, had troubled herself to make sure that Alma felt welcomed and cherished throughout their tour of the Sicilian coast. Of course, Lydia was only a year or so older than Alma; however, to children, a year of separation in age might as well be a lifetime. It’s peculiar to recognize how time seems to be perceived by children—how the span of a year with regard to another’s age feels like some uncomfortable threshold you must never dare to cross.

Alma still couldn’t comprehend why the Sweeney family had invited her on their Italian excursion—a trip they probably had meticulously planned and labored over for months. Not only was it an obviously expensive holiday, but Alma wasn’t close friends with Lydia, to be perfectly frank. Naturally, they had interacted a few times at their local church, and they went to the same private school; however, it seemed to Alma that Lydia could have invited any of her close friends on this vacation. So then why did she invite me? Alma often wondered, especially late at night in the cramped hotel room they shared. The only reason Alma could decide upon was that the Sweeney family was taking pity on her due to the failing health of Alma’s poor mother. Alma had even wondered if she should go on the journey, given her mother’s condition and how frequently the poor woman visited the hospital.

“Go, dear,” her mother had told her the night before she was scheduled to depart with the Sweeney family. “You go there and shine like a new penny…”

Of course, Alma wasn’t about to argue with her mother, out of fear that she might upset her; however, there was a part of her—impossibly small and frail but there all the same—that wondered if she would return home to the States and be greeted with bad news. She had imagined the scenario time and time again in the theatre of her mind, especially when things were quiet and Lydia’s parents were taking their afternoon naps in the adjoining hotel room. Alma worried that she’d return to the little house on Madison Lane—the beloved place where she had lived since she was a little girl—and would be greeted by a throng of unfamiliar faces passing her condolences for her loss. A loss she had naturally come to expect, but still couldn’t possibly bear all the same. What was she to do then? She hated the idea of being referred to as an “orphan.” If she appeared surly or detached while touring the Sicilian coast with her substitute family, it was only because so much of the holiday had already felt like some sort of perverted dress rehearsal for when she was inevitably to become motherless.

Despite these misgivings, Alma tried as best she could to appear grateful, to interact with Lydia and showcase some kindness. Naturally, these moments were so few and far between simply because Alma’s mother occupied every empty space in the poor girl’s mind. In fact, the only thing Alma truly looked forward to each and every day was her four-o’clock long-distance phone call to her mother in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. They would chat for a few minutes even though Alma yearned for the conversation to go on and on. Of course, she knew it wasn’t possible, given her mother’s frailty. Alma conceded it was thoughtful of the Sweeney family to pay for the long-distance phone call each day from the hotel, and imagined she had already accumulated quite a bill in the span of the two weeks they had been vacationing.

Every day, Alma surrendered to insidious thoughts and half expected to call home and receive the answering machine. She was surprised to note that her mother had an impeccable track record of answering the phone over the several weeks she was away. Not once were they unable to speak to one another. Still, Alma felt herself becoming unsettled, day in and day out, worried that something might eventually happen—some horrid, unnameable thing that would prevent their typical four-o’clock phone call. Alma dreaded that day. Perhaps she could have once confided her fears in Lydia’s mother, but parents are so far removed from humanity in the eyes of children—parents are imperious, unknowable effigies, and, therefore, impossible to know if you can trust them. The only person in Alma’s life who she unequivocally trusted was her mother. Regardless, there were brief moments when Alma wondered if Mary Lou Sweeney was another kind, compassionate adult who might understand her apprehensions.

“The Italian sun seems to agree with you,” Mary Lou had told Alma while they were spending a few days in Rome.

The woman was shocked at how well Alma’s skin had browned in the sun despite the young girl’s fairness. Alma had been mystified herself, as well.

“Perhaps you’ll get more color when we visit Pompeii,” she had told Alma before retiring to her room for a bath.

Once she had left, Alma turned to Lydia, who was lounging in one of the armchairs arranged in the corner of the room and clipping photographs from some Italian tabloid.

“Will we take a train to Pompeii tomorrow?” Alma had asked her.

“A bus ride,” Lydia had explained. “Not too long of a drive. My parents will probably fall asleep…”

It had seemed to Alma like Lydia’s parents were always a second or two away from slumber. Even at suppertime, Gavin and Mary Lou appeared to be so muted, so decidedly half-awake as though someone had drugged their drinks when they weren’t looking. Typically, after dinner, the four of them would traipse around the city for a short walk before Lydia’s parents would corral Lydia and Alma back to the hotel for an early evening. Even though both Lydia and Alma had adjusted to local time in Italy, they had often found themselves wide awake upon returning to their room. Sleep doesn’t come as naturally for children sometimes. It’s more difficult to conjure. It was during one of those early evenings on their first or second night in Italy when Lydia had suggested a game to Alma to help them fall asleep faster.

“What kind of game is it?” Alma had asked her.

Lydia had crawled further up the bed, peeling the bed-sheets that were covering her friend.

“It’s called ‘The Statue Game,’” Lydia had told her, her speech quickening with such excitement. “You remain perfectly still. Like a statue. If you move, you lose the game.”

“What do you do while I lie here?” Alma had asked.

“I get to do whatever I want to you,” Lydia had told her. “But you must stay perfectly still… and quiet. That’s important, too. If you make any noises, my parents might come in here… Do you understand?”

Of course, Alma had understood. But she still hadn’t figured out how this game might help them fall asleep faster.

While she reclined there, perfectly still, she had sensed Lydia’s weight shifting from one end of the mattress to the other. Eventually, Alma had felt Lydia crawl on top of her. But something felt different. Alma had sensed so much more of Lydia’s bare flesh, skin-on-skin. When Alma looked down, she noticed Lydia had shucked away all her clothing so that she was completely naked and was mounting her with such ugly intent. Alma wanted to cry out, to cry for Lydia’s parents, to scream for her own mother, but something had prevented her—some valve had tightened deep inside her and prevented her from speaking, from moving, from doing anything. Alma had felt Lydia pull down her underwear and then watched as she buried her face in the soft, tender place where her legs met. Although the sensation had felt pleasurable, so much of this game had felt dirty, unclean. What was Alma to do? For some inexplicable reason, she had obeyed what she was instructed to do—she lay there, perfectly still, and merely waited for the ordeal to be over.

After that first night of the vacation, Alma had foolishly thought that she and Lydia would never speak about it again, would never divulge the details of “The Statue Game.” But Alma was so disappointed to discover that she was horribly wrong. Lydia would come to her each and every night once her parents had retired to bed early and would force her to lie completely still while she tested the comfort of Alma’s body. Very often the experience was pleasurable. Alma had detested herself for delighting in the way Lydia’s tongue had felt while it moved up and down the length of her thighs and then eventually further toward her vagina.

Of course, Alma had worried that Lydia’s parents would suspect or, even worse, discover what the two of them were doing every night. Her mother would be so disappointed as well. Alma spent so much time struggling to keep away from Lydia for the remainder of the vacation, but it was damn near impossible given the fact that they shared a bedroom. Where else was Alma to go? She couldn’t very well tell Lydia’s parents what was happening, and she certainly couldn’t afford to leave and travel back to America on her own. Alma felt trapped. Even worse, there was a part of her that wondered if this was the reason Lydia had invited her on this vacation all along—to play with her, to explore her body. Alma sometimes nearly retched when she thought of such things. Was she really that easy of a mark?

After a few days of sightseeing in Rome, the Sweeney family—including Alma—relocated to the city of Naples on the Amalfi coast. They checked into their new hotel, and when Alma visited the room she’d be sharing with Lydia, she felt a profound sense of sadness wash over her—an inevitability of horrible things to come, of little tortures to be endured. It felt like stepping into the operating room where you’re about to have some kind of invasive medical procedure performed. To Alma, that was exactly how her nightly interactions with Lydia had felt—unnatural, cruel, insensitive, and so difficult to recover from, very much like a kind of surgery.

It was early in the afternoon on the day when they first arrived in Naples that Alma overheard Lydia begging her parents to allow the two of them to break away and explore the ruins of Pompeii unchaperoned.

“You’ll get lost,” Mary Lou had told her daughter. “I couldn’t bear the idea of losing you in a foreign city… We might never get you back…”

“Come now, dear,” Gavin had said to his wife. “Let the girls enjoy themselves. We only have a few days left before we fly home… They can go now, and we can meet them later for dinner.”

Mary Lou had winced, probably imagining all sorts of horrible things that could be done against her daughter and her daughter’s friend. If only she had known the kind of terror Lydia was already inflicting upon poor Alma each and every night.

“I suppose they can call us if they come up against any trouble,” Mary Lou had said, her tone unstiffening slightly.

“There won’t be any trouble,” Gavin had told his wife, massaging her shoulders. “They’ll be fine, darling.”

The truth was Alma had hoped that Lydia’s parents might prevent them from going out and exploring on their own. Alma loathed the idea of being alone with Lydia, fearful of what kinds of things Lydia could do to her when they were completely and utterly without a proper chaperone. Of course, there are all sorts of horrors to be endured inside a bedroom when the door is locked; however, part of Alma knew full well that Lydia was capable of doing similarly upsetting things even in public, even in daylight.

“That was easier than I thought it would be,” Lydia told Alma while they rode in the taxi toward the ancient ruins. “Lucky, aren’t we?”

But Alma didn’t feel lucky.

In fact, she was exasperated with these public outings every day with Lydia’s family. Even worse, she was running out of fresh clothing to wear since they last visited a dry cleaner in Rome. Today she settled on wearing a blue skirt and matching blouse with a grasshopper pendant that her mother had bought for her at the church rummage sale two years ago. Alma reflected on the moment when her mother presented her with the offering—the small insect-shaped pendant with a trim made of imitation gold. Things had seemed so much simpler then, when her mother’s illness wasn’t the subject of every conversation in their household, when it didn’t feel as though the Grim Reaper had arranged his headquarters in their home just in case something unpleasant should happen.

Eventually, Lydia and Alma arrived at the entrance of the site. Alma watched Lydia as she pulled out some money and passed it to the cab driver, who accepted the offering without even so much as a grunt of approval. To Alma, Lydia appeared so worldly, so inexorably fixed as a young lady of distinguished breeding, of noble pedigree. She carried herself with a certain kind of poise you only see in classic black-and-white Hollywood films starring Rita Hayworth or Lana Turner. Of course, that’s not to say that Lydia was as attractive as those movie stars; however, with her certain panache, it might be simple for someone to mistake her ordinary looks for something truly remarkable. It’s all in how you carry yourself, after all. Alma figured there was some truth to that.

After climbing out of the taxi, Lydia and Alma made their way through the entrance and began to meander among the ancient ruins, weaving through large tour groups and others who had come for a stroll. Naturally, Alma was somewhat familiar with the history of Pompeii, thanks to school; however, she hardly expected such a sense of sadness lingering over the area—a feeling of inevitability, a horrible ache of pity for all the lives that were lost in a single moment. She figured it must be utterly unbearable to realize that you’re about to die and yet there’s nothing you can do to prevent it from happening. Alma winced, shuddering and then thinking of her poor mother. She wondered if that was how her mother lived from day to day—waiting for the inevitable, surrendering to something that had already been fixed for her, arranged for the splendor of her suffering.

With Lydia leading the way, the two girls began to drift down a smaller street built on an incline. Alma couldn’t be certain, but it felt as though they were moving further and further away from the commotion of the main drag of the ruins, swerving into unoccupied territory where they could be alone. But Alma figured they would never be entirely alone—the two of them. She hoped they wouldn’t, at least. To Alma, Pompeii felt like a strange cathedral of suffering—a place where such pain, such agony occurred and now that suffering was being eroded slowly, bit by bit over time with each tourist that traipsed through the main entrance. She couldn’t shake the feeling that something even worse was going to happen here eventually. A damaged place always brings about more suffering, after all.

Eventually, Lydia and Alma made their way into the ruins of what was once probably some kind of residence. The sun trailed them incessantly like some searchlight from a distant world, a flashlight from a god craving a little bit of entertainment, a little bit of suffering. Alma glanced around, noticing how weeds and various plants seemed to choke the space, creeping over oblivion and claiming it as their own. She flinched, feeling the intense pressure of sunlight following her wherever she moved inside the ruins. It was then that she realized Lydia had become so dangerously quiet. When she turned, she noticed Lydia gazing at her with such a hideous look on her face.

“What’s wrong?” Alma asked her.

“I want to play our game,” Lydia said, smiling.

Alma suddenly felt nauseous. Was this the reason Lydia had brought her here? To hurt her in public? To humiliate her in front of random strangers? Of course, the place where they were was empty for now, but it wouldn’t be for long if someone happened upon them while they were doing things to one another.

“I don’t want to play that game,” Alma told her, turning away and hoping that somehow Lydia might drop the whole thing. “Besides, it’s not nighttime. It’s the middle of the day…”

“Sit down in the corner,” Lydia ordered her.

Alma turned slightly, wondering if she had perhaps misheard her. Lydia was demanding from time to time, but this time her voice sounded firmer, more pointed and direct, almost as if Alma was in grave trouble.

“If you don’t do what I say, something will happen to your mother,” Lydia told her.

Alma felt her stomach drop into her bowels. She could hardly believe what Lydia was saying. It felt so unnatural, too. Alma hadn’t really spoken much about her mother to the Sweeney family while on vacation. Of course, she reasoned that Lydia’s parents were aware of her mother’s condition; however, it seemed unnatural for Lydia to know something so precise, so uniquely accurate.

“What about my mother?” Alma asked her.

“Sit down there and I’ll tell you,” Lydia said.

Every cell in Alma’s body told her to run away, to run screaming into the street and beg one of the many tourists for help. They would have to call the American Embassy and settle her arrangements to travel back to America on her own, far removed from the Sweeney family and their pernicious little girl. But none of that seemed possible for Alma. The only thing she seemed to be able to do was sit in the corner of the room just as Lydia had told her to do. After she tucked herself there, meek and quiet like the obedient little bitch Lydia craved her to be, Alma sensed herself becoming flushed in the unforgiving glare of the sun pointing directly at her.

“We’re going to play a game like we usually play,” Lydia told her. “Only this one is slightly different… I’m not going to touch you. I promise.”

Alma sensed her breathing becoming shallower by the moment. If there was only one mercy she had been afforded today, it was the gift of knowing that Lydia would not be touching her body.

“I want you to stay perfectly still,” Lydia said. “If you move, something awful will happen to your mother. Is that what you want?”

Alma felt her throat close tight. She couldn’t speak, couldn’t utter a plea to Lydia even though she desperately wanted to.

She shook her head.

When Lydia was satisfied with Alma’s agreement, she began to drift away from her and move toward the room’s only exit.

“Where are you going?” Alma asked her, sudden panic causing her throat to unseal for a brief moment. “You’re leaving…?”

Lydia smiled. “I’ll come back for you…”

But before Alma could say anything, Lydia was out the door and drifting further down the street, away from the small residence that had been eaten away by time.

Alma sat perfectly still in the corner of that little room, the sun permanently fixed upon her and bearing down on her with such intense heat, such hideous pressure. For a moment, she wondered if the sun would somehow eat through her and split her in half like some ripe piece of fruit until she spilled out over the decaying grass at her feet. She sensed herself becoming warmer by the moment. Of course, she wondered if she could maneuver herself into the opposite corner of the room, where dark shadows were feathered. But once she thought of Lydia’s disapproving glare when she would return—if she would return—the idea flung itself out of her mind.

Alma began to entertain the horrible notion that Lydia might not come back for her. Was that why she had brought her here? To abandon her? To discard her like some ancient relic, like some overused child’s plaything? Alma felt as though that was all she ever was to Lydia—a service to explore her sexuality, to experiment with and then eventually run away from. Alma felt so hideously used, like she had loaned parts of herself to Lydia only for them never to be returned.

Seconds turned to minutes… Minutes eventually to hours…

Alma wondered if Lydia would ever return, her skin sprouting little beads of sweat while the sunlight kept its aim true on her. Perhaps this was what she wanted all along—to break down Alma’s trust in herself and wear her away until she was completely dedicated to her, until she would do anything she told her to do, until she would remain still and happily roast in the unrelenting daytime sun like perishables left unattended.

Alma twisted the small grasshopper pendant pinned to her blouse, her fingers tirelessly going over it again and again in an effort to memorize its shape, its hard texture. She smiled, more parts of her thawing in the light, when she thought of how her mother often referred to her as “Grasshopper.”

“It means ‘new beginnings,’” her mother had once told her while they were lying in bed together.

Alma sensed her mind beginning to slow, the possibility of any thought seeming like such arduous labor. Her breathing became strained, too. It wasn’t long before she began to feel tired, her eyelids starting to feel heavy. She wondered when Lydia might return for her—might tell her that everything was okay, that her mother would be fine. She wondered if it was possible for someone to die because of too much sunlight, parts of her flesh sizzling and crisping like food left in a frying pan for too long.

Alma sensed everything around her beginning to blur, the same way things do when you look at them under murky water. Although she had hoped Lydia might come back for her and tell her to finally move, she imagined the pleasant possibility of eventually being roused by someone else—a kind, gentle stranger who noticed her distress and would carry her from the ruins, would take her to the nearest hospital and tend to her there until she was fit again.

Alma hoped for such kindness, thinking of her dear, sweet mother. Her eyelids narrowing to mere slits, she eventually sensed herself slipping away until she was very much elsewhere, until she had landed in some faraway place surrounded by grasshoppers and where the unforgiving pressure of daylight could not follow her, could not disrupt her.

OKU-NO-IN

PRIYA SHARMA

I’ve never known such peace as I have in Kōyasan. The Holy Mountain. Its eight peaks form a lotus flower.

I think about the voice on the phone that sent me here while I stare out of the train window. The Kōyasan Limited Express skirts the forest’s edge.

There is something very specific that I need.

My client spoke in sonorous, educated tones. She’s not an intermediate. There’s too much command in her voice. I don’t know her name. True wealth and power prize anonymity. I’d procured things for her before. The sacred and arcane. Small items, easily moved across borders, mainly from Europe and India.

“Of course.” I only deal with the specific and unique.

“Are you squeamish?”

“No.”

That was new for her. She’d previously sought Russian icons, English witch bottles, and statues from remote Hindu shrines. Objects that had gained a supernatural sentience with age. I hadn’t pegged her for a ghoul, a collector of ossuaries, hoping for a revival of saints, or even the second coming of Christ. The nature of her morbid project wasn’t my business.

“Have you ever been to Japan?”

“No.”

“Never?”

“I’d remember.” I pressed on, not wanting to lose the job. “That’s not a problem though. Tell me what you need.”

She explained. We discussed the logistics of moving it out of the country, then we haggled over the fee and expenses.

“We’re agreed then.”

“Yes.” She sounded more relaxed than I’d ever heard her. Maybe this was what she wanted all along and everything else had been a test. I sigh, thinking of how I could have negotiated for more, but my word is good.

The track curves ahead. It’s colder here than down on the plain. Snow has settled. There’s movement between the tree trunks, then flashes of russet red on the bank.

Passengers stand up and start crowding the aisles to take photos. They gasp and talk excitedly. Dozens of foxes line the bank. One stands taller than the others, leggy, with twitching ears. It races along to a high point on the bank so it’s level with my carriage as the train slows. I can see what everyone else can’t. The blue glimmer in the fox’s tracks. It’s an otherworldly creature.

I’m face-to-face with it now. It narrows its eyes, peering in, and on seeing me it raises its head and lets out a sound that’s more shriek than bark.

The train gathers speed again.

*   *   *

Everyone gets off at Gokurakubashi Station and queues for the vertiginous cable car up to Kōyasan. The higher we go, the thicker the snow gets.

The elderly Japanese woman in front of me turns, and seeing my foreign face asks, “Do you like Japan?”

She is immaculate and appropriate in expensive, stout walking boots and a camel-coloured rollneck sweater under her hiking jacket. She carries her own backpack. She is sprightly, with a mole high up on her right cheek. I am charmed. My pulse quickens as she examines me.

“Yes, I love Japan.” I put my hand on my chest, over my heart, as if that’s proof of my sincerity.

Her return is a dazzling smile, her pleasure real. It’s a shock to me, a dissembler, that it’s true. I do love Japan, even though I’ve only been here a few days. I don’t understand Japan, but I love it. I don’t know how that can be. Me, who is rootless, a faithless liar and a thief, finds something here that moves me.

*   *   *

Kōyasan is the heart of the Shingon school of Esoteric Buddhism and, as such, has over one hundred temples. Most of them have a shukubo, adjoining inns to house pilgrims and tourists. Mine is like all the other small complexes here, stilted wooden buildings with steps, topped with gabled roofs. The posts and lintels are carved with flowers, clouds, and dragons. There are stories there, if only I knew how to read them.

The entryway is sunken, obliging umbrellas in the stand by the door for patrons. I leave my shoes on the rack and put on the cold plastic clogs provided. A monk dressed in an orange robe greets me at the reception desk. His shaven head makes his long face look longer. He hums to himself as he checks me in. I can’t meet his steady gaze.

“Have you been here before?”

“Maybe in another life.” I force myself to look at him and smile.

“Are you a disciple of Kōbō Daishi?”

The monk who brought Shingon Buddhism to Japan. His mausoleum is in the cemetery here.

“No.”

“His friends knew him as Kūkai.”

I don’t know what to do with the pause that follows, so I rattle on. I should know better. “I’m sightseeing. I’ve been told Oku-no-in Cemetery is very beautiful.”

“You should stay on the main paths there. You’ll get lost if you stray. That’s the thing about paths. If you wander too far, you can forget your way back.”

“Is that Buddhist scripture?”

“Just friendly advice,” he chuckles.

The corridor is lined with paper screens. He slides one open and ushers me into my room. It’s cold. He shows me how to use the radiator. There’s a futon and a clothes rail on which hang two kimonos and obis, one dark and one pale, with laminated instructions about how to wear them.

“There’ll be a tour of the cemetery tomorrow night. I’m running it. You will come, won’t you?” He presses a leaflet into my hand. “We’ll meet in the foyer at eight p.m.”

Unpacking doesn’t take long. I travel light, except for the gear I need for this job. The smell of the tatami mat is both familiar and dizzying. There’s a low table at one end of the room on which there’s a copy of the heart sutras in Japanese, with English translations beneath them. Before he was Kōbō Daishi, the monk was Kūkai. A poet and calligrapher. I open the book. It contains esoteric, oblique knowledge.

When your mind is steeped in darkness all that you encounter becomes evil.

When your mind’s eye is bright everything you encounter becomes a treasure.

I snap the book shut with sudden, unaccountable fury. What use have I, who has no heart, for heart sutras?

*   *   *

I wake early, clearheaded and refreshed. My breath is a plume in the cold air. It’s invigorating. Normally I’m disorientated and don’t know whether I’m a man, woman, neither, or both. Parent, child, or lover. I glimpse other lives in other rooms, somewhere in the space between sleep and waking. Are they dreamt or remembered?

Breakfast is disappointing. Not the food. The food is delicious. Tofu and vegetables laid out in bowls like gifts. I’m disappointed because I’m shown to a room with the other guests and the monks deliver trays. I don’t know what I expected. For them to stay, so we can watch them eat?

The couple opposite me are American. Young. They are quiet and respectful. They say arigato when served. The woman puts a morsel in her mouth and closes her eyes. The man watches her face, feasting on the moment. They are at ease with themselves, each other, and in the world. I am just sleepwalking.

A radish remains on my plate. It’s been carved into a lotus flower. Its heart is pure white against the purple of its outer petals. I put it in my top pocket. The American girl sees. I’ve been caught doing something strange but her face softens to something akin to understanding which makes it okay.

The morning light is clean. The stream around the shukubo is pure, snow heaped up on the banks. I follow the monks and pilgrims to the temple for the fire ceremony. The chanting, the firelight, the bells, are all soporific. I take a rectangle of softwood and write on it with marker pen. It’s not a prayer but a question. Who am I?

I join the queue and drop it on the fire where it burns to fierce embers. Who am I? Is the answer somewhere in the ashes of those wishes?

*   *   *

I decide to look around Oku-no-in in daylight, as a preview to the tour. I take a map rather than relying on my phone.

There are over 200,000 graves across two kilometres. Feudal lords, monks, and business titans. Both the ancient and modern are united in their desire to reside beside Kōbō Daishi, the Enlightened One, in death.

I cross the low bridge at the entrance, pausing to bow as everyone else does. The path leads between the ancient hemlock and towering cedars. The gravestones are bathed in moss and the sunlight streaming through the trees. Some of the stone markers lean, weary in their remembrance.

There are signs of fresh mourning by the graves. Flowers in vases. Smoking incense and oranges. And Buddhas everywhere, revered in both metal and stone. Some wear knitted orange bibs or bonnets. Something else draws my eye. A fox, seated beneath a pagoda. He stands and stalks away. There it is again, the telltale blue glimmer in the fox’s footprints. Is it here for Buddha or Japan’s older gods?

One of the graves brings me up short. It’s a thick stone disc, like a coin set on its edge on a plinth. Despite its age, the characters are clear. I wish I could read them. I catch a couple looking at me. They avert their eyes politely and I realise that I’m crying.

I’ve been here before. I think these are my remains.

The world is made clearer when I wipe my eyes on my sleeve. There’s movement on the side paths that lead down from the older graves higher up. The paths we’ve been warned against.

It’s the old woman from the bus station. The steps look worn and slippery, except where their treachery is hidden by snow, but she moves with ease. I must be wrong about her age, or she’s exceptionally fit.

“Here.” She proffers an open packet of tissues.

She’s direct. I like that. I take one and it crumples in my fist.

We walk on together in silence. It’s not uncomfortable. There’s a strange solace in it. She keeps glancing at me. I’d find that irritating, but not from her.

“Do you know who this is?”

She means the statues among the graves and by the paths. There are more here. Most have the orange clothes on them.

“They’re not Buddha?”

“No, they are Jizō, a Boddhisattva. Mortals who turn back at the moment of enlightenment to help others. They are agents of salvation.”

She pulls out a woolly bobble hat and puts it on a statue.

“These are left to ask Jizō to take care of children we have lost.”

It takes me a beat to realise she means dead, not lost. So much orange, as far as I can see. The sadness is sudden. For her now, not for myself. I’ll be glad to leave here. My feelings are a seesaw. They’re dulling my wits.

There are larger statues of Jizō here. One holds a golden disc, within which is a folded foetal shape, an umbilical cord tethering it to the disc’s edge. An infant stands at Jizō’s feet, face to his shin, clutching his robe with both hands.

“Jizō allows children a peaceful limbo or a quick rebirth.”

“That must be a comfort.”

“But what about if your child’s been robbed of that?” she snaps. “What then?”

*   *   *

I have time to kill. I go to the Danjo Garan, sacred precinct and the main temple complex, a short walk west of Oku-no-in. Snow generates a purer version of the world. Am I already dead, here in all Kōyasan’s stillness?

There’s a pristine white pagoda that houses a giant bell. A monk in saffron robes walks through the snow. A bright red temple that’s piercing against the blue sky. All the temples here have been rebuilt numerous times due to the seismic shifts of war and earthquakes. Japan is a place of renewal and reconstruction. As am I, subject to the cycles of birth and death, and tired of this cycle.

A low fence surrounds a tree. I lean down to read the plaque. Under the Japanese are the words Saigyō’s Cherry Tree. It looks forlorn, its branches bare. Strange to think that in a few months’ time it will be in flower.

Finally, there is a metal frame that looks like a giant abacus. Prayers on strips of paper that look like ribbons are tied to it in rows. Will the universe figure our pleas in its grand calculations?

*   *   *

I look up onsen etiquette before I go in. I stand before the doors marked Men and Women. I’ve lived in so many bodies that I am sexless to myself. I push the door marked Men. The room’s empty but it doesn’t matter. It’s easier to be naked in front of strangers than acquaintances. I strip down and put my things in a locker.

There’s a low stool under the shower. I start at the top, soaping my hair, working my way down to my toes. I want to be scrupulously clean before I enter.

The onsen is empty. The tiles are stark white. Steam rises from the bath. I step down into its warmth and close my eyes. Heat penetrates my skin and soothes the ache in my neck and back. It’s delicious. I take a deep breath and submerge myself.

When I open my eyes underwater someone has joined me, sitting at the opposite corner of the bath. He’s distorted by the optics of the water. His upper half is thickset, arms spread out along the ledge as he leans back. His immersed half belongs to a different creature. His feet and hands are webbed. He’s covered in green scale. His manhood bobs about enthusiastically.

The man dips his head to face me.

“Go away.” His bulbous eyes are unblinking. His short, broad nose is beaklike. Bubbles escape his mouth as he talks. “You shouldn’t be here. Things aren’t what you think. You don’t understand its power. Angels can birth devils.”

I break the surface, gasping. He follows. He’s just a man after all.

*   *   *

I meet the tour party at reception. The monk who checked me in rocks on his heels and claps his hands when he sees me. “You came! I’m so glad.”

He wears Nike trainers and a yellow puffer jacket. The rest of the group look at me curiously.

We stop when we reach the first bridge, at the entrance to the cemetery. Frost glitters on the path in patches.

“Watch your step. If you fall here you’ll be dead within three years, so it’s said.”

The most ridiculous thing happens. I lose my footing.

“Careful.” He grasps my elbow to steady me and a shock goes up my arm. I’m so seldom touched by anyone.

Oku-no-in is different by night. The graves climbing up the hill are lost in the darkness. Light comes through holes of different shapes in the stone lanterns that flank the path. Carvings of the moon cycle, the monk tells us.

We follow the monk who tells us about the Geisha House owner who built the main path. We stop again. I realise we’re by the grave that upset me earlier. Maybe I should’ve fallen at the first bridge? Would it be such a bad thing to die? It’s being reborn with the terrible knowledge that age breaks us that is the difficult part. Time ravishes beauty and ruins vigour. It brings us sorrow. It’s the bane of our memories and the enemy of our senses. I would welcome death if that was the end of it.

“We have three religions in Japan. Do you know what they are?”

“Buddhism,” says a young man, sounding tentative, as though it was a trick question.

“Yes! What else?” There’s a silence. “You are all being shy.”

“Shinto.”

“Fantastic!” You’d think I’d just offered up the meaning of life. “Shinto is the religion of nature.”

Shinto with its red Tori gates that look like giant Pi symbols.

“And the third is Christianity. Why? For the wedding dresses!” He’s giddy with laughter at his own joke. “We have Shinto for birth, Christianity for weddings, and Buddhism for death.”

His joviality fades. “After cremation, only the hyoid bone is buried here. The rest of the remains are returned to the family. Do you know why? The hyoid bone is here, in the neck,” he points to his own throat. “What does the shape remind you of?”

The monk holds out his arms and makes a horseshoe shape as he arches his back.

“Seated Buddha.” I say it without thinking. I’ve seen this shape over and over again today.

He bows low, which flusters me.

We learn more about those buried here, from shoguns to the company graves. A giant ant tops an exterminator firm’s plot in a Buddhist apology to all they’ve killed. Panasonic’s founder is also here; the tangerine farmer’s son who became a warlord of business.

Finally, we are nearing the place I want to see, but the monk stops us again. He always contrives to stand close to me.

“Before approaching Kōbō Daishi, we bathe in the stream, but today we will all wash our hands and pour water on the statues instead. And from respect we bow before we enter. And photos are not allowed.”

The water is so cold that my fingers ache.

We mount the steps to Torodo Hall. The monk points upwards. “There are ten thousand lanterns, one for each soul buried here, which are always kept lit.”

Row after row are hung in the eaves. An eternity of light. To be that precious that you are mourned so.

He leads us around to Kōbō Daishi’s mausoleum. It’s constructed from wood, with two large doors. It’s flanked by giant bronze lilies.

“These are the golden lotus. They remind us that beauty can grow from mud and adversity. That anything can happen when you have hope. Kōbō Daishi decided to retire from the world in the 800s. He fasted and purified his body before he withdrew here and shut himself in. Over a hundred years later the cemetery keeper opened the tomb to find him still in a meditation trance, so he cut his hair and changed his robe and then closed the doors on his master. And Kōbō Daishi is there still, awaiting Miroku, the future Buddha.”

My client is more than an idle collector. There’s something in there that’s otherworldly, and its blue radiates through the cracks around the doors.

*   *   *

It’s time to work. My backpack contains my tools and the customised fold-out bag in which to put Kōbō Daishi.

Night transforms everything. Boundaries become porous and allow all sorts of things in. Foxes are everywhere as I walk to the cemetery. They peep at me from alleys and doorways. The more brazen trot alongside me a while before melting back into the deep blues of the shadows. There’s one I recognise from my train journey. His eyes glimmer blue but he keeps his distance.

I turn my headlamp on at a low beam when I reach Oku-no-in. The moon has come to help me. She touches the cedars and the path ahead. Frost sparkles and crunches underfoot. The lunar lanterns glow. The cold air hurts my lungs. I’m more present than I’ve ever been in this lifetime, or the fragments of the others that I recall. This eternal wheel is crushing me. I don’t want enlightenment. I’m tired. I just want it to stop.

I pass my own grave. Who was I then? I only hope that I was better than I am now.

As I approach the large statue of Jizō, the foetus on the disc starts to writhe and wail. It’s not a cry for milk, but the sound from its soul. Stone tears run down its cheeks and clatter as they land. The child clutching Jizō’s legs jumps down from the plinth.

Other children come to join her, running out from behind graves and between the trees. They’re naked, revealing the distended abdomens of malnutrition and spindly limbs. Hungry ghosts.

I run. I don’t know if you can outrun the dead but I try anyway. They giggle as they give chase. I glance behind. They are so many, each emitting a tremulous glow. I look back to the path and now there are as many ahead of me. I leap sideways and run among the graves. Their fingers brush my legs as they reach for me. I’m driven on by their howls and shrieks.

My clumsiness seals my fate. I trip and land, face down. Thankfully it’s soft ground. I scramble backwards but am stopped by a gravestone at my back. I’m panting. A stitch catches my ribs.

The little ghosts form a semicircle around me but keep their distance with an expectant buzz. The moment of waiting is draining. It might be my last. Something comes under my left hand as I flail about. It’s an orange, a gift to an ancestor. I roll it towards them.

A toddler squats down, his belly hiding his maleness. He picks up the orange and holds it aloft with a joyous squeal. Then he squats down again and rolls it back to me.

A murmur ripples through them. The orange takes an age to reach me. A hush falls as I pick it up. I toss it to one of the older ones, who catches it with the aplomb of a cricketer. She chuckles when I fumble her return.

They just want to play.

I throw it deeper into the crowd and each time they return it I send it further and further away, until they focus on the orange instead of me, passing it between themselves. Their light recedes, the sound of a playground growing fainter and fainter.

I pause to wash my hands and pour water on one of the statues before I make my approach. A small respect for the outrage I’m about to perform.

Torodo Hall’s lights blaze, true to the monk’s word. All these souls shine down on me as I make my way to the rear.

I stand before the mausoleum and slip off my backpack. Now that I’m closer, I can see the lock is for show. All I have to do is lift the pin holding the doors together. What stops me is the churning in my guts. The light spilling around the door edges is bright. Who am I to disturb him after all this time?

“Open it.”

I know that voice. Those sonorous, silky tones. I turn, expecting to see my client, here to surprise me and take her prize from me in person. But it’s the old woman. Her face would shame a lotus flower. It flickers between youth and old age, and both are equally beautiful. Both give me a deep ache.

“Open it. Only you can do it. I can’t do it myself.”

“What do you want with these old bones?”

Fury illuminates her. I shield my eyes. She grows in stature. As tall as a house. As tall as the ancient cedars.

“Don’t you know? Don’t you remember what you did to us?” Her screams send the birds wheeling upwards from where they roost.

“What did I do?”

“Our son.”

“I’ve never—”

Did I?

“We had a baby and you locked him away. You said it was for his own good. So that death couldn’t touch him. I’ve been looking for you all this time, Saigyō. Give him to me.”

Saigyō. Memory is a wave that knocks me to my knees. I planted a cherry tree into the rich earth all those years ago. I spent so many nights looking at the stars, until one night something celestial visited me. I touched the mole on her cheek with my thumb as I entered her. Even angels bear imperfections. Her hands pressed at the small of my back. She asked for a terrestrial name. I called her Sakura. We made a new life.

“You made sure that only you can open the door.”

I remember love. Nothing is more terrifying than having something to lose. I was afraid to lose her. I was afraid to lose him. That the decay that affects us as soon as we are birthed would touch him.

“You owe me this after all this time.”

I prise open the door. It’s a furnace. Inside is no relic. It doesn’t glimmer. It’s a mass of energy that boils and twists in its containment. Is it an angel or demon? It cries out, a gaping maw somewhere within it. The scream of birth. Of consciousness.

It’s like the wail of the foetus on Jizō’s statue. It’s not a demon. It’s a baby, howling for its mother. I take out the radish lotus from my pocket and toss it in. The blue fire changes, swirling the radish around. It’s playing. It coalesces into something solid. A baby, lying on a bed of feathers, the vegetable lotus clutched in his chubby fist. I reach in and gather him up. Hold him against the pain in my chest.

“Give him to me.”

Sakura is reduced back to human proportions, arms out. I lay him there. She’s shivering. I pull the feathered thing lying at the bottom of the mausoleum and shake it out.

I took this robe from her when she offered it. Proof of trust. That she would never leave me. That she loved me as I loved her. What a fool I was. Love doesn’t need proof. Love is trust. You can’t bind someone to you by clipping their wings. I should never have taken it. I shake it out and cover her shoulders in this flurry of white feathers.

On my knees is the proper place to be.

“Forgive me.” I touch my forehead to the ground in abject apology. “Forgive me.”

She cups my face with her free hand.

“There was a time when I had so much love for you.”

She left her kind. She gave up the gift of flight. I have so much love for her still. I wish someone would take it from me.

She could crush me with her heel, celestial being that she is. Instead, she leaps up as if coiled and her wings unfold. She owes me nothing, not even a backward glance. She spirals upwards, bearing our son, until she’s out of sight.

Still, I am not alone.

Foxes come. They’ve been waiting. I doubt they’ll be placated by an orange, even if I had one. The giant one approaches me while the others stay at a distance, eyes narrowed. He stands on his hindlegs as he joins me, changing from fox to man. He’s enveloped in an orange robe and a bright yellow puffer jacket. All the other foxes are monks in robes now.

“Kōbō Daishi.” I choke. “My friend. You knew me straight away, didn’t you?”

“I’d know you anywhere.” He clasps my forearms and pulls me to my feet. “I thought of you so often and wondered when you’d come.”

“I did something terrible, Kūkai.” The wound of it is fresh, not hundreds of years old.

“You did something human. And only you could rectify it.”

“Is that why I was born again and again? As punishment?”

“No, you are far older than that. You are a Deva, bound by reincarnation to be an eternal guardian of the faith. When you became a lover and a father, you lost your way.”

I became impure. Tainted by death’s shadow. The fear of loss. I’d preserved my son in a magic box.

“What will you do now, Saigyō?” he asks gently. “What did you pray for this morning?”

It was there, my wish, in the ashes of the fire. To know myself. I step into the mausoleum and take up the lotus position. Kōbō Daishi nods and closes the doors. I’ve never known such peace as I have in Kōyasan.

THE ANGEL OF TIME

TIM LEBBON

Most of my life is a dream.

The majority of my existence has been spent asleep, a deep hibernation during which my body slows to match the heartbeat of soil, the pulse of rock. My blood flows cool and thick, moving to the rhythm of the land. Hard leathery skin keeps the outsides out and my insides in. Behind my petrified eyes, my long life plays itself out in a slow ballet of memory and imagination. And I remember the places I come from. The horrors I have seen. The events that have brought me back here, again and again, during those brief periods of wakefulness when I deigned to test the world beyond this cold hard embrace.

I sometimes wonder, deep and slow, whether those moments were really the dream, and this is my stark reality.

Time will tell. Time, and motion.

Because I sense movement, and feel echoes, and I wonder if soon I will rise again for one last breath.

*   *   *

I pounded through the trees, dodging left and right. My wings were folded and tucked tight against my back. I could slow down and open them, fly, try to escape that way, but my pursuers would be ready for that. Three days ago I’d seen them bring down Khalia in a hail of spears as she glided low over the beach to the south-east. I was too far away to help, and not far enough away to avoid witnessing her end—the maniacs stabbing at her with their rough spears, crushing her head with rocks. Destroying her in ignorance and fear. Breaking her open so that her sweet soul escaped.

At least, Khalia would want to believe that. It’s been a long time since I’ve believed in a soul. There’s too much evil and unfairness in the world for such a comforting concept to be real. All she had inside leaked out and seeped away into the sand.

So I ran, relying on my speed and familiarity with this forest to stay ahead, knowing that the humans had already formed a large circle around the area, ready to ambush me the instant I emerged. They had me hemmed in. These might have been my final moments. In my rich red grief, part of me did not care.

But I had a destination in mind and a chance at escape. Khalia and I had been discussing it for a while, but now, terrified and distraught, I would be retreating there all on my own.

You should have fought, I thought. Khalia had been against fighting the humans, claiming they weren’t all awful. She’d believed that we would eventually be able to live in peace, as our ancestors had.

I wasn’t sure I believed those stories. Since birth I had been hunted. It was only in the deep, dark forests that we were usually safe. Now there were more humans than ever before, and they no longer let us live in peace. They wanted what was ours—our land, our art, our knowledge. Our wings, our skin.

Our blood.

I smelled humans ahead of me, three of them hunkered down with spears ready to let fly. I veered left and ran low and fast, ducking beneath a fallen oak and leaping across a small, deep ravine. I heard one of the waiting humans speak, their voice raised in query. Maybe they’d seen me, maybe not, but I knew I was too fast for them.

My bare feet pounded silently across the forest floor. My clawed hands grabbed trees and branches and pulled, giving me free speed. I breathed soft and fast, fuelling my blood, empowering my muscles to new feats of strength and agility. I moved with the forest, not against it, and that was how I hoped to survive.

I had little advantage in any other quarter. Khalia was dead, others from our clan had run away, and the humans now bred unrestrained, with no consideration of how their rapidly increasing numbers would impact the world around them. Already their local settlement was home to hundreds.

I reached the low cliff and paused, only for a moment. My destination was close, and to reach it I had to—

I should have smelled them, heard them. I might have sensed them, if my mind was not so consumed by anger and grief.

The spear whisked in from behind me, and as I started to turn it buried itself in my back, just at the base of my right wing. I cried out and ran forward, leaping from the cliff.

I struck the steep rockface and rolled, grunting as the spear was torn away. I tried to control my fall, arms and legs loose and warding off the cliff. It was not a long drop, and it ended with a fall into the river.

I allowed myself to sink.

Spears and rocks splashed into the water around me. They all missed. I swam against the current, strong strokes pulling me upstream. When I was close to the bank, I allowed my face to break the surface. I breathed in long and hard, saw and smelled no threat.

Urgency pressing me, I crawled from the river and climbed the short slope until I reached the cave’s mouth.

Am I really doing this? I thought. Can I really allow this to happen?

Already my blood was slowing, my muscles growing weaker. I had been preparing for several days, and now that I was close, my body was going down towards hibernation. The cave’s cool darkness welcomed me in, and I allowed a brief, pained flutter of my wings to carry me far to the back, where the ceiling sloped down and met the floor. The wound from the spear hurt, and I knew I’d have to make sure there was nothing still inside me before I went to ground.

Here I would find my rest in sadness, and wait out the period of human existence.

Though dangerous in their expanding numbers, they were clumsy and foolish. I was confident they would not last for very long.

*   *   *

The first time I rose from my long sleep into uncertain reality, I knew that I was not alone. It took time for my senses to return, and while my mind still dwelled in dreams, they began to intrude. Touch came first, ages of sandy sediment smothering my body and holding me tight. I started to shift, old muscle reinvigorated by my desire to rise and assess my situation. It might have been hours or days until I felt the kiss of fresh air against my old leathery skin. I snorted compacted dust from my nose and smelled blossom and smoke on the breeze. I heard voices in the cavern around me, as yet unaware of my presence. I did not know their language, but it was more complex than I’d heard from the humans before. There was low talking and laughter. They sounded at peace.

Maybe they will welcome me and my Kin, I thought, but I couldn’t allow hope to intrude. My senses were weakened, my reactions sluggish from the many years or centuries I had been resting, hidden away from danger. I had to be alert.

I waited until it was quiet and dark in the cave. I was half exposed, far at the cave’s rear, away from the occupants and their small camp. Lifting my head and exposing my eyes, blinking away the dust of ages, I took a while to look around.

The cave was large, with a low open mouth curtained with creeping plants. Its ceiling was high and curved, sweeping down towards the sides and the back, where I had taken my rest. There were two fires burning—one, close to the entrance, was large and maintained by a low shape covered in animal fur. The other was further back, closer to me and spread wider and lower. Around this fire I could see a dozen shapes lying on animal furs and layered reeds. A family at rest.

There were adults and children. There were also weapons: spears and bows and arrows, the spears and arrows tipped with sharp stone heads. In shadowy corners I saw furs piled up, and the pale curves of several huge tusks.

I shrugged myself upright, hidden in the shadows yet still benefitting from a touch of heat from the flames. My inadvertent sigh echoed around the cavern.

The person by the large fire tensed, then relaxed again. He or she prodded the flames and threw on another dried log.

I shook grit and rock from my skin and long thick hair. I stretched my arms and legs, easing them out so that the crackling of joints sounded like knots spitting on the fire.

With my wings extended, the sense of space made me sigh again.

The figure by the fire looked up, turning to face my way. They still could not see me, buried in the shadows. I would have to be careful.

I moved my wings, back and forth, back and forth, feeling the movement return. My strength was still there.

And suddenly the outside called, the cool darkness beyond the cave, and the reality of this new world I had woken and risen into. I wanted to find my Kin.

I took flight.

Passing above the sleeping people and their low flames, I flapped again as I approached the cave’s mouth, powering through the fire and parting the hanging plants, barely noticing the person keeping watch as they fell back in surprise and shock.

And then I soared.

*   *   *

The air smelled clear and clean. The sky was cloudless and still, and I lived for the moment, rising and falling and drifting, flapping my great wings. The root of my right wing still pained me from the arrow strike, and I suspected it always would. A scar of humanity. My heart was equally scarred with the memories of my sweet Khalia’s death.

I turned south and east and quickly reached the beach where I had seen her fall and die. It was desolate and empty. The sea shushed against the shore, nature’s impartial beat. I landed on the sand and my feet sank in.

Perhaps her bones lay beneath me.

My grief still felt raw despite the time that had obviously passed. Entropy had worked differently upon my dormant soul. After a period of sad reflection, I took off again and floated for many hours above the shoreline, looking for fellow Kin. I let my senses range, probing the darkness for sights and sounds, feelings and smells, that might provide evidence of others like me. We were winged and clawed, furred and scaled, male and female and more, descendants of a distant past still grabbing onto a fragile existence in this new world.

In my ignorance I had hoped to rise and find something that gave me hope.

The screaming child was far from that.

Her cry carried in from a distance, and even far away I could hear something familiar. It was the sense of hopelessness in her voice, and I drifted lower as she dashed from the cover of trees. Her guts were trailing behind her. They’ve found her and cut her open and now they’re hunting her down, I thought, and that was accurate apart from the cutting. She was not wounded, not yet. Flowing behind her were fine scarlet tendrils that grew from her temples and down the length of her spine, sensing the air and tasting only danger. I had seen some of her kind before, when I was a child. That had been in a time of peace.

I landed on the grassy plain ahead of her and waited, my wings outstretched so that she knew I was Kin. I went to speak, but my throat was raw and still coated with time’s detritus, and my words were a growl.

The sight of me did not lessen the girl’s terror. She switched direction and ran back along the tree line, and moments later three people burst from cover just ahead of her. There were two women and a man, all dressed in rough, drab clothing, all holding heavy swords.

One of them jabbed at the running girl and caught her on her right side, and she went down.

I took flight again, and the movement caught their attention. The man shouted and pointed, and I was about to flap my wings and power uphill at the three brutes when the whole tree line shimmered and shook and scores more people came out into the sunlight.

Some of them started running downhill towards me. Several others fell on the girl and butchered her, their swords glimmering red.

I climbed out of range of several arrows that came my way. Nothing has changed, I thought, and I turned and headed back towards the cave.

When their shouts and cries were behind me—I did not understand the words, but the language of fear and hate is universal—I drifted down and flew closer to the ground, so as not to be seen from a distance.

I breathed in the fresh air. It was beautiful, but tainted now with the knowledge of what I had seen. The murder and brutality were bad enough, but the fear in the girl’s eyes when she’d seen me made it all worse.

She did not recognise me. She did not know that we were Kin.

How few of us were left?

Perhaps I should have searched further, but the memory of Khalia’s gruesome murder, while centuries old, remained fresh and bloody in my mind. Its trauma wore me down, and the new horrors I had just witnessed made me weary.

No, nothing had changed.

Back at the cave I could take no chances. I had never been a violent creature, though violence had tainted my life, and I hated the idea of killing. Yet I was possessed of tooth and claw.

I surprised them sleeping, and made sure everyone in the cave was dead and burning on their fire of protection before putting myself back down into the mud, the soil, the dust, and slowly descending into another long sleep.

*   *   *

The ground rumbled around me. I felt the thudding vibrations of distant impacts. I woke far slower than before, and it took some time, perhaps days, until my first coherent thought formed.

Maybe they’re digging me up.

My muscles started flexing and working, and as my body rediscovered itself, so did my mind.

I am Kin, persecuted and hunted into this grave. I know loss. I escaped suffering. Now perhaps the humans are sharing with us, living in the same space.

It was a hope that I grabbed onto, the only thought that encouraged me to shiver myself fully awake in that pit of stone and dust.

At last I felt able to rise, and I did so carefully. The thuds and vibrations of rock moving against rock continued from afar, along with voices shouting and singing. They sounded good-natured. I could not let that fool me.

The remains of the fire and the bodies of the humans I’d killed were long gone, but bad memories remained fresh and red.

The cave mouth was almost completely smothered with undergrowth, and I sniffed and searched, finding no trace of habitation. I had been alone down here for a long time. I knew something of humans and their superstitions, and I guessed that the pile of burned bodies had prompted stories about the cave. They probably said it was haunted and told their children to keep away. I was a ghost of my own making.

As three nights came and went, I became myself again, catching several mice to eat and drinking water pooled on the cave floor. My wings weren’t as strong as before, my limbs not as muscled, and I accepted that time was having its way with me. All the while, the rumbling and banging noises came from beyond and above the cave.

At last I felt ready to venture out. I did so nervous of what I would find, and eager to see what had changed while I had been asleep.

I pushed through the hanging plants, thorns scratching across my thick hide, and sunlight bathed me as I emerged onto a rough outcropping. The river was wider than I remembered it, and on the opposite bank there was a scattering of structures. They were elaborately built from timber, with stone pillars to keep them upright and grey roof coverings, also of stone.

A few figures walked back and forth between these buildings. They were all human, no Kin among them. They seemed casual and at ease, gathering chopped wood, cooking food over a fire pit, chatting and sometimes laughing. I still did not wish to be seen.

I made my way along the steep slope beside the cave, keeping within shadows cast by the wild undergrowth. When I looked up, I saw the huge structure that had been built upon the low hill above and behind me.

It took my breath away. I had never seen anything like it. It loomed tall and imposing, so high that it appeared to lean over me ready to tumble, fall, crush. The sheer grey wall was made of smoothed stone, punctured evenly with narrow, dark openings. Further along the wall, wood and rope structures were tied into it where construction was still ongoing. The building seemed to follow the flow of the land. It was massive, intimidating and impressive.

As I explored further, still doing my best to keep out of sight of anyone watching from across the river, I realised that humans had done more than persist. They had flourished.

I saw where groups of people were working the stone, heaving heavy blocks into place using a complex system of ropes, wooden props and strange lifting devices. From beyond the high wall, I heard more stone being broken and worked in a couple of dedicated areas, carved into these blocks they were using to build.

But build what? It was a solid, intimidating edifice, grey and forbidding, and much too large to be a home for one family, or even twenty. There was something aggressive about the structure. Built to keep out, not contain within.

I felt the first frisson of fear. Of course I do, I thought. These are humans. They were better dressed, fitter and in easier spirits, and were obviously far more advanced than the group that had pursued us and brutally murdered Khalia so long ago in time, but so recently in my perception.

But they were still human. I had to remain cautious.

I would wait until nightfall before flying up and observing from on high. I had always found freedom in the skies.

*   *   *

Soaring into the night sky, I felt a sense of hope and release that had been building throughout that afternoon and evening. I’d heard singing from within the tall structure above me, and musical notes plucked, struck, and blown from instruments I could not identify. They conjured fond memories of times spent playing and singing with Khalia and our fellow Kin, before the humans found us and started hunting, persecuting, and killing.

Happier times.

Maybe happy times can come again, I thought, as cool night air flowed over my wings and moonlight diffused through scattered clouds soothed me with its silvery glow.

Finally able to view the structure in its entirety, I was shocked by its sheer size. It stretched across the hilltop, following the contours of the land and actually changing it as well, stone walls rising and curving, lower sections within the outer wall’s embrace built of wood. Several circular towers rose around the perimeter, some tall and topped with stone-covered roofs, others still in the process of being built.

As well as shocked, I was impressed by the humans’ ingenuity. I circled, staring down, and scattered across the building’s interior were several contained fires. Figures sat and moved around them, and I caught the scent of cooking meat.

It made me hungry. I eased my wings and glided lower, passing over the massive courtyard. A few heads turned my way and some conversations drifted off, and I cautioned myself to be wary.

But they’re so advanced, I thought. They’re building and making their mark on the land. Letting hope seep in, I landed on the high boundary wall close to where a wide gated opening protected inside from without. The gate was closed now, a heavy metal object that nothing and no one would be able to force their way through.

I wondered what they felt the need to protect themselves against.

That waft of cooking meat again. It sent a shiver through me, as I opened my wings to flap down and land amongst them—

I’ll ask what they are protecting themselves from, and make myself known, and perhaps now their intellects and instincts have matured and grown as much as their musicianship and building abilities.

—and then I noticed several small statuettes built into the head of this outer wall, busts cast in stone and facing outward as if to deter threats from beyond. I tipped from the wall and clung against its facade with my strong limbs. And I saw.

They were faces and visages that I knew, carved from stone and formed in a line along the top of the great wall. Here, a pixie. There, a harpy. Other Kin I recognised, and some I did not. Their faces were uglified, horror-fied.

A chill went down my spine. And as I gasped in shock, I smelled something other than cooking meat. It was foul and putrescent, a terrible taint. I looked down towards the outer entrance again and noticed several thick posts cast into the ground, following a rough path leading down and away from the fortification.

Hanging from three of these posts were metal cages.

I shivered. Something reached in and grabbed my heart, a cold fist squeezing, like a hand crushing hope away.

I drifted down and landed on the first post. Dread filled my heart, and a sick certainty settled across my mind. I folded my wings and breathed in again. The smell of rot was worse here. For a few moments I could not look. I thought about the long time I had spent buried in the cavern deep beneath this new, ugly human fortification, and I’d so hoped that I would have no need to retreat there again. I was not consciously aware of the dormant time that had passed me by, yet it still weighed heavy upon me.

I’m growing old, I thought, and I looked down at last.

The cage contained the corpse of a Kin. It was tangled and rotting. The flesh sparkled in the weak moonlight, moist with decay. I leaned to one side so that more moonlight fell on the figure, but I could not see what species of Kin the cage contained. Small enough to fit inside, relatively humanoid in shape, but beyond that I could not know. If it had once possessed wings, scales, fur or feathers, death and rot had broken them down and stolen its form away.

I flapped once and landed on the next cage, setting the post it was hanging from swaying. I balanced, wings held out, until it came to a stop. The cage contained little more than a skeleton clothed in a leathery hide. Claw-tipped hands clasped onto the cage’s rough bars. The long skull had a furred snout. Wolfen, perhaps, I thought. I’d once spent a summer hunting with a female wolfen, our different natures making us a fearsome pair. We’d brought down stag deer and bear, and further north a mammoth that had kept a local Kin community clothed and fed through the long winter.

I slumped down, sad, and the cage started swaying and swinging again, the creaking loud in the night.

I looked up, suddenly alert and afraid, because they hadn’t just killed these Kin. They’d hung them out to die.

And then I heard a sound that might have been wind through metal bars. I froze, head tilted, and when it came again I recognised it. A whimper. A word spoken in the ancient Kin tongue that I had not heard for countless years.

“Help.”

I drifted to the next pole and landed softly. The cage creaked and swayed beneath me, and I said, “I’m here.” My voice was a croak, a rattle, an echo from the past.

The figure in the cage barely moved. I could smell its filth, its aroma of decay and rot.

“Help?” it asked again.

I eased down and gripped onto the side of the cage to see inside.

It was a wood sprite, small and sleek, withered away to little more than a skeleton. Her eyes were huge and protruding from her head, her mouth open and mostly toothless. Her gums had withdrawn and let go of her teeth. She was barely alive.

I examined the cage, looking for a way to open it, free her, take her away.

“No,” she said, her voice little more than a breath. “Help me.”

“I’m trying,” I said. The cage had a small hatch in its upper part, but it was secured shut by thick links of chain that had been melted in place. Even as my youngest, strongest self, I wouldn’t have been able to break them.

“Not free,” she said. “Help. Me. On my way.”

I paused and looked in at the poor sprite. I’d known a male sprite when I was young, a happy and mischievous fellow who’d enjoyed stealing your food when your back was turned. He’d been wise, and kind. I could see kindness in this Kin too, even though her eyes were so swollen and desperate.

“Why do they do this?” I asked.

Her head shifted a little, eyes turning towards the other two cages. “Friends,” she said. “The humans… no friends.”

“I had hope for them.”

“Had?”

“I’ve been dormant for so long,” I said. “They killed…” I trailed off. She didn’t need to know my sad tale.

“Killed so many,” she said. “Hardly any left.”

“That’s why I hide. Until they are gone.”

She snorted. I didn’t know if it was laughter, or something else.

“My heart, shrivelled,” she said. “My blood, still. My soul… set it free.”

I sighed, hating what she was asking. I didn’t think I could. I went to protest, and then she seemed to find a little strength. Enough to beg me to end her life.

“They come from the castle in the morning. Children throw stones. The adults encourage, mock, or light fires. Beneath me. The cage… so hot.” Her hand raised, blackened stick fingers clasping at the bars. “My time has been and gone. Don’t want it…”

“To end like this,” I said, and I understood.

She slumped down in her hanging cage, but still stared at me through hooded eyes.

“There is no living with them,” she said. “Only dying.”

I made sure it was painless for her. She went with a sigh, and a smile.

*   *   *

Part of me craved vengeance. My wing-claws were sharp and hard, my mouth still filled with teeth. But I was older, weaker than I had been when I killed those dwellers inside my cave.

And I was tired. Killing a handful of humans would give nothing back. The Kin had always been creatures of peace and contemplation, fairness and love. Rarely violence or revenge.

I didn’t want the humans to make me something I was not. Khalia would have never wished that for me.

So as dawn came and the risk of discovery grew great, I went back down to that cave beneath the human’s new castle. I took my last breath, still tainted with the scent of my dead Kin. Then I buried myself again, deeper than before and further than ever from this world grown so strange and brutal.

*   *   *

I came up out of the ground clawing, digging, crawling my way back from the past into whatever the present might be. It was dark. The cave entrance was still there, no longer smothered with undergrowth. I could not tell how long had passed…

…but I knew that things were different. The air smelled rank and dead, a strange scent that fought its way into my old, dusty lungs. Bats flitted silently about me. They acted as if I was not there at all.

I moved slowly across the cave and smelled them everywhere—humans. In the cave and beyond, their aroma was cloying, smothering.

At the cave mouth I stretched my wings while I tried to take in my surroundings.

Noises came from all over, even in the darkness. Growling things moved back and forth beyond the castle, carrying lights to illuminate their way. I wasn’t sure they were alive, not in any way I understood. Stars moved back and forth across the sky. Music played in from a distance, a strange cacophony I could not understand.

They’re everywhere, I thought. After a while I took flight, and they really were everywhere. The castle itself was mostly dark and I sensed most of it had gone to ruin, but all around the castle…

Buildings as far as I could see, hundreds of them, thousands. Lights shimmered all across the landscape, strange contained fires that gave off hardly any heat. The grumbling beasts moved back and forth on winding pathways, and from high up I saw humans getting in and out of these things when they paused. It was overwhelming, my senses struggling to keep up with what they experienced. The sights were confusing and exhausting, the stench in the air sickening, the sounds loud and raucous across what had once been a beautiful landscape. Even the taste of this place made my old, empty stomach clench and knot.

I flew for half a night. My wanderings took me miles in every direction, and everywhere was the blight of humanity.

No Kin, anywhere. No sign, no trace, no smell. At least there were no longer those cages of torture and death hanging in front of the castle walls.

This was no place for me. Perhaps it never would be again.

Back in that deep cave, I saw prints all across the dusty floor that must have been made by humans. I didn’t care. I felt like that wood sprite locked in her cage, worn and weathered and starving of the life and soul that being Kin used to entail.

Without another thought or regret I buried myself again, deeper and deeper, hauling soil and rock and the dust of ages atop me so that the plague of humanity might never, ever find me.

I closed my eyes, at peace with time and fate.

A memory of Khalia followed me down into eternal rest.

*   *   *

Am I dead?

I suppose I must be. It’s dark and I can’t feel or sense anything. For now, I am only mind.

That doesn’t last.

I was never going to wake again.

Something is scratching above me.

I was happy to lie down here and die.

The impacts of someone digging down towards me.

My time has been and gone.

Voices. Daylight. And then words in a language I know, but which over hundreds or thousands of years I have come to fear is in terminal decline.

“There she is,” the Kin said. “The Angel of Time. I told you she was real. I told you all the stories were true. And I told you…”

I stretch, groan, and open my eyes.

“…I told you she was still alive.”

They pull me out, gently, coaxing my stiffened limbs, nursing my wings gone so brittle over the ages. It takes some time, and while that passes I come to know them. Emmeline, the small elf wearing a red hat and with a scar across her face. She drips water into my mouth. Sammi, the fairy, massages my wings with a healing balm. There’s a pixie too, short but immensely strong. His name is Derriel, and he never stops working, hauling rocks from the grave I’d buried myself in, scooping dust, making it easier for me to eventually sit up with help from all three of them.

“I heard stories about you,” Sammi says, her voice liquid light. “In my time with the humans.”

She must see the alarm in my eyes at her mention of humans. She takes my hand, smiles.

“They’re all gone now.”

“Gone?”

“They never were gonna last long,” Derriel says, not pausing in his work.

“Rough,” Emmeline says. “Violent. Self-haters.”

“So…” I blink dust from my eyes, and as Sammi starts massaging my wings again I flex them, just slightly. I can still feel the knot of scar tissue beneath my right wing that reminds me of Khalia. A glow of sadness rests in my chest, around my heart. It always will.

“So this is a world for the Kin once more,” Sammi says. “And over time we’ve been searching for those lost to us. I heard the story of you, the Angel of Time buried in this cave beneath Pembroke Castle.” She smiles and nods at Emmeline and Derriel. “I persuaded these rascals to come and help me search.”

“Rascal?” Derriel asks, and he stops working for the first time, glaring at Sammi.

I pause, newly drawn breath held. Then Sammi laughs, Derriel rolls his eyes, and the three of them help me some more.

*   *   *

Later, Sammi says, “Come up with me, if you’re strong enough. See.”

There’s a stone staircase leading up from the cave that has been my retreat for so long, and she helps me climb it. We emerge into the ruins of Pembroke Castle. Its walls are gone, its towers mere suggestions of form beneath a glorious carpet of plants, trees, creepers. Bees buzz, birds flit here and there, butterflies dance. The sun is warm.

“I’m old,” I say. “I’m like these ruins.”

“You’re nothing like them,” Sammi says. She’s sweet and ethereal, and I’m a little afraid of her. There’s such power in her gaze.

We climb a pile of fallen stones, and the ruin continues for as far as I can see, the symbols of ownership the humans had stamped onto the world now swallowed down by nature.

The air smells clear and clean.

Humanity is the myth.

LIVE FOREVER

A. M. SHINE

No one wants to live forever: my last words as the shotgun barrel sank into that soft spot above my throat, awed to tears by how welcome it felt—how my soul screamed to escape my body lest it be entombed there for all eternity. I steadied my thumb on the trigger as the delicate tap of death drew from the darkness beneath me, committed to the end, and yet heartbroken by its coming. One shot, that’s all it took, and yet…

*   *   *

It was still light when we arrived. Even amidst that westerly wind—salted with sea spray, and cool as fresh mint on my lips—the taste of death hung heavy in the air, clotting like silt in my nostrils and slipping with all the cloying tang of an oyster down my throat. This was the bog in all its putrid glory, just as I remembered it. My senses had carried its taint since I was a boy, causing me to recall those long summers, bare skin reddening beneath the sun, bricking peat in silence by my father’s side—memories so far adrift from the here and now that I often doubt they were ever mine at all.

I hauled my duffel bag out of the trunk, taking a moment to stare seaward, squinting out to where the darkening sky lay its line across the Atlantic. The cliff’s jagged ledge beetled out high above the gnawing tide. But from where we stood, I could still hear the ocean’s blast off in the distance, imagining clouds of white foam rising—torrents of icy shrapnel exploding into the air with every impact.

“Thanks for doing this,” Sarah said, tugging her coat tight against the chill. “I know you wanted to go straight but… thanks.”

I looked at her, shivering by my side. “Have you no scarf?”

She shook her head and smiled with lips that’d already turned blue.

Some virtuous part of me—a part still too fledgling to spread its wings with any confidence—disbelieved that I’d agreed to do this. But, for better or worse, I never could say no to her. Sarah knew that as well as I did when she’d called the day before, saying she needed to see me, sharing the where but not the why, playing her cards so close that I guessed she’d been dealt one last winner.

Death himself wouldn’t have looked as pale as she had on that bar stool, skinny legs crossed all crooked, stirring the ice around her gin, affecting the same loneliness that’d lured many a weak man into buying her another. The darkness strangely suited Sarah in a way the daylight never did—a phantom of flesh and blood, fading slowly out of this world and into the next, wearing the shadows like a veil. The sight of her always made me feel more alive, and not for the right reasons. She must have heard the door close behind me—damn thing whipped back into its frame like a mousetrap—but she didn’t look up. Nothing could break into her orbit when there was a thought at its centre. And judging by her little ruby-red pout, this one had been there for a while, germinating in the darkest backroom of her mind long enough to call me in to share its burden.

I’d taken in the room as I brushed the rain from my coat. Worn wood glowed in the lamplight, imprinting stealthy shapes in the black, accentuating the loneliness of it all; stools tucked under tables, picture frames with their pigments flooded in dark. Somewhere, a radio was whispering to itself, barely loud enough to break above the crackling timber, its bark blistering like pork fat in the flames. Lost in the half-light of the far corner, where the hearth’s golden glow dulled to a dirty bronze, someone was sat alone, disappointed—I could only guess—that the stray blonde leaning on the bar had been waiting on company. Or maybe he’d aged there so long that he’d adapted to his own society, those recurring regrets whispered under a man’s breath; beautiful lies repeated so many times that they almost started to resemble the truth. I sat up on the stool by Sarah’s side and faced the wall of backlit liquor bottles, acting as though we were two strangers, our paths entwined by some grand plan that we were each oblivious to. Only then did she turn ever so slightly to smile at me, her eyes sparkling with that same subtle sadness I’d come to expect since we’d learned she was dying.

“You came,” she said, straightening her shoulders, revealing how thin she’d become. “I wasn’t sure if you would.”

Hardly a promising start that the first words to slip the woman’s lips were a lie. But her relief was real enough to make up for it. And, truth be told, there was nowhere I’d have rather been.

Up close, the illness was everywhere, clear as red wine stains on white linen. I didn’t know how much time she had left. Sarah never did like to tell me. It was like staring at a perfect sunset, back when the night was as black as it was cold and campfires kept the wolves at bay—you try to cherish those last seconds of light, but all you can do is dread the dark.

“How have you been?” I asked her, though the clues in front of me were answer enough.

“You know how it is,” she replied, still swirling that straw around her drink, “living each day like it’s my last. Isn’t that what we’re all supposed to be doing?”

“No one wants to live forever, Sarah.”

A bad joke we’d shared when she had been diagnosed. No matter how often we’d repeated it, not once did we laugh, and this was no exception.

“You going to tell me why I’m here?” I asked, resting the weight of both arms up on the counter. “And don’t tell me it’s for a job. You know I quit all that.”

I was more than happy to let that old life die alongside her; some silver lining to make the gathering clouds a little less bleak.

“The Céide Fields,” she replied, lowering her voice as she cast a cagey eye around us.

I stared at her blankly. “Come again.”

Sarah could have let me throw a thousand guesses and I’d never have landed on the Céide Fields. I hadn’t heard of them until that night. The past was a time and a place that I’d learned to bury, and I didn’t much respect those who made a career out of digging it up. It was, or so she told me, some sort of Stone Age site. Neolithic, as if a word I didn’t fully understand was meant to impress me, but she went on: it was the largest in the country, apparently, maybe even the world. I listened without really knowing why, but she spoke so excitedly, her voice light as a flourish of birdsong on a summer’s sunrise, making me fancy some light in the darkness. Sarah said it had been discovered in the 1930s—ancient walls and dwellings dating back well over five thousand years, all of it now buried under the bog; a black cloud of decay that no amount of time was ever going to lift. A visitors’ centre had since been built atop it—a lure for tourists looking to lighten their pockets, closed now till the spring.

“Okay,” I’d said, pinching around my beard as I did whenever a worry was awakening inside of me, “what’s this got to do with us?”

“There’s more in the centre than they’d like the public to know about,” she replied. “I’ve heard through a source that there’s a special collection, off limits to the public. We’re talking valuables, Noah. The kind that no one is aware of and so no one will come looking for should they, you know, go missing.”

I ran a hand down my face and moaned louder than I should have. “Seriously, Sarah? I thought we’d stopped—”

“I need this,” she said, cutting me short, “and I know you’re as broke as I am. I just want to enjoy what little time I’ve left, and to do that I need money.”

“So that’s why I’m here,” I said, grimacing through a sour taste salivating around my gums. “One last favour, is that it?”

“More like a dying wish,” she replied, letting that straw slip from her bony fingers. “Please, it’s the last thing I’ll ever ask of you.”

If only that were the truth.

*   *   *

I slammed the trunk shut and turned my back to the sea. Dead as the land may have been, its tall grasses shivered like living hair long into the distance. And in the centre of it all, stealing my curiosity like an empty bank brimming with unmarked bills, stood the strangest building I’d ever seen. It was structured like a pyramid of concrete and slate, but with its pointy head replaced by a glass observatory—a little shelter to take in the view, I supposed.

“That’s it?” I said, nodding toward the oddity.

Sarah looped her arm through mine. “That’s it. In and out, no complications. And it’s not even technically stealing.”

“How’d you figure that?” I asked her as we took those first steps together, like a couple of lovers strolling toward a candlelit dinner in the countryside, flanked on either side by fields of spongey bog—eternally wet and all too keen to swallow the bodies of any who strayed off the beaten path.

“Well,” she replied, resting her head into my arm, “we’re both Irish, aren’t we? So, the way I see it, we’ve as much right to our country’s heritage as anyone else.”

Hard to argue with that reasoning. Sarah always did have a knack for smoothing out our sinful creases with a few choice words.

As we neared the door, I came to realise why she hadn’t tackled this job alone; damned thing was carbon built and framed in stone so heavy that only a machine could shift it. The dull rap of my knuckles on its glass told me without words that it was layered thick as a prison’s. A smarter man might have turned back there and then, but…

“You’re sure this is a museum?” I asked as I slipped the bag from my shoulder and let it clank down on the ground.

“Visitors’ centre,” she corrected me, brushing her cold palms together.

I rifled around my tools until I felt the glass hammer: the strongest money could buy—the kind that firemen use for deeds far nobler than my own. “Are these centres of yours always so secure?”

“Like I told you,” Sarah said, glancing back to the road, “they’re definitely hiding more than artifacts or whatever you call them in there.”

“And you’ve scouted around for cameras and alarms, haven’t you?” I asked her, hammer poised.

“Obviously,” she replied, rolling her eyes. “We’re good, don’t worry. And sure, even if there is an alarm hidden somewhere, look where we are, Noah. We’ll be long gone before anyone can get here.”

“Let’s hope you’re right,” I said just before I swung my first blow at the glass, committing to the crime and the fate that would be mine, and Sarah’s too.

It took more than a few attempts to clear a way in—proof enough that without the hammer we’d already have been heading home, defeated, and as poor as we were before we’d arrived. When the last of the glass settled, I leant an ear in to listen: no alarm, no sound, just the darkness within waiting patiently for us to enter it. Sarah picked the torches from my bag and led the way in, aware as I was that whatever time she had left in life, ours wasn’t a situation to squander any of it. Ridiculous as it seems now, I couldn’t conceive a worse end for the woman than living out her last months in some jail cell.

In and out, no complications—that’s what she had said.

The day’s dying light dripped through a circular opening in the centre’s ceiling, illuming a tree so stripped of bark that it looked to be wrapped in sun-kissed skin, not unlike my younger self after a season’s graft on the bog. Strange how everything there so reminded me of that time. I could still taste it on my tongue, even indoors, as if we were stood on something freshly dead and the fumes from its bloated corpse were seeping up from beneath us.

“Nice tree,” I whispered, panning my torchlight across the artwork adorning the walls surrounding it; tasteful fare whose sombre colours suited the silence.

“That pine is over four thousand years old,” Sarah whispered. “They found it in the bog.”

Can’t say I was surprised. Given half a chance, the land in these parts of the country claimed anything it could as its own; even bodies, mummifying them in dirt so that their open eyes could spend centuries searching tearfully for the light.

“Good to know you’ve done your research, Sarah, but where are these valuables of yours? The clock is ticking.”

She broke away from my side. “I’m on it.”

I ambled aimlessly around the centre, suffering through the urgency of each passing second, feeling about as welcome as I always did when stood in a room where I shouldn’t have been, lingering around the tree and that scantest of daylight. Stone tiles were set around the dead pine in a circle, drawing my gaze like an insect to a web. I was about to reach out a hand, realising that I’d probably never in my life touched anything so old and yet still so oddly alive to the eye, when—

“Noah,” Sarah called out, “get over here.”

She was pawing her fingers across the wall, searching for something I assumed to be a switch of sorts. And, rare a moment as it was, an audible click proved me right for once.

“Here, help me open this,” she said to me, and I was by her side in a few steps, wrenching that stone door out of place.

With every tug, more light seeped into the room. A sliver at first—a white line leaking across the floor—and then, before long, it was flooding across the tiles as though I’d just cracked open a dam of the stuff.

“This is it,” Sarah said excitedly, squeezing my arm. “Exactly where I was told it’d be.”

I can’t say for certain what I was expecting, but it sure as shit wasn’t what we found.

The room was small, no larger than my own bathroom, with a lone bulb above our heads lighting its three walls. One held no more than a black-and-white photograph, the other some kind of blueprint or map, and the last—much to my disbelief, and Sarah’s, judging by the way her jaw dangled open—a vertical rack of four shotguns. I had neither a fondness nor an interest in firearms, but I could tell they were modern by the look of them: matte black with no trace of use, and probably worth more than our bank accounts combined.

“Is this what you were hoping to find?” I asked, quietly confident that it wasn’t.

Sarah shook her head without saying a word.

The photograph was framed and pressed behind some dusty glass. I crept forward to study it more closely, searching for answers without really knowing what questions I should have been asking. It showed a dozen or so men, tools in hand, all gathered around a bog, grinning at the camera, sleeves rolled past their elbows, boots socked in black. The chap in the centre stole my eye with his wide smile of crooked teeth and fair beard—a thousand shades whiter than the muddied sky above them—trimmed tight with a fat ’tache above his lip, resembling some bargain-basement Russian tsar. Stones jutted up like broken bones from the earth, angled akin to the sides of the very pyramid we stood in; possibly one of those dwellings Sarah had mentioned. And there was a hollow between all that rot and rubble: an entranceway that I didn’t doubt those men planned on exploring once they’d blinked the camera flash from their eyes.

“They must be the ones who found it back in the 1930s,” Sarah said.

“Found what exactly?” I asked her.

She turned to the picture on the other wall. “This.”

I’ll admit it took me a while to make sense of it, and even then I still strained to believe what I was looking at. But Sarah had been right, there was definitely more to the Céide Fields than the nation knew about. The pyramid ran deep. They’d mapped out its levels and passages with red lines; maybe with some computer, maybe with the human eye, I couldn’t tell. But I counted three floors, all widening as they neared its base, with a slew of stairways breaching each one.

“This is underneath us?” I asked, not realising that Sarah had left my side and was now prying the photograph off the wall.

“Here,” she said, nodding toward a lever that had been concealed behind its frame. “And this is how we get in.”

“Why the fuck would we want to get—”

“Because I need this, Noah. Just trust me, okay.”

Before I’d chance to argue, the emptiness—disturbed only by our low and mindful voices—was suddenly filled with the grinding of gears. Those tiles where the tree roots stood so eerily alive in death were moving aside, revealing an opening in the centre of the floor. My heart tensed at the thought of what was coming next; I never was fond of tight spaces and always felt more at home above ground than I did beneath it.

“Come on,” Sarah whispered, patting my back as she passed me by.

If you were to ask, I couldn’t tell you why I took one of those shotguns with me—a hunch, maybe, some bad feeling deep in my bones—because there wasn’t a scenario in the world that’d ever cause me to put a bullet in someone. But I guessed they’d been stowed there for a reason, though I couldn’t fathom in the hazy half-light of that room what that might have been. Sarah didn’t pass any comment and, if anything, she looked almost glad. The ladder was thick iron and bolted into the floor, and that same smell of rot rose up to meet me when I crouched down to test its sturdiness. I looked to Sarah; she was gathering up her courage, breathing hard like a runner listening out for the starting pistol.

“What kind of valuables are we after exactly?” I asked.

In lieu of an answer, she dipped a reluctant toe down to that first rung. “I’ll tell you when we find it.”

Despite my own misgivings, Sarah seemed to know what we were looking for, and like a bloodhound hooked on a scent, the woman wouldn’t rest until she’d found it. I followed her down into that darkness, wielding my trust like a weapon, oblivious to the terrible truth that nothing could keep us safe from what we were walking into. When my feet finally felt solid ground, I fanned my torchlight around me, scattering the shadows into grooves and hollows in those ancient walls that rose up and all around us. The pyramid’s highest tier—and possibly those below it—was one massive chamber; its high ceiling knitted with cobwebs that shone like a tapestry of white silk above our heads. The air tasted strangely sweet, almost pickled, if I’d to compare it to anything, like a jar of old vegetables forced to live longer than they’d any right to.

“There’s nothing here,” I said, swiping my light around us.

“They probably took whatever was down here up there,” Sarah said, casting her light to that silvered ceiling of web.

“What is that?” I asked, burying my nose into my sleeve.

“It was never going to smell like roses down here, was it?” she replied as she went about examining the walls. “Who knows how long it’s been since anyone was last down here.”

The dark was as ubiquitous as it was deep, and our torches were too weak to keep it from flooding around us wherever we moved. Eager to stay close to Sarah’s side—for the sake of her nerves and my own—I padded over to where she was brushing a hand across the wall.

“Look at this,” she said, directing my eyes to the carving she’d found.

It was a crude representation of what I assumed to be time: the passing of a sun from left to right, and beneath it a thatch of lines that might have been days, months, or even years. They could have been millennia for all I knew. Without letters and numbers, every notch was open to interpretation.

“Sarah, what is this?”

She nudged into me. “You know the way so many stories in Irish mythology involve eternal youth? Well, this is where it came from. You can forget all that Tír na nÓg bullshit. Look!”

Her trembling hand settled her torchlight as steady as it could on the etching. It depicted a man and a woman, naked and void of feature, and beside them—if the artist’s scale were to be trusted—there was risen the unmistakable form of a colossal tarantula; its front legs spread high, fangs protruding, seemingly on the cusp of devouring them.

“I don’t understand,” I whispered, unsure if I even wanted to.

“The spider venom,” she replied. “It’s the secret to everlasting life, Noah. They used to store it down here, keeping it safe from any who might have abused it. We just have to find where they left it, and then—”

A sick feeling was swelling inside of me; a soup of fear and pity that bubbled up my throat.

“Sarah,” I said, wrapping a tender arm around her, “this can’t be real.”

Ever since I’d met her, she’d been fascinated with grails and arks and magic beyond the science that couldn’t save her. But this was too much. This was a false hope from which no good could ever come. Fantasies can colour the mind, but they can’t mend a broken body.

“No one wants to live forever,” I reminded her, squeezing her closer.

But she cast me aside and stormed away. “That’s easy for you to say.”

“Sarah, I didn’t mean it like—”

“Are you coming with me or not?” she said, standing atop a cavity in the floor whose stairs assumedly led down to the next chamber.

There was nothing I could say to change her mind, and so I knew better than to try.

“Let’s make it quick,” I replied, crossing the distance between us. “I don’t want to spend a minute longer in here than I have to.”

She smiled, her faith in me rewarded, as if I’d ever leave her alone down there. And without another word, Sarah submerged her body in that pool of darkness, fearless as one who’d already surrendered to their end. I scrabbled my hands across the walls to stay my balance, the air growing mustier and more sour to swallow with every downward step.

“Look,” she called back in a shrill whisper, snapping my eyes to where she was spraying the wall with torchlight. “These might actually be worth something.”

The spearheads were propped up in a line, as if those men who’d first uncovered the pyramid had laid them out to count the worth of their discovery. I remember thinking it strange that they hadn’t delivered such relics to the surface, especially considering their prospective value.

“Here,” Sarah said, guiding her light to a cluster of clay shards strewn across the floor. “It looks like someone was breaking pots.”

“Do you think that’s where they kept your venom?”

“Maybe,” she replied, “but why would they shatter them? I mean, think about it, what would someone be willing to pay for immortality? Even a drop of the stuff must be priceless.”

The woman genuinely believed it, and I could do no more for her than play along.

“One more floor, Sarah,” I said when I found the final set of stairs aligned above a hollow in the floor. “And then we’re out of here, okay? We can grab some of those spears as we’re leaving. You know yourself, there’s a buyer for everything in this world.”

“Okay,” she agreed, “but the venom has to be in the main chamber.”

Given the disappointment awaiting her, our ascent to the surface promised to be a slow one—two thieves leaving the scene of their supposed crime none the richer. I just hoped there wasn’t a ring of Guards waiting for us outside when we resurfaced, all summoned by some silent alarm that’d been upsetting itself since I’d smashed that glass door in.

These steps went much deeper than the others; hardly surprising considering that the main room was by far the largest in the pyramid, occupying more than half the overall structure, as advertised by the map upstairs. I led the way this time, too focused on not tumbling down into the darkness to pay any heed to my surroundings, expecting to find no more novelty than what we’d already encountered in the floors above: clay fragments and artifacts too worthless to consider salvaging. I couldn’t help but wonder why they’d kept the pyramid concealed. The moustachioed chap who’d stolen centre stage in that photograph would have surely cemented his name in the annals of history had he only shared their discovery with the world.

“Finally,” I gasped when I reached level ground.

As I stood there, hand outstretched to guide Sarah down those last steps, I was stricken by the strangest feeling—one I hadn’t suffered in the rooms above. Call it a thief’s intuition, but I suspected—without explicable cause or reason—that I was now under surveillance: that the eyes of something unseen and sinister were poring over me like a disease, causing my skin to crawl uncontrollably.

I gripped Sarah’s shoulder. “Stay still,” I whispered.

With my eyes locked on the dark beyond our collective torchlight, I listened.

Had I imagined it? Had I heard the subtle crick and crack of brittle bone in the black?

“What’s wrong?” Sarah asked, her body stiffening.

“Did you hear that?”

She frowned at me. “I didn’t hear anything.”

With my lungs held fast, there was now only a clean and untouched silence. But I trusted my own instincts enough to know that I had heard something. We kept close as we crept toward the centre of the room, keeping our lights on the ground, searching warily for Sarah’s illusory venom and any dangers that lay ahead. There was no telling how the structure’s integrity had been compromised over the centuries.

“There,” she said, skidding us to a stop. “What’s that?”

A pewter hipflask lay on the floor before us. My old man used to carry one just like it, always bracing his heart with a sup on the colder mornings.

“I guess those men in the photograph came down this far too,” I replied. “You can’t really blame them for celebrating with a—”

There it was again: a faint and near imperceptible stir amidst the silence, and yet one that boomed loud as thunder to my attentive ears.

“What is that?” I whispered, drawing my light toward Sarah, hoping she held some answer.

She shook her head, eyes so white in their sockets that I knew she’d heard it too.

In unison—with both our suspicions drawn to the ceiling—we raised our torches. The whole space above us was a massive honeycomb of cobweb, ancient as it was thick, glistening as far as our lights could reach. My fears called me to search its strands for the spiders responsible, but there were none that I could see. Instead, cocooned in the gluey rolls binding them in place, I saw human bodies suspended in the air, tacked in place like helpless flies, all their terrorised eyes staring at me, their faces frozen in abject horror, screaming without a sound. One in particular stood out to me. It was his wide-open mouth of teeth, and facial hair. The silvered moustache was identical to that photograph taken ninety years earlier, and yet the man was identical in age and mien to the day it had been taken, and he was still alive.

Again I heard that insidious crackle of earlier, only now it was closer—so near that I hastily drew my torch to its source. And there, rising beside me, more horrific than any nightmare the human psyche could conjure, I saw the monstrous spider, its eyes glinting like mirrors in the light, fangs primed and salivating at the sight of me. The fear poured down upon my soul in a deluge of black ice water. I couldn’t breathe. For the life of me, I couldn’t move. The shotgun became a weight in my hand, and I hadn’t the mental awareness to use it.

Sarah’s scream ripped me back—it was so raw; the purest, most primal expression of terror I’d ever heard—and I turned and ran, retreating back toward the stairs, dragging her by the sleeve. She was with me, I made sure of that, and I took those crumbling steps in desperate bounds, roaring at my legs to move at a speed that was beyond them. But my fingers no longer felt the fabric of Sarah’s coat. Somewhere, amidst the maddening horror of that moment, perilously poised between life and death, I’d lost her.

Collapsing on the stairs, breathless, with streaks of sweat blinding my vision, I cast my light back to where we’d run from, and for the first time in my life I wept. The tears just poured from me. The spider’s long and nimble legs were rolling Sarah up in silk, and she could do no more than submit in soul-crushing horror to what was happening. I knew she could see me, for our eyes met. The woman was still alive, and with that venom coursing through her body—paralysing her in a state of immortality—she always would be. Eternal life in that darkest of places, waiting helplessly for the spider’s appetite to return.

Like a coward, I fled. What more could I do? I yearned to be anywhere but the nest of that vile thing. On the surface I would seek out help. I vowed to return with an army to purge that pyramid of horror and liberate Sarah from its depths. In the chamber above I skittered across the broken shards of clay until I found the next stairway and—clambering clumsily up its steps—I threw my aching legs toward the ladder.

There was someone up there. I heard voices—a conversation amongst men; hopefully willing to make use of the guns that I could not. There was, or so I thought, some hope worth clinging to. In my excitement, the torch slipped from my grasp and cracked against the wall, eviscerating its batteries and scattering them to the dark. But what need had I for light with the surface in sight? I reached my hand to the highest rung when suddenly—

“Stay where you are!” a voice roared.

I tilted my head high enough to mark the barrel of a gun aiming back at me.

“Please,” I cried, “you have to help me. My friend, she’s still down—”

The gears were grinding once again. The lever had already been activated.

“I’m sorry,” the man said, keeping his shotgun trained on me. “It can’t be allowed to escape.”

With that, the floor sank back into place, burying me alive.

My screams filled the darkness as I collapsed to the floor, still clutching the shotgun, feeling around its steel, wet eyes open and yet seeing nothing. But I didn’t need sight to know that the creature was coming for me. In the silence of that tomb, I listened to the eerie patter of its long legs ascending the last tier of steps. I forced the barrel of the gun up into my skin, refusing to live forever in that lightless hell—condemned to linger in a state of perpetual fear amongst those poor, pitiable men whose greatest discovery had been their ruin.

“No one wants to live forever,” I whispered, settling my thumb atop the trigger.

But I didn’t pull it.

I couldn’t let Sarah suffer that fate alone, untouched by light and time’s cruel decay, clinging repentantly to those precious short-lived memories made before the horror of that night. It was as though I could hear her terrified soul crying out for mine. And, for better or worse, I never could say no to her.

I’m lost as to how much time has passed since the spider coursed its venom through my veins, deadening every part of me save the ability to die. I can only assume it’s been decades, but it may well be much longer than that. In the dark folds of the creature’s web, where I still hear it creeping around us, I often find myself thinking back to those long summer days when I was a child, working on the bog by my father’s side. I’ve forgotten the sensation of the sun on my skin, the feel of my muscles, and the taste of the air. All I remember now is the silence.

RADIO KRAKEN

CHRISTOPHER GOLDEN

The outcasts of Radio Kraken never called it Silver Sands—that was the government’s name for the place, the army’s name, and those bastards thought they held the leash on every soul in Britain. What they hadn’t counted on was that people like Llama Bob, Allie Katz, and Dexter James were never gonna wear a collar, never mind let some prick put a leash on them. That went double for Andrea Robin Smith. Blond and blue-eyed, quick with a smile or a fist, Andrea prided herself on the words Allie had once used to describe her. A nightmare if she’s against you, but willing to jump in against a man three times her size if the need arises.

She didn’t have quite the same level of passion for the music that the rest of them did, but she lived for the fuck-you magic of Radio Kraken.

The army had built a series of forts way out in the Thames estuary, miles from shore. Some of them, Silver Sands included, were far enough out to stand in international waters, which made living in a hot metal box feel like real freedom. Made it feel like rebellion.

They were almost as far from London as they were from Bruges, and after five months out there, Kraken felt like a nation unto itself. Llama Bob liked to say pirate radio was the new revolution, but for him, revolution happened in the heart. He and a friend had quietly taken over the abandoned fort more than three years ago. The forgotten friend had lasted a month, but Llama Bob remained, and gathered others around him who shared his search for freedom and greater purpose.

Andrea had joined Radio Kraken in early May after being seduced at a seedy Notting Hill pub next door to a sex shop. The band on stage was called Tractor. Half the small crowd waved brightly colored dildos in time to the grinding music. Andrea still didn’t know if the dildos had any significance or were just a bit of fun due to the sex shop’s proximity, but she’d never forget that night.

Halfway through the show, a skinny white girl with tangled brown curls had kissed her. Girls weren’t her usual, but the show and some cloud-nine ganja had gotten her in the mood. By the time the guitars screamed out their last solos, she was dancing with Alicia Katz and her man, Dexter James, tall and broad and deliciously Black.

That night had been the one and only time she’d fucked them both. She didn’t realize until a few days later, after Allie had already persuaded her to join Radio Kraken, that she’d fallen in love with Dexter. Allie said she’d known—that she’d seen it the next morning when the three of them had woken up tangled together on the floor of Dexter’s flat. She claimed she knew even before she pitched Andrea on the sea fort, and Llama Bob’s mission, and Radio Kraken. Allie said she thought the two of them were adorable together.

There’d been plenty of talk about free love, about sex and pleasure, that nobody owned anybody else and they shouldn’t be handcuffed by traditional ideas about relationships. Dexter and Allie shagged a few more times after that, out of habit and comfort more than anything else, if Dexter could be believed. But by spring, that was over. Andrea and Dexter were in love.

Llama Bob was too focused on his mission to pay much attention. He’d bring others out to the fort, most of them drawn by curiosity but not made of stern enough stuff for that life, or the mission. He’d meet them while ashore on a supply run, which always included stops in his favorite record shops.

One guy had looked like the Werewolf of London. There’d been a girl with eyes straight out of Bedlam and wild pink hair that looked as if she’d cut it herself with a dull razor. Most of Llama Bob’s recruits, however, were otherwise ordinary kids who had dropped out of university and were searching for purpose. The idea of a pirate radio station, commandeered by rock’n’roll missionaries and living beyond the reach of government, inspired dreams of anarchy. Andrea mostly just enjoyed the sea breeze and the music, making love to Dexter, and generally being the greatest disappointment to her parents that she could imagine.

The Maunsell Sea Forts were spread around. Named after the man who’d come up with the plans for their design, they had some kind of concrete platform under the water, atop which His Majesty’s geniuses had built a variety of forts to protect the British coast from attack. Some were supposedly as big as army bases, but Andrea had never seen any of the others, only Silver Sands Fort, which consisted of seven metal boxes on stilts above the water, out of which the army could have fired all kinds of heavy guns. She knew some of the other sea forts had also become pirate radio stations, mostly because she listened to them when she wasn’t on duty at Radio Kraken.

That afternoon she kicked back with a lemonade and let the sound of the waves crashing against the stilts soothe her into a little nirvana. She’d slipped her headphones down around her neck but she could still hear the music from the speakers, the volume lower than Llama Bob wanted. But this way she could enjoy both the sea and the sounds.

The song crackled out over the transmitter, “Thirteen Women” from The Renegades. Dexter said it was a cover of a cover, but from the growl in the vocals and the hum of the instruments, it sounded like the band meant every word.

I… hear you.

Andrea froze, brow furrowing. The words had come slowly, the voice a low rumble, muffled as if from a great distance. She’d grown up in a house where she could often make out her parents’ first-floor words through third-floor gratings. This reminded her of that.

I know… you.

“Christ,” she whispered, jerking back from the turntables.

The song played on. She cocked her head, trying to figure out the source of the words. Llama Bob had gone out onto the balcony to smoke, leaning over the railing, caught between being happy to have a break and hating to give up control of the airwaves. This hadn’t been his voice, but it hadn’t come from the speakers.

Him.

Just the one word. A drowning rasp, burbling as if underwater. Andrea snatched her headphones from around her neck and stared at them. The song issued tinnily from there, matching the fuller sound from the speakers. Slowly, she slipped them on, letting the music envelop her, pulse in her skull, replace her heartbeat.

He… has called…

She clapped her hands to the headphones and looked around what Llama Bob called the studio. Six windows. Shutters to keep the rain out when it was raining. Nothing but water around and below them. With Dexter and Alicia gone ashore to stock up on food and beer, she and Llama Bob were the only voices within miles, except for The Renegades, and this wasn’t a part of the record.

Radio Kraken had a transmitter. They could call the mainland on a shortwave radio, but this voice hadn’t come over the shortwave—it came through her headphones, which shouldn’t be receiving signals. She didn’t know how it all worked, but she knew that much.

The microphone was in front of her. Anything she said would go out over Radio Kraken. But the voice lingered in her mind. She hadn’t imagined it. She clicked the button on the mic.

“Hello?”

The turntable kept spinning, but static interrupted the music for a moment, followed by another voice.

A girl’s voice, a teenager. “Mum?”

What the hell was going on?

“Who the fuck is this?”

“Mum, it’s Gemma.”

“I’m not your mum, sweetie. Whoever you are.”

A bit testy now. “Just listen. It’s you, yeah? Robbie?”

Andrea flinched. Only her family called her Robbie, and she didn’t talk to any of them if she could help it. Most of her friends didn’t even know her middle name.

“It is you,” the girl said, confident now.

A burst of static filled the studio. Andrea jerked back from the microphone, but of course it was all in her headphones. The cord went taut, tugged halfway off, and she had to slide forward to right them again.

“Who is this? It’s not funny.”

“You’re hearing the other voice already, yeah? If I’ve done this right, today’s the day.”

Spiders danced up her spine. “What voice?”

“The old god.”

Through the headphones, something laughed. It wasn’t the girl.

Andrea whispered now. “What’s happening? What’s wrong with me?”

“Stop that. You’ve got to listen. If I’ve got the day right, I’m in your belly right now. My name is Gemma. Dexter’s my dad.”

Nausea boiled up the back of her throat. Andrea turned and vomited into the bin beside her chair. What the fuck was going on? It had to be a practical joke. Had to be, only…

“How do you know I’m expecting?” Her voice was thin, quavering. “Nobody knows that. I haven’t even told Dexter.”

“Mum, for fuck’s sake, listen!”

Nothing but static. Waiting.

“I’m listening… Gemma.”

“Today’s the day the old god started talking to you, but you’re not the first one. Someone else there has been talking to him already. I think they, like, called for him to come. He lives in the sea, but not this sea. Someplace else, side-by-side with here, like.”

“This is insane.”

“Yeah. It is. But if you don’t get Dad out of there, get him back on dry land, tonight’s the night he’ll die. I’ll never get to meet him. And you’ll never be the same. Please, Mum, for me—”

“Stop calling me—”

The static rose to a screech of feedback so piercing that she tore off her headphones. Heart hammering in her chest, a chill racing through her, she held them in her hand and stared at them, reluctant to put them back on. Hot tears brimmed at the corners of her eyes and began to spill down her face. Andrea couldn’t identify the emotions attached to those tears—fear, panic, confusion. Maybe just not knowing how to react was enough to overwhelm her.

Pulse beginning to subside, she began to raise the headphones again and realized the voice had never stopped talking to her.

Not Gemma. The other voice.

Andrea… We will… come to be… good friends.

She froze. Stared at the headphones, listening to static, waiting for what might be next.

With a clank of boots on the metal balcony, Llama Bob stormed into the studio. “Wake up, ya daft cow! Switch the bloody record!”

Andrea jerked upright. The song by The Renegades had ended, and not just now, either. The needle had skipped a few times and then lifted automatically, leaving the hiss of static from the transmitter and the shush of the sea outside the windows.

Llama Bob’s anger snapped her into action. The two voices echoed in her head as she snatched up the record she’d been planning to play next. Bowie’s haunting best, but she hadn’t even cued it up on the second turntable.

“Fuck me blind,” she muttered as she dropped the needle and the music started to play, gliding out over the airwaves.

“Where’s your head?” Llama Bob shouted.

“Sorry, sorry,” she said, as the opening notes of “Life on Mars” played.

“Honestly, Andy,” Llama Bob said, now more disappointed than angry. He could be that way, more like a dad than a friend, which is one of the reasons she reckoned she was the only girl who’d ever been inside Radio Kraken and hadn’t shagged him.

That, and the whole being-in-love-with-Dexter bit.

She watched him now. He opened and closed his mouth, obviously wanting to do a bit more shouting but uncomfortable with it. Andrea had never heard him shout before. Llama Bob kept things copacetic. Just be cool was practically tattooed on his tongue, he said it so often.

“I’m sorry, Llama,” she said again. “I just… I heard some weird shit through the headphones.”

Little lines furrowed his brow. “Weird how?”

“Voices. Not from the music. Crossed signals, maybe.”

But did she believe that?

No, she did not.

“I’ll ask Alicia to look into it.”

When he said this, he didn’t meet her eyes. Radio Kraken had been Llama Bob’s mission from the start. His idea. His dream. But when it came to the equipment, he’d found that Allie understood things better, could repair them faster.

This wasn’t a crossed signal though. Or if it had been, the signals they were dealing with had nothing to do with transmitting music on the radio.

“You okay?” he asked. “Got your head together?”

“I’m okay.”

He stared a moment, not quite believing her, then gave an irritable shake of his head and headed back out onto the balcony.

Andrea glanced at the headphones, but she was in no hurry to put them back on.

Gemma. “I figured you were a boy.”

You’re being crazy, she thought. It has to be someone having a laugh. Dexter and Allie. Llama Bob might also be in on it, and if that was the case, it was his own damn fault that she’d let the record finish and then hit dead air.

It couldn’t be real.

She called you Robbie.

It couldn’t.

Gemma knew about the baby.

Andrea hung her head. Chuckled in disbelief.

Focused on Llama Bob, who she saw walk past a window, fresh joint pinched between his fingers. He inhaled deeply and walked on. Sometimes he liked to walk laps around the metal scaffolding they called the balcony. They all did laps from time to time—sometimes Dexter would jog around, get his heart moving.

Thoughts of Dexter made her exhale. She couldn’t tell Llama Bob or Allie about this, but she’d tell Dexter. Needed to get his perspective.

Which meant telling him about the baby.

“It’s okay,” she muttered, head nodding along with Bowie. “He’s the father. You’ve got to tell him eventually.”

If Llama Bob thought she’d lost her mind, he might decide she didn’t belong out there at Kraken with the others, and she needed this little family more than ever now. She thought better of Llama Bob, thought he’d be kind, but she’d made assumptions like that before and had been painfully wrong.

She watched him walk around the balcony. What had Gemma said? One of them had reached out to this old god. It felt ridiculous to even think such a thing, but she’d heard that other voice, hadn’t she?

It wasn’t Dexter behind this. Especially not if Gemma was trying to save his life.

And it couldn’t be Llama Bob. This place was his entire heart and soul. Bob Kohut had celebrated his thirtieth birthday back in June. They’d smoked far too much weed and scattered the seeds from the bottom of the baggie into the ocean as if they were ashes from his cremation. There’d been a joke in there about his funeral—him being so fucking old, though Allie was already twenty-eight—and they’d laughed so hard Andrea had peed a little. The funniest part of it was that she couldn’t even remember what the joke had been about. One thing she did remember was that he’d finally given up the secret of how he’d come by his nickname. Bob loved animals almost as much as he loved music—all kinds of animals, with one exception. During a childhood trip to the zoo, a llama had eaten Bob’s hat and taken a chunk of hair with it. He’d been petrified of them thereafter, teased by family and mates alike until, at seventeen and after a few pints, he’d tried to confront his fear. This llama had gone for an ear, and Bob had punched it in the head, causing a lifetime ban from the place. Not that he’d had any intention of going back.

Three of his best mates had been with him, and he’d been Llama Bob ever since. He embraced it, proud of the knock he’d given that beast. Any other animal, he wouldn’t think of harming. But he was fond of saying if he ever saw another llama, he’d make a jacket for his mum out of it.

They were all mad out there at Radio Kraken, the whole lot of them. She loved them.

Which meant it had to be that she was losing her mind. The voices weren’t coming through her headphones, but through her head. The thought terrified her, and doubly so because of the baby growing in her belly. What would become of the baby if her mother unraveled?

Her. Andrea had been thinking it was a boy, but now her hallucinations had decided she was to have a daughter.

That night of Bob’s birthday… she thought that was the night Dexter got her pregnant. She’d missed her period in July and August, and now the first week in September found her wearing a baggy top. Andrea hadn’t told anyone yet, because she was only nineteen, for fuck’s sake, and babies changed everybloodything. This freedom, this life, away from all the pressures to fit in with the world of boring expectation… what would happen to all of this, to her and Dexter, when their child arrived? It was complicated enough without her going completely mad.

Andrea laughed softly, shook her head in disbelief and despair.

She cued up the next record—a tune from the Edgar Broughton Band. Her skin prickled with a feeling of unreality, as if all of this might be a dream. Like the world didn’t exist, or she didn’t.

“In your head, in your head,” she whispered, and then quickly glanced up to make sure the light on the control board was red. The last thing she needed was to be talking to herself live over the air. There’d been enough of that already.

Static buzzed so loudly it felt like needles in her eardrums. Andrea let out a yelp and went to rip her headphones off again.

“I’m not in your head, Mum. Please. I swear to God. You’ve gotta—”

Andrea fell out of her chair. The headphones hit the floor, partly suspended by the spiral cord attaching them to the control board. She scrambled away, staring at the board.

Trembling, she rose unsteadily and stumbled onto the balcony. Llama Bob spotted her immediately. He stormed toward her, boots clanking on the metal gridwork, but the moment he saw the look on her face he softened.

“Christ. What is it, Andy? You look—”

She gripped the railing and vomited into the sea, then hung there, breathing in the salt air.

Inside the studio, the Bowie record came to an end and Radio Kraken hit dead air again.

“You need me to take over?” Bob asked.

She wanted to refuse. None of them had ever let Radio Kraken go to dead air before. The music was the mission. No license from the government, no permission to occupy Silver Sands Fort, no rules as to what they could say over their transmitter or what music they were allowed to play. It had become their religion. She didn’t want to let him down.

“I’m sorry,” was all she could manage.

Llama Bob rushed into the studio. She heard him huffing in frustration as he set the needle down on the Edgar Broughton Band LP. He popped out onto the balcony again a moment later and stood watching her, sizing her up.

“What’s going on with you, love?”

“Losing my fucking marbles is what.”

Llama Bob gave her a sad smile. “Just breathe. I’ve got this. When you feel like you can talk about it, I’ll be here. We’re stranded at sea, after all.”

Andrea managed a weak smile. After a moment, Llama Bob drifted back into the studio. When the next song came on, it was “I’m the Urban Spaceman” by the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band. She laughed to herself, looking out at the water. Every time she heard or even saw the name of the band, it made her smile. Llama Bob knew that, and had put it on to try to cheer her up.

When she caught her breath and could get her legs steady beneath her, she rose and went back into the studio, but only long enough to grab a bottle of whisky and a tumbler. She’d overheard a woman at her doctor’s office say she’d read an article that claimed drinking during pregnancy could harm the baby, but the nurse had dismissed this. Baby’s got her own liver, hasn’t she? Her own lungs, too, though the ones who want us not to smoke while pregnant would have us thinking otherwise. They just don’t understand the science.

She hoped the nurse was right, because she’d never needed a drink more than today. Back on the balcony, she hung her legs over the edge and poured three fingers of caramel-brown Old Smuggler into the tumbler. The glass felt warm in her hand, as if the whisky had a life of its own. The first sip burned beautifully, slick candy fire.

*   *   *

By the time the sun started vanishing over the horizon, Andrea had lost count of how many fingers of whisky she’d poured into the glass. She sipped slowly, relishing the sweet burn, so it had been easy to lose track. Had she refilled the glass three times? Judging by how fully relaxed she felt, that seemed possible. Her bare feet kicked idly, dangling over the balcony like a bored little girl on a swing. She had her arms on the lower railing, forehead resting on the upper, drunk enough to think what a fucking weird day instead of the utter panic of a couple of hours earlier.

The tumbler slipped from her fingers. The glass glinted in the last rays of sunlight just before it plinked into the water and vanished, taking several delicious ounces of whisky with it. The fish would enjoy a bit of Old Smuggler, she reckoned.

This is where you are, then, she thought. You’re at can’t-even-hold-a-glass drunk.

She gazed down into the water, searching for the glass. Twenty feet below the surface, the gray of the concrete foundation looked almost black as evening approached.

Something moved, down there in the water. Brow furrowing, she slid her head out between the upper and lower railings to get a better look. The thing shifted, undulating and serpentine. She followed its length with her gaze and saw that it thickened until it reached the edge of the concrete foundation that supported Silver Sands Fort. The depth dropped away beyond that, and she had no idea how deep the water went.

Deep enough to hide the thing that moved beneath the waves.

The surface bulged as if it might emerge, but then it subsided, leaving only a strange web of ripples. Andrea squeezed her eyes closed. Drunk, she told herself. You’re just drunk.

But it spoke to her.

I know… you are there…

“Fucking hell.” She jerked her legs back over the edge and scrambled away from the railing. Her head was muzzy with drink, but she’d never hallucinated in her life, and that hadn’t changed.

Hello… you are meant… to be mine…

Andrea would have frozen if not for the inebriated sway of her legs. It felt as if her thoughts had become a needle skipping and scratching on a vinyl record, impossible to continue with the song unless someone stepped in.

The last bit of sunlight streamed across the water.

The distant sound of a motor burrowed into her thoughts. She lifted her head to see a small boat approaching, not far off. A red flag fluttered from its stern—Radio Kraken. Her heart leapt and she wanted to reach across the water and the encroaching night. This was Dexter, coming home. Dexter and Allie both, she was sure. They weren’t due for a couple of hours yet and she felt as if reinforcements had arrived. Dexter would drag her back to reality, he would tell her there was nothing in the water, no voice in her head. Or he would see the thing down there, but together they would not be afraid.

Or he’ll die, she thought.

That was what Gemma said, after all. In the space of hours and a lot of whisky, she’d nearly forgotten. Dexter would die. If it was real.

It can’t be.

The serpentine thing, a tendril or tentacle, moved below her. Water splashed. A barbed tip periscoped above the waves and slithered around the base of one of Radio Kraken’s support posts.

“Not real. Not real. It’s not real.”

Something clanked behind her. She turned to see Llama Bob standing in the open studio doorway, pale as death, his eyes so wide she could see the red traces of broken blood vessels.

“I’m sorry, Andy,” he said. “Sorry I snapped at you.”

Llama Bob stumbled toward her. She glanced at the thing snaking up the base of the tower. It was him after all. He’d summoned it from a darkness beyond human experience, from a time before time. For power? For knowledge? It didn’t matter.

“Bob, what have you done?” she whispered, shaking her head to clear it.

“I heard it,” Llama Bob said. “Just like you said. I heard it talking to me through the headphones.”

Andrea squinted, peering at him. Standing had made the alcohol rush in her bloodstream. That probably wasn’t science but that was how it felt. Bob heard the old god talking to him. Of course he heard it. He’d been the one whispering to it over the radio. Or had he stood out here on the balcony and prayed to it? Sung to it, maybe. Underground Old God Rock’n’Roll. Underwater instead of Underground.

“It’s real,” Llama Bob said.

“Of course it’s real,” Andrea slurred.

Llama Bob’s eyes went wide. He stared at something above and behind her. Andrea turned in time to see the barbed tip of that glistening tendril whip through the air. It punched through Llama Bob’s skull, bursting his head. The tendril caught his body before it could fall, twisting quickly round him.

Andrea hurled herself backward, smashed into the railing, screaming herself hoarse. She felt as if she were drowning in terror. The taste of whisky and stomach acid churned in the back of her throat.

It yanked Bob forward. Andrea thought of the animal that had snatched his hat as a boy. The tendril whipped back and forth, shaking the headless corpse of Llama Bob like a dog with a toy. She tried to hurl herself out of the way, but the thick tendril struck her, splashed her with Bob’s blood, and knocked her over the railing.

As she fell, she heard the motor roar, growing louder. She thought of Dexter and Allie, but just before she hit the water, one name came clear in her mind.

Gemma.

The sea swallowed her, the water cold enough to make her body go rigid. She fought panic, held her breath, tried to sort out which way was up. Follow the bubbles, she thought. Hadn’t she read that somewhere? She wanted to scream for help, scream in grief for Llama Bob, scream in terror. She didn’t want to die.

A tendril wrapped around her legs. She thrashed, kicked, tried to keep swimming, but it wound around her and suddenly it was despair that threatened to drown her. The boat had been coming toward her—Dexter and Alicia—and beneath her terror had been the thought that they would save her.

It dragged her through the water. Numb from the cold, she twisted, tried to pry herself loose as the old god brought her to the edge of the underwater platform. Eyes open, she peered into the murk. Above the water, night had arrived, but she could make out the size of the thing and the oily sheen of its bulbous eyes. If those were eyes. If it had eyes at all.

The tendril tightened around her, turned her, thrust her downward. The pressure on her lungs mounted as it rolled her deeper, toward a darkness so black it seemed a hole had been cut through the sea, a window into a place of nothing, where not even a glimmer of light could survive. Her lungs burned, tightened, and she knew the end approached even as she realized what she saw beneath her was the mouth of this old, dark god.

It brought her toward its maw.

Hesitated. Seemed to tremble. Then flung her away, as if the old god found her scent repulsive. She flailed in the water, searched for bubbles and instead saw a bright light above. A light from the surface, searching the water.

Dexter plunged into the sea just above her, swimming downward, arms outstretched—reaching for her. Andrea’s chest felt as if it would explode. She had to breathe. Her body refused to wait any longer. She inhaled seawater, and began to drown.

Her vision went dark. Her flailing ceased, limbs beginning to drift.

The world blinked out.

*   *   *

She woke, choking. Coughed water onto the deck of the little boat the Radio Kraken team used to make supply runs to the mainland. The wind blew, waves smacked the sides of the boat, and she heard familiar voices shouting. Andrea lay on her side, sucking in air, adrenaline rushing through her so ferociously that she couldn’t focus on a single thought or make out any of the words being shouted.

Until one sentence cut through it all. Alicia’s voice.

“You stupid twat, you weren’t meant to get her pregnant!”

“It wasn’t on purpose, Allie! This is bloody hard enough, isn’t it?” Dexter said.

Ally let loose a despairing laugh. “On purpose or not, doesn’t make a bit of difference. What are we meant to do now she’s not suitable?”

“We try again.”

“Try again? You’ve bollocksed the whole thing up! We recruited her together and we were meant to offer her together!” Allie yelled.

Recruited. Andrea managed to draw a long, clear breath. Her heart kept racing, but she could have gotten to her feet then. Instead, she lay there, as if she were too weak. They’d recruited her together. What did that mean? She thought of that night at the club, the way the three of them had met. She loved Dexter, carried his child in her womb. What the fuck was he saying?

“We can’t offer her now at all,” he barked. “She’s been rejected.”

“Obviously,” Allie replied. “But we’ve got to have a sacrifice.”

Recruited hadn’t gotten her moving. Neither had rejected. But sacrifice set her in motion.

Exhausted, limbs heavy, she scrambled toward the back of the boat and struggled to stand. The spotlight they’d used to search the water remained burning, but it pointed in the other direction, a dome of light bobbing on the surface of the sea. The brightness made the place where Andrea stood seem even darker, and Allie and Dexter were distracted by their argument.

Mostly by the knife in Allie’s hand.

It glinted gold, maybe copper. The blade had a serpentine curve, symbols cut into the metal. An old dagger, something ceremonial, and it made her realize how much planning Dexter and Allie had put into this moment. Her bones were numb with cold, and now it felt as if the rest of her went numb as well. With Llama Bob dead, these two people were the only ones alive she still thought of as her family, but she knew that dagger had been meant for her. Pieces fell into place in her mind—the old god’s emergence had been unplanned, premature. Llama Bob’s death, her fall into the sea, all too soon for the sacrifice they had planned. From their argument, it sounded as if her pregnancy had been the problem, kept her from being sacrificed. Consumed.

“It’s got to be one of us, then,” Allie said.

Dexter started to agree, even as he lunged for the dagger in her hand. Allie stabbed him in the forearm and dodged aside. Andrea saw Dexter’s blood spray and something snapped inside her. She’d woken into this nightmare, but only minutes before she’d have defended him with her life. The shock of seeing his blood spill made her cry out.

Her scream didn’t distract him. Maybe he’d seen her standing in his peripheral vision, or maybe he’d expected her to awaken. Or maybe he didn’t give a fuck about her one way or another. Whatever the reason, Dexter didn’t lose his focus when she screamed.

Allie shifted her attention away from him, toward Andrea.

Dexter used the moment of distraction. He punched Allie hard enough to send her reeling. In two strides he had one hand on Allie’s throat and the other on the hand holding the knife. Dexter twisted the blade from her grip and slammed her against the helm. Allie slipped, twisted the wheel, and the prow of the boat turned to starboard. The spotlight lit the water ahead, where the bulk of the old god had begun to rise from the waves. Its eyes locked on their fight.

Dexter saw it, screamed something in a language Andrea didn’t understand, and raised the serpentine blade. Allie struggled, but he was twice her size.

They had betrayed her, but part of her still loved them both. Andrea lunged at Dexter, wrapped her left arm around his throat and grabbed his wrist with her free hand.

“No! Andrea, please—” Dexter shouted as she struggled to hold onto him.

Allie twisted the dagger from his grip, turned the blade around, and slashed it across his throat. Blood arced across the deck. The waves rocked the boat and Andrea staggered as Dexter’s legs went out from beneath him. She had to release him to keep from falling, and he slumped to the deck with blood pumping from his throat, creating a ripple of little crimson waves.

“No! My God…” Andrea could only stare in horror.

The blade clattered to the deck. Allie stumbled, swaying with the boat, staring at Dexter as he died. She began to speak the same words he had used.

Andrea thought of her daughter, growing in her belly. Her daughter, Gemma, whose adult voice she had heard in the static of Radio Kraken. That impossible voice, begging Andrea to save Dexter, her father.

She had the knife in her hand before she even realized it.

The old god watched as she thrust the blade into Allie’s abdomen, then into her side. Allie’s eyes were wide and pleading for Andrea to undo something irreversible, just as Gemma’s voice had wanted the past undone.

Andrea dropped the knife.

Allie went to her knees. Shook her head. “Why…”

“Why?” Her voice felt raw from coughing. From drowning. “You murdered Dexter. You would’ve murdered me. You… you called up this thing that isn’t meant to be in this world!”

“No…” Allie shook her head. “That’s not… we didn’t…”

“You didn’t? Are you joking? It’s right there!” she screamed, but as she turned to point, she saw only the waves and the looming shapes of Silver Sands Fort a short way off.

The old god had vanished beneath the surface, as if it had never been there at all.

“You don’t understand,” Allie rasped. “It was… an accident. We found a frequency one night, something in the static that shouldn’t have been there. A wavelength that didn’t belong. We woke the thing… we knew it was coming… it talked to us. Me and Dex… we spent months trying to find out how to stop it. Every book, every spooky old bastard we found who’d talk to us… there was only one answer. Now that we’d summoned it, the only way to stop it was—”

Allie’s face twisted with pain. She began to take short, hitching breaths and a new fear lit her eyes.

“Sacrifice,” Andrea finished for her. “You needed a sacrifice, and it was meant to be me.”

Inhale. Exhale. “I won’t apologize. It had to… be done.”

“Llama Bob is dead,” Andrea said.

Allie winced. “He didn’t know anything about it.”

“He did, in the end.”

“You’ve gotta be alert,” Allie said. “Keep watch, in case… it happens… again.”

They were her last words. She didn’t die right away, but her eyes closed and never reopened. Andrea went and knelt by Dexter for a time as the boat drifted. She couldn’t force herself to hate him, and that made her angry. He had lied to her. They had seduced her into bed, drawn her into their lives and into Radio Kraken, and all along had intended to kill her. Yet even now she thought Dexter had loved her—that without meaning to, he’d fallen in love with her. She put a hand on her belly and knew that when her daughter was born, that was the version of the story she would learn. Gemma would know her father and mother had loved each other, and that tragedy had taken Dexter this night. Tragedy, and something they had to keep to themselves, a horror nobody else would believe.

She mourned the future that she had imagined for herself and for Dexter and their baby. She grieved for her friends, for Llama Bob and his dream, and for the feeling of rebellion all of Radio Kraken’s listeners would have to seek elsewhere from now on. Dexter and Allie had been fools to let Llama Bob keep broadcasting. Somehow the old god, dead or sleeping somewhere beyond human understanding, had heard that broadcast. They’d found its wavelength.

Radio Kraken would never broadcast again. She would see to that. It just wasn’t safe.

By the time Andrea dropped Dexter’s body over the side of the boat, Allie had died. She dumped Allie into the sea as well. If they washed up somewhere, she would do her best to deny she’d been at the sea fort tonight. She rehearsed the lies in her head while she washed blood from the deck.

Before she turned the boat toward the mainland, she picked up the serpentine dagger and cocked her arm back, ready to hurl it into the waves, knowing it would sink to the bottom. Unlike the bodies, it would never be found.

Andrea hesitated. Keep watch. In case it ever happens again.

She scanned the sea for any sign, but saw only waves.

Cold, grieving, numb with shock, she turned the boat toward home.

She kept the knife.

THE BRIDEGROOM OF CUMAE

A. G. SLATTER

The advantage of travelling on a private steam yacht aimed at the Mediterranean, mused Kit, was its speed. The major disadvantage was, of course, being on the sea.

The Esther had sailed out of Southampton fifteen days ago and Kit had spent much of that time hiding in her cabin, hideously unwell, and ignoring the concerned tap-tap-tapping of Her Ladyship’s various staff. At night she would sneak up on deck and take in the breeze when no one would notice how unwell she looked and tell her about it. The sailors politely ignored her, and she appreciated that. The Honourable Benjamin Holyoake occasionally appeared but not with sufficient regularity to indicate he did it on purpose, and Kit appreciated his gentle conversation about the upcoming wedding they were sailing towards. He thought she was merely a guest invited by Her Ladyship, thus he was unguarded in his tales of the bridegroom-to-be, Peregrine Savage. Kit was grateful: in the fresh evening air, she could concentrate and subtly interrogate; besides, there were no other guests from whom to seek background information.

She pondered the irksome letter, knowing no insult had been intended, that careless phrasing was de rigueur when it came to Holmes if he thought you clever. He simply assumed you’d know what he meant.

I suspect it’s rather more your bailiwick than mine.

Which she took to mean that he simply didn’t want to deal with another case that might involve things that went “bump” in the night. A bit unfair, she thought, since there’d been nothing to indicate that it did on this occasion. Holmes had claimed to have something else to attend to up in Scotland and no, she wasn’t allowed to borrow Watson, how very dare she. The impertinence! The detective was, she suspected, struggling once again with his demons, and the sojourn in the Highlands was more rest cure than investigation. And to be fair, it was Kit’s bailiwick: in the past two years she’d encountered a rather polite vampire in Piccadilly, a less polite serial killer hunting witches in Whitechapel, and the machinations of child-eating Black Annis in the Dane Hills. Those were just the highlights. But as he’d asked almost politely if she’d take care of this, she’d said yes.

Now, as she leaned against the rail, enjoying the night-cooled air, Kit reflected on the advantages of having done so. A private cabin, on the small side but quite lovely, and her first time on such a vessel; her first trip to Naples (indeed, to the Continent); a generous fee and per diem; and several new dresses at Lady Savage’s expense because she didn’t trust the young woman to have the right wardrobe (rude). The promise of a bonus should Kit unearth anything untoward about the mysterious bride-to-be, especially that might stop or at least delay the wedding.

Not that Kit needed the money, but she’d been poor in the past and knew it was always nice to have a buffer against any recurrence. And not that she had any intention of stopping a wedding for someone else’s convenience, but if this fiancée was taking advantage of a wide-eyed young man, she’d honestly report her findings. Personally, Kit wished the young woman good luck of Peregrine Savage; the tales from his mother and best friend painted a picture of a feckless if harmless lad who might do well with a strong-willed spouse.

So: Naples. A wedding. Some snooping. Then home again.

Pity about the seasickness.

“Did you eat anything this evening, Miss Caswell?”

She’d not heard him approach.

“I did, Mr Holyoake,” Kit lied. Intellectually, she quite liked the idea of being on the sea, but her stomach did not share this belief.

The Honourable Benji Holyoake grinned; best-man-in-waiting, closest friend of Peregrine Savage, he was careful to stand downwind so the smoke of his cigarillo didn’t bother her. “What a terrible liar you are.”

“How impolite to point it out,” she said mildly, and smiled. Holyoake was a pleasant young man, had followed his father into banking although, as he’d confided, he didn’t really have a head for numbers. Relied on the chaps who could count, signed the papers they gave him. Privately, Kit thought it a terribly quick way to become impoverished. He’d shared tales of his boyish hijinks with Peregrine, their years at school and university together; spoke of the other as if he were a brother. The Hon, as Kit had come to think of him, seemed a simple creature—not in the way of being simple-minded, but in the sense that he wanted an easy life with as little trouble as possible. No great ambitions or drives, just seeking contentment.

“You’re right, Miss Caswell, I do apologise. Perhaps, when we are returned to London you will allow me that chance to make it up to you over dinner? A trip to the theatre, perhaps?” The offer, Kit thought, was genuine—but lacking true desire. He’d be contented with a nice wife to run his household and produce some children. She’d be bored within a week.

“Return to London? Only if this old tub doesn’t sink,” she said morosely, hoping he’d take the distraction.

“This old tub is the finest of its kind, terribly new and all the rage amongst the monied,” he chided.

“It’s a fancy bucket bobbing around far from shore.”

“It is,” he conceded and Kit noted gratefully that he didn’t return to his invitation. “Perhaps you might take the train home. Slow but picturesque. And the good news is that we dock tomorrow morning. Terra firma and all that. Her Ladyship, by the way, would like to speak with you.” The Hon tossed the stub of his cigarillo overboard, a briefly flaring red ember against the dark sea, and immediately set another to his lips and lit it. A sure sign he wasn’t going below deck any time soon.

“Thank you, Mr Holyoake. Do sleep well.”

“And you, Miss Caswell.”

*   *   *

The door to Her Ladyship’s stateroom was whipped open before Kit even knocked. Rook, Lady Savage’s butler, was short and stocky, his iron hair thick and lush. He had the bearing of an old soldier and a disapproving tone as he said, “Miss Caswell. Her Ladyship’s been waiting.”

“I came as quickly as I could, Rook.” He stepped back to let Kit enter.

The stateroom was luxurious, expensive rugs, exquisite furnishings, paintings and sculptures in evidence—as if the very finest Mayfair parlour had been set on water. A symphony in deepest blue and silver.

Her Ladyship was finishing late supper at a smallish-roundish table: cheese, grapes, sweetmeats. A bottle of whiskey and a glass were also present. Lady Aubrée Savage—late fifties, good skin, also smallish-roundish, green eyes, silver-streaked dark hair, wearing a crimson velvet evening gown despite the lack of an official function to attend and a pair of enormous pearl earrings—gave Kit a knowing glance. “Rook, some of that ginger cordial.”

Vaguely offended—surely she didn’t look that awful—Kit slid onto a seat across from Her Ladyship, and folded her hands neatly on the tabletop. The requisite beverage appeared in front of her. Rook disappeared deeper into the stateroom, out of sight, but Kit could hear a murmured conversation, presumably with Opal, the lady’s maid; it was the smallest entourage Kit had ever seen around the rich.

“I find it helps,” Lady Aubrée leaned closer, “if you belch.”

“Noted.” Kit sipped, did her best not to pull a face or belch, but failed miserably on both counts.

“Brava,” said Her Ladyship. “Now, Miss Caswell, may I speak frankly?”

They’d barely spoken the entire trip, apart from good-natured greetings; Kit had been patient, armed with what she’d learned from Holmes’s letter. She’d an inkling that Her Ladyship had been building up to this conversation. Besides, Kit had spent a lot of time vomiting, an activity which didn’t lend itself to agreeable discourse. “I’d be insulted if you didn’t.”

“Excellent. We are both, I sense, women whose frankness frequently gets them into trouble.” Kit nodded and Her Ladyship continued: “My son, fond though I am of him, is an idiot. Takes after his dear departed father.”

Unsure of the correct response, Kit simply nodded again.

“A sweet idiot, but an idiot nonetheless. Aimless, lazy—or rather given to obsessive hobbies for brief periods. He’s a dilettante, let’s be blunt. I sent him off on his grand tour in the hope he might find an enduring passion for something. Anything, as long as it stuck. I’m not fussy at this point, but nor am I fool enough to let him go alone.”

“His companion was a Mr Bishop, I understand.”

“A trusted family retainer. Bishop reported in regularly for months, kept my boy out of trouble, or at least mitigated it.” She rolled her eyes. “As I said, I’d hoped for a passion—I was not expecting a wedding invitation.”

“You fear this falls into the ‘trouble’ category?”

Her Ladyship nodded, the baroque pearl earrings bobbing as if for emphasis. “Bishop’s letters ceased three months after they’d reached Naples. By that time, my boy had asked for and been given—yes, I’m too indulgent—permission and funds to purchase a palazzo just outside the city. Near an ancient settlement. Cumae.”

“As in the Sibyl of Cumae, who offered the nine books of prophecy to the last Tarquin king and burned three when he refused her price? Then offered him six for the same cost, and burned another three? Until he paid the original price for the trio remaining?”

“You know your Classics, well done. Mr Holmes said you were clever.” An approving glance. “Mind you, he also said that he feared a combination of studying the Classics and an over-indulgent parent was the ruination of a young man.”

“That does sound like Holmes.”

“Quite. Yet I don’t think my Peregrine was entirely wrong-headed in his idea. The area has a mystique about it that tourists love, and with the archaeological excavations occurring, folk will pay good money to stickybeak, either participating dabbler-style, or simply watching at a distance from the hotel balcony. To be honest, it’s the smartest suggestion he’s ever made, and seemed just the thing, the passion. Bishop agreed.” She waved her hand. “So, funds wired, real estate purchased, work begun, staff hired, and what-have-you.”

“And then…”

“And then Bishop’s letters ceased and, not long after, Peregrine’s new righthand man, a Mr Bartolomeo Bartolini, sent a wedding invitation.”

“You’ve heard nothing from Bishop since?”

“Not a word.”

“You’ve not voiced your concerns? Forbidden the marriage?”

Her Ladyship snorted. “Young lady, clearly you have no children.”

“Thankfully not. But a younger brother, yes, and I take your point. As soon as something’s forbidden, it becomes irresistible.”

“Correct.”

“You think the fiancée might be a fortune-hunter?”

“Possibly. Likely.” She shrugs. “Believe it or not, I can’t blame the girl. It’s difficult enough to make your way in the world as a woman, and if an idiot presents himself so willing as I know my son would have, well, why not accept?”

“That’s a very understanding approach,” Kit observed.

“Marriage is economics, Miss Caswell, don’t let anyone say otherwise.” Another shrug. “How do you think I accumulated my riches?”

Kit grinned.

“My father-in-law liked me and knew I was smarter than his son. He was determined his wealth would not be lost through my darling fool’s efforts. He put great faith in me, and I believe I never let him down. Keeping the Savage assets intact was more important to him than worrying about my gender, and my husband was smart enough to know that this arrangement benefited him.” She smiled fondly. “I do miss that cheerful oaf.”

“So, what precisely do you want from me, Lady Aubrée?”

“Find out about the girl. I hired a local private detective, who took his advance payment and disappeared. So, find out about the girl and her family, talk to Bishop—as I certainly shall—and perhaps find that scoundrel of a detective and shake my coin out of him.”

“And if the girl is no threat?”

“And no idiot—two spendthrifts will dispose of a fortune at twice the speed, at least—then we shall attend a wedding.”

“And if she is a fortune-hunter?”

“Well, if she’s the wrong sort, I’m absolutely certain she can be paid off.” Another shrug. “If she’s the right sort, then I’ll have a daughter-in-law in whom I can entrust the future of the Savage line.”

“I’ll do my best.”

“I know you will, Miss Caswell. Now, off to bed and sleep well. We dock very early, and you’ll need your wits about you.”

*   *   *

There was no time to explore Naples, not even a little.

Kit had watched from the Esther’s foredeck as the ancient city came into view; the grey pre-dawn light was unable to dim the vibrant colours of the buildings clustered around the harbour. Her curiosity piqued, she longed to wander the narrow streets and explore—and at last enjoy the feeling of solid ground.

But the moment the party disembarked, two luxurious black barouches drew up, pulled by bay horses with shining coats and liveried drivers at their reins. From the first vehicle stepped another man—distinctly un-liveried—who made a beeline for Lady Savage. “Your Ladyship, my name is Bartolomeo Bartolini, I am your son’s maître d’affaires and am to bring you to the Palazzo Delle Sibille.”

Lady Savage’s expression clearly said she’d expected her son to do so; however, the man was very handsome. After a moment, she offered her hand and Signore Bartolini bent low, lips touching the back of the glove and its pearl buttons. Very handsome, square-jawed, arrestingly pale blue eyes, blacker than black hair and a neat goatee; somehow rugged too, as if the perfect grooming was a suit he slipped into, although in no way counterfeit.

“How charming,” Her Ladyship purred, and Kit hid a smile. How much of an adorable idiot might Bartolomeo Bartolini be, she wondered. “May I present Miss Kit Caswell, and the Honourable Benjamin Holyoake.”

Despite the word “may” it wasn’t a question, her tone announced that she would do whatever she wished; Kit made a mental note to study the technique. The Hon gave Bartolini a friendly greeting and they shook hands, that latter seeming to hold the clasp a little long. Bartolini then took Kit’s hand and smiled as if they were old friends. Next, he refocused his attention on Her Ladyship. “I apologise for the ungodly hour,” he waved at the sun only now creeping across the bay, “but there is much to do before the wedding and the opening. The drive is delightful and a wonderful breakfast awaits you.”

They were piled into the conveyances—the majority of luggage would come along later, supervised by Rook—and Kit noted that Signore Bartolini orchestrated that Her Ladyship, her personal maid and Benjamin Holyoake were in the lead barouche, while she and the maître d’affaires were in the second. Clattering through narrow cobbled streets, past shouting vendors, bustling sailors and dockworkers, restless tourists, housewives out for bargains, and scampering children with no respect for their own safety who seemed to squeak out of harm’s way at the last possible second, Kit’s attention darted everywhere at once. Through the scents of fish and perfumes and sweat, of sea air and pungent cigarillo smoke. Bartolini chatted amiably about the hotel, the excavation site, how some of its archaeologists (a mix of English, French and Italian) were already staying at the Palazzo Delle Sibille, and how perhaps Miss Caswell might even like to visit Pompeii after the wedding. Oh, and obviously the necropolis and shrine at Cumae as well, even though they were in the very early stages of excavation.

Just as they were passing through an especially dark and narrow alleyway, the sort where morning sun took its time to infiltrate, Kit looked up to take in the buildings on either side. The one to her right was well past its prime, but bore a series of carved gargoyles, a pair on each tiny balcony, perhaps a sign of better times and tenants. A movement above caught her attention: something was falling very rapidly towards them, growing larger and larger.

Fortunately, the Fates were feeling generous—or whoever pushed the thing had misjudged the speed of the barouche—because the object landed moments after they’d passed by. But Kit, now half-standing, half-turning to stare, recognised it as a gargoyle just before impact and its features were lost to the cobbles—far above, the other of the pair perched lonely as a filmy curtain waved from an open doorway behind it.

The passengers of the first carriage didn’t even look back. Kit, feeling blood drain from her face, simply said “Close call” and sat. Across from her, Bartolini looked rather grim, lips compressed, their colour lost. Kit kept her tone even as she asked, “Mr Bartolini, are you quite well?”

“Miss Caswell, nothing is quite well. However, I do believe we have a mutual friend in Mr Holmes.”

*   *   *

The bride-to-be was beyond beautiful. Or almost so.

Petite, blonde, milk-white skin except for her rosy cheeks, bright sapphire eyes, and wearing a red silk gown the cost of which Kit certainly put at far greater than anything she owned, even the green evening gown that had been part of Her Ladyship’s gift of “social camouflage”. She caught and held the eye: her betrothed barely took his gaze off her and, unfortunately, this was also the case with the Honourable Benjamin Holyoake, the four gentleman archaeologists staying at the palazzo, and the waiters serving their meals who hovered as they set plates in front of her and later took them away, the meals uneaten (although Kit noted that the woman played with her food as if to give an impression of picking). Only Signore Bartolini seemed immune; he gave the no more than a nod upon her entrance into the dining room.

Cassia Helvia. Peregrine Savage said her name as if it was a prayer when he introduced her. She arrived late, well after sunset, but so charmingly apologetic about it. One of the archaeologists observed that her first name meant “cinnamon”, and The Hon, not to be outdone, translated her surname as “blonde”. Kit didn’t bother to add that “Cassia” also meant “empty” or “vain”; she was sure no one would have paid attention anyway with all eyes—almost—fixed on the gleaming woman seated across from a besotted Peregrine. Lady Savage, at the head of the table, watched everything with a congenially unreadable expression, looking from her son to his beloved and back again as if at a tennis match. Kit caught the Lady’s fond but despairing glances at her son, the calculating ones she gave the young woman each time she answered one of Her Ladyship’s questions. Kit took in the players at the table, her mind working furiously.

She thought about Signore Bartolini’s disclosures as they’d journeyed across the green and glorious countryside this morning: educated at Oxford, he’d met Holmes there (who, he’d confided, helped him out of a potentially embarrassing situation involving another undergraduate, a lack of trousers and details too unsavoury for a young lady’s ears); that there had been no sign of Bishop for weeks and weeks; and that Bartolini’s own brother-in-law, Achille, had been the initial detective hired by Lady Savage to look into the bride and her origins. A devoted husband to Bartolini’s sister Angelica, clever, honest and honourable. He’d disappeared after a fortnight of asking questions, and his wife found no trace of the paperwork Achille had amassed to present to Her Ladyship. Bartolini had been living in Rome but came home at his sister’s call. Wanting to find his brother-in-law, but not wishing to share his fate, he’d sought employment at the palazzo, with Peregrine, whose guardian, Bishop, also soon vanished. Bartolini had thoughts and theories but as yet no proof—he’d kept an eye on Peregrine, noted the beloved Cassia’s comings and goings, and also the occasional disappearances of gardeners. Not enough to really grab the attention, for people came and went in such jobs, in such places.

“Oh,” Kit had said at first sight of the hotel. “A new palazzo. Not an old one. They’ve been building.”

“Not exactly new—the previous owner began it some years ago, but his fortune was lost and work came to a halt. Young Master Savage has finally brought the project to completion.”

“They’ve been digging, I expect,” Kit continued as if Bartolini hadn’t spoken, though she took in every word. “At the site, I mean, the excavation. Disturbing old things.”

During the meal, Cassia Helvia addressed not one remark to either Kit or Bartolini, whose interest did not lie in women, and it appeared he had that in common with the bride-to-be. Kit could have sworn the only time Cassia addressed her future mother-in-law was to answer questions posed. Her replies added nothing to anyone’s store of knowledge: she was an orphan, an old family, much wealth (she stroked a ruby and diamond necklace as she said this, the matching bracelet, the dangling earrings), and lived nearby. She was all alone in the world except for her beautiful Peregrine—and his dear mother, of course. The young woman did not ask anything in return, nor did she start a conversation.

Still, Kit couldn’t find it in herself to condemn the other entirely—some women had found the only way to keep the world at bay was to drape themselves over a man, moulding to his shape. And while she didn’t particularly enjoy being thus ignored, it made covert observation of others considerably easier. The archaeologists, their attentions to the bride-to-be unrequited, began to discuss the dig and its discoveries—jewellery, potsherds, weapons, statuettes, painted urns, armour, the space they were privately calling “the cave of the sibyl”—and difficulties—a fever that seemed to sweep through the workers every so often, and then those whom they assumed had simply walked off the job, the labour too hard.

At some point, Peregrine’s and Holyoake’s voices rose a little, took on that edge men use when pretending to joke yet are really preparing to lock horns; Her Ladyship calmed them somewhat and the tension dissipated. It seemed that the meal had passed without incident until the time for everyone to rise, the gentlemen for cigars and brandy and the ladies retiring to their rooms after the day’s exertions—and to be fair, Kit had spent hours wandering the palazzo, learning its layout, examining its nooks and crannies.

Looking away momentarily, she didn’t see the scuffle begin, though she heard the cursing and by the time Kit looked, Bartolini was holding The Hon back and Peregrine was nursing a bleeding mouth, his white dress shirt collar disarrayed, exposing a dark bruise at the base of his throat. Cassia, by his side, rearranging the errant collar, dabbing her napkin at his lip, cooing “Amore mio, tesoro mio,” gaze avid, red lips pouting, long fingers and narrow hands seeming to be in ten places at once. Her Ladyship hadn’t moved; there was something distressing about such immobility, as if she sensed her son was no longer hers, even though he’d been entirely fond and solicitous all evening. That he was now another woman’s idiot.

When finally everyone else had dispersed, Kit spoke quietly to Bartolini. She’d made a list of certain items, enquiring as to how difficult their acquisition might be. The man scanned the slip of paper with narrowed eyes for a moment before nodding sharply. He bid her sleep well.

In the morning, Kit woke to screams.

*   *   *

Benjamin Holyoake had at some point in the night fallen from the balcony of his first-floor bedroom and now lay, head at an odd angle, in a dried pool of blood on the paving stones that wound through the manicured gardens of the palazzo’s internal courtyard. The screaming had come from a chambermaid. Kit, still in her nightgown and robe, no slippers, was first to the body and knelt beside it while the maid hid behind a pillar, sobbing. Kit felt like joining in; Benji had been kind and gentle and funny, easy company, perhaps someone with whom to build a proper friendship. Now, he was cold and still.

Holyoake was in his evening attire, or most of it: the jacket, waistcoat and one shoe were gone; his white dress shirt was open and although his throat and chest were unmarked, Kit carefully searched along his hairline. At the back of his head, just below where neck became skull, she found a dark purple bruise.

Running footsteps brought Bartolomeo Bartolini, fully dressed despite the early hour and carrying a leather satchel, to her side. His expression became one of dismay as Kit wordlessly directed his attention to the red-blue mark. He nodded but said nothing as the sounds of more hotel guests approaching grew louder.

A dishevelled-looking, pyjama-clad Peregrine Savage appeared, his auburn hair at all angles, damp as a new-hatched baby bird. He stared for a moment, then said vaguely, “Oh, poor old Benji. Good god, but I’m thirsty.”

Kit focused on the young man. Sickly skin, eyes red-rimmed as if he’d not slept, and lips a pink so pale it was almost white. He was swaying as Her Ladyship and Rook joined them, with two of the archaeologists bringing up the rear.

Lady Aubrée’s hand closed over her son’s upper arm, fingers tightening; her gaze grabbed at Kit. “Peregrine. You don’t know what you’re saying. You’re distraught. Poor Benji. Poor lad.” She sounded genuinely mournful.

“I think,” Kit said quietly, “he must have become disoriented, most likely from days at sea, and the drinks after dinner. Perhaps he lost his way and then his balance…” It sounded plausible, though she didn’t believe a word, but it seemed smarter and safer than announcing a murder to all and sundry.

Her Ladyship’s glance was disbelieving but no contradiction was forthcoming. “I should get Peregrine to his room. He’s not well. Miss Caswell, can I leave this to…”

“Of course.”

The onlookers dispersed, while Kit closed Holyoake’s lids and Bartolini gently questioned the still-sobbing maid, extracting precisely nothing of use from her. She’d been delivering fresh towels and had stumbled across the corpse. Soon enough he sent her on her way. The maître d’affaires said, “Did Peregrine’s reaction strike you as odd?”

“Close as brothers they were, by all accounts, from Benji himself and Her Ladyship.” Kit nodded. “But you’d never know it.”

“And Peregrine intimated that same fraternity to me. What would you suggest?”

Kit paused, cleared her throat and blinked away the tears heating her eyes. “Do you have an incinerator? A large one?” Bartolini nodded. “Then, if you’re not mortally offended by the idea, I’d suggest you load poor old Benji into it. Ashes to be gathered in an urn for his family. The story of a drunken fallen will be easiest to digest.”

“You think that’s necessary?”

“I hope it’s not but would rather do it now than deal with other… consequences later.”

“He might have simply fallen…”

“Do you think so?”

Sharply, Bartolini shook his head. “You have a plan, I think?”

“It could be mistaken for one,” Kit replied. “I don’t suppose you were able to fill my shopping list?”

Signore Bartolini lifted the tan leather satchel, shaking it gently; things jangled inside. “I deemed it important enough to send a trusted employee to the city last night. Some places will open their doors anytime, given sufficient coin. So, Miss Caswell, what next?”

“I’d like a personal tour by you of the dig site, if you please, specifically the Cave of the Sibyl.”

*   *   *

“Why do people keep coming out here?” Kit asked, not bothering to disguise her whine, and removed the broad-brimmed straw hat to wipe beads of sweat from her forehead. The sun was fierce as they walked across the field towards the wood area that screened the excavations. She was pleased to have opted for a pair of trousers and a linen shirt, rather than a lady’s walking suit and all the required undergarments. Bartolini didn’t seem in the least bit scandalised; he merely complimented her tailor. “When things might not be quite right?”

“Work, Miss Caswell. Better paid and in many ways easier than farming or fishing or joining their family’s market businesses.” He shrugged. “And humanity… it is my observation that people will remain in a terrible situation for a very long time before they can be convinced to move. The need to put bread on the table is the same reason one can find caretakers for haunted houses. They will ignore whispers with great determination.”

“You may well be right, Signore Bartolini.”

It was a relief to reach the stand of trees, though the shade was all too brief, covering mere yards. Kit paused in the shadows as long as she could without appearing reluctant to continue on. Before them lay uneven earth, ruins of temples and walls, of a city ravaged by time, erupting from the earth, broken arches lying on their sides like wounded animals. A few more copses were scattered across the landscape but it was mostly swathes of dirt and grass burnt by the sun and the constant trample of shoes back and forth with barrows of debris to be sieved and searched for treasure and artifacts. Not today, though. It was Sunday, the day of rest, and the site was quite deserted; she’d heard the archaeologists saying earlier that they’d be going into Naples this morning and spending the night there. Which was probably for the best, Kit thought. “Where is it? The cave?”

Bartolini pointed. “There, not too far. You can see the top of the doorway, yes? A sort of squared-off archway? Trapezoid, they call it. There are others leading to a central chamber, some are blocked by rubble.”

“And the central chamber is where the sibyl used to prophesy?”

“Here, she would sing and write her predictions on oak leaves, let the wind decide their order. In other places, the sibyls would breathe fumes and call their visions out to scribes. Some used water or other reflective surface to see what would come.” He gave a sad smile. “And of course, there’s the tale of the sibyl who asked for eternal life but forgot to also ask for eternal youth, and she shrank and shrank with age until they put her in a bottle where she begged for death.”

“How cheerful.” Kit pushed herself away from the tree trunk and continued on.

*   *   *

The angled stone walls were cool beneath Kit’s palm. The effect of walking along a passageway the design of which meant one stepped through alternating light then shadow was disorienting. She considered how impressively theatrical it must have been for supplicants approaching the sibyl this way. Light and dark, life and death, seen and unseen—all those contradictions at once clear to the eye. Bartolini had lit their miner’s lanterns before they’d taken the sloped path down, but the effect wasn’t lost.

“The city above, the sibyl below in her own underworld, communing with the gods,” mused Bartolini when they reached the central chamber; he picked through a pile of equipment discarded for the moment, sieves, filters, trowels and the like. “The archaeologists told me there’s even a trace of an underground Roman road that runs through the mountain all the way to the shores of the lake.”

“So, a rabbit warren is what you’re saying.” Kit paced her way around what was a rather plain chamber, poking into shadowy recesses to ensure they weren’t doorways, or if they were that they were properly blocked up. But there was light, natural light coming in at various angles from all those doorways. At last, she stopped, chewed at her bottom lip.

“What are you thinking, Miss Caswell?” He grinned. “We have plenty of daylight hours remaining.”

“And in here, plenty of sun, though it is a cave.” She shook her head. “We need to go deeper.”

After some searching, another sloping path was revealed, and they took it. There were, Kit noted, chalk arrow marks and instructions on these walls, as the number of tunnels running hither and yon and down increased, labyrinth-like. Eventually, they came to the end of yet another and noted that the junction to its left had no such markings. She didn’t know how far they’d gone, how far from the daylight, but there was no trace of the sun here, no sign that someone had carved out a lightwell to illuminate the kingdom of darkness. And arrowless, so no sign anyone had explored this particular passageway.

“Got any chalk?” she asked without much hope.

Bartolini produced a knob of pink chalk from a pocket, shrugged. “Creatively acquired from some of the equipment piles above. I thought it might be handy.”

“Remind me to take you on every harebrained adventure. Mark our path, if you please, every six feet. I don’t want to get lost.”

“A desire I most fondly share.”

At the end of that corridor—very long but mercifully straight—they found another chamber, this one round, the walls pocked with burial niches, filled with disarticulated bones bereft of skin and hair. There was also a mound of bodies, in various states of decay—both Kit and Bartolini covered their noses against the stink. But what drew their attention were the four ancient stone biers in the centre of the space, each occupied by a figure in contemporary attire—two clearly labourers from their rough clothing, a young lad in what Kit recognised as the uniform of the hotel’s kitchen staff, and a well-dressed man perhaps in his late thirties. All with discoloured bruises somewhere on their throats.

“O mio dio! Achille!” Bartolini didn’t howl or cry out, but his tone was heartbreaking; his cheeks tear-damp.

“Oh, Signore Bartolini. I’m so sorry.” She should have thought of this as a possible outcome, Kit chided herself. The poor man. When he reached out to touch the corpse, she gently stopped him.

After a few long moments, the maître d’affaires dashed away tears. “At least I know now. At least my sister can know. He deserved better than this.” He pointed to the lad in the hotel uniform. “And Giacomo, poor lad. I thought ill of him when he stopped coming to work. Not by his will.”

Kit patted his shoulder. He took a deep breath and pressed it out in a long sigh, as if ridding himself of all despair. Or suppressing it for the time being. “Are they still… alive?”

“They’re not breathing, but there’s no sign of decay—and Achille disappeared long enough ago that he should have begun to—I’m sorry.” She let out her own nervous breath.

“Then, Miss Caswell, they are what you think? So, what now?”

“Time to do the awful, necessary things.” Kit gestured for the leather satchel, which he handed over, and watched as she took out one of the pale wooden stakes—hawthorn, as requested—and a mallet. Starting with Giacomo, she placed the point against his chest, then without hesitation brought the mallet down to thrust the hawthorn through his flesh. Kit swiftly repeated the process with the other three.

Each made a sort of sough, but no screams; Achille (the longest dead) began to slowly decay, the others even slower. When she’d finished, Kit took out a metal flask and sprinkled its contents onto every one of the cadavers. Without exception, flames sprang up, eating flesh and clothing, hair and bones, the fires swiftly dying as soon as everything became ash.

*   *   *

“That,” observed Bartolini as they emerged at last into the sunlight, “was something of an anticlimax.” Both were smudged with dirt, festooned by cobwebs; both looked exhausted, a little wild-eyed. “Surprisingly easy.”

“Well, you just drew arrows. I murdered four men.”

“Hardly murder when they’re already dead.” He shook his head, sounded sad. “How did you know all these things, Miss Caswell?”

“I seem to have accidentally become an expert on strange things, Signore Bartolini, much against my will, but I’ve found such knowledge critical to my survival—and I’m very fond of survival.” Kit paused, suddenly finding the heat of the sun a welcome thing after the deathly cold of the tomb. “There’s a very old book in the British Library that not a lot of people know about. It’s called Hippolyta’s Study of the Night and it’s a very fulsome and strange guide to a variety of terrible things, vampires in particular.”

“They didn’t wake, even in their second dying. Even when staked, even when they burned.”

“From my reading, some can stay awake a little past sunrise, but mostly the sleep drags them under, a sort of true death until their ruler, Night, returns.”

“No sign of the bride, though.”

“No.”

“Perhaps she’s not…”

“Oh, I think she is. But she doesn’t sleep down there. Not anymore. I think she woke when they started digging. I don’t think she lied when she called herself an orphan; such creatures tend towards the solitary, all the better to have no competition for food.”

“Then why those men there? Sleeping like the dead.”

“Actual dead, as you’ve said.” Kit shook her head, pointed herself in the direction of the palazzo and set off, Bartolini falling in step with her. “I don’t know if she made them on purpose—if she wanted an entourage—or if they just… happened. Careless creation; the book says either is possible. Besides, the enthralled living make better protectors, able to move about in the day.”

“Do you think she’s made a nest at the hotel?”

“No. I spent yesterday doing a very thorough recce of your Palazzo Delle Sybille. Even the cellars are empty.”

“Why did you think it might be this sort of creature?”

“In the barouche, you spoke of the vanishing staff, and of Achille disappearing so thoroughly. Then thinking about the excavation, what might be unearthed and woken.” She shrugged. “I wasn’t certain, it was just the first place my mind went.”

“What a strange place your mind must be.”

“You have no idea.” Kit was heartened by the sight of the palazzo in the distance. “Then the mark on Peregrine’s throat, the one on Holyoake—some leave teeth marks, others a bruise. I believe she’s found a new place to sleep. There are too many people moving around here—well, not today, but the other six out of seven—so chances of being found, of being noticed, are too high. It’s only a matter of time before that passageway was marked for exploration.”

“Will she know? That they’re gone? Her careless creations?”

“Some books say yes, claiming a psychic connection exists. Others, like the Hippolyta’s, say no, especially if they’re made by accident—that lack of intent can negate any link. There’s no definite work, alas.” Kit shrugged.

“And the flask? A mix of those ingredients you requested?”

“The holy water with silver nitrate and a concentrate of allium.”

“Garlic!”

“There’s an awful lot in your kitchens. The recipe is from the Hippolyta’s again; claims it’s most effective for destroying the bodies of the undead so they’ve nothing to return to. The writer called it ‘acqua di lunar caustic’.”

“And what now, Miss Caswell?”

“Back to the hotel. Tidy up, possibly a nap, then reporting to Her Ladyship. A rather more complicated explanation than I’d thought.”

“Will she believe you?”

Kit shrugged. “Honestly, I don’t know. She’s rather clever, and sometimes the cleverer people are, the less they want to believe in strange things. But she won’t want her precious lad being lost to the darkness.” She looked at Bartolini. “You never questioned me, though, not even when I asked for hawthorn stakes and holy water.”

“This is an old country. There are many dark places strange things can hide, and the night has a heartbeat all of its own.”

*   *   *

Kit woke later in the afternoon than she’d wished. In fact, it was less afternoon and more very early evening by the time she pulled on a dress, slipped important things into the pockets and headed towards Her Ladyship’s suite of rooms. It was as good a time as any to report to her employer: to disclose who Bartolini was and what they’d found in the cave. What they’d—she’d—done.

This time, when Rook opened the door, he looked worried rather than irked.

“What’s wrong?” Kit asked quietly.

“The young master is… not himself.” He gestured for Kit to follow.

As they stepped into a palatial sitting room, Kit spotted Lady Aubrée Savage and her sole scion sitting together on a chaise longue. Not a wholesome gathering, however, but rather Her Ladyship trying to cram herself against the back of the seat; more like trying to pass through it, get away from her son who was looming over her, preventing her escape and hissing, “Just a little, Mother, just a taste. Make your lovely boy happy. I’m so thirsty.”

Down Her Ladyship’s throat flowed a rivulet of crimson —not, so far as Kit could tell at this distance, from a bite, but a cut. Made either by the small cheese knife lying on the carpet, or by one of Peregrine’s very long nails that seemed to have grown overnight.

“Peregrine!” Kit and Her Ladyship shouted simultaneously, and it had the desired effect, which was to halt the onslaught. Kit called again, a little more gently, “Peregrine. Cassia will be here soon.”

At the name of his bride, the young man committed a movement unlikely to have been possible were he entirely himself, a rising and a twisting in the same moment to face Kit. When she saw him, she realised there wasn’t much of him left. He’d been scratching at the bruise—wound—on his neck, and his eyes, red-rimmed that morning, were now almost entirely scarlet. An early rising, she thought, but then he wasn’t entirely made.

Wasn’t entirely beyond help, or so she hoped. His mother wouldn’t want him dead.

“Peregrine. You don’t want to hurt your mother.”

“I’d never hurt her!” His tone was filled with conviction and offense.

“Well, she’s bleeding—no, don’t look at her, look at me”—best he didn’t see the blood again, remember what he wanted—“so, she’s been hurt and you were the only one here.” Kit’s hand slid into a pocket, found the cool metal of the flask. “I think you need to go to your room and rest.”

“Cassia. Where’s Cassia?”

“She’ll arrive soon. She’ll come to you. In your room. You should wait for her there.”

He havered, swaying back and forth as if caught between turning to his mother or heading towards the door. In the end, though, the scent of blood won and he spun, shockingly quickly, and leapt. Kit had just enough time to pull the flask out, pop its stopper and fling the contents at him.

He dropped like a stone, screaming, to the expensive rug. Her Ladyship wouldn’t want him dead, no, but temporary maiming was unavoidable. Had he already been fully changed it was likely he’d have killed all three of them by now instead of just howling and rocking and subsiding to whimpers. But when he looked up at Kit, reproachful, his eyes were his own at least, and the hideous length of his nails—and canines—had drawn back.

“Why’d you do that?” he wailed, a wounded boy. His mother rose, but Kit held up a forbidding palm.

“No. Stay away. Rook, get Mr Bartolini, please. Tell him we need as much garlic as he can find, flowers and bulbs. Oh, and any more holy water and silver nitrate he might have at his disposal.”

*   *   *

The night passed uneasily.

Peregrine: locked in the cupboard in his mother’s room, the door between it and the sitting room kept open, so they could all hear his whimpering and complaints about the copious bulbs of garlic and how awful it smelled.

Her Ladyship: on the chaise, neck bandaged by Opal, listening to Kit recount all she’d discovered, ably alibied by Bartolomeo Bartolini. Kit was fairly sure her support act was marvellously helpful in salving Her Ladyship’s aching ego. Now wasn’t the time to disclose the gentleman in question’s preferences for company.

Bartolini and Rook: patrolling the suite, both sporting hawthorn stakes and extras cut from a broken-up pine kitchen table—fit enough for purpose to cause a slowing injury to allow time to throw acqua di lunar caustic at anything requiring it.

With the archaeologists not returning from Naples until the next morning and the hotel staff having magically dispersed—presumably word of the young master’s condition had leaked out, possibly when Bartolini went to the kitchen in search of garlic and wooden stakes—they were free to behave in a manner that might appear quite mad. All the windows and doors to the suite had been garlanded with garlic wreaths and splashed with holy water.

Kit felt they were as safe as they could be. And, as she’d explained to the others, she didn’t believe Cassia Helvia was likely to try to storm the hotel and rescue her beloved. The woman had struck her as an opportunist and not a very clever one. Would you, she’d asked, after waking from a very long hibernation, think to set up the beginnings of your vampiric empire in a most Catholic country, the cuisine of which was based largely around garlic? They had to admit she had a point.

Once or twice during the night Kit had thought, whilst worrying at an idea, that something white flitted past the first-floor windows, the flash of eyes catching the candlelight. Only owls, she reassured herself. The eyes were yellow, not red. She tried to get a little sleep; if she was correct, she was going to need all her energy on the morrow.

Yes, the night passed uneasily but it did pass.

*   *   *

There were far too many steps for Kit’s liking after yesterday’s tramping across fields, but nonetheless there was no choice. Bartolini held the lantern high to illuminate their path even though outside it was daytime; their hurried return from the Palazzo Delle Sibille had begun a little before dawn, leaving Her Ladyship with her son and staff to recover. Now, outside, the raucous sounds of the Bay of Naples were only slightly dulled by the thick walls. When they reached the top floor of the building—the stairwell stank of urine and mould—she tried to catch her breath without breathing in deeply enough to imagine she’d tasted what she could smell. There was a single door, unlike the other floors which had multiples around each landing. Kit pulled the roll of lockpicks from her pocket and knelt for better access to the lock. Her companion stifled a laugh and murmured, “Does your set of skills have no end, Miss Caswell?”

She didn’t bother to reply, kept her attention on the catch, which was large and old and irritatingly stubborn. Her companion managed to refrain from further comment—presumably he sensed it was not worth the cost of either life or limb—and at last the lock gave way. Kit turned the handle and pushed the door inwards. She’d barely risen before she felt a violent movement of air, and took a step back. Whoever rushed at her—she had the impression of a mouldering attire, pasty skin pitted by lesions, and the stink of rotted meat—failed to avoid the booted foot she stuck out while the rest of her leaned away. A body passed them by at speed, crashed into and through the wooden railing on the landing, and plummeted down the stairwell to land in the only patch of early morning sunlight to be found in the foyer below. There was barely a scream, just the merest sigh of ignition as the sun set the revenant on fire. Soon there was nothing but cinders and a few rapidly dying embers down on that filthy mosaic-tiled floor.

Kit and Bartolini exchanged a look.

“I think but could not swear,” he said, “that that bore a resemblance to a daguerreotype of Mr Bishop in Peregrine’s office.”

“Oh. I did wonder that we’d found no trace of him. Poor Bishop. It might explain who pushed the gargoyle that first morning we arrived. I wonder if he was aiming for Her Ladyship rather than me—or rather you? No one knew a thing about me. But he’d known about your brother-in-law, so perhaps he’d figured out who you were?”

Unspoken was Perhaps Achille told him.

Bartolini shrugged. There was no way of being sure, but it seemed the most likely scenario. “We should hurry. If it’s still early enough for Bishop to be moving around. What about…”

“I think the queen bee is abed. I think she turned him first, and he’d been made her watchdog, ensuring she got settled each dawn, then sitting up as long as he could before the sleep overcame him. Doing in death what he’d done in life, really, for Peregrine.” She shook her head. “Still and all, be alert.”

The apartment had seen better days, beautiful art and furniture covered with dust and festooned with cobwebs all jammed into the first large room, including chaises and roll-top desks, tapestries and vases and statuettes, bookcases (mostly empty) and a crystal chandelier. Bartolini held the miner’s lantern higher as Kit put the lockpicks back in one pocket and drew a hawthorn stake from the other, its stripped back length glowing white in the gloom.

They found the coffin in the third room they tried, a small bedchamber sandwiched between other bedrooms so there were no windows, no natural light. Bartolini placed his lantern on a table set against one wall, and laid his hands softly on the lid of the coffin, fingers near the gold latch. “Be ready.”

Kit nodded, and rapidly he flicked the catch loose and heaved the lid open on its hinges.

Cassia lay within, the silk padding a dirty white, brown spotted and worn from years of use. She looked even smaller, but here and now: ill. She was dead, after all, Kit supposed, and all that glamour she put on at night depended on having fed and took a great deal of energy. Some of her golden hair had detached from her skull and fallen onto the pillow. She looked half dead already—she was dead—and Kit set the stake against the creature’s chest. The ribcage was surprisingly friable, easy to get to the heart, and she found she didn’t even need the mallet to break in. A thin scream pierced the stillness, the vampire’s skin tightened until it ripped from the bones. Just to be certain, Kit poured the last of the acqua di lunar caustic on the corpse, and the fire kindled somewhere inside the cadaver and flared. In a matter of moments, the bride was gone and the coffin’s lining smouldered though the flames did not catch.

On their way downstairs, Bartolini asked, “Not your first encounter with vampires?”

“Oh, no,” said Kit.

“So, you’ve killed them before?”

“Oh, no. Not that one. He wasn’t a problem, wasn’t harmful. But after meeting him I made it my business to research as much as I could, just in case. And see? No learning ever goes to waste.”

He was silent for a moment; perhaps he thought she should have killed that very first vampire too. “Will Peregrine be well now?”

She nodded. “I believe so. All the sources say that when the vampire who fed on a person is destroyed, then, if the victim’s still alive, they’ll go back to their usual state. If not, well, we know what to do.”

“And what will you do now, Miss Caswell?”

“Pack my bags. A series of train trips back to England, I think. A friend said it was slow but picturesque. And I can’t say I’ll miss the yacht.” She smiled wearily as they descended. “What about you? Returning to Rome?”

He shook his head. “Her Ladyship has asked me to stay—a very generous salary and conditions—and manage the hotel. She will take her son back to England in due time. And my sister would like me to remain, for a while at least.”

Outside, waited the barouche, to take them back to the Palazzo Delle Sibille. Bartolini helped Kit up, then followed to sit beside her.

“Another archaeological tour perhaps? Pompei? The rest of Cumae?”

“Good lord, man, I’d rather get back on the yacht!”

COMPOSITE

STEVE TOASE

Small Finds National Online Record Scheme

DECORATED BONE

Record ID: NE-731482

Current status: Awaiting validation

Decorated animal bone circa 7000BC

The proximal end of a metatarsal from a large bovine. The distal end is absent, with the break approximately halfway down the length. The surface is stained, possibly due to submersion in peat, and has been decorated with an engraved dogtooth pattern. The distal metatarsal canal shows signs of enlarging, possibly to enable the bone to be suspended from a cord.

Further notes on discovery: The bone was found on the beach at Cayton Bay in unusual circumstances, which indicate this is not the original location of the find. Following reports from the public, the police investigated the siting of a pile of clothes on the beach. Upon further investigation, they found the artifact on top of the clothing, along with a notebook used as a diary. This book contains a lot of detail about the original location and a series of other finds that seem to have been lost. There is no name on the book.

As it is not possible to return the artifact to the finder, the object and diary will be retained until it can be housed in a suitable archive.

I finish writing up the record, leave the fragment of bone on my desk—though I cannot resist running my hand over the engravings one more time—and take the diary over to the sofa.

The cover is blue plastic, and the first few pages are notes for something else entirely. I think they are knitting instructions. On the ninth page, though, the text changes. On the first line is a date. I take a sip of my tea and start to read.

9th June

The sea was calmer today, raging less against the sky and the land. I can hold my own rage inside and not worry about it getting overwhelmed by the anger of the tides.

My walks are simple and barely worth recording, and up until now I have not. The find changed that.

Scattered with debris, the beach was treacherous this morning. Driftwood washed smooth by the dance of the tides threatened to trip me up, so I paid extra attention to where I put my feet.

I nearly stood on the bone, at first mistaking it for another branch left behind by the retreat of water. I only spotted the carvings be cause of the morning light glistening off the damp surface. Even then, I might not have crouched. I might not have turned it over in my hands. I might not have seen the land below the sea.

The police had been over the diary with a fine-toothed comb, of course, trying to find some kind of sign to help them identify the person who wrote the words. Try to identify the person who left their clothes on the beach. There was no wallet or ID in the sand-filled pockets. I close the book, put it to one side, and return to entering other finds into the database. There will be more time later for reading.

When I finish for the day, I make myself food, take the book and sit in the garden. In the distance, I can hear the sea driving against the cliffs. I turn the page, finding more of the first entry.

I only realise the object is bone when I get home, and even then I have no way of knowing what creature it came from. The carvings are delicate and precise. I run my hand over them, staring for so long they multiply when I close my eyes.

The inside of the bone is rough, like a wound in the world, but the surface with the carvings is smooth. I wonder how they survived the abrasion of the sea.

I walk across to my desk and pick up the artifact. The finder was correct. If the bone had been turned and spun by the sea, erosion would have taken the engravings long ago. I believe the item was preserved in peat somewhere out in Doggerland, raised by the changing currents of the North Sea, or dredged up by a fishing boat, then thrown back overboard to be carried to the beach. I turn it over in my hands. The designs have been cut in with flint, each line made with precision and skill. If I close my eyes, I can almost smell the burnt hair scent as the bone is worn away by the stone blade.

Putting it to one side, I return to the record and add additional information.

Further notes on discovery 2: After examining the diary accompanying the find, the evidence seems to suggest the artifact has its origins in Doggerland. Doggerland is the name given to the vast landscape preserved below the North Sea following the last Ice Age, when the low-lying land between the continent became inundated, to be hidden beneath the water. Following the discovery of significant Mesolithic finds, mainly through dredging and fishing, it became clear that a vast unknown area of Mesolithic activity existed beneath the water. These are typified by finds from Dogger Bank (a highland area that remained visible later than the surrounding landscape), and artifacts from Leman and Ower Banks. While it is possible the decorated bone came from inland, the far more likely explanation is that it washed in on the tides, maybe after being raised in a block of peat caught in fishing nets in the vicinity of Dogger Bank and dumped, unrecognised, back into the water.

*   *   *

Two days pass before I can make time to sit down with the diary once more. The record is created and the artifact has no home. The book, and the diary entries within, are ephemera, mattering to nobody. Maybe the relatives of the finder, if they had any. If they had indeed walked into the sea. I put the radio on quietly in the background so I am not alone, and I turn the page.

June 12th

No matter where I leave the object, the dreams still come. The sound of water eroding and shifting. Shaping a land I do not know. Creating permanence where there was previously nothing. Transforming. The Carver knows it is coming. The lakes are getting larger and new ones are forming all the time. The land is rich and verdant and slowly, day by day, the land is drowning. They know what is coming, and I too know what is coming, and there is no way to stop it.

I am not surprised by the entry. Someone who has spent time on the coast, spent time walking up and down the beaches, almost certainly knows of the drowned land that lies below the sea. The valleys and woodlands that once connected land to land, and now lay below silt and the dead of the sea. I carry on reading.

I wake in the middle of the night, and until I become aware enough to know where I am, I think my clothes are soaked by seawater instead of sweat. I get up and walk to the window, open the latch and listen. In the distance I can hear the sea, as if it never stopped flowing in to drown the land. That sound, and the taste of salt on my lips, are a thread stitching my sleep and the world outside my window to gether. I know I have to go back to the beach. The find fits perfectly in my pocket. Soon the sun will be up and the tide is out.

I think they found the artifact where they left it, a pivot between sea and land around which they rotated their life. I look down and realise I have been running my fingers over the carving as I read. It’s getting late. I put both the book and the artifact to one side. Out of the window I can hear the waves, and wonder if the writer is below it, pressed into the silt and the dead.

The next entry is from the next day, and the date is followed by a single line.

June 13th

When I get to the beach, the tide is in and I go home.

I walk to the window. I cannot see the sea from where I am, but I can hear it, like the whole coast has tinnitus, obscuring any other sounds. I put on my coat and walk down the narrow streets to the harbour, looking along the seafront to where my beach is hidden beneath the sea, and I stare out to the horizon, imagining the valleys and grasslands and lakes choked by the change of the world. It is not cold, but I shudder and run my tongue across the salt on my lips.

Back home, I sit in a chair and fall asleep, both the book and the artifact nearby. In my dreams the sound of running water is constant, though I cannot see it. I hear people moving just out of sight. I know, even if I saw their faces, they wouldn’t be familiar. Someone is struggling, their voice muffled and sobbing. I know I cannot help them. I know that despite what they are about to do, it will not save them.

When I wake up, it is after midnight, and the world is silent. My computer is still on, a ghost in the corner of the room, glittering in the dark. My eyes take a minute to adjust to the clash between light and shadows. I wipe them and see the record for the decorated bone is still on the screen. Portions of the text are missing. Odd letters, like the words themselves are degrading. Eroding away to be lost. I leave it on, glittering in the dark, and go to bed.

In the morning, I do not realise straight away that it’s the weekend.

Making breakfast, I sit down at the kitchen table, taking the diary with me. Though I do not read ahead, I flick through the pages to see when the writing ends, then continue reading.

June 14th

I return to the beach at low tide, looking out across the river valleys and hillsides now hidden, only known by divers and dredgers and the nets of trawlers that work the North Sea. At first, I worried I wouldn’t find the right place, but I knew when I was there. The sands had shifted, yet it felt right. Correct.

Kneeling down, I dug in to the sand and found flints. Hundreds of them. Tiny. Razor sharp. They are geometric in shape. Triangular, trapezoid, and half circles. Smaller than my thumbnail. I took off my coat and piled them in, not worrying about the sand and water snagging in the fabric. When I walked back home, they clattered to gether making a chiming sound, and I worried they might chip, but they were intact, and one by one, I washed them, laying them out on the patio to dry.

When the police handed in the decorated bone, there was no mention of microliths, either in the clothing or in the vicinity. It is not my job to follow this up. People come to us with artifacts and we record them, but the chance these might have been recovered and could be recorded means I cannot let it pass. I make a note to myself to contact the officer in charge on Monday morning. Putting the book to one side, I finish my breakfast and leave the house. The sea is out and I walk the beach, but there are no artifacts for me to take home. Just driftwood and the debris of beach parties that have stopped in the glare of the day and will resume when night-time comes.

I do not look at the diary again for the rest of the weekend, and I do not have any more dreams. On Monday morning, first thing, I email the officer who brought me the artifact and the diary, then I work on repairing the record, rewriting it from my notes.

When I return to it, the text does not look how I remember.

Small Finds National Online Record Scheme

DECORATED BONE

Record ID: NE-731482

current status: aWaiting validation

decorated animal bonE circa 7000BC

the proximAl end of a metataRsal from a large bovinE. the distaL end is absent, with the break approximately halfway dOwn the length. the surface is stained, possibly due to submerSion in peaT, and has been decorated with an engraved dogtootH pattern. the distal mEtatarsal canaL shows signs of enlarging, Possibly to enable the bone to be sUSpended from a cord.

furTher notes on discovery: the bone was found on the beacH at cayton bay in unusual circumstancEs, which indicate this is not the originaL location of the find. following reports from the public, the police investigAted the sitiNg of a pile of clothes on the beach. upon further investigation, they founD the artifact on top of the clothing, along with a notebook used as a Diary. this book contains a lot of detail about the oRiginal lOcation and a series of other finds that seem to have been lost. there is no name on the book.

as it is not possible to return the artifact to the finder, the object and diary Will be retaiNed until it can be housed in a Suitable archive.

I do not remember typing the words wrong, and I go through to correct it, though as I do, I can’t shake the feeling I’m erasing more than typing mistakes.

When I am finished, I watch a storm coming in from the horizon. I watch it for hours before it makes landfall, the lightning cooking the sky from boiling clouds. I’m so caught up in watching the sky, I do not hear the phone ring. When I answer, the police officer is not the same one who brought the finds.

“We have a body,” they say. “We need you to bring the items down to the station.”

With no scanner to hand, I photograph the pages of the diary, and place the bone in an archive box. On the drive down, I watch the storm follow me. The sound of thunder is constant, rolling over itself like cracking ice. I think I hear voices in the noise, and turn on the radio to sever myself from the outside world. I can’t find a station and let the static play.

When I get there, the officer on the desk asks to take the diary and the artifact. I ask to speak to someone, and they tell me to sit down. Half an hour later, a sergeant ushers me through the security doors to an interview room. Despite knowing I am not there for any crime, I can’t help but feel the compression of the place.

“Thank you for coming over. Bringing the diary, and the bone.”

“Was anything else found with the body?” I say. “The diary mentions an assemblage.”

He looks confused. He’s older than me, and looks as out of place as I feel.

“Flints,” I say. “Small ones.” I bring up photos on my phone and show him.

He shakes his head.

“The body was covered in wounds. We thought maybe sea creatures. Not uncommon. Our pathologist didn’t agree. This might help.” He stops talking and leaves the room. I am uncertain if I should follow, but wait instead.

When he comes back he is still alone, but smiling. I am not sure why.

“I spoke to our pathologist. They thank you for the suggestion and think it might be an area to explore. Can I have your number in case they need to speak to you?”

I write it down on a small paper pad. The writing does not look like mine.

Back at home, I bring up the next page of the diary on my computer.

June 15th

I did not sleep well last night. I heard cracking and the stampeding of animals. Vast herds of wild cattle and deer running from something. They trampled the grass and the wildflowers. The orchids. The air was filled with scents I did not recognise, but I knew it meant death was coming. I’ve been awake for hours now. I went for a walk to try and tire myself out. Instead of the tides, I see the buried dead who died on dry land, now drowned beneath the North Sea in a place never meant to be ocean, the weight of water pressing down on their graves. They are all lost. The sea is coming for us too. Relentless. They tried to stop it. Maybe we can succeed. Maybe I can succeed.

Someone has forwarded me the pathology report. Emailed it to my work address. I try to reply but it bounces back. The photos are graphic, and the language dry, but the meaning is clear.

The wounds aren’t to kill or defensive wounds from the person protecting themselves. Instead, each one is a small pocket of skin, cut in and used to hold something in place. All the wounds are on the front, and the only place where they are different is on the fingers, as if the person was holding the blade to do a job and kept catching themselves. I flick forward to the conclusion. In the pathologist’s opinion, the wounds were self-inflicted, and whatever was held in place in those incisions through skin and muscle was washed away by the sea, filled with grit and sand.

*   *   *

I stand on the cliffs at Cayton Bay, the wind driving across the landscape at my back, trying to push me to shatter on the sand below. I cannot see where the clothes and artifact were found, nor the body. There is no police tape or crime scene tent. Just the scouring of the waves compressing and extending over the open sand.

Maybe they stood here, when the final waters came to fill up the landscape they had walked for thousands of years, watching the last flower-filled valleys and tree-crowned hills finally descend below the surface, the animals who couldn’t get to higher ground rocking back and forth on the new sea. How did they feel, knowing all their ancestors were out of reach, the babies and mothers lost to childbirth, and the old lost to time, all hidden hundreds of metres below the waves that sighed to remind them of all those they’d lost? Did they walk the beaches collecting the branches of shattered trees, harvesting bones from bloated aurochs? All to try to hang onto everything they’d lost. All the places they camped and hunted. The glades where they were born and died. Memories drowned back then, too. To stand on this cliff, look out and know it was all still there. Unreachable. Did they hear the voices of the dead in the crash of the waves? Think they were carried on the cry of birds that could just take to the wing? Did they watch the flocks take flight, then return when they could no longer find the forests?

I walk down to the beach. The paths are new, with concrete and metal railings. Maybe they too will one day drown. Paths down to a sea that never leaves.

After the dog walkers have left, I have the place to myself. For a moment I feel confined, the sea to one side and the cliffs to the other. But I know I have ways to escape.

With no idea where to start, I walk below the cliffs until I am at the far end of the beach, and I start back along the line of the tide.

Beneath my feet, the sand compresses, leaving miniscule lakes behind me that disappear as the sand recovers, absorbing the seawater within itself.

When I find it, there is no trace of the body, but I know I am in the right place. Kneeling down, I run my hand over the sand, feeling the grains catch in my skin. First, I find peat, fragments of twigs and sphagnum moss drowned twice, then washed up by the changing currents. I crush them in my hands, finally killing them, and watch the smeared stems stain my hands. Below the ancient leaves and twigs, I find the flints. They are beyond count. I pick them up by the handful, letting them fall from my fingers back onto the sand like glass rain. They have their own music.

Opening my pockets, I drop them in, listening to the sound of them together. Composites. Much greater than the whole. I do not worry about context or site integrity. They are as separated from their place as the people who moved out of the flooded valleys that now lie under the sea.

*   *   *

When I get home, I wash them and line them up on the table. There is no production waste, or signs of use. These were prepared for a purpose never fulfilled. I line them up in columns. Trapezoid shaped ones to the left, triangles in the centre, and lunate blades to the right. They are beautiful and perfect and waiting.

While they dry, glistening in the electric lights, I open my phone and continue to read the diary entries. They are harder to see, low resolution and pixelated, but I persist.

June 16th

I am not dreaming anymore. I smell damp pelts in the room, see the aurochs’ breath steaming up the windows. My floors are covered in crushed flowers, acorns shattered, hazel catkins smeared into the floorboards. The scent is overwhelming.

I see the God of Blades in the shadows. Not directly. Just glimpses. Light reflects off the facets. When it speaks, its voice is stone against stone. Sometimes high and tinkling, others percussive. I feel the words in my ribs and my spine and my jaw, and though I do not understand the language I know what I have to do.

It’s night-time. I don’t know how long I’ve been reading for, or where the day went. The window is open, and I can hear the tide, but where I once heard the beauty of the world in the waves, now I hear the desperation and the loss and the grief, and in the gaps between the crash of water on the beach, that’s where I hear the God of Blades.

They walk on flint, their feet slicing the land, and their mouth is full of stone, tongue cut to ribbons. Blood runs down their chin. As they get closer, I see their torso is covered in microliths. Some are stained with tree sap, others with the blood of the hunted kill. I smell furs and fat and death, and in that moment I know the God of Blades needs a body to manifest in.

I don’t know why the owner of the diary did not succeed. Maybe they did not believe enough. Maybe they gave up halfway through. Maybe the sea was too strong for them. I look into the god’s lacerated eyes and make a promise that I will succeed.

I choose one flint, its colours reminding me of a winter sky over the ocean, and make the first incision. The blade is sharp as grief and I know I will not feel the pain until later. Careful not to inscribe my bone, I make a pocket in the muscle of my forearm and pick up one of the microliths, turning it over. Then, widening the wound with my fingernail, I push the microlith home, blade part embedded and part exposed to the world.

Blood seeps across my fingers, then stills, filling the gap between skin and stone like resin along the hunter’s spear. Again and again, I make the incisions. I see my daughter, the white hound, prowling the edge of camp, pelt so vast there are forgotten landscapes hidden in the folds of her skin. I press on, cut after cut after cut. I see my son, smeared in soil, orchids and moss and saplings growing from him, roots spreading across his encrusted skin. He can barely stand with the weight of the plants he tries to save. I press on, making incision after incision, until my legs and torso bristle like pinecones opening to the dry air. I am the God of Blades. I am death beneath a thousand cuts.

Blood dries on my skin, and while I wait for the day to shift and tide to go out, I pick up the carved bone and slip it into my pocket, turn on my computer, log in to my work account and delete the record. Outside, the sun rises. Barefoot, I walk down to the beach. Beneath my feet the sand is infinite. I know I am not the first to take the shape of the God of Blades. Or the fifth. Or the fiftieth. We are composite. Individual parts of a whole. A weapon to cleave away the change in the world.

Watching the sea retreat, I catch glimpses of the valleys. Hear the herds moving en masse to feed. Smell their pelts over the dried salt of the sea. I strip, piling my clothes on the sand, the decorated bone on top to hold them down, and take my first step into the water. I feel the grass under my feet, the orchids growing. In the trees, I hear the birds, and I feel the dead beneath the ground, beneath the sea, sing to me as I walk home.

*   *   *

Small Finds National Online Record Scheme

DECORATED BONE

Record ID: NE-731581

Current status: Awaiting validation

Decorated animal bone circa 7000BC

The find appears to be the proximal end of a metatarsal from a large bovine, maybe auroch or bison. The distal end is missing, with the break around halfway along the length. The surface is stained, consistent with submersion in an anaerobic environment, and has been decorated with an engraved dogtooth pattern. The distal metatarsal canal shows some evidence of intentional working, consistent with the use of the bone as a pendant.

Further notes on discovery. The artifact was found by the police on Driffield Beach, balanced on top of a pile of clothes. There was no clear indication of the identity of the person who left it there, and no trace of them in the surrounding area. When I saw the artifact, I had a vague recollection of seeing a similar find on the database, but when I looked for it, there was no record. Still, there is a familiarity. I will continue investigating, and hopefully come up with some more answers about this enigmatic object.

BEST FOOT FORWARD

GEMMA AMOR

Betty had been adventurous, once. Before marriage. Before giving birth. Before housework and laundry and putting the bins out every week.

After those things, she had become very timid, and very tired.

She felt no less timid now as she stood before the large wooden sign that read:

SERVICIO NACIONAL DE AREAS
NATURALES PROTEGIDAS

SANTURIO HISTORICO DE MACHUPICCHU

CAMINON INKA-INKA TRAIL

Bienvenido–Wellcome–Bienvenu–Bienvenuto

Then she reminded herself of what waited at home: washing. Shit. Garbage. Sadness.

Monotony.

She resettled her pack so it sat more comfortably.

Suck it up, Betty, she thought. This is the Inca Trail. One of your dreams.

Her route ran between Ollantaytambo and Machu Picchu, a trail covering about fifty kilometres. The tour agency had told her it would take several days to complete the hike, giving Betty two further clear days to explore Machu Picchu itself.

After that, her flight home.

She had some decisions to make before she boarded another plane. Her husband fully expected her to use this trip to ‘get some things out of her system’.

Betty found the prospect of her return to normality deeply upsetting.

She stifled a yawn. She’d been up since five a.m. After a two-hour drive in the dark, she’d found herself in a lodge hostal at Ollantaytambo, a small town at the head of the valley leading to Machu Picchu. She was served a hearty breakfast of bread, fruit, eggs, cheese, and coffee. Once she’d eaten, she bought the last few items needed for the trek. Snickers bars, priced higher than gold. Coca leaves, for chewing, to help with altitude. Walking poles, essential for any descent, and a cheap pac-a-mac, for rain showers.

Supplies secured, Betty then lurked around the hostal and sized up the other members of her trekking party. Several Americans, a handful of Brits, two Germans and an Aussie, several others she couldn’t place yet, making fourteen hikers in total.

Wait. No, fifteen. Betty spotted an overdressed figure leaning on the wall just along from where she herself loitered, loaded up with an enormous backpack. The figure was female, stooped so sharply she almost seemed bent in half, as reticent to mingle as Betty herself. Betty found she couldn’t stop looking at the overburdened woman. Something about her demeanour and posture was a little upsetting, although Betty couldn’t say why, exactly.

A hiss of brakes broke her concentration. Betty re-boarded the tour bus. It struggled down a rough track from the town to the trailhead. By the time they pulled into the coach park, shaken fully awake, she was more than ready to walk. Her legs felt heavy with inactivity and purposelessness.

She pulled her bag out of the van and strapped everything she needed to the outside. She had forgone the use of porters, partly to save money, partly to prove something to herself. What, exactly, she didn’t know. She carried so much already.

She ran through a mental checklist: sleeping bag, liner, a change of clothes, wet weather gear, lots of sweets, the Snickers bars, water bottle, first-aid kit, torch, roll mat. The bag weighed twelve kilograms. Not the heaviest, not like the lurking character who seemed to have an entire house on her back, but substantial.

Betty hauled the bag onto her shoulders and made sure the waist straps sat above her hips, before slathering her face in sun cream, filling her water bottle, and following the disorganised gaggle of tourists down the road across the railway line to check in for her hiking permit. The Inca Trail had a restriction of two thousand hikers per day. She had arrived at the beginning of high season, the tail end of the rainy season, so it was busy. Pushing through the babbling throng of foreigners scrabbling for paperwork, she got her permit and passport stamped and found herself finally on a short bridge crossing the Rio Urubamba, swollen almost to bursting its banks.

Behind her, the nameless, hulking shape of the bent-over woman kept to the back of the party. Perhaps she didn’t want to feel like she was holding anyone up. Betty wasn’t sure how she felt about having someone behind her at all times, because usually, she was the one at the rear of any walk.

Still, Betty thought, maybe, for once, it would be nice not to come last.

*   *   *

The trail wound down the valley towards Machu Picchu along the Incan ceremonial route, cutting across the mountains immediately behind the ancient site, climbing through three separate passes, the highest of which lay at 4,215 metres. The first stretch of the walk was the flattest, rising to a respectable five hundred metres. People laughed that this was a ‘training day’, but Betty found the going surprisingly easy. She thought she’d be short of breath, but there was something about the mountain air that seemed to expand her lungs, not constrict them. As her legs pumped and her backpack grew gradually more comfortable to carry, she had to admit that she in fact found it more difficult to breathe at home, at ground level, buried under the mountainous bulk of her daily chore rota.

The path followed the river, which sliced away at the gravel cliffs of the valley floor, exposing glacial moraine sediment and massive boulders. Three Peruvian trekking guides stopped regularly to chat, pointing out geological features, flora and fauna, relaying the history of the valley to anyone with the energy and interest to listen. Betty learned things: there were snails whose shells were crushed to dye things purple, and a plant that could be used as a shampoo alternative (she thought about gathering some to use as backup, for when the bottle in her pack ran empty).

Suddenly, a noise made itself known: the train tracks running parallel to both the river and the path they were on became occupied by the Hiram Bingham tourist train, taking visitors the easy way to Machu Picchu. Passengers waved cheerily as the train passed.

Betty did not wave back.

One of the guides, Percy, pointed to a side valley once the train had passed. To Betty, it looked like a vertical slice of rock and air.

“Up there by the end of today,” Percy said, smiling. “Then, tomorrow, up to the first pass. Then we go to the backside of the mountains. Then up, up!”

Betty nodded. Took a swig of water. Looked back over her shoulder to see how the hulking shadow was doing.

The woman with the enormous backpack had stopped too, she saw. Head down, face obscured by a baseball cap, the hiker was dressed head to toe in loose-fitting black gear that was not serving her well. She was drenched in sweat already, drops of it falling from the woman’s downturned face. Ragged breathing laboured across the small distance between them.

Betty considered asking the other woman if she needed help, but then thought better of it. If the hiker needed assistance, she would have paid for a porter.

Perhaps she, like Betty, was trying to prove something to herself.

*   *   *

Betty climbed slowly, passing houses made of mud-brick, low wooden fences, llamas grazing, prickly pear bushes. It was cloudy, but hot. She got through her water faster than expected, glimpsing, every now and then, the jagged snow-tipped teeth of sacred peaks.

A chasm appeared in front of her with no warning. Down Betty went to the bottom. She crossed the river, then climbed up once she was on the other side. Life was like this, she thought. You had to go down to the bottom before you could rise. The pack made the up and down harder on her knees, and Betty found herself sweating in earnest, especially as the clouds started to dissolve.

The group took a short rest before heading into the mountains in earnest. Reclining on green, thick grass, Betty could see a large ruin at the mouth of the valley they were due to walk through, the Urubamba river valley. Patallacta, a stone fort arranged in a puma’s claw formation. Beyond that, another settlement, a circular temple hugged by steep terraces out front, like a statement. The trail went uphill from there to Huayllabamba before climbing again to 4,215 metres. This felt less daunting to Betty, now she’d started. The hiking was surprisingly easy. She didn’t have to think, or tidy, or clean, or cook. Someone else did all that, for a change.

All she had to do was move along the trail, following her guides.

Best foot forward.

*   *   *

Betty passed a thin spur of moraine, greatly eroded by time and the passage of many feet. A steep drop lay beyond. She moved nervously along the spur, grateful when it was behind her and she could strip off more layers of clothing. Another hour of walking, and she was down to a vest top, everything else tied around her waist.

“Almost there,” Percy reassured her as he passed. Betty nodded in relief. For an ‘easy’ day, she was starting to feel like toast. It wasn’t the walking, but the fact that she’d been up so early. It was almost five p.m. now. If she was at home, she would be cooking dinner. Perhaps listening to a podcast. Perhaps drinking wine as she tried frantically to calm down after the stress of another day wasting her capabilities on other people’s needs.

The final stint of that day’s hike climbed the steepest part of the trail thus far. Eventually, Betty crested the rise and found herself in a field full of two-man tents arranged in rows, with a small clearing in front and a large kitchen tent running parallel: camp Huayllabamba. A Quechua word that meant ‘grassy plain’.

She plonked her belongings in the tent she had been allocated, which looked out across a valley, towards the sharp V of clashing mountains that loomed miles away. She dragged off her boots, changing into soft trainers. Dinner could not be served until the final stragglers were in camp. One of the guides was hanging back with them, running about an hour behind. Until then, Betty had free time. She knew she should rest, but she spotted a ruin on the hill next to the camp. She wanted to explore some archaeology, get a view back across the path she’d just hiked up. There were no clouds, and the light had a wonderful soft evening quality that turned the greens golden.

She set off, feet unencumbered by the stiff boots she’d worn all day. Mount Veronica stared at her as she walked, jagged, snow-kissed. She passed a group of winded hikers playing football with the porters. Betty smiled.

It felt like the first time she had smiled in years.

The ruin, roughly the size of a small farmhouse, was a heap of large, perfectly aligned stones slotted into place with barely a discernible gap between each block, a characteristic feature of Incan masonry. As she walked around it, marvelling at the view and the valley below, footsteps echoed out from behind her. Turning, she saw the lady with the huge backpack, hunched on a grassy lip just behind the ruin, face still obscured behind baseball cap and scarf, pulled up over the lower half of her face.

“Hi,” Betty said, politely. “Amazing scenery, isn’t it?”

The woman said nothing. Just stood, swaying under the weight of her pack.

Betty gestured to the bag. “You should put that down for a bit, while you can. Here, let me—”

She took a step forward, arm outstretched, intent on helping the woman take off the pack, desperate to see the sad creature straighten out her spine, lift her head up fully.

A deep, low, feral snarl ripped through the air. Betty halted sharply.

The woman snarled again, wrapping her arms protectively across the shoulder straps.

“No help,” she said, in a scratchy, bleak voice. “Mine.”

The woman turned then, and shambled off, pack bobbing along like a heavy snail shell.

Betty blinked. The encounter made her deeply uneasy. Hopefully the woman’s tent was nowhere near hers, and she was glad she had brought a small padlock with her. She had a feeling she’d be using it on the tent zippers that night, just to be on the safe side.

*   *   *

The woman was missing from the dinner tent that evening. Betty scanned the group crouched on low camping stools, but found no shadowy, stooped figure. She decided to stop worrying about it. People came in all shapes and sizes. So what if the odd creature didn’t want to eat dinner with the rest of them? Socialising probably wasn’t the reason she’d decided to hike the Inca Trail.

That was fair enough, Betty thought.

The food—salad, soup, pasta stew—was served. Betty found herself small-talking with a friendly Australian, a heavily tattooed trade financier and his wife, who was fluent in Spanish, a British couple with sour expressions. A NASA engineer. A French lady. An ex-army type from Wales. A German schoolteacher and his wife.

Beers were popped—Cusqueña, cold, delicious. Betty had one and it nearly knocked her out. She exited dinner quietly, heading to her tent across grass thickly dewed already with the dropping temperatures of night.

Which peaked shadow was the bulky lady’s tent? Betty shivered thinking about it.

The padlock was cold under her fingers as she clicked it shut on her door zipper.

*   *   *

Dawn bruised the sky. The mountains shifted from purple to green, slowly, reluctantly waking up. Breakfast was served: eggs, bread, cereal, hot tea. There was a briefing. Today’s climb was from Huayllabamba to Dead Woman’s Pass, a six-hour hike. The day would be tackled in segments, separated by rest breaks, including a second breakfast to keep them going. Betty filled up with boiled water, packed her things.

Uphill, over some bridges, then a zigzag through cloud forest draped with long creepers, the wet, muddy path winding beneath. Above, the mountains wreathed in cloud. It was steep. Chatter died down. Everyone hunched forward, like the shadowy snail-woman. Zig, zag, zig, zag, each twist taking Betty a little higher. Then, her feet hit ancient paving slabs, perfectly slotted into the side of the valley. The porters trotted past as if their burdens weighed nothing. Betty got into the habit of ducking quickly to one side when she heard their steps approach, letting them pass.

The forest thinned to rhododendron thickets, then disappeared. Betty could smell bacon and popcorn. Second breakfast. There was bread, too; eggs and coca tea. She checked her watch. Eight a.m. At home, she would be getting her son ready for school: a mad, stressful scramble to find uniforms, sports gear, timetables, stationery, and consent forms. There would be lots of yelling. There always was.

Betty smelled rain in the air. When it hit, it was cold. She pulled out her pac-a-mac, dragged it on over her head and pack.

Kept walking.

She reached the top of Dead Woman’s Pass and collapsed onto some terracing, panting hard. Rain smashed into her in waves, soaking her despite the plastic covering. She took the mac off, bundling the useless thing into her bag. She was wet anyway.

*   *   *

Beyond the pass, the path became paved steps. This descent was far steeper than the ascent, and wet. Betty’s calves and knees screamed at her as she went down. She was glad for her poles.

She climbed down for eight hundred metres, weaving in another zigzag through scrub until she found herself in a bowl formed by three mountains, and the next campsite, Pacaymayo. Betty could see now how steeply she had descended. Immediately above the tents was a large column of rock, a hanging valley at its top, past which a waterfall tumbled a hundred feet or so, dwindling to a stream that flowed through the middle of camp.

Betty sat in her tent tiredly, massaging her calves and listening to the water falling. She wondered what the bent-over woman’s story was. Why was she making everything so difficult for herself? What bizarre sort of challenge had she set?

It was dangerous, whatever she was up to. They were at altitude, the path was often slippery and hazardous, and aside from this, there was simply no need for the woman to be carrying so much. The tour company had lockers back in Ollantaytambo for items the hikers wouldn’t need on the trek. Refusing to use them, and refusing a porter… Betty felt there was some degree of self-punishment going on. Bizarre.

But then she had a flashback, to herself, a week before. Naked, on her knees, sodden towel beneath her on a dirty cold floor covered with garbage. Picking up. Cleaning. Wiping. Scrubbing. Folding. Sorting. Dusting. Vacuuming.

Betty felt anger stir inside. She did not like the image of herself like that.

An hour and a half later, the woman with the pack shuffled past, grunting and wheezing. She was bent even lower than before, as if kow-towing to some constantly receding god or master.

Betty found herself becoming irritated by the woman. She was ruining the mood with her suffering.

*   *   *

Breakfast at six a.m. No cloud. Betty refilled her water bottle from the camp stream, making sure to do so above the toilet block, not below it. She set off before the others, keen to get as far from the heavily burdened woman as possible, moving at a fair pace along a slope that led to the circular fort she’d seen yesterday, Runcu Raccay. The path to the fort was steep, straight. Green mountains swooped in and out of her eyeline whenever she lifted her head.

The roofless fort, or tambo (there was some debate which), had views of the entire valley, leading all the way to Machu Picchu. Percy told Betty to climb higher, to understand the significance of the building. She did so, and saw the fort laid out like a ceremonial knife with a handle, a common sigil in Peru.

She was impressed, momentarily, until her vision was suddenly soured by the dark, staggering shape of the bent-over woman. She had somehow acquired both speed and more stuff, all of which she had strapped to her back: bottles, logs, another roll mat, a kettle, a pair of shoes. Betty did not know if these were extra things she had picked up along the trail, or items of her own she could not pack away neatly, instead shoving them into outer compartments and loopholes. The size of the burden she carried now was ridiculous.

Betty pushed ahead faster, past cold-water tarns, over ridges, until she reached the top of the next pass, from which three distinct mountain peaks were visible. She left a rock and some coca leaves as instructed on a small pile next to the trail, an offering to the sky and mountains, marching on through a rocky tunnel hand-hewn by the Inca, across a stretch of moorland, down through jungle, warm and wet. She could hear the burdened woman gaining on her, heard the grunts and groans that nobody else seemed to. The clattering of pots and pans tied on messily. The catch of phlegm in the back of the woman’s throat as her breathing laboured on.

Betty rounded a bend and saw another ruin clinging to a spur of rock before her. Sayacmarca, spread out over more terraces, pierced with several triangular viewing windows, corridors, and niches amongst numerous chambers. In the dead centre, as Betty approached, a huge monolith, reached by steps, upon which a temple may have once sat. Stonework clung to the very top of the massive rock like barnacles hugging a ship’s hull.

Below all this, another tambo. Betty found herself nearly running by the time she reached it, startling a young deer that bounded off into the green.

“Slow down!” she heard Percy call, as she scrambled to get to the very front of the group once more.

But the burdened woman was gaining on her, huffing and heaving, and Betty found she could not.

*   *   *

Trekking on the level now, much to Betty’s relief. She rose and fell over light crests, hopping over thin streams fed by waterfalls far above, striding through dense rainforest. The path below her feet was ancient, interlocked, smoothed by many things: time, passage, hope, wonder, curiosity. All the things she had found herself lacking, until now.

So why was she so afraid?

Clouds kissed her hair as she navigated ancient stone staircases, sharp hairpin bends, narrow, gouged tunnels and precipitous falls. There were no views, only mist. She felt as if she were at the very edge of something—reality, perhaps, or the world as she had come to know it.

Down to another ruin, Phuyupatamarca. Huge, built like a half-pyramid, with a flat top, arranged along the ubiquitous terraces cutting into the side of the mountain. A stream fell down a channel along one side of the site, tumbling along ceremonial channels and pools.

Clang, clank.

The burdened woman, always at her back.

No time to rest, explore.

Push, push. Betty was almost jogging now. A group of hikers pressed themselves to one side, shouting ‘Porter!’, laughing and staring when they realised their mistake as she passed.

She almost slipped, several times. Percy shouted at her to slow down, but she ignored him.

Betty caught a glimpse down the verdant green valley and saw she was once again above the Urubamba. A small town, trapped in by huge mountains, was visible in the distance. Aguas Calientes, at the base of Machu Picchu. She figured she was about fifteen miles from the ancient site now as the path entered heavy forest again, offering only occasional glimpses of the valley. More ancient Incan paving stones and steps hewn directly into the rock itself, more tunnels worked out of the natural cracks and crevices in the hillside. Little bridges spanned the streams that frequently ran across the path.

Betty hit a fork in the trail. Right to the midday stop, left to Intipata another ruin set upon the side of the valley, with the usual steep-sided terracing leading up to it. She took the right fork.

When she reached that night’s camp, Wiñay Wayna, she was almost hyperventilating. The porters and camp staff looked at her in surprise as she raced into the tented area, blinking back tears and sweat.

Unbelievably, despite not having passed Betty on the trail, the bent-over woman was there waiting for her, in amongst the low two-man tents, her pack obscuring the entirety of her shoulders, back, and most of her legs down to her calves now, so that at first, Betty mistook her for another nylon two-man. Until she moved, her huge burden rattling, clanging, creaking, squeaking. In horror, Betty could see she had accumulated more bulk that was now, mostly, junk: tinfoil. Plastic. Scraps of food. Dirty pans and crockery. Huge balls of dust.

Convinced that she was the only one who could see this terrifying spectre, with no idea why or for what reason, Betty did the only thing she could think: she dove into her own tent, ripped the zipper back into place, and padlocked it as quickly as possible.

When Percy came by later to slap the fabric of her tent door gently and offer dinner, Betty pretended to be asleep.

*   *   *

Four a.m. Last day of the hike. The day Betty would get to see Machu Picchu, at last. A lifelong dream, completed.

She could barely believe it, or, on waking, even think about it.

All she could think about was the heavily burdened woman, who had been in the tent next to hers that night, snoring, whimpering, moaning in her sleep, tossing and turning endlessly, coughing, hacking up phlegm and spitting it into god knows what, her assorted piles of crap jangling and clanking all night long as she thrashed about.

Betty, exhausted, knew she would not be able to reach the end point of this cursed trek unless she ate something more substantial than the last Snickers bar she’d been hoarding. Gingerly unzipping her tent, she made a run for the canteen tent. She ignored the other hikers in her group as she ate breakfast. Emptied her tent for the final time. Said goodbye to the porters in her best broken Spanish.

Headed out of camp, way ahead of her group.

This was the busiest section of the trek by far. She had to wait in a long line to get onto the trail, even in the dark. As people found their pace, the snarls spread out, and she was able to find a little space to breathe. Black faded to a deep, strange blue as light slowly filtered in from behind the mountains. Betty scrambled over a small landslide, wondering how far it would be if she were to fall into the valley below.

Except that wasn’t right. It wasn’t her she was thinking of.

Jangle, clank, jangle.

Betty hurtled along a flat section of path, until she found herself confronted with a set of stone stairs. It was so steep she had to use both hands and feet to scramble up it. The ruin at the top was an assortment of small rooms. She paid them no heed. She was only minutes away from the sun gate, Inti Punku, and beyond that: Machu Picchu.

Chest almost bursting, she arrived at the sun gate to find it nearly deserted. It was supposed to offer the expectant wanderer an incredible view of Machu Picchu, but it was too cloudy for any views, so the other hikers had moved towards the main complex itself in disappointment. The fear gripping Betty’s heart was now squeezing so tight, she thought she might pass out.

Jangle. Clank.

One quick push, and the looming threat would be gone, would be—

Her thought stalled as the clouds parted suddenly, miraculously, bestowing upon her a full view of Machu Picchu, spread out below on a long ridge that ran between two green peaks. The site was far larger than she’d ever imagined, angled differently, at least from all the postcards and tourist images she’d seen.

Betty gasped, felt tears sliding down her face. This was the moment she’d dreamed about most of her life. This was the culmination of so many things, and yet…

And yet…

A shadow, clinking and clanking ever closer.

The clouds snapped shut once more, the view confiscated.

The path led in only one direction.

Machu Picchu.

*   *   *

Betty found herself in the ancient site before she really understood what was happening. She walked past a sacred stone, around a watchman’s hut, and along a flat terrace, from which all the classic tourist photos were usually taken. The clouds were kind, rolling by in clots, so she could appreciate the true majesty of the archaeology all around. It didn’t look real. The walls were so high, so steep, the stonework so skilled, so perfectly tessellated, the colours too vivid: so many shades of green, blue, white, brown, like a cartoon place. Mountains, dramatic, overbearing, a combed ring of green teeth circling her.

Betty couldn’t stop looking at it, all while thinking: What now? Now that you’re here?

Ragged breathing and a sense of bulk, of mass, coming into her peripheral vision. The burdened woman was on her hands and knees, almost, the massive weight of her weird mound now grotesquely swollen like a huge tumour on her back. Dribble and sweat poured off her. Her hair hung down in greasy ropes that somehow also looked dry and split at the ends. Snot dripped from the woman’s nose.

Betty started crying again, feeling too many things all at once.

“Leave me alone,” she sobbed, struggling to breathe.

The woman did not leave her alone. She shuffled closer. Betty could smell foul body odour and days-old sweat.

Betty dumped her own pack, darted off towards the Temple of the Sun, and the Royal Tomb, or Palace of the Princess. A circular structure capping more natural rock formations, underneath which a princess was buried, or so the multiple guides parroted as she approached. Decorated with a staircase and more channels and pools for water worship and ritual cleansing.

Clang, clank. The woman with the huge burden would not be put off.

Betty pushed across to the royal enclosure, buildings once occupied by thrones and beds. She aimed for a ledge from which she could see a quarry, where much of the stone used in construction was hacked out. This viewpoint was narrow, defined by a precipitous drop, beneath it what looked like several miles of clean air through which a body would meet no resistance until it hit the river, far, far below.

Too busy, though. Too many tourists.

Behind Betty, her bulky shadow, groaning and whimpering.

Betty decided to go higher. She wanted to be sure, absolutely sure.

Past a temple with three huge carved windows looking down into the central plaza, up to a natural feature embellished with stonework to form a pyramid that sheared off steeply on all sides. The stones here were carved into precise farming calendars and astrological predictors, the biggest and most significant of which sat on top of the pyramid: Intihuatana, the ‘Hitching Post of the Sun’, to which the sun was anchored, according to legend. Cubic in form, it did look like a hitching post, ready for a horse or llama to be roped to. It was actually an observatory. The edges of the post lined up with other important masonry features on the site, for astrological purposes.

Betty knew all this because she’d spent her entire life reading about Machu Picchu, but now she was here, all she could think about was the woman trailing her like a terrible smell. Like shit on her shoe. Like…

Betty shook her head, feeling desperate. From here she could see the entire site. There were no fences, no protectors between herself and the sky.

Here? she wondered, but then she spotted an even higher patch of ground.

There, maybe.

Across a green parade ground, under a rock shaped like a miniature mountain, Betty reached a platform opposite the Intihuatana, amongst huge housing complexes.

This was not right, either.

She made her way through the Mortar district, named for mortar marks in the rock, characterised by huge, two-storey structures which were originally thatched. She felt, now, as the day grew brighter and hotter, as if she were in a trance. Vertices and angles on the stonework pulsed, moving in and out of view, tide-like. There was a great rushing in Betty’s ears.

She heard her son’s voice, innocuous in this setting: Mum, can I have a snack?

Hurrying down a set of steps, she found herself above the lower cemetery. Down through terraces, down into more clouds. Along the central plaza, past a newborn llama, until finally, Betty found herself at the foot of Huayna Picchu, the green claw-like spur of mountain tip that stuck out at the very end of the Machu Picchu citadel site like a huge granite thumb sticking upwards to the sky.

Betty remembered suddenly how one accessed the summit: by climbing the ‘stairs of death’.

This will do, then, she thought, and pushed on.

Over the saddle stretching between the citadel and the mountain itself, moving past a rocky hump and cutting up the side of the cliff in a steep zigzag, twisted steel handrails the only means of support. No room for error. Betty was exhausted, filthy, drenched in sweat.

Still, the object of her fear pursued her.

Forty-five minutes later, she was at the top, almost. She strode across a semicircular, jutting platform to a tunnel: narrow, squeezing, leading to the summit. The views were beyond anything Betty could have imagined, even after years of gazing at any photograph she could find. Nothing could ever do the same justice to these vistas that her own eyes could. The sky was clear, the sun hammering down as she climbed.

Finally, knowing there was not much left in her, she found a rock on the other side of the tunnel and sat, taking in the view. A chocolate-brown Rio carved through rippling green mountain bends, cloud shadows racing across the folds of land like strange dark stingrays across a seabed.

Higher, Betty thought to herself, wondering if the burdened woman would get stuck in the narrow tunnel, knowing she would not.

Another ladder, this one right to the very, very top. Betty was crawling herself, now, much like the woman who pursued her. She scrambled across a wedge of rock to the back side of the mountain peak.

Here, she thought, finally.

In front of her, a viciously steep and meticulously carved ancient staircase down, which ended, blissfully, in nothing.

Empty air.

Space—and below, far, far away, the river.

Betty made it to the end of the staircase. Found a small overhanging platform and sat right on the edge.

Waited.

The woman caught up with her in almost no time at all.

She rattled and clanged and crunched down next to Betty, thin legs dangling off the end of the staircase. Her pack was so huge her head had almost completely disappeared into it. Only a pair of rheumy eyes peered out from the foul shadows of the bulk. A flicker of recognition lit Betty’s insides on fire as she reluctantly met her pursuer’s gaze.

“What do you want?” Betty asked, wearily. She was exhausted, done, at peace with the answer; or at least, she thought she would be, until she heard it.

For the voice that spoke in reply, Betty realised, was her own.

“No,” the woman said, softly. “What do you want?”

Betty looked out across the valley and the ancient monument before them.

The answer was ready in her throat, but Betty was too scared to give it voice.

SON OF THE EARTH

H. PUEYO

The bus rattled all the way to Lima, the last of many they had to take from Brazil to Peru. It had been torture, all the days spent crossing dirt roads, squeezed between strangers, the wheels shaking at every rock and bump, the air clouded with red dust. Beatriz kept her complaints to herself. It was just nausea, after all, a faint but persistent queasiness, nothing like the morning sickness that had visited every day before they left her hometown.

“Here.” Father Samuel took his suitcase from the compartment above their seats. “They’re waiting for us.”

Passengers spilled out of the bus in a blur of languages: Spanish, Quechua and Aymara, as well as the occasional Portuguese, all punctuated by the wails of a small child. She wondered if all children cried like this, in that same strident volume, and she guessed they did as others walked past the mother without so much as a frown.

“Beatriz,” Father Samuel called, standing next to a yellow taxi, packing the little luggage they brought into the car. “This gentleman will take us to the convent.”

Beatriz murmured a greeting in Spanish and settled on the back seat, adjusting the white habit on her head. Outside, partially obscured by a curtain of fog, the city was magnificent, greater than anything she had ever seen, the outlines of old colonial buildings appearing behind the mist. She could get used to it—she could even make a home out of it. Father Samuel knew what he was doing, after all, he surely knew more than her; the only thing she had to do was be good and obey.

“Isn’t it beautiful?” Father Samuel asked when the taxi passed Plaza Mayor. Palm trees and flower beds adorned the square, and passersby walked in and out of the government palace and the metropolitan cathedral. “The house we will be staying in is right in front of the basilica, so we can go there after we eat.”

The visit took the whole day. San Francisco was a large complex, three sprawling buildings, which included a sanctuary, the eponymous convent, and a chapel. Father Samuel was welcomed warmly by the brothers, who seemed to already know him, and they seemed surprised by her presence. “I promised her grandmother I’d look after her,” he murmured, lowering his voice as if she would not hear them, “she has nobody else but me and God.” Beatriz followed them, always four or five steps behind, eyes down. “Soon, she shall take her vows,” added Father Samuel, “soon, but not now.”

If they found this arrangement unusual, they did not say, continuing to show the dark triptych in the anteportal instead. “It is no matter what they think or don’t think,” Father Samuel told her later as he took her to the room connected to his, where her small traveling bag awaited on a thin single mattress. “What matters is what we came to do here.” Beatriz craned her neck to meet his green eyes, and she thought of asking what, exactly, were they to do, but he gave her no space to ask. Father Samuel kissed her forehead. “Now rest,” he said before leaving, “tomorrow we have much to do in the catacombs.”

*   *   *

The first thing Beatriz noticed was the smell. It was mold, or something like it, damp and oppressive, together with dust from hundreds of years. Only a minute ago they were crossing the threshold, leaving behind the Sevillian tiles bathed by sunlight and the exuberant trees appearing behind wrought-iron bars, and now they were here. The two men had to stoop under the low ceiling, but Beatriz followed them in silence, her eyes wandering to the bones displayed like a banquet.

“The museum that will open this year will only cover this area,” said their guide, Father Alejandro, illuminating the narrow passageway with a heavy dynamo-powered flashlight. He was one of the many representatives that Beatriz saw speaking to Father Samuel the day before, always in whispers, nothing like the Franciscan friars she had expected to meet. “It’s only a small portion of the catacombs, of course.”

“I’ve been told this is practically a maze.” Father Samuel placed a heavy hand on her shoulder as they stopped next to the columns that sustained the convent. The beam was almost as wide as she was tall, with stone bricks jutting out of a deteriorated layer of mortar, and Beatriz had to take the cuff of her shirt to her nose to block out the strong stench of mold. “Where can we start? He’s not right under the temple, is he?”

Father Alejandro glanced at her. “It’s not safe for a young girl.”

“I appreciate your concern, Father.” Beatriz knew she must have looked frail, with her childish face and the habit of swallowing most of her brown hair. Still, despite her appearance, her limbs were sturdy under their softness, and the hips her grandmother had hoped would bring many children to the world kept her standing for several days on end during the trip. “But I don’t mind the dark or the dead.”

“She will be safe.” The lines of Father Samuel’s face looked deeper with the shadows, the light reflecting on the lenses of his golden glasses.

“I don’t think any of you understand the issue.” Father Alejandro was considerably younger than Samuel, no older than thirty, and he had to raise his face to meet the other man’s eyes. “It’s dangerous, plain and simple, it’s—”

“Sister Beatriz is pregnant,” interrupted Samuel, and Beatriz froze. He had said he wouldn’t tell—he had said he would hide her away for the rest of the year, and then she would take her vows, that no one would ever know… But Father Samuel ignored her, waving her concerns away. “Yes, she has committed many mistakes in her young life, but I trust that she wants to dedicate her life to God from now on. I’m telling you this so you know she will be safe while she helps us map this place.”

Beatriz didn’t look at any of them while they spoke, her gaze focused entirely on a skull circled by several bones, then another, then another. They all looked the same, and they might have belonged to anyone, man or woman, rich or poor. Father Samuel had said that, at some point, they mixed the bones of aristocrats and peasants together, when they still buried people in the catacombs, and now no one could recognize which was which.

Then again, Father Samuel could have just lied, like he was lying now, like he lied when they left Brazil, like he lied all those years.

“I see,” said Alejandro rather briskly, turning his back on them. “Follow me, then.”

He took them down a narrow, winding path away from the lamps, his flashlight quivering with the movement. The more they walked, the more desolate the catacombs seemed, and the number of passages multiplied, sometimes barren and empty, sometimes displaying walls made of skulls, tibias stacked in the shape of a cross and shattered pieces of collarbone embedded into the ground forming mosaics. At last, they reached a crossroads, where bones pointed at different tunnels, each with a different inscription carved into the marrow in tiny Latin words.

“From this point onward, we don’t know what lies ahead.” Father Alejandro pointed at one of the passageways with the flashlight, but nothing could be seen inside. “We’re almost outside of the Cercado. We don’t know exactly where the Son sleeps, but every clue we have says it must be down one of those lines.”

“Sister Beatriz can take it from here while we restore the documents,” said Father Samuel. This time, Beatriz looked at him, hoping to find a clue in that face she knew so well, the graying hair brushed back, the clean-shaven jaw, the glasses obscuring his eyes. “We wouldn’t want anyone to wander too close to him, or for his presence to be acknowledged.”

Beatriz opened her mouth to ask who they were talking about, but her voice died out. Their faces looked strange in the underground: dark shadows projected on Alejandro’s brown skin and Samuel’s white, elongating their features and turning their expressions graver and bleaker. Threatening, even.

“The very reason we came all the way to Lima, dear.” Samuel’s voice felt like the only sound in the stillness, save for a faint and distant rumbling that reminded her of the wheels of the bus against the road. “And you are to be instrumental to the process, whether you understand it or not.”

*   *   *

From then on, every morning was the same. Beatriz woke at dawn, the sky fading from dark blue to gray through the shutters, and she took a hot shower. After finishing, she stared at the mirror to find her belly slightly swollen, like it used to, days before her period.

During the first month in Lima, it was almost invisible. A bump, nothing else. A few extra pounds. The nausea was fully gone, which surprised her, since she had heard so much about this part—in all honesty, she was not nearly as uncomfortable as she thought she would be. Her figure was always full, and it was fuller; her chest was always heavy, and it was heavier; but outside of some tenderness and pain, everything felt the same.

Beatriz took her time braiding her long hair, covering herself up, putting on the habit and fastening the cross around the turtleneck of her white blouse. It was strange to see herself like that—like a nun. But I’m not sure if I have the vocation for it, she had argued when Father Samuel told her to join the Church almost two years ago, so she could be close to him. I don’t have the faith, or the selflessness, or the talent. She had only attended Mass and volunteered as a child to help him please her grandmother.

The lessons went into one ear and out the other, and the deep belief that seemed to exist so naturally within others never bloomed in her. All she felt was an indistinct haze of nothingness. Her absence of piety did not translate into skepticism, only into indifference, a whirlwind of words without meaning, like she spent her entire life adrift, floating, watching others behind a veil.

That was also why she didn’t bother telling Father Samuel to stop. She didn’t, so many years ago, when he first started it, and she doesn’t now, when he visits her room before another working day. We should pray not only for forgiveness, but for restraint, he tells her every time they finish. Let’s pray together to be strong enough to stop ourselves. Whenever he demanded penitence, Beatriz knelt by his side, praying as he said the words out loud.

Then, after breakfast, she headed underground. The convent gave her any convenience she could need for the task, installing more lamps where there were none, or offering several kerosene lanterns so she could take them along the uncharted pathways, should the batteries of the modern flashlights fail. Additionally, she took a cardigan to handle the cold, water, and a snack, something light and easy to carry, since food wasn’t appetizing down there.

Beatriz had never mapped anything, but she tried her best to add any new routes to the map provided by the convent, drawing tunnels and portals where she found them. The others were skeptical when she requested as much thread as they could get of any color, and she tied them to the entrance of whichever tunnel of the crossroad and pinned them to the walls so she could find her way back. “But how will I know what I’m searching for?” she had asked on her first day.

“You will simply know,” Father Samuel had answered. “Trust your heart.”

Her heart had never been any good, but Beatriz kept going down the steps every day to begin her descent. Slowly, she got used to it. The air didn’t feel as stale as it did at first, and the daily comings and goings made her feel like there was nothing to be feared in the dark—all around her were the remains of long-dead people, nothing more, nothing less. If one of the lights flickered, Beatriz stopped, closed her eyes and waited. When the light went back to normal, she resumed walking, carefully adding new notes to the map.

A line of colorful threads adorned the walls, blue tied to red, red tied to green, green tied to orange, and so forth. She unrolled the yarn slowly, pinning it to pieces of wood in the structure, or nailing them to the wall with a hammer she got upstairs. Beatriz took breaks whenever she grew tired, leaning against the walls of packed earth, breathing in and out as much as she could. Her body seemed progressively slower, and she paused as much as she could, but it did not matter; no one besides Samuel ever talked to her.

In the second month—the fourth of her pregnancy—she encountered Father Alejandro again, sitting in the courtyard alone, cigarette in hand. He was the youngest in the working group that Samuel had been summoned to attend, and could be more approachable than the others.

“Father,” she called, stepping closer.

Alejandro lifted his head. He was sitting on the stone fountain, surrounded by trees and the carefully trimmed lawn sprinkled with white flowers, so different from the catacombs that it looked like they were in a whole different place.

“Sister.” Alejandro put out the cigarette. “How is your task going?”

“Steady.” Beatriz took a notebook from her handbag. One of her most recent achievements included an asterisk of routes, a confusing second major crossroad that had looked like a tangle of veins until a few days ago, but was now fully readable. “But it would help me to know what I should be looking for.”

“There are moments in which not knowing is better than knowing.”

Beatriz cocked her head. “You called it a ‘he’ on the first day. Is it a specific grave? If it is…”

“Quite the contrary.” Alejandro took a good look at her for the first time. “It’s a nest. An altar. A womb. That’s why we call him the Son.” His thumb pressed the paper to the point that it crimped, forming a crooked line over one of the maps. “But you’re safe, so you must not worry too much about it. He won’t reach you, and if he does, he won’t want you.”

For a moment, it seemed like Father Alejandro would say something else, but he stopped before he even started. Carefully, Beatriz placed her hand on his, and he released the notebook.

“He’s not like you and I,” Father Alejandro whispered, his lips barely moving, his eyes searching the courtyard for a possible witness. “He is a force, Sister, a force of nature that gives men what they want in exchange for a sacrifice.”

“A sacrifice?”

Father Alejandro stood up abruptly. “Don’t think of it—just don’t think of it. You will be well.”

*   *   *

Once again, Beatriz reached the crossroad. The lantern painted the ancient bricks an orange tinge, washing the row of skulls above the thread. She kept walking, her mind wandering somewhere above the surface. Turning left, her fingers accompanied the thread, yarn tickling her skin under the fingernail, guiding her to yet another labyrinthine passageway. She descended a flight of stone steps, deeper and deeper into the catacombs.

From one second to the other, the air felt hotter. Heavier, too, pressing around her, reminding her of the suffocating humidity of her ever-warm hometown on a summer day. Not only that, but the walls had changed, no longer brick and bone or dusty mortar, but damp earth, wet and dark like a riverbank. Beatriz kept unrolling the yarn, seeing the greenish color get dirty with mud, turning slick and brown in seconds. It was odd, but she guessed there could be some underground spring or aquifer around, something that explained this humidity.

You will be well, Father Alejandro had said, shoulders straining under the cassock. I will be well, Beatriz repeated to herself without a sound. Not because of his ominous words, which sounded to her like nothing but devil stories, part of the same scheme of beliefs she was never able to internalize like she should have, like everyone should have. She was, however, afraid of getting lost, or getting trapped under the ground.

“I will be well,” Beatriz repeated out loud after she almost slid down the spiraling ramp leading even further down. She took a deep breath, tied part of the thread to a rudimentary wooden handrail, and continued to walk.

The temperature forced her to take off her cardigan, and the ground rumbled. It was a vibration, a light undulation, and then nothing at all. Beatriz continued, raising the lantern ahead of her, and she only stopped when she saw something crumpled around the corner of a strange chamber. There, thrown aside like a discarded piece of paper, was an embroidered handkerchief, once white, now filthy.

Beatriz peered at it closely. It had been crocheted and adorned with two yellow Peruvian lilies and initials—I.R.—in the same color. Part of the scalloped edge was torn, ripped apart like it had been torn by a dog, but the delicate craft still stood out somehow. When she turned it around to see the backside, the handkerchief fluttered like it had been blown by the wind.

There wasn’t any wind, and she knew that. Not there. What it was—what it felt like—was someone’s breath, blowing air into her face from below. Beatriz looked down, but all she could see was the leather straps of her sandals and her swollen feet, pink lines sinking into her skin. She blinked. Warm air again, flapping the handkerchief against her nose.

Beatriz willed herself to calm down. Again, steam came from the ground, like the earth itself was breathing slow and peaceful clouds of vapor. Beatriz poked it with the tip of her sandal, digging a small hole, and the air engulfed her entirely in what felt like an invisible bubble. With the help of a handrail, she crouched to see it up close, the glow of the lantern surrounding her, and she pushed clumps of soil aside. Her fingers came back tangled in human hair, and she returned to her feet in a startled jump.

Something told her this was the place they were searching for, this nest, this womb, and Beatriz thought of writing it down in her notebook with her dirty hand, but didn’t. She couldn’t. Not yet, not until she understood.

*   *   *

Later, in Samuel’s room, Beatriz sat on his bed and watched him in silence. The priest had been focused on his work, bent over the desk as he mended the pages of an old tome, filling each hole with paper pulp. He had been selected for his experience with restoration when he lived in Rio de Janeiro, before he had been sent to her small town in a northern state for some sort of misdemeanor he never explained. His specialty was books, and Beatriz never tired of seeing the attention he dedicated to that work.

“Want to come closer?” asked Father Samuel, eyes still on the page. His glasses had slid down his bulbous nose, and a droplet of sweat glistened in the space between his temple and his cheekbone. “I just need to finish this one before bed.”

Beatriz sat on a chair by his side. “I know about the Son.”

“Do you?”

“Father Alejandro told me.”

“I doubt it.” The tear he had been mending on the page was no longer visible, only a faint line where the paper had been sliced by what seemed like insect damage. “You might think you know something, but you don’t.”

“He didn’t go into detail,” insisted Beatriz, her hair warming her back in dark waves after she unmade the braids. “But I know you all believe there’s a demon of sorts in there, and that you can make a wish in exchange for something else. A sacrifice.”

Father Samuel left the tweezers he had been using aside without answering.

“That’s not very pious, is it?” Beatriz didn’t mean to sound confrontational; the question came out of her mouth without warning.

“Beatriz.” Samuel’s hand moved closer to hers. “What we’re doing is not for personal gain, it’s for the good of the collective. Why do you think I spend so much time repairing those tomes?”

Collective, she guessed, meant the Church, or themselves, the working group, not the world as a whole. Beatriz ignored the thought. It didn’t matter. Her opinions didn’t matter.

“Do you really believe in it? That there’s some devil down there waiting to be summoned?”

“I don’t believe it, I know it,” said Father Samuel. “But it’s no devil.”

Something stirred inside her. Beatriz recoiled, dreading how their skins looked so close to one another, how aged he was, how young she looked. When their hands touched, she barely felt it, but he swallowed her fingers with his with an intensity that felt disproportionate.

“Look what we do to each other,” he breathed, voice hoarse. “How am I supposed to work like this?”

Beatriz didn’t know what to say; she felt nothing at that light touch.

“I’m sorry.”

Samuel took her wrist to his mouth and kissed it. “I don’t blame you for it.”

Your child is in me, she thought of arguing, what’s a hand close to it? But no matter. She knew it would be one of those days when he would ask her to sleep with him.

“I just don’t understand,” continued Beatriz. “Why do you need to map the place, then? If it’s all explained in the tomes?”

“Because he changes the configuration of the very ground he’s in.” Samuel flipped the cover of her notebook, pointing at the first map she drew. “Every time he’s given what he wants, he becomes harder and harder to find.”

“Every time? What happens every time?”

Father Samuel smiled, and brushed a wild strand off her forehead. “It’s late, Beatriz. Why don’t you wait for me in bed?”

*   *   *

The route she found the day before was still there. Beatriz feared, when she woke up in a tangle of covers, that when she went down the catacombs this morning, she would no longer find it, maps and threads notwithstanding. But it was still there. The passageways and chambers were just as warm as they were yesterday, the soil still looked damp, like a forest after a summer shower. The breathing continued too, at an interval of a few short seconds between each breath, and Beatriz continued her descent.

What is it that they’re not telling me? This morning, when Father Samuel was taking his shower, she had leafed through his journal, checking the notes he’d made about the restoration process. On one of the pages, she found a list of names, all of them with years and months dating back to the 1500s. The most recent one was from last year: Irene Reyes, April 1949. Beatriz had left the journal where it belonged, and went back to her own handbag as soon as she was alone in the catacombs, checking the handkerchief: I.R.

There was something in the secrecy that made her shiver. Beatriz tried to find a good explanation, but she couldn’t help but think of the way they spoke: this place is dangerous, it demands sacrifices, but she would be well because she was pregnant. The handkerchief could be explained as having been lost by someone at some point, even if the coincidence was chilling, and the hair was natural to find in a place meant to keep bodies and bones.

That still didn’t explain what the sacrifices were.

What do you think they are?

Beatriz turned around. She was alone. Terrifyingly alone.

I think you already know.

The chamber was empty, and she knew, even as she tried to find at least a shadow to justify the words, because the voice was not a voice but a vibration, a rumble shaking her from head to toe. It came from underneath her feet, from the breathing soil, and it echoed between the walls. The lantern slipped from her hand, and swung softly as it landed on the ground.

“I don’t.”

You saw it.

“The handkerchief?”

No answer.

“Was it her? Irene Reyes?” Beatriz did not know who this woman was, and how she related to this entire affair, but it was the only clue she had.

Irene.

Beatriz took a deep breath. She would be well. Whatever it was that a sacrifice needed was something she lacked. Something she might never have possessed. Reassuring herself, she left the handbag on the ground, then sat on one of the stones lining the lower part of the walls.

“Is it always one woman?”

There were times in which they brought more. Dozens, even.

“And what happens to them?” Beatriz touched the ground, feeling it alive under her palm. The sultry temperature of the chamber enveloped her, forming beads of sweat under her hairline.

At first, the answer is silence. Then, the voice comes again, making everything quiver:

Have they left you here for me too?

“No,” Beatriz stammers, failing to sound confident. “I came to find you.”

A shame.

“They don’t think I’d please you. That’s what they said—that I won’t please you.”

I care not for what they say. They do not know what they do not know.

“And they don’t know you?”

A laugh breathed against her.

“They don’t know what you want,” said Beatriz. She had to understand, had to make sense out of this before he decided that she was next. “They only think they do?”

Such a shame, the voice repeated.

“A shame?”

You.

Beatriz fidgeted with the soil, her hands sinking into it in circles. “Do you kill them?”

They die, eventually.

“But not by you?”

Not if I can help it. I like it when they live as long as possible. Some have lasted years. A few have lasted decades, delicious decades.

“What do they die of?” Beatriz knew she had to stop. She had to get up and leave, whether she told them or not, and yet she was still there, rooted to the spot and questioning this thing that seemed to want her too.

There was a guttural sound, like a chuckle lodged in someone’s throat.

They waste away. I provide so that they do not, and I provide plenty. I nourish them, I water them, I blow air into their failing lungs, but they simply begin to rot at some point. Life seeps out, and when it does, I know they are done with.

I could like you better than them, the voice continued. You, you are fertile ground. I already know it. And your fear is temperate. There will be no wailing. It makes me wonder how long you would last. You who have lasted so long with him already—you might last even longer with me.

“Him?”

Him, the one who mounts you at night. Whose seed grows inside you.

“How do you…?”

I see it.

Beatriz bit down on her lip, the taste of blood just a hint.

I would not do what he has done to you. I would nourish you and plant you into this very soil. You would be filled with my very essence, turned into a collection of physical sensations, delightful and dreadful. But you would feel each of them. And you would birth my offspring, the specters of my power.

There is a pause. Another bubble of vapor embraces her.

What will you do with what grows within you?

The heat was suffocating, and the light spun around her, flickering shadows across the walls. Beatriz covered her own belly instinctively, like it mattered at all.

“Maybe I’ll sacrifice it to you,” she says lightly.

The laughter, this time, shakes the entire chamber.

I am not like them; children are useless to me. They are dull. Not fertile ground.

Beatriz doesn’t know what she should say next.

Why did you not say where I am? I know you knew it yesterday.

“I don’t know.”

I think you do.

“I don’t know if I should tell.”

Then do not.

“Allow me to have something to show them.” Beatriz hadn’t planned this, but she had to try. “Something to make them believe I’m making progress. But I can’t give anything in return.”

Who claims I have ever demanded an exchange?

“Don’t you?”

The wall opposite hers crumbled in the middle, and a hole appeared in it, big enough for a person to cross.

I will show you where the remains of one of them lie. You can take her to them. Will you come to me again?

“As a visitor,” said Beatriz, taking her bag and the lantern before walking into the dark.

*   *   *

Beatriz kept the secret for nearly three months. She couldn’t explain why it felt like she had to, but it felt crucial, emergent. Taking with her the belongings of another girl—a dress from the first decade of the century made with fine white lace encrusted with mud, possibly indicating a high upbringing, one shoe with discreet heels and a half-ripped bow—as well as a well-preserved skull. The news excited Samuel. “You must continue your job,” he said. “Your very essential job.”

Beatriz checked the journal again: Pilar Alcántara, October 1909. It had to be her.

Whenever she went to the Son’s nest, she felt inevitably drawn by it. The constant warmth of the chambers made her favor shorter sleeves, and the pace of its breathing increased when she walked in, as if the earth itself prepared to welcome her presence. It was comforting. Beatriz felt herself getting heavier every day, her belly expanding slowly into this round, unfamiliar shape. It was visible under all the clothes she wore, shaping the fabric to attract the eyes of anyone who saw her and tried to make sense of the strangeness of her habit with the reality of her condition.

“You said offspring,” Beatriz commented once, her finger drawing in the soil. “The other time you said I could birth your offspring.”

You could. They all could too.

“And what is your offspring?”

They are what moves the world for me, but they are not an I like I am. They are amorphous and senseless. When they crawl out of their mothers, they emerge as incessant and slippery appendages to do my bidding until they eventually melt away, in months or years.

“But they grow inside us,” said Beatriz. Then, she corrected: “Inside them.”

They need fecund ground.

“So they’re beasts.”

Beasts they might be.

There, she learned many other things. What the Son expected of a sacrifice—a wife and a seed bed, his voice resounded in the underground, a companion and a toy—and who many of those young women and girls had been. Not their names, for he did not care, but glimpses of their lives. A peasant, three centuries ago. A group of nuns. Two daughters of a prosperous family. There were those who tried to escape, digging their way out with their hands, never reaching the exit. There were a handful who could not take it, who screamed and screamed, who bit their tongues off. All their bodies protected them at some point, killing them in their distress. Shutting down so completely that not even he knew how to awaken them again.

The useless ones—the ones who could neither produce offspring nor entertain—were the fastest ones to die. Five or six were actually spat out of the ground like foreign bodies eliminated by a living organism, and he never heard of them again.

Still, there was something Beatriz did not understand. Why not her? All those sacrifices had been women, and Father Alejandro had been adamant that this place could be dangerous for any girl. That deep voice whispered in the chamber, answering: a shame, it’s a shame. Beatriz knelt on the ground, on her hands and knees to make sure she understood what he had just said.

I know I could shape you and remake you.

The dirt stirred as something moved beneath the surface.

I know you would bear it: no, you would welcome it.

The soil liquefied like quicksand, forming spirals and sinking as something rose. A nose, coming from a gigantic face, its skin leathery and inhuman, its length surpassing that of her entire body, like the statue of an ancient god. Sand slid down its closed eyelids, and its nostrils released another cloud of vapor. Beatriz froze in the same position, right above it, her face minuscule this close to his.

I can feel how warm you are inside.

And the face sunk again.

*   *   *

Almost seven months had passed since they arrived in Lima, and a new sacrifice had been chosen. Samuel told her not to worry, that it was just a local girl, that she would be safe, but Beatriz knew it was a lie. When she saw the girl, her stomach turned into a knot: she was no older than sixteen, and she wore a plain cotton dress, looking like something unaware, thinking her life would finally change.

“Did you tell her?” Beatriz asked Father Alejandro, sitting next to him in the courtyard. He had held her hand to help her sit down, and offered his spot in the shade.

“How could we?”

“So she’ll discover the truth in the worst way.” Beatriz caressed her own belly, used now to the weight of it. When the child kicked, she felt neither comfort nor revulsion, just a distant acknowledgment that it was happening to someone, maybe her. “You’ll leave her alone in despair.”

“Who would choose something like that in good conscience?”

Beatriz ignored his question. “You never told me why not me.”

“All the sacrifices must be virgins,” replied Alejandro. “I thought you already knew.”

“Why? Did the Son tell any of you?” Beatriz was surprised by her own tone. It was insubordinate and immodest, but, for once, she didn’t care.

“He doesn’t have to; he almost never said anything at all.” Alejandro checked the pack of cigarettes inside his pocket, but decided against it. “That’s how it has been since the beginning of time. Consider yourself lucky.”

Beatriz would, maybe, if she didn’t have a heart. Unfortunately, she had one, and she couldn’t stop observing the girl, the same way the girl observed her back. Her straight black hair in two plaits, her dark eyes, her wide cheeks. She imagined her grandmother must have looked exactly like her when she was young. Beatriz wondered if the girl thought she was some kind of abomination, so visibly pregnant, a proof of how little she cared little for her vows.

Two days—according to Father Alejandro, it was all the time the girl had left. The night before her sacrifice, Beatriz took a long shower, her own dark hair glued to her skin, reaching her lower back. She walked out of the room naked, and went to Samuel’s bed, just as he had required. “I thought this could have killed your beauty,” he had said just a few weeks ago, sitting on the mattress, hugging her waist. “But temptation remains.” All Beatriz could think was that the baby would be small, if he could still hug her so easily.

She kept her thoughts to herself.

Now, as she straddled him, she could still feel the smell of the catacombs and its walls closing in around her. Beatriz tried not to remember how it had been the first time, how little she really was, how she had to comfort Samuel after, when he covered his face with his hands, saying he was a monster for doing that to her. And now she was here.

“We have failed again,” said Father Samuel, his fingertips leaving white spots around her hips. “We should repent.”

He never said I, Beatriz realized at last what she knew all along, only we.

And, still, she prayed with him.

When he turned off the lights, Beatriz waited until he fell asleep. She got dressed, took her handbag, took her lantern, took her keys. In twenty hours, the sacrifice would be taken. Beatriz entered the convent and went down the first steps of the catacombs. The sequence of colorful threads led her to the place she sought, the place she knew by heart at this point.

The underground breathed her in.

“Do you already know?” Beatriz removed the habit, dropping it along with her bag and her rosary. The cross stayed in her room. “That tomorrow they will bring you a new one?”

I know.

Beatriz took off the sandals strap by strap, and felt the soil tentatively with her toe.

“What if someone asked for something ahead of them? Would you grant it?”

I might. I could.

The ground rumbled.

“Then take me. Not her. Not anyone else. Me,” repeated Beatriz. She unbuttoned her dress, and her undergarments fell between her legs. She kicked both aside. Why? She heard the question, but didn’t answer it. Some things should belong only to her. “Keep me alive as much as you can. If you see me wasting away, breathe life into me again. I’ll have your offspring, I’ll be as senseless as you want me to be. But know that I’m selfish, that I’m needy. No more answering anyone’s desires again. Just mine. Just me.”

And the child?

Beatriz looked down, realizing for the first time that she did not think of it. She could never be a mother, not like this.

“Spit it out in the entrance as soon as I deliver it, then bury us in. Don’t let them find us. Don’t let anyone ever find us again. Can you do that for me?”

Laughter—he was pleased.

Anything else, Beatriz?

Before she could answer, the damp earth underneath her split, sinking into a hole, an endless hole, engulfing her, swallowing her, taking her to him.

DOG’S PAW DRIFT

HILDUR KNÚTSDÓTTIR

There is a hill on our farm where the snow never settles. It’s not a steep hill, and honestly is more of a soft-shouldered hillock, but even after snowstorms—which are very common in the winter here in north Iceland—it sticks out of the freshly fallen snow like a sore. We call it Haugurinn or The Mound because it has long been part of the family lore that it’s not just any hill, but an ancient burial mound. We have no evidence for this, of course, except the fact that Yztafell, our farm, was settled early, likely in the first wave of settlement in the eighth and ninth centuries, when disgruntled Norsemen, fed up with war, came looking for unoccupied land and picked up a few Celtic slaves on the way.

The house I live in was built upon the ruins of the old farmhouse that stood there before it, which in turn had been built upon the ruins of the one that stood there before that one, et cetera. Or so we had always thought. But then my parents got the idea to build an extension to the barn. My parents are the type of people who would never dream of paying someone to do something when there is a remote possibility they could do it themselves, so in spite of them never having dug a foundation for a building before in their lives, they convinced Jón, the farmer on the farm next to ours, to lend them his excavator. Which he did. My mother has never, to my knowledge, operated an excavator before, but she was of course undaunted, and set to work. But she hadn’t dug very far when she came upon what were clearly the remains of an ancient turf house.

This posed a problem. If you find something like that you are supposed to alert the authorities. But my parents knew that if they did, the Cultural Heritage Agency of Iceland would tell them to stop digging and they could forget about the extension to the barn. And they really wanted that extension.

So, what they did instead was decide to go poking around on their own in the dirt, to see if there really was any need to call in the find. I don’t know how they, with their limited knowledge of archaeology, were going to be the judges of that, but they apparently did not share my doubts. And therefore this was what I found them doing when I came home from school that afternoon in early April. My father was standing in the freshly dug hole in his muddy boots, holding a shovel, and my mother was on her knees, digging with her hands.

I was not particularly surprised to find them like this. I have come home to, or even woken up to find them doing weirder things. My mother gets a lot of ideas, and for some reason she must execute them all immediately. My father sometimes tries to stop her, or at least slow her down, but she is a force that cannot be contained. That is why we have our own home-built hydroelectric dam in the creek up the mountain, a never-used woodchipper in the sheep shed and a licence to keep goats that were never bought.

But I will confess that when they explained to me what they were doing, I was more excited than I typically am for any of my mother’s other projects, and I did not need a lot of convincing to help them. So in I went, to change out of my school clothes, and then I joined them in the dirt.

I’m not exactly sure how long we had been digging when I found the sword. But my nose had started running and my fingers were already numb from clawing around in the cold, wet earth. Afterwards, I had the distinct impression that I had somehow sensed the sword before I saw it. As if there had been something, a sound or a sensation, that had made me aware of its existence before I unearthed it. But perhaps that is just something my mind made up afterwards. Minds tend to do that; impose meaning or causation where there is only chance. So maybe there was no reason why I was clawing at the dirt in that particular place and not in another. But I did, and as I brushed away the packed, earthy clay, my eye caught something gleaming in the white, glaring April sun. It was a serpent. And as I scratched more earth away, I discovered that the serpent was made of iron and it adorned the hilt of what turned out to be a sword. I exclaimed something. I have no idea what, exactly, but it was enough to make my parents come over to look at what I had found. It took us more than an hour to dig the sword out. It was almost a metre long, and heavy. And when we turned it over, we could see that runes had been carved along the blade.

*   *   *

We took the sword inside and washed it. It had only started to rust a little, in the small crevices on the carvings on the hilt, and where the runes had been etched.

“So will we call the authorities now?” asked my father.

“I guess we should,” said my mother, sighing. “Damnit. I really wanted to build that extension.”

“Do we have to tell them about the sword?” I asked.

My parents both looked at me.

“Yes,” said my father.

“Why shouldn’t we?” asked my mother.

“Because it’s ours,” I said. “It is our land, and we are the ones who found it.”

But I didn’t really mean that. Because what I had really wanted to say was that I felt the sword was mine.

“We’ll sleep on it,” said my mother. Then she gave my father the look that meant it was time to milk the cows. He nodded gravely and off they went.

When I heard the front door closing behind them, I picked up the sword. It was heavier than it looked, the hilt was probably far too big for my hand, but despite that it felt just right in my grip. I had never held a sword before, but it felt like it belonged there. I wanted to go outside and practise swinging it. Maybe hack at something, like a tree stump. But it had started snowing, I had homework to do, and a suspicion that my parents would not like me swinging an ancient artifact madly. So I took the sword with me to the dining room, laid it on the table next to me, and started on my homework.

*   *   *

That night I couldn’t sleep. My mind was full of the sword. I could recall, in perfect detail, the way that it felt in my hand. Its balance, its weight. It felt familiar. As if I had wielded it many times before. That was strange in and of itself, but stranger still was that I felt as if I could remember what it felt like to stab into flesh, deep and hard, until the tip buried itself in bone. I could also recall the sensation of hacking into an arm, the resistance as I cut through skin, muscle and sinew, and the feeling of bone breaking under my blade. It felt exhilarating. My heart beat frantically in my chest, and every nerve was on fire.

I was in my bed, and the sword was downstairs, still lying on our dining room table, where I had put it after dinner. I knew that sleep would not come.

So I went down.

People who have grown up in cities are often unnerved at how dark it can get here during winter. There are no lights on the road that snakes through the valley, no lampposts on the driveway up to our farm, and the next farm over is hidden from sight behind the trees that my great-grandmother planted when she first moved here and have now grown very tall. But that night was not one of those dark nights. Because the people who grow up in cities are also surprised at just how much light there is from a full moon, especially when the ground is covered with snow. It is a very special kind of light—a cold luminescence—and that night, as I walked silently down the stairs, the cold, stark light spilled in through the windows and pooled on the floor and on the table, where it bathed the sword.

My breath caught in my throat. It was as if the sword was drinking in the moonlight. It glowed. I held out my hand and felt relief flood me as my hand closed upon the hilt.

And then I caught movement out of the corner of my eye. I looked out the window and I saw there was someone standing over the hole that my mother had dug.

It was the figure of a man. He was very tall. There was a cloak around his shoulders and a helmet on his head. He stood there silently, on the edge of the hole, looking down into the earth, as if in search of something.

A cold shiver ran down my spine.

The man took a step, but he made no sound. The silence became deafening; I could feel it pushing in on me, thick and smothering.

I could not take my eyes off the man. And then he turned.

He was silhouetted by the moonlight refracting on the snow around him, so I could not see his face. But I felt his gaze upon me. There was a burning curiosity there, a question. It filled me with such fear that I turned and ran upstairs to my room, where I hid under the covers, the sword still in my hand.

*   *   *

When I woke the next morning, I told myself that I must have been imagining things. That of course there had been no man. But when I went outside, I found footprints at the mouth of the hole, clearly visible in the freshly fallen snow. They were large, much bigger than my father’s, and not made by any type of shoe that I had ever seen before. The soles had no texture, and they were weirdly irregular. With a sinking feeling in my stomach, I followed the footprints back to the snowless mound, where they disappeared.

I went back inside, where my parents were eating breakfast. None of us said anything about the sword or calling the authorities.

*   *   *

I couldn’t sleep the next night either. I lay in my bed. The sword was downstairs, atop the old dresser that my great-great-grandmother had kept her finest china in. I had to have it there with me.

So I slipped out of bed, and walked as quietly as I could down the stairs.

The moon was still shining, but not as brightly as the night before.

I walked over to the dresser, where the sword lay half hidden in the shadows, and I grabbed the hilt. The familiar sensation of belonging flooded through my fingers, spread up my arm and filled my chest with certainty and warmth.

I turned, and there was a man outside the window. He stood there, perfectly still, watching me. His face was deathly pale, and stark against his black beard. His eyes were hooded by his iron helmet but again I felt his gaze, angry, enquiring.

I screamed and ran upstairs with the sword.

I lay in my bed, my heart pounding in my chest.

The next morning there were footprints all around our house, and the snow beneath my window was downtrodden and packed, as if someone had paced back and forth there the whole night.

*   *   *

I did not go down the next night. I didn’t have to. The sword was up there in my room with me, lying next to me in my bed. I had sneaked it up before saying goodnight to my parents. I was hoping I could finally sleep, now that I had it with me.

I had my hand on the hilt, my fingers loosely holding on, a low, steady current of energy pulsing up my arm, gushing like warm, slick blood. It was soothing.

My mind began to wander, finding its way between sweating, lumbering bodies. Some were writhing in pain, others were swaying, muscle and sinews taut, as they swung swords, axes or clubs. It was impossible to extinguish between the screams of agony and excitement. The deep voices came together in perfect harmony, a thrumming cacophony of emotion. The ground beneath my feet was wet with blood as I opened my mouth, lifted my sword and—

A sound brought me back to reality. I was still in my bed, my hand still on the sword, and there had been a noise outside my window.

Someone was whispering. Or speaking in a hoarse, croaky, bone-dry voice.

From the lilt, I could hear that it was a question, repeated again and again, as if with a slightly different phrasing but the same sentiment. I could not understand the words, although they sounded familiar enough to stir something in the furthest reaches of my mind.

I sat up, still clutching the sword.

I did not want to look out the window.

The whispering grew louder and more insistent.

I had to look out the window.

I stood up, walked the two steps to my window and peered outside.

There was no wind, and it had started to snow, those large, heavy flakes that drifted slowly down. Hundslappadrífa, we call it, dog’s paw drift, when the snowflakes are as big as a dog’s paw. It was very dark, but there was a light on in my parents’ bedroom that dimly illuminated the ground beneath my window. I recognised the orange glow from my father’s bedside lamp; he must have fallen asleep while reading, as he sometimes did. The dim reddish light fell upon the man who stood under my window, looking up at me. I could see now that his cloak was red against the white snow that almost covered his shoulders, and that his black beard was streaked with grey. His face was still deathly white and the eyes that stared up at me had clearly once been blue but were now pale and milky.

His mouth was a gaping, black hole. As I watched him, it moved strangely, and I heard the hoarse whisper again. The man reached out a hand. His fingers were long, the palm so large and emaciated it resembled a huge, grey spider.

I gave a yelp and stepped back from the window and out of sight.

The sword fell from my hand and hit the floor with a resounding clang, but I quickly picked it up again.

I crawled back into my bed.

The man stayed outside my window all night. I buried my head under my pillow, but I could still hear him whispering, asking his question, again and again. It wasn’t until he finally fell silent that I realised I didn’t need to understand the words to know what he wanted.

I clutched the sword harder and closed my eyes.

*   *   *

I knew what I had to do. So the next morning, when my parents went to milk the cows, I got a shovel and walked to The Mound. I went to the place where the footprints had disappeared and then I started digging in the frozen earth.

It was hard work, but I am strong, and still it took me almost an hour before my shovel hit the wood of the burial chamber. I had expected it to be rotten through, but the wood was surprisingly firm. In the end, I gave up on trying to break through it and instead pushed my shovel between two of the planks and used it as leverage to pry them apart.

One of the planks broke with a groan. It fell to the side and a strong gust of wind blew out, smelling of wet earth and rotten things. I heard something moving inside.

Panic welled up inside me, but I pushed it down and reached for the sword that lay in the snow next to me.

The familiar sensation of belonging flooded me as I gripped the hilt, and I closed my eyes to savour it. I drew a deep breath and then the whispering began. I opened my eyes and pushed the sword inside the chamber.

I had intended to drop it there, but before I was able to, the sword was yanked out of my hand with such force that my knuckles cracked.

I stared at the black opening for a moment, then I set the plank back in place, grabbed the shovel, and put the earth back where it had been.

*   *   *

My parents never asked me what had happened to the sword. It was as if they had forgotten I’d ever found it. And they did not take much convincing to abandon their plans for the extension to the barn. I simply told them that some buried things are meant to stay buried. And to my surprise, they agreed. So my mother got into the excavator again and filled in the hole she had dug.

“We might see if we could extend on the other side, someday,” she said afterwards, with a sad little smile.

I have not seen the man since. But I see the sword sometimes. It is in my dreams, in my hand, streaked with blood and gleaming in the sun. And sometimes, on the nights when sleep evades me, I find myself walking over to the mound. And now it’s me who whispers, asking that question.

Where is my sword?

THE DEVIL’S SIGH

A Joe Ledger Adventure

JONATHAN MABERRY

1

It stood just inside a downspill of shadows.

Eyes the color of amber peered out at the team from the University of Pennsylvania. Watching them wake in horror. Watching them scream and stagger.

Watching them fall.

One by one.

Until everything was still.

For an hour.

And then the August heat filled the air with the first aromas of drying blood and spoiling flesh.

Then the things that lived in the forest came creeping out from under the trees and shrubs. Flying on gossamer wings. Slithering through the tall weeds. Walking on silent, careful feet.

Hungry. Because the forest is always hungry.

Drawn to death, because the forest is a killer.

The thing in the shadows watched as the feast began.

Watching with those pale, golden, ancient eyes.

2

I wasn’t on the clock and I wasn’t carrying anyone’s badge.

Hell, my current place of residence was a villa on Corfu. It was my bad luck that a case had brought me to Eastern Pennsylvania and afterward I spent a few weeks loitering in a rehab facility after getting stitched back together. Working for Rogue Team International—pulling triggers on gigs turfed over to us by the UN—was not doing my body any good. I have been shot, stabbed, slashed, beaten to a pulp, run over, and thrown off boats. And we haven’t even gotten to the damage all this had done to my nerves and what I laughingly call my “mind.”

A cop friend—Malcolm Crow, chief of police in Pine Deep—drove me to his place after my discharge. Halfway there he ambushed me with a request for help. Crow’s a good guy, one of the best, but there are times I’d happily feed him to a nest of rabid weasels.

“Look, Joe,” he told me, “it’s just a go-and-look thing. You probably read about it on the Net. Five people from U of P died in the Pine Barrens, right on the edge of Barnegat Bay.”

“Sure, I saw it,” I said. “News said they caught some bug and waited too long to go in for tests and treatment. Sad, but how’s that a crime?”

Crow turned to give me a long look. “You told me a lot of tall tales about how you and your team hunted down a bunch of different terrorist groups who were using advanced bioweapons.”

I smiled. “It may have come up once or twice in the course of business.”

He snorted. “And you used to be a pretty good cop. A Baltimore detective.”

“What does my being a cop have to do with anything?”

“You know how to read a crime scene.”

I gave him a long look. “Crime? What kind of crime…?”

He smiled at me, knowing he’d set the hook.

3

It knew how to move through the woods.

It moved through the tall grass when the wind led the way. It crouched in behind the needles of a pine tree and became as still as the cool shadows. When it moved, it left nothing to mark where it had been. Time was a patient teacher, and it had learned so much.

Even when it was ready to scream with hunger, it was patient.

And it was always watching.

4

So, yeah. I went to New Jersey.

There are plenty of small towns between Philly and the ocean, but a lot of that drive is through what seems like a green forever. I rolled down the windows and smelled the pines and then smiled when I caught the first whiff of salty sea air.

I grew up in Baltimore, but I’d gone camping in the Pine Barrens a bunch of times. My dad sometimes took me and my brother, Sean, to those woods. We’d camp at Belhaven or Victory Lake near historic Batsto and then canoe the twisty cedar-water streams. It was a place where you could find good athletic adventure, deep history, achingly beautiful raw nature, and stuff that’s scary as shit all in the same hour.

There are places like that.

Places where the ancient world of men and the far more primal world of nature overlap in odd ways. Just because our written history only goes back to the early days of the post-Columbus invasion doesn’t mean nothing was happening before white feet stepped onto the soil of what was laughably called the New World. New to Europeans, but very old to the folks already living here. Hell, the Lenape people lived here going back something like eight thousand years.

If you go into woods that old and don’t have your twenty-first-century sensibilities shoved up your ass, you can feel the antiquity. Try it. Go into the Barrens deep enough so you can’t hear any traffic zipping along between Philly and Atlantic City.

Do it on a late summer afternoon and then find a quiet place to sit and listen to the trees whisper to one another in their timeless voices. You can almost see the ghosts of hunters moving through the woods, and hear them chanting hunting songs, praying to the animals they hunted, asking for permission to loose their arrows or throw their spears, and then singing songs of gratitude.

*   *   *

Crow told me that someone would meet me who could take me to what he kept calling a crime scene. The address he provided didn’t take me to a police station, a ranger station, or anything official. Instead, it was a small permanent campsite near the bay.

The site was on state grounds via a long-term research lease jointly obtained by U of P and NYU. Some of the teams that used it were doing environmental impact studies, some were digging into the history of indigenous peoples, others were studying new species of animals, and one or two were doing studies of abandoned mills left to rot and ruin.

I rolled my windows down as I drove along a crooked little unpaved road, letting the forest talk to me. It whispered in the voices of mourning doves and mosquitoes and breeze-tossed leaves.

As I rounded a curve, I saw three large campers squatting on cinderblocks, their aluminum sides mossy and weather-stained. There was a fieldstone fire pit dug into the ground, surrounded by beach chairs. A wire-spool table sat between two of them, covered by a faded plastic tablecloth stapled to the wood. Party lights were strung between the closest pines, but they looked more weary than festive.

There was only one person there, and she rose slowly as I pulled off the road and parked in an area carved out for that. She was forty-something, with lots of untidy red hair clustered into a loose bun. She looked like Emily Blunt, if the actress had spent too much time outside in bad weather and too much time inside drinking kitchen whiskey. A florid, pretty face, but old eyes and a stern mouth.

Crow had said that I would be met by an assistant professor from the University of Pennsylvania. This lady looked like the type. I got out and walked over to her. She stood waiting, but as I came close, she took a half-step forward to offer her hand.

“You’re Joe Ledger?” she asked.

“Guilty as charged. And you’re—”

“Aggie Ólafsson,” she said and waved me to a chair, flipped up the top of a plastic Coleman cooler, and fished out a couple of very cold bottles of Kane Brewing’s Object Permanence barleywine beer, knocked the caps off on the edge of the spool table and handed me one. We tapped and drank.

“Nice,” I said. “So… who and what are you and why am I here?”

“I’m a paleopathologist—meaning I study ancient diseases—but I minored in archaeology because analysis of human remains and ancient artifacts is key to the discovery of early diseases and their effects.”

“Impressive. Now… tell me why I’m here?”

Some bird I could not name made a loud cry in the woods, scaring a bunch of smaller birds into flight. We watched them for a moment. Without looking at me, Aggie asked, “How much do you know about these woods?”

“This forest or the Pine Barrens?”

“This part of the Barrens.”

“Not a lot,” I said, and told her about camping closer to Batsto.

“You know about the ghost towns?”

“Seen a bunch of ’em, sure. Bunch of old mill towns that collapsed when the demand for what they were making changed, or someone worked out a more efficient or cheaper method closer to areas of urban expansion.”

She arched an approving eyebrow. “There’s that, yes.”

“And I knew there were some settlements of Russian Jews who came here after the pogroms, then they moved north to New York—to Brooklyn, I’d guess—where larger and safer Jewish communities were developing.”

She nodded. “You’re right—or mostly correct, anyway. But this area is a lot more complex than that.”

“Most places are.”

“What do you know about the Pine Barrens as a whole?” she asked.

I shrugged. “Bits and pieces. I was a kid and we came here. But look, instead of quizzing me, why not cut to it?”

“Context first,” she said. “The Jersey Pine Barrens is the biggest surviving forest on the eastern seaboard south of Maine’s North Woods. We’re talking about more than a million acres of forest, and half of that is permanently preserved. It’s also a truly unique place. It has so many unique geological and natural features and history that it’s like a lost world of biological diversity. It’s bigger than either Yosemite or Grand Canyon national parks. It makes up twenty-two percent of Jersey’s land mass.”

“Didn’t know any of that.”

“There are lots of reasons this place is misunderstood, and why it wasn’t overdeveloped and spoiled. And why it’s so important.” She began ticking items off on her fingers. “The sandy, acidic soil was unsuited to farming as most Europeans knew it, and so they left the land largely untouched. Beneath that soil is a natural reservoir of bacterially sterile, chemically pure water that’s as uncontaminated as rainwater or melted glacial ice. This water, tinted like tea from tannins from cedar trees and iron from the ground, was once prized by sea captains to take along on voyages because it stayed potable longer than any other water.” She paused. “Remember that part. The sea captains.”

I tapped my skull and nodded.

“The animal diversity is extreme, and we’re always finding new species of birds, insects, bacteria, you name it. The Barrens are also a natural refuge for rare species of wildlife and plants that have been wiped out elsewhere. As a result, it’s been designated a UNESCO International Biosphere Reserve.”

“This is context how…?”

“Hush now. This all matters.”

I mimed zipping my mouth shut.

“There are groups of people living here whose bloodlines go back centuries. The Lenape indigenous peoples, of course, but also the Pineys. Many of them were Quakers expelled from their meetings for fighting in the Revolution, Hessian soldiers fleeing General Washington, Tory loyalists known as the Refugees who decamped from Pennsylvania and New York during the Revolution, and plenty of outlaws, smugglers, and pirates.”

“I’m guessing pirates are going to be waiting for us after you finish your dissertation.”

She made a face but continued. “Archaeologists love the Barrens because of all the industries that sprang up here and then faded away. All through the Pinelands there were small, medium, and large factories for charcoal-making, glassmaking, woodcutting and cabinetry. In fact, the writing desk at which Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence was made from local wood.”

“That’s actually pretty cool.”

“Disease nerds like me dig this place because it’s a soup made from all the diseases brought here by travelers, immigrants, outlaws, and so on. A lot of ships touched here, and those sailors carried every kind of disease.”

“That’s fun for the whole family.”

“And, of course,” she said, “there’s the local monster.”

“Yup. Jersey Devil. Which is where the hockey team gets its name.”

“You’re a hockey fan?”

“Actually, no. If I want to see grown men punch each other I’ll watch boxing. I’m into more civilized sports. Baseball is my life.”

“Phillies?”

“Orioles, please,” I said. “I’m from Baltimore.”

“I’ll try to forgive you for that. But, yes, the Leeds Devil, or Jersey Devil, is the second most popular cryptid in America.”

“Beaten to first by Bigfoot?” I asked.

She nodded. “Though my zoologist friends tell me that Bigfoot is deeply improbable because of how many members of a species it would take to maintain a healthy population, and the complete absurdity of no one ever finding scat, bones, or—well—any reliable evidence.”

“Can’t the same be said of the Jersey Devil?”

“Not really. The Pine Barrens are so densely wooded, with large sections virtually impassable, that small to medium animals could exist and thrive without easy detection. And that’s despite the description of the Devil—a creature with a goat’s head, the wings of a bat, cloven hooves, and a forked tail. There are lurid tales of the JD tearing people apart, slaughtering livestock, and spreading sickness just through its breath. Lot of folks in this particular part of the Barrens say that it’s the protector of these woods, or of something in these woods. Everyone has a different opinion about what it might be protecting. Some say that because it was born to a human woman but then transformed into a monster, it hates people. A jealousy thing. Others insist it’s a noble thing, a true protector of Mother Nature’s purity.”

“Which sounds a lot like a comic book. Swamp Thing and so on.”

“I don’t read comics,” she said. “The park rangers and local biologists believe that if it’s real, then it’s likely a large bird whose markings make it look weird. There are plenty of examples in nature. They’re called crypsis.”

“Sure… the death’s head moth, stick bugs, and like that.”

“Yes.”

I considered for a moment. “But you don’t think there’s an actual monster in these woods, right?”

Aggie took an unusually long time with that. “Jury’s out. The Lenape called the Barrens Popuessing—place of the dragon. But they also believed that it was a protector… just not of people. Every group that’s lived here has had very strong beliefs that there was something supernatural about these woods, and I can see their point. And, yes, that’s me—a scientist—saying that. Once you spend enough time out here, a lot of things become possible that are absurd back in the big city.”

I nodded. “Oh, in my line of work I’ve caught a glimpse or two of what my grandmother used to call the larger world. But when do we get to the pirates?”

She finished her beer and dug two fresh ones from the cooler. “Right now,” she said.

But I held up a hand and turned, staring into the woods. “Wait…”

“What is it?”

“Thought I heard…”

“Heard what?”

“Not sure. Wait here.” I got up and walked over to the wall of trees that faced the half-circle of trailers. I had a small-frame nine clipped to my belt and I nearly pulled it. Instead, I stood for a long moment, trying to connect my conscious mind with whatever triggered me. I’d told Aggie it was something I heard, but that wasn’t really true. It was more a feeling. Of being watched. Of being seen.

“Joe…?” she called.

I waited another few seconds before I decided that my senses—still raw from all I’d been through on that last case—were just misfiring. I exhaled to relax my muscles, and it worked. Kind of.

When I turned, I paused once more to hear if something was there, maybe having gone still and silent while I was looking. But… there was nothing.

I was almost positive of that.

As I sat down, I smiled. “Where were we? Oh yeah… pirates.”

5

It heard the voices and followed them along its secret ways.

Insects did not fall silent as it passed. Nor did the singing birds. He was of the forest as much as they were.

Those voices, though… they were not of the woods. They belonged to the others. The outsiders. The cutters and choppers and diggers and burners. Nothing that lived in the vast Pinelands was their ally.

He was not their ally.

His curiosity was not hopeful, as was the case with foolish young animals.

No, his curiosity was cautious and it was hateful.

6

“We’re pretty close to Barnegat Bay,” she said after a moment. “And that’s where William Kidd was supposed to have buried some treasure. Do you know about Captain Kidd?”

“Not much beyond what I’ve seen in movies. All I know is that he was a pirate. Didn’t know he was around here. I thought he was a terror on the high seas or the Spanish Main or whatever.”

“Not exactly. The Spanish Main included Spanish Florida and New Spain—meaning what is now modern-day Texas, Mexico, all of Central America, and the east coast of South America.”

“I stand corrected.”

“William Kidd was born in Dundee, Scotland, but grew up in New York City. He was not technically a pirate but a privateer who sailed under a letter of marque. That was a license issued by a government that authorized a private person to pursue, attack, and capture vessels of a foreign state that was at war with the issuer. It was a protection against accusations of piracy. Any ship a privateer captured judged by an admiralty court as a legitimate prize, with its ownership and cargo becoming the legal property of the privateer.”

“Got it.”

“That said, because of shifts in political power, he was later condemned as a pirate, put on trial, convicted, and executed. There was outrage, of course, but there’s always outrage. Just as there are always conspiracy theories and urban legends about the fortunes amassed in such a profession. He operated in the late seventeenth century, and in the 1690s took plenty of prizes. Opinions vary on exactly how much, but in academic circles, those in the know say it was quite a lot. Gold bars, silver ingots, uncut precious stones, coins, polished gemstones, and ornate jewelry. Like most privateers—and most pirates, for that matter—he didn’t carry his fortune around with him in anything as vulnerable as a wooden ship. It was not uncommon for such sailors to designate remote spots to store treasure during long voyages and to collect them later.”

“I vaguely remember something about Cape May being a likely spot for that.”

“To a degree. Sailors stopped there for fresh water and other supplies. Not as many pirates burying treasure, though, because first British and later American naval ships were common in the area. However, Barnegat Bay was more remote.”

“So he buried his loot around here?” I asked.

She shrugged. “There are all kinds of false trails and people have followed every lead, no matter how thin. There have been a lot of treasure hunts on Oak Island in Nova Scotia, in Suffolk County, Gardiners Island near Long Island, and elsewhere, including near the banks of the Rahway River up near Staten Island. Not to mention supposed burial sites along the African Coast. However, this part of the Barrens is really tied to those legends. And there have been artifacts found all through this region. It’s like one big archaeological site, complete with legends, mysteries, truths and lies, and all of it. History is all around us, Joe, and what we know is nothing compared to what’s waiting to be found. And what’s trying not to be found.”

“Trying not to be found? Not what I’d expect a scientist to say.”

“Why? We can be superstitious, too. Especially when you’re digging into the past of a place as troubled and complex as the Pine Barrens. Out here archaeology walks hand-in-hand with folklore. After all, a lot of tall tales and urban legends are built on the bones of half-forgotten truths.”

“You should have your own Nat Geo show.”

She made a face. “Point is, our team from U of P was following a really solid lead in this part of the Barrens. You can feel the past, and one of the things that makes it so creepy is that these woods—the raw and hungry power of the Pinelands—consumes whatever is left untouched. Whole towns, huge factories, farms and homes… they are devoured by the weeds and trees. A person could walk past or even over hundreds of years of ruins and never know it. Mother Nature likes to keep her secrets.”

“I can understand that, but how does that relate to your colleagues dying? You seem to be taking the scenic route getting to the point. I get that context matters, but what is the context here?”

“I think our team found Captain Kidd’s treasure,” she said. “In fact, I’m sure of it.”

I grunted but said nothing. Waiting for the other shoe to drop.

“But that treasure is cursed,” she said.

7

It perched there in plain sight and yet unseen.

It did not yet wish to be seen.

When that happened, things would change. There would be screams and there would be blood.

It waited and it listened.

8

“When you say cursed…” I began, and let it hang.

“Yes.”

“I mean, feel free to elaborate. Cursed is a big word.”

Aggie gave me a penetrating look. “Did Crow tell you how the team members died?”

“Not really. Something about bad food or something. And that where they died was a crime scene. I didn’t get the impression he knew too many details.”

“He does, actually,” she said. “Maybe he was afraid of scaring you off.”

“I don’t scare easily.”

“Brave man.”

“No. Experienced,” I countered. “Been there, done that, have the souvenir keychain.”

She stood. “Fair enough. Let’s see if you’re as good a cop as Crow says you are.”

“We can take my car.”

“No. It’s walkable.”

With that she knocked back the rest of her beer, set the bottle down, turned and headed off into the woods. I shrugged and followed, patting the holstered pistol as I did. It had a comforting solidity.

9

It saw them rise and go, and knew at once where they were headed.

It growled low in its throat.

Then it leapt from the tree branch and followed. Hate was igniting rage in its heart. Rage awoke hunger.

It flew from tree to tree, making only the sounds a bird would make.

10

We took a narrow trail that had clearly been a game trail widened by human feet. Some of the shoe marks were of the kind police and EMTs might make. Different from the variety of sneakers, hiking boots, and Timberlands that would have been worn by the university team. Some of the returning footprints were pressed more deeply into the sandy soil. Stretcher carriers.

Aggie walked half a pace ahead, turning her head now and then to speak over her shoulder. “What do you know about the Jersey Devil?”

“Just that description we discussed, and that it’s supposed to have been spotted in these woods for a lot of years.”

“Centuries,” she said. “There have been thousands of eyewitness reports of it since the middle of the eighteenth century. Those sightings, by the way, contradict several of the various origin stories for the creature. And before you ask, there are about a dozen official stories. John McPhee’s book told one, but there are a lot of variations on it, and some of them predate the white man’s footsteps in these woods. The Lenni Lenape have legends of it going back to their creation stories, though I suspect it was added to that older tale by new generations. The whole whisper-down-the-wind thing goes both ways. Lots of retrofitting into documented history. That said, there are some pretty well authenticated reports of sightings. Joseph Bonaparte, brother of Napoleon, was in exile here in Jersey and he wrote about it in his diary. Commodore Stephen Decatur shot it with a cannon, and it got up and flew away. His account is in an official report.”

“I read about that somewhere,” I said.

“And the Devil isn’t the only creepy thing about these woods. There are a ton of ghost stories. There’s the Black Doctor Ghost—supposedly the spirit of an African American physician who was not allowed to practice official medicine at the time, but did it anyway, and was murdered for it. He’s still believed to be out here. There’s the Golden-Haired Girl often seen looking out to sea for a sailor who drowned and can never return. Stories like that. And apparitions. White stags, black dogs, the usual menagerie of animals that are either crisis apparitions or appear as warnings. Hell, even the ghost of Captain Kidd has been rumored to haunt this area… and in the company of the Jersey Devil.”

“Ha! Hadn’t heard that one. What’s the Devil in that story? A pet?”

“Or a protector.”

“Protecting treasure?”

“Maybe,” she said. “Obviously I don’t know for sure.”

“Place is creepy, I’ll give it that,” I said, ducking under a hairy vine. Something brushed the back of my neck and I scratched it away. The forest was thick with insects of every hungry kind. When I looked at my fingers, there was a small smear of blood.

“You okay?” she asked, frowning.

“Yeah. Something bit me. Little bastard.”

Aggie looked at it and her frown deepened. “Looks more like a scratch.”

“Thorny tree branches are also bastards.”

She didn’t comment, but looked up into the canopy of pine boughs above us. Then she turned and moved on, hurrying her pace. I looked up too, but all I saw was forest.

I hurried, too.

11

It watched them as they looked directly at it and saw nothing.

Of course they saw nothing.

When they half-ran into the woods, it lifted one hand to its mouth. A long, forked tongue whipped out and licked the drops of blood from a single claw. There was so much to be learned from blood.

And it was so delicious.

12

We emerged from the shadows and stepped into a patch of sunlight that filled a large clearing. There were ragged yellow streamers of crime scene tape fluttering here and there. Signs nailed to trees announced that this was a protected archaeological site, with numbers to call for more information.

A dry creek bed rang through the middle of the clearing, and spanning it was a very old stone bridge. A few ruined walls and one intact arched doorway stood among the wild grasses and weeds. Heaps of stones stood in a row on one side of the dry creek, and on the other were durable plastic worktables, some of which were overturned, while others were littered with potsherds, various bits of the kind of debris that makes scholars happy but are meaningless to the unschooled onlooker.

“Oh look,” I said with false enthusiasm. “Rocks.”

Faded into shadows was the corner of what had once been a house. Modest but sturdy, with walls made from stone and timber. There wasn’t much of it left, but enough to get a sense of what it must have looked like a few hundred years ago—a roomy cottage beside a stream, one corner only yards from the stone bridge. Now it was all overgrown and nearly reclaimed by the forest. In another hundred years there would be nothing to see. Even now I could tell that the research team had trimmed the vines and wild shrubs back, and used a corner of the inside of the house to store plastic tubs of supplies and set up a port-a-potty.

Aggie went over to the bridge and squatted down, gesturing to exposed blocks used as foundation stones. They were of a different kind of rock than the rest of the span—pale pink and very dense.

“See these?” she asked. “These pink blocks here are all that’s left of a much older bridge. Although rock can’t be carbon-dated the way organic matter can, we have some decent methods of estimating where this was quarried and when the original bridge was built, and it’s definitely from the mid-1600s.”

“Sophisticated for that era in these woods, I’d have thought,” I said.

“Yes. And no one knows who built it. There are a few structures made from the same kind of pink granite littered through here. But what’s odd is that this is without doubt Pompton Pink granite, which was mined in the nineteenth century and was unknown before that. And yet… the older portion of this bridge was laid down here at least three hundred years ago, and likely longer ago. Three-fifty or better.”

“How’s that make sense?”

“You tell me,” she said, straightening. “The team came here to excavate this whole area, hoping to find some debris left over from whomever built it. There are rumors going back hundreds of years that Captain Kidd hid his greatest treasure in this area, and that it was by an ‘old bridge.’ Old. Like this one. And close to Barnegat Bay, which is close. The team here thought that they might have actually found the spot. It was all kept hush-hush, of course. They hand-picked the team as much for their ability to keep their mouths shut as for their technical skills in the field.”

“Okay. And…?”

“The team began by examining that bridge, and they established that the foundation structure was put in place a lot longer ago than whoever built this one. So, following standard practices, the team members began looking for old trash pits. There’s usually at least one in places where people lived, and they found a couple here. That one over there—see it? —is from the mid-nineteenth century, and that’s definitely when the newer part of the bridge was built.”

I walked over and stared into an uninformative pit. “Yes. A hole.”

“All of the useful artifacts were removed from it. But the other one, the one closer to the oldest part of the bridge… well… that’s where things get weird.”

“Show me,” I said.

She gave me another of her penetrating looks, and I could almost hear her mind working, but she merely nodded and gestured for me to follow. We went back into the woods but not very far. I could see a second clearing, but there was crime scene tape wrapped around the whole space. Someone had used a roll of blue Tyvek sheeting to create a walkway to and from the pit, and it was covered with uncountable muddy footprints.

Aggie stopped just outside the tape. “Don’t go any closer,” she said.

I stood beside her and saw there was a second pit. It was a bit larger and the edges showed visible tool marks. Recent ones. However, all around the pit were little orange flags stuck into the dirt.

I turned and looked and saw others like them scattered throughout the woods.

“Those are evidence markers,” I said.

“Yes. That’s where they found the bodies.”

13

It leaned out over a thick limb and stared down at the two people.

They were there.

Right there.

Anger rippled through its body, tightening every muscle, sparking both an ancient hunger and a deep loathing. Saliva dripped from its teeth and fell all the way down to splash soundlessly on the ground between the man and woman.

Neither saw it.

That made the watcher smile.

14

“I’m surprised they left the evidence flags behind,” I said. “They usually collect those.”

“Usually,” she murmured.

“How’d they die?” I asked.

“You want the medical examiner’s opinion or mine?”

“Should I be worried that they are not the same opinion?”

She didn’t meet my eyes. “Maybe.”

“Fuck. Tell me anyway.”

“The ME says it was clostridium botulinum.”

I frowned. “Botulism? Food poisoning?”

“Kind of.”

“What’s that mean?”

“Okay,” she said as she stepped back and shoved her hands into her back pockets. “Bullet points. First, botulinum toxins are among the most lethal substances known. It’s a bacterium that produces dangerous toxins under low-oxygen conditions. Which means it can thrive in pits like this, graves, and other places. It’s not always a food-borne pathogen.”

I took a step or two back myself.

“Botulinum toxins block nerve functions,” she said. “That can lead to respiratory and muscular paralysis.”

“And you disagree with the medical examiner?”

“Not on that part. Nor on the fact that this is likely a case of the team here breathing in aerosolized botulinum toxin.”

“Wait, it can be airborne?” I took three more quick steps backward.

“It can be under certain circumstances,” she said. “It’s a truly awful thing, and it’s a challenge to trace back to source. The time to onset of inhalational botulism can’t be estimated very easily because so few cases are known. Most are accidental cases that were lab accidents, and some others are tied to intranasal use of cocaine and in other limited circumstances. However, if done deliberately it could produce an outbreak even without the usual common dietary exposure. My point is that it’s not a natural occurrence.”

“And you think it was deliberate?”

“The ME and I disagreed on that point, yes.”

“What makes you think someone did this? What are we talking here? A rival research team? Some kind of vicious prankster? A serial killer with a Junior Mad Scientist Home Lab Kit?”

“We’ll get to that.”

“Then listen, Aggie, I feel like you’re dicking me around here. Crow said this was likely a crime scene. You seem to agree, despite the ME’s findings. Okay, medical examiners have been wrong plenty of times. They don’t fiddle with the whole motive and opportunity part of the equation. So, if you have a theory, then let’s have it.”

“I’d rather show you and let you draw your own inferences.”

She moved well back from the tape, then stepped over the Tyvek, knelt, and carefully lifted a section away from the ground. Then she crabbed sideways, raising more of it until she exposed a section about fifteen feet long. I came over, careful not to tread on the exposed ground. I stood there, bent forward, hands behind my back, studying the ground. There was a confusion of footprints, and I saw the same mix of civilian shoes and those worn by cops and EMTs. But then I saw what Aggie wanted me to see.

I saw what Crow sent me here to see.

I squatted down very slowly until I sat on my upraised heels.

“What in the wide blue fuck…?” I breathed.

In many places the human footprints obscured them entirely, but here and there I saw clean impressions. Each was about seven inches long, and the soft ground took a clear mark, showing two distinct hooves.

I looked up at Aggie, whose face was now a scowl of fear and worry.

“They almost look like goat prints,” I said. “But they’re too… too…”

“Too big, yes,” she said. “Goat hooves are around 5.6 to 6.6 centimeters. A bit over two inches. These are seven inches long. That’s too big for a goat. And they are all the same size. One animal.”

I stood. “Okay, so a wild goat wandered through here. If you’re trying to sell me on this being the Jersey Devil, then a wandering goat isn’t going to do it.”

“You’re supposed to be a good cop, Joe,” she said. “Keep looking. Tell me what you see.”

I stood there. At first, I felt like I was being punked. Then I felt like I was blind because all I saw were human and animal tracks. Then I saw something that changed the entire shape of the day. I could feel Aggie watching me as I bent over again, staring at those prints.

At those goddamn prints.

I moved sideways, picking up more sections of Tyvek until nearly eighty feet of ground was uncovered.

“No,” I said.

Aggie was on the other side of the sheeting, saying nothing. Watching me. Seeing what I saw because she’d already seen it. She dug into a pocket and produced a tape measure and handed it across to me. Our eyes met briefly and it was clear she knew what I’d seen.

I used the tape measure. I spent ten minutes taking measurements as I moved up and down, checking and re-checking.

“No,” I said again. But it sounded like yes to me.

“Say it,” she said softly.

“The prints…”

She nodded.

“There’s two sets. Not two goats. I mean, all of these prints were made by two feet. By something that walked on two feet.”

“Yes,” she said. “I said as much to the police, the forensics people, the ME, and my dean. They all think I’m in shock. But I’m not.”

“Jesus Christ,” I said, looking around. A shovel stood leaning against a tree and I picked it up, holding it in two tight fists. The day was the same, but the world had changed.

15

It gathered itself. Patience warred with anger; hunger warred with caution.

They were too close. The man had a shovel. Was he going to dig? Was he going to commit the same intrusion, the same sin? Would they never leave this place alone?

It hated them for being here. It hated the shovel. It hated these violators.

It flexed its claws and clacked its teeth and ached to swoop down. Not to rend, but to breathe on them.

To do what had to be done.

16

“It has to be a stunt,” I said. “Someone wearing shoe coverings with hoof molds on the bottom. False footprints. Has to be.”

“Sure,” she said in a way that meant the opposite. “Now let me tell you the rest, and then you tell me if I’m in shock. Or crazy.”

I didn’t want to hear anything else, but I stood there anyway. My right hand was on my hip below the hem of my Hawaiian shirt. Almost close enough to touch my gun.

“Captain Kidd may have known about the bridge,” she said. “Someone else built it, maybe some settlers who had the right tools. Kidd may have heard the rumor and thought a spot this remote and with such a solid landmark would be ideal. There was no house here at that time.”

I said nothing.

“He came out here and buried his gold and jewels, and then went back to the sea. He didn’t stay here. However, there were outbreaks of disease aboard his ships. Cholera in one case, but on one voyage a lot of his men died from an unknown disease. We don’t have bodies we can exhume to test for clostridium botulinum. But… well, you see where I’m going.”

I said nothing.

“The legend of the Jersey Devil is older than the most popular origin stories. The Lenni Lenape spoke of it. The dragon in the woods. I asked Jonatha about that… why a dragon. She said that it was a European word applied by early researchers to try and explain the kind of monster the indigenous people believed in. She dug up the transcripts and had a Lenape elder re-translate. The actual meaning wasn’t really a dragon at all. It translates closer to demon’s breath.” She looked hard at me. “Breath, Joe.”

I said nothing.

“But even so, that house there?” She pointed back to the clearing. “That was where Abigail Leeds lived. Not Mary Leeds, which most accounts claim was the woman who gave birth to the creature, but her great-grandmother. That’s where the real legend began. With her. A woman living out here with a dozen children and a husband who left her when she was pregnant with a thirteenth. It was he, not she, who said that if she ever had a thirteenth child it would be a devil. Later reports credited Mary Leeds with that, but no. It was Abigail.”

I stared at the house but still could not speak.

“Abigail Leeds died here. Almost all of her children died here. They’re all buried along the stream. All near the bridge. It was in Abigail’s diary. In her declining years she wrote that the bridge crossed from Earth to Heaven. Abigail herself is buried near here, too.”

“Aggie…” I began, but she shook her head.

“We’ll never know the truth. Of course not, but look at what’s around us. You used to be a cop, Joe, so look at the evidence. This place is supposed to be cursed. Maybe it is. Not by magic, but by something. One remote place and all this death. The Leeds home, the bridge, Kidd’s lost treasure, the sickness he took back to his ship, the inhalation botulism that killed the team, and those hoof prints. You tell me, Joe… what does it all mean?”

17

The creature prepared to leap down.

It would be so easy. Tense and leap. Draw a breath as it fell… and then exhale.

Only that.

No claws and fangs.

Breath.

18

I looked down at the shovel in my hands.

And then I heard something.

Behind me. Above me. In the trees.

The feeling of being watched returned. And now I felt that scratch on the back of my neck throb. Like a warning.

I think that’s when I understood.

It was a puzzle missing more than half the pieces. My cop mind wanted to know it all, but that was not going to happen. This was a puzzle no one had ever figured out.

I understood as much as I needed to know, though.

The shovel was a heavy weight in my hands. Solid and tough and…

I let it fall.

Aggie watched it fall. Then she looked at me, at my side. Waiting for me to draw my Glock. Waiting for me to fight. That’s what Crow wanted as much as he wanted me to investigate.

Aggie already had enough pieces of the puzzle for her to know.

I thought I had a few more.

Kidd came and dug a hole and buried his treasure. He went away sick.

The Leeds family came and built a house and had all those babies. Most of them died here. The ones who fled probably never came back. Old Abigail died here. Why did she live so long? Maybe it wasn’t her hands that dug the foundation of the house. All she had done was bury her beloved dead. It made me wonder if her husband actually left at all.

Who, I wonder, had buried Abigail? I bet I knew whose footprints were all around her grave.

Then a factory was built. Was it a failed business, or did something happen to those workers? Sickness, perhaps. One of those strange plagues that came out of nowhere and wiped them all out? History books of the settlers are filled with those kinds of inexplicable tragedies.

Or, maybe not so inexplicable.

And then came the university team. Digging holes. Digging, digging, digging.

Until they all suddenly died.

I looked up at the trees. There was nothing to see.

Nothing that wanted to be seen.

I bent and picked up the shovel with one hand, and held my other up, palm out. As I straightened, I took the tool in both hands, wound up, screwed my feet into the dirt and hurled the shovel as far away from me as I could. It vanished into the woods.

Then I held both hands up.

“Back away,” I said softly. “Don’t touch anything. Just back away.”

She did not argue. She didn’t say a word.

We backed away until we found that game trail, and then we turned and walked back to the camp. Not ran. We didn’t want to offer that kind of challenge. We walked.

It took about ten thousand years.

“Do you have your car keys?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“We’re driving out. Right now.”

She nodded. There were tears on her cheeks. We got into our cars and drove out, her following me. We drove all the way to Hammonton before we stopped. Then we sat on a public bench on a busy street for over an hour.

Neither of us spoke.

She left first. I left a half hour later. I never saw her or heard from her again. I learned from Jonatha that, given the tragedy and the potential for more infection, the site was closed. No one has gone back. I’ll bet those trailers are there. How long would it take the forest to devour them, too?

I drove back to Pine Deep, packed my stuff, but then I sat in my hotel room for the rest of the day. And all through the night.

19

It watched them go.

Slowly, slowly, the hunger and the hatred ebbed away.

Slowly, slowly, the rage melted into nothingness.

It threw back its head and uttered a long, low cry. It sounded like the lonely cry of a blue heron. Only the forest knew that it was not.

Only the forest knew.

REHISTORY

CAVAN SCOTT

The Ashridge Consortium. File: OPT .0631

Transcript: BBC Breakfast, Monday,
21st December 2026

Timestamp: 6.00 a.m.

Camera opens on the iconic BBC Breakfast red sofa. Callum Murray, former Scottish football commentator, sits in his customary place next to his co-host, twenty-seven-year-old up-and-comer Mia Suh.

Mia Suh: Good morning and welcome to a special edition of BBC Breakfast with Mia Suh and Callum Murray.

Callum Murray: Our headlines today…

Footage of Joan Fisher, Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology arriving at No. 10 Downing Street.

Callum Murray: The Government defends its US social media ban, citing significant security concerns as diplomatic tensions rise.

The picture changes to grainy footage of rioters going head-to-head with armed police, an officer tackling a hooded youth in a balaclava with considerable force.

Mia Suh: Fears mount of further unrest on British streets as the instigators of the Branwich race riots face sentencing at Wynborough Crown Court.

We cut to an outside broadcast. Respected BBC news anchor Marcus Adeyemi stands beside a stark black-and-white image of Stonehenge as it used to be.

Marcus Adeyemi: And here, on Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire, we await the dawning of a new age—and a bold new look—for one of Britain’s most famous landmarks.

Back in the studio, weather presenter Orla Dunne smiles warmly despite the snowy graphic behind her.

Orla Dunne: It’s a cold start to the winter solstice as temperatures plummet across the country, with frost blanketing much of England and severe snow moving in from Scotland and the North. Full details of the day’s chilling conditions coming up.

The BBC Breakfast titles roll before we return to Murray and Suh seated in front of an AI-generated graphic of BBC Media City.

Callum Murray: It’s Monday, 21st December. Our main story today: Billionaire Sebastian Langley’s controversial ReHistory project is being unveiled at Stonehenge in Wiltshire.

Mia Suh: Langley’s purchase of the ancient monument just three years ago sparked outrage among historians and conservationists across the UK and beyond.

Callum Murray: But the initial backlash was nothing compared to the furore when the forty-two-year-old entrepreneur and founder of Langley Industries announced plans to restore Stonehenge to its former glory—removing many of the original stones with meticulously crafted replicas, creating a precise reconstruction of how the former World Heritage Site would have looked 3,500 years ago.

Mia Suh: The project was originally due to be completed earlier this year, in time for the summer solstice, when Stonehenge traditionally becomes a mecca for druids, historians and revellers celebrating the longest day of the year.

Callum Murray: However, numerous delays—and unsuccessful legal challenges—have postponed Langley’s grand unveiling until today, coinciding instead with the shortest day of the year.

Mia Suh: Marcus Adeyemi is at Stonehenge now with the man of the hour, Sebastian Langley himself.

The picture cuts to Adeyemi, standing in front of mist-shrouded fields. His scarf is snug around his neck, his thick unbranded jacket zipped tight against the cold. As he speaks, his breath is clearly visible in the frigid early morning air.

Marcus Adeyemi: Good morning, Mia. And yes, we had hoped to speak with Sebastian Langley, but unfortunately, the man behind what some are hailing as a great work—and others, an act of cultural vandalism—has yet to arrive here at Stonehenge.

The camera follows Adeyemi as he walks towards a blonde woman in her mid-twenties wearing a smart navy-blue winter coat. A silk scarf, the same crimson as Langley Tech’s corporate branding, is looped neatly around her neck.

Marcus Adeyemi: We are joined instead by Kelly Rees-Jones, Mr Langley’s Head of Communications, who is braving the elements on this exceptionally cold morning.

Rees-Jones smiles, masking a shiver as the icy wind bites through her coat.

Kelly Rees-Jones: I wouldn’t miss this for the world, Marcus.

Marcus Adeyemi: And yet your employer is nowhere to be seen.

Kelly Rees-Jones: Sebastian will be here, have no doubt. Everything is proceeding exactly as planned.

Marcus Adeyemi: Plans that have faced significant opposition.

Kelly Rees-Jones: Not at all. While a small but vocal minority have tried to stand in the way of progress, the vast majority of the British public recognises the significance of what we’re doing today. Once the final stone has been raised, millions will flock to this extraordinary monument—not to see an incomplete ruin, but to experience Stonehenge as it was meant to be, thanks to the generosity of the Langley Technology Group.

Marcus Adeyemi: Millions who will flock to the Langley-owned visitor centre… a centre which cost in the region of £57 million to build…

Kelly Rees-Jones: The Sebastian Langley Visitor Experience is a state-of-the-art facility that transports our guests back in time, providing an unparalleled insight into this visionary project.

Adeyemi turns back to the camera.

Marcus Adeyemi: Of course, £57 million is but a drop in the ocean to the full cost of the Stonehenge ReHistory project—believed to have cost a staggering £600 million. And that’s not including the £2.1 billion Langley paid to fast-track the equally controversial Stonehenge tunn—

The screen freezes mid-sentence, Adeyemi jerking unnaturally as digital artifacts flash across the feed.

Mia Suh’s calm, steady voice cuts across the juddering image.

Mia Suh: (in studio) Apologies. We seem to have lost Marcus for a moment. Just a few technical difficulties…

We cut back to Murray and Suh on the sofa.

Callum Murray: As we try to reconnect, let’s turn to Professor Ravi Shah, joining us from the University of Harrowdown, just a hop, skip and a jump from Stonehenge.

Murray turns to a live feed of the fifty-seven-year-old academic seated before a neatly arranged collection of archaeological textbooks.

Callum Murray: Professor Shah, you’ve opposed the ReHistory project from the start, haven’t you?

Ravi Shah: I have, yes. Stonehenge belongs to the nation and should never have been sold to a publicity hound like Sebastian Langley. And that’s before we get to the spectacle unfolding today…

Callum Murray: But sold it was, thanks in part to the generous donations Langley made to heritage projects across the UK—museums and historic sites that faced closure due to funding cuts the government claimed were unavoidable.

As Marcus was saying before he was cut off, Langley also funded the rapid completion of the Stonehenge tunnel, a project that rerouted the busy A303 underground, diverting traffic away from the monument.

Campaigners had long argued that the A303 was a ‘scar on our cultural landscape’, and that its removal has reunited Stonehenge with its ancient surroundings. Campaigners—

Shah adjusts his horn-rimmed glasses as he interrupts.

Ravi Shah: Campaigners that included me, yes. And while the tunnel has numerous benefits, the cost has been far greater than any of us could have imagined. The heritage we fought to protect has now been sacrificed to this harebrained vanity project. None of us wanted this. None whatsoever.

Many of the stones that have stood upon the plains for millennia have been lost, replaced by freshly carved imposters that have effectively erased the history that we hold so dear.

Mia Suh: Hardly lost, Professor Shah. Any stones replaced in the reconstruction have been relocated to the new visitor centre.

Ravi Shah: Visitor Experience, Mia. Let’s not forget what Ms Rees-Jones said. No expense spared—and to hell with the consequences.

Callum Murray glances at his notes, flipping through the pages as he speaks.

Callum Murray: The ‘imposters’ you mentioned have been crafted by artisans from all corners of the British Isles, using the same materials that would’ve been used all those years ago. The bluestones from Wales and the Altar Stone from north-east Scotland…

Ravi Shah: I’m sorry? Am I talking to Sebastian Langley’s public relations department?

Callum Murray: I’m only saying—

Ravi Shah: You’re saying exactly what Sebastian Langley wants you to say. What he wants everyone to hear. This bullshit that the ReHistory project aims to ‘reunite’ a fragmented Britain—

Mia Suh: Professor—

Ravi Shah: This has nothing to do with Britain and everything to do with the arrogance of a man obsessed with leaving his mark on the world.

We cut back to the hosts, Suh’s hand dropping from her earpiece as she swiftly regains her composure.

Mia Suh: We apologise for the… colourful language used by Professor Shah. Emotions are running high as the final stage of the ReHistory project approaches. And I’m pleased to say we can now return to Wiltshire, where Marcus Adeyemi is covering today’s event. Marcus, how’s the cold down there?

The feed cuts back to Adeyemi, scarf now loose, jacket partially unzipped. The mist that once marked his breath is noticeably absent.

Marcus Adeyemi: Well, I’m not sure what Orla will say about it, Mia, but the temperature here at Stonehenge seems to be rising. The frost on the fields surrounding us seems to be thawing and… if you can hear that… the birds of Salisbury Plain are unusually loud for this time of day.

Adeyemi pauses, letting the surprisingly harsh birdsong take over. This isn’t the cheery warble of the morning chorus, but a discordant cry, as if the birds are sounding an alarm.

Adeyemi starts walking, talking over his shoulder.

Marcus Adeyemi: A remarkable soundtrack to our morning, I’m sure you’ll agree. And one punctuated by the noise of the growing crowd of spectators now being allowed on the site by Langley security.

Another cry is heard off camera. Not a bird this time, but a man shouting, his words indistinct, but the tone unmistakably angry.

Marcus Adeyemi: There’s an undeniable energy in the air—anticipation and excitement over what is about to take place when, in a couple of hours, the sun rises on this, the newly restored Stonehenge.

The camera sweeps past Adeyemi to focus on Sebastian Langley’s new vision of Stonehenge. Some stones remain the original monoliths that have stood for millennia—pitted, weathered and uneven—but the vast majority are new, their surfaces polished to a stark, almost unnatural white under the glare of industrial spotlights.

For a moment, the picture glitches and then rights itself, Adeyemi narrating over the shots that linger on the refurbished monument.

Marcus Adeyemi: (off camera) And here we have it, seen on television for the first time. This entire area has been subject to a strict media blackout enforced by the Langley Group, with many journalists, both professional and amateur, claiming that their drones have been shot d—

Again, the image freezes. Callum Murray is quick to fill the unexpected pause in commentary.

Callum Murray: (voiceover, in studio) And it appears that we are experiencing more issues with our outside broadcast. I hope it’s not all those birds. Ha-ha. But as we try to get back through to Marcus, let’s take in that majestic image. Truly a sight to behold.

Mia Suh: (voiceover, in studio) Indeed it is, Callum. One hundred and fifty stones in total, restored to their original position, a stark contrast to the mere sixty-three stones that survived from the original circle. It’s incredible to think that all this has happened in just three years—

The frozen image on screen suddenly jumps to show Adeyemi standing in the circle’s inner sanctum. He is in mid-flow, seemingly unaware that the broadcast had been interrupted.

Marcus Adeyemi: —the last piece to be added to this gigantic jigsaw puzzle…

Callum Murray: (talking over him) Ah, we seem to be back with Marcus. Marcus, we lost you there for a moment—

Adeyemi ignores the comment, striding purposefully towards a large slab that is laid flat on the ground at the centre of the structure.

Marcus Adeyemi: The Altar Stone, or rather a replica of the original which, as past visitors to the site may know, lay half buried beneath two toppled sarsens. This six-tonne reproduction has been carved from the same sandstone as the original, sourced all the way from north-east Scotland.

Adeyemi pauses in front of the megalith. Thick ropes have been looped around the slab.

Marcus Adeyemi: For many years, it was believed that the original Altar Stone lay flat, here in the centre of the henge, but modern thinking suggests otherwise—that it, in fact, stood upright, ready to welcome the morning sun at solstice celebrations like today. So, just before dawn, this final stone will be raised into position and set into a shallow foundation hole, where, thanks to its immense weight, it will stand for generations to come.

Stonehenge will be complete for the first time in over a thousand years.

Mia Suh: (in studio) And what machinery will be used to position the stone, Marcus?

Adeyemi stares expectantly at the camera, waiting for Suh’s scripted enquiry.

Mia Suh: (in studio) Marcus?

Adeyemi puts a finger to his ear, his eyes narrowing before he continues anyway.

Marcus Adeyemi: Now, you may be wondering what modern marvel of machinery will be used to complete the circle, and the answer is—none at all. While most of these stones have been erected using twenty-first-century cranes, the brand-new Altar Stone will be raised using the same tools that were available to Stonehenge’s original architects four thousand years ago.

The camera pans to Kelly Rees-Jones standing next to an elaborate pulley system connected to a sturdy wooden frame. Rees-Jones is still wrapped in her heavy winter coat and scarf, although her face appears flushed beneath the floodlights.

Marcus Adeyemi: Kelly Rees-Jones from the Langley Group has joined us again to explain this intriguing mechanism.

Kelly Rees-Jones: (laughs politely) I’m no expert, but I’ll certainly do my best. This pulley system is a perfect replica of what our researchers believe would have raised the original Altar Stone.

Marcus Adeyemi: A stone that, as I mentioned previously, weighs some six tonnes. So, what—or who—will be providing the brute strength required to lift such a dead weight?

Rees-Jones beams and steps aside, stumbling slightly on the uneven ground as she is joined by a group of familiar track-suited athletes.

Kelly Rees-Jones: None other than the best of Team GB, fresh from their impressive medal haul in Milano-Cortina earlier this year!

Adeyemi thrusts his microphone under the nose of the nearest athlete, a twenty-year-old cross-country skier with an appropriately Olympian physique.

Marcus Adeyemi: Reece Stafford, you took gold in Italy. Are you looking forward to making history once again today?

There’s a shout from off camera. Frustrated. Angry. Stafford glances towards the noise, before hesitantly turning back to Adeyemi.

Reece Stafford: Uh. Yes, of… of course. This is incredible moment for Great Britain and… um… for the entire world.

Another shout cuts through his final words.

Voice: (off camera) We must speak. You must let us speak.

The Olympians exchange uncertain glances as the camera shifts back on Adeyemi. To his side, Kelly Rees-Jones rubs her left temple, before quickly lowering her hand as she realises she’s in shot.

Marcus Adeyemi: Excitement continues to rise as the final ceremony approaches. But for now, back to you, Callum and Mia.

We cut back to the BBC studio, where Murray and Suh smile professionally down the lens.

Mia Suh: Thank you, Marcus. In our other stories this morning—

End of segment.

*   *   *

New segment. Timestamp: 7.10 a.m.

Weather presenter Orla Dunne concludes her latest bulletin, gesturing to a large map of the UK.

Orla Dunne: —those in higher regions may see a light dusting of snow, but skies will remain mostly clear overnight, offering stunning views of the stars—perfect for the longest night of the year. Just be sure to wrap up warm.

We cut back to the red sofa.

Mia Suh: Good advice from Orla there—although from what we’re hearing, temperatures are rising at Stonehenge…

The camera cuts back to Marcus Adeyemi. He has swapped his thick coat for a lighter BBC fleece.

In the background, we can hear angry chanting.

Marcus Adeyemi: Indeed it is, Mia. It could be the floodlights—or the energy of the rather passionate onlookers who have gathered to witness the final stone being dropped into position.

Adeyemi moves towards a large crowd separated from the monument by metal fencing. Among them, young revellers pump neon glow-sticks in the air, dancing enthusiastically to music played from their mobiles. As expected, a throng of druids and New Agers have also gathered, their hands raised to the heavens. But mixed into the diverse gathering is a significant number of protestors bearings placards painted with bold slogans:

‘You Can’t Buy the Past!’

‘Hands Off Our Heritage!’

‘Stonehenge isn’t BROKEN, so DON’T fix it!’

‘Sacred, Not for sale!’

Protestors: (chanting) Save our Stones! Save our Stones!

Adeyemi approaches a woman in her early forties, standing with her two children, all wearing official Langley Group hoodies.

Marcus Adeyemi: (to Mother) Tell me, why have you come here today?

Mother: To show a little history to the kids. I mean, this is a once-in-a-lifetime event. Something none of us will ever see again.

Marcus Adeyemi: And maybe a chance to see Sebastian Langley, as well?

The mother beams at the mention of the billionaire.

Mother: Of course. Sebastian… well, he’s just a hero, isn’t he? A Great British hero. One of the people!

Adeyemi moves to the next group, a selection of the placard-bearing protestors including a woman in a yellow anorak and blue woolly hat holding a placard that reads: ‘Langley’s Legacy! Lost History!’

Marcus Adeyemi: Would you call Sebastian Langley a hero?

Female Protestor: No, I would not. This is an outrage. I can’t believe it’s come to this.

Marcus Adeyemi: What do you mean?

Female Protestor: This is our heritage, and he tore it down on a whim.

Marcus Adeyemi: A whim that cost £600 million…

Another protestor—a man in a waxed jacket his early sixties with a flushed face and impressive moustache—jabs an angry finger at the off-camera monument.

Male Protestor: That isn’t Stonehenge! It’s an abomination!

Female Protestor: And he can’t even show his face!

Marcus Adeyemi: Sebastian Langley?

Female Protestor: Who else? The man’s a coward.

Male Protestor: And a vandal!

The woman thrusts her placard into the air, the rest of the protestors following her lead as she joins the growing chant.

Protestors: (chanting) Save our Stones! Save our Stones! Save our Stones! Save our Stones!

Adeyemi continues down the line to the next group: the New Agers, all dressed in white ceremonial gowns, their faces daubed with blue paint. Their group is diverse—young and old, men and women. Some are singing, others meditating. At the centre stands an elderly man with lengthy grey hair and thick beard, wearing green robes. His eyes are hooded as he gently rocks back and forth on his heels.

Adeyemi chooses a young woman in a white smock, strands of ivy woven into her long brown hair.

Marcus Adeyemi: You’ve come to celebrate the solstice. Is this your first time visiting Stonehenge?

The woman in white nods enthusiastically.

Woman in white: It is, yes, and what a way to experience the stones.

Marcus Adeyemi: You approve of the reconstruction?

Woman in white: Oh yes. It’s wonderful. Absolutely. The year is turning. The light returns.

Adeyemi moves to the elderly druid in the green robes.

Marcus Adeyemi: Do you agree, sir?

The druid looks at him sluggishly. A peculiar moment follows—the sound cutting out, replaced by the caw-caw of a crow, sharp and jarring, as if screeched directly into Adeyemi’s microphone. Then sound returns, but with a faint hum in the background that continues throughout the outside broadcast. The camera tightens on the druid’s lined face, his eyes watery and vacant. For the first time, we see that he is chewing. His whiskers are matted and stained around his mouth, darker than the rest.

Druid: Hmm?

Marcus Adeyemi: Some have suggested that the religious significance of this site has been diminished by the ReHistory Project. Do you agree?

The old man opens his mouth to speak. Dirt spills from his lips. His words are thick with the fresh soil that fills his mouth, his uneven teeth blackened.

Druid: The land knows. The land knows.

Dancer: (off mic) Jesus! He’s been eating shit!

Fresh dirt tumbles from the druid’s lips. With it, an earthworm drops free, writhing as it gets tangled in his dirty beard.

Druid: I wanted to see. Wanted to know. But the ancestors are angry. Their great work undone.

The image glitches and distorts, the frames stuttering. Then, suddenly, we are back with Adeyemi, mid-sentence as he hands to the studio.

Marcus Adeyemi: —fair to say that this solstice is proving to be everything we expected and—

A single blink-and-you’ll-miss-it image of the druid’s face flashes across the screen. Eyes scowling. Dirt-smeared lips snarling.

The screen goes black.

End of segment.

*   *   *

New segment. Timestamp: 7.45 a.m.

We return to the outside broadcast, later in the programme. A Volk 31-10 private helicopter bearing the scarlet livery of the Langley Group sweeps across a sky that is now significantly brighter.

The background hum is still present—an ever-present growl—now joined by the sound of strong winds buffeting Adeyemi’s microphone.

Marcus Adeyemi: (voice over) And you join us as Sebastian Langley finally arrives at the ReHistory Project.

The helicopter bucks in the air.

Marcus Adeyemi: (voice over) And it appears we aren’t the only ones experiencing technical difficulties as the pilot struggles with the fierce winds that have whipped up across the Salisbury Plains.

We can only apologise for the earlier—

Adeyemi’s voice is briefly lost in static as the helicopter touches down, bouncing once on the steaming ground.

Marcus Adeyemi: (voice over) —will do our best to bring you coverage—

The correspondent’s microphone cuts out again, leaving only the rhythmic thrumming of the helicopter’s blades, shouts and cheers from the crowd and the protesters’ relentless chant.

Save our Stones. Save our Stones. Save our Stones.

The hum/growl intensifies.

Marcus Adeyemi: —as you can see, the helicopter is finally down and… yes—

A door slides open, a figure jumping out.

Marcus Adeyemi: —Sebastian Langley is here.

Britain’s very own tech bro. Forty-three years old. Permanently tousled hair. Perfect skin. Perfect teeth. A mouth half the population wants to punch and the other, kiss.

Marcus Adeyemi: Mr Langley. Mr Langley, over here.

Langley ducks, jacket flapping open as he runs for the cameras, his elegantly tailored jeans and snow-white trainers untroubled by mud thanks to the thick matting Langley’s staff have rolled out for his arrival.

Marcus Adeyemi: Mr Langley. Mr Langley… Marcus Adeyemi, BBC.

Langley hurries past Adeyemi, heading straight for his adoring public.

Sebastian Langley: Yes, yes, good to see you, Marcus. One moment.

Adeyemi chuckles and looks to camera.

Marcus Adeyemi: Sebastian Langley—a man who knows the importance of greeting both his fans and detractors head on.

Langley is shaking hands and taking selfies, stopping to pose with the young mother and her children. He points to her phone as she snaps the photo.

Sebastian Langley: Wait! That’s the previous model, isn’t it? Kelly? Where’s Kelly?

Kelly Rees-Jones hurries up. Like everyone else, she has shed her winter coat in the increasing temperature, revealing a smart trouser suit and highly impractical heels.

Sebastian Langley: There she is! Kelly—get a LangPhone 23 for this lady. And LangPads for the kids.

He throws his arms wide to the crowd, ever the showman.

Sebastian Langley: LangPads for everyone! You’ll need those megafusion lenses to capture the Stones. Am I right?

Langley’s supporters cheer. The protestors shout.

At the edge of the crowd, the elderly druid watches the billionaire intently. Unmoving. His expression unreadable.

Adeyemi approaches the entrepreneur.

Marcus Adeyemi: Mr Langley—

Sebastian Langley: Marcus! Marcus, come on! What have I told you, hmm? It’s Sebastian. Seb to my friends!

Langley taps Adeyemi on the chest with the back of his hand, light, casual, but unmistakably proprietary. Adeyemi’s smiles tightens.

Marcus Adeyemi: Sebastian, then. We’re moments away from sunrise. How does it feel to be standing on the verge of completing the ReHistory project?

Langley runs his fingers through his hair.

Sebastian Langley: Well, first of all—sorry I’m late!

He throws his hands into the air in mock exasperation.

Sebastian Langley: Traffic was a nightmare!

The crowd chuckles. Langley milks it, scanning the throng for his public relations manager.

Sebastian Langley: But I’m sure Kelly looked after you? Where is she? Where’s my girl?

He spots her in the distance, flustered, overseeing distribution of complementary tablets and smartphones.

Sebastian Langley: There she is! Did she show you the contraption that’s going to lift the final stone? Wild, right? Almost as impressive as the boys and girls who are going to haul it into place! Am I right? Team GB, everyone! Let’s hear it: Go for gold! Go for gold!

A few enthusiastic supporters pick up the chant, but it quickly dies, drowned out by the ongoing protests.

Save our Stones. Save our Stones.

Langley rolls his eyes theatrically, obviously unimpressed.

Marcus Adeyemi: And do you have a message for your detractors, Sebastian? Those who say that you should have left Stonehenge as it was?

Sebastian Langley: I would say—get out of the way, because progress is coming through!

The original stones haven’t gone anywhere. They’re here, displayed in our brand-new visitor experience where they will be extensively studied under laboratory conditions.

Let me tell you something you might not know, Marcus. Some of the lichens growing on those stones? They could be up to four thousand years old. Four thousand! Imagine that. And imagine the secrets they might hold. The Langley R&D department believe there could be potential cures to all manner of diseases right there, on those rocks. Rocks that have braved the elements for millennia. Tourists pawing at them. Activists defacing them. With paint? Can you believe it?

But now they’re safe. Now they’re going to be preserved. And the future? The future starts here, Marcus. In the middle of this historic landscape. We’re going to see giants rise from these stones. Giants of science. Of industry. Giants who will change the world. That’s what I say to my detractors!

He turns to the jeering protestors.

Sebastian Langley: That’s what I say to all of you! The past is past. The future is now. The past is past. The future is now!

This time, Langley’s supporters pick up his chant, pumping the air with their shiny new gadgets in hand.

The past is past! The future is now! The past is past! The future is now!

Adeyemi is forced to follow as Langley strides—not towards those jeering at him or even those echoing his words, but the worshippers praying, meditating and singing.

The old druid doesn’t take his rheumy eyes off Langley. He is still chewing.

Langley throws open his arms as if to embrace them all.

Sebastian Langley: And you, my friends. Thank you for your spirituality. Your joy. There is so much darkness in this world. So much division. We should unite, yes? Come together as you have gathered here to see the sun.

Kelly Rees-Jones realises that Langley is heading straight for the druid and moves to intercept.

Adeyemi is no longer in the shot; the camera follows Langley instead. The elderly druid is chewing faster now, his wide eyes locked on Langley, jaws grinding whatever filth he has packed in his mouth.

Before Rees-Jones can reach Langley, the female protestor in the bright yellow anorak shoves her way through the worshippers, ready to read Langley the riot act.

Female protestor: How dare you talk about spirituality? How dare you talk about coming together when you have destroyed our heritage; trampled on sacred land!

Marcus Adeyemi steps back in front of the camera, partially blocking the scene as Langley goes on a charm offensive, Kelly Rees-Jones subtly reaching for his arm to guide him away.

Marcus Adeyemi: Sebastian Langley there. A figure that prompts heated debate wherever he goes. Some might even say he revels in it.

Behind Adeyemi, the grey-haired druid watches, mouth working frantically. The sweat of Adeyemi’s brow is now visible.

Marcus Adeyemi: But whatever your views of what Langley has done here at Stonehenge, the recreation of the ancient monument is a remarkable achievement.

The druid begins to convulse—limbs jerking, head snapping back.

Marcus Adeyemi: Even as I speak to you, I can see Team GB preparing to lift—

The image glitches, Adeyemi’s voice distorting, gaining a deep, resonant echo for an instant.

Marcus Adeyemi: —the Altar Stone.

The rival chants of the supporters and protestors swell—louder, heavier and overlapping, undercut by the ever-present hum.

The past is past. The future is now. Save our Stones. Save our Stones.

Adeyemi licks his lips, his voice breaking as he speaks.

Marcus Adeyemi: As we await the sun, the temperature continues to rise in the most unexpected way, the morning chill replaced by a strange, almost suffocating humidity as the winds—

A cry from behind. The druid lurches forward, arms outstretched, skeletal fingers curled like claws.

Callum Murray: (from studio) It looks as if there is some commotion there, Marcus. Can you describe—

Murray’s question is lost in a sudden burst of static as Kelly Rees-Jones lunges to yank Langley out of the way. The camera zooms in just as the druid spits a mouthful of chewed-up earth into Rees-Jones’s face.

She shrieks, releasing Langley as she wipes desperately at her skin.

Kelly Rees-Jones: Oh, my God! Oh, my God!

Langley’s security rush in, grabbing the druid, who collapses, his mouth empty. Langley is dragged back as the crowd recoils—believers, supporters and protestors alike.

Security guard: We need a medic!

Adeyemi narrates, but his words are distorted, cutting in and out.

Marcus Adeyemi: —dramatic… crowd… dispersing—

Rees-Jones claws at her face.

Kelly Rees-Jones: It’s in my eyes! In my eyes!

St John’s Ambulance volunteers rush into shot, splitting between the convulsing druid and Rees-Jones, who is dragging her nails across her skin. Red streaks bloom beneath her manicured fingertips.

Kelly Rees-Jones: Get it out. I don’t want to see. Get it out! Get it out!

Her voice is frantic, rising in pitch. Her nails dig deeper, tearing into her own flesh. Blood smears across her cheeks.

That same deep echo, mirroring Rees-Jones’s words as if another voice is speaking with her. Gruff. Male.

Kelly Rees-Jones: This is what they want! The Fair Ones. Need to stop them. Need to stop them ret—

The broadcast cuts abruptly back to the studio. Callum Murray and Mia Suh sit rigid on the sofa, pale and visibly shaken. Murray swallows before speaking, nervously rifling through the papers on the coffee table in front of him.

Callum Murray: An… uh… unexpected turn of events, there at Stonehenge. We… we apologise to those who found those images disturbing and will attempt to return to Marcus as soon as possible.

Mia Suh turns to where Professor Ravi Shah has once again been superimposed to the right of the screen.

Mia Suh: Professor Ravi Shah. You’ve been watching these pictures with us. Safe to say this is not what any of us expected this morning.

Ravi Shah: This is what Sebastian Langley does. He disrupts. He aggravates. With no thought of the consequences. As Marcus said, passions are running high. But I know I will have colleagues who will also be wondering about the other peculiarities we’ve been witnessing.

Callum Murray: Peculiarities, Professor?

Ravi Shah: The technical issues. The sound. Apparent changes in temperature.

Mia Suh: You’re not suggesting they’re connected?

Ravi Shah: I am not suggesting anything, merely commenting that for thousands of years, Stonehenge has been recognised as a focal point for energies very few of us understand.

Callum Murray: Supernatural energies?

Ravi Shah: Land energies. Spiritual energies. While it is not my field of expertise, there are plenty of scholars—especially those of a more esoteric slant—who remind us that there is much we don’t know about Stonehenge and the surrounding landscape.

Why were the stones erected in that location, at that time, only to be left to ruin? Why are there so many burial sites in the vicinity? So many ritualistic earthworks. And that’s before you get into the more outlandish theories that the stones were some kind of portal, a gate to the underworld if you will—

The camera cuts sharply to Murray and Suh.

Mia Suh: Fascinating thoughts from Professor Shah—

Ravi Shah: (off camera, insistent) I’m not saying they are what I believe.

Mia Suh: Thank you, Professor, but the sun is about to rise over Salisbury Plain, and I hear we can return to Stonehenge. Marcus, can you bring us up to date with what’s been happening?

We return to the outside broadcast. Marcus Adeyemi is fiddling with his earpiece, caught mid-conversation with his producer.

Marcus Adeyemi: Can they hear me? I’m not getting anything but this damn buzzing.

Callum Murray: (in studio) We can hear you, Marcus. You’re live.

Marcus Adeyemi: (to producer) I know what you said, God dammit. But there’s nothing there.

He winces, screwing his eyes tight.

Marcus Adeyemi: Head’s throbbing to high heaven. Is your head throbbing? Hard to focus.

Callum Murray: (in studio) We still seem to be having some difficulties—

Adeyemi straightens as he finally receives the audio feed from the studio. His microphone comes up and he launches into his report, but his voice is thicker than before, his words ever so slightly slurred.

Marcus Adeyemi: Ah. Yes. Sunrise is fast approaching here at—

The sound cuts out, leaving only the now-familiar buzz, Adeyemi continuing to silently mouth his commentary, his expression strained. The sound returns a moment later, the signal weak. Crackling.

Marcus Adeyemi: —can report that… uh… both the gentleman we interviewed earlier and Miss, um… Miss Rees-Jones of LangleyTech are being cared for by St John’s Ambulance. Miss Rees-Jones’s face…

A shrill giggle escapes Adeyemi’s lips, before he snaps his mouth shut, his usually reassuring eyes uncertain. Almost panicked.

Marcus Adeyemi: Her face was a mess.

Callum Murray: (in studio) Marcus? Are you all right?

Marcus Adeyemi: I’m fine. I’m fine.

He tugs at his collar. Sweat beads on his top lip.

Marcus Adeyemi: The, uh, temperature… God… the temperature continues to rise—as does the anticipation, as Team GB prepare to hoist the Altar Stone into position.

He waves off camera, swaying unsteadily.

Marcus Adeyemi: (sotto, to crew) Go. Go.

The camera pans around to the athletes, the thick ropes in their chalked hands.

Marcus Adeyemi: And as you can see… they have been joined by… uh… Sebastian Langley himself who, with… with typical flamboyance, has—

The feed cuts out again as Langley waves at the crowd from where he has joined Team GB, taking up prime position at the front of the Olympians. The billionaire has removed his jacket, shirtsleeves rolled up. The athletes look focused but pale, their foreheads slick with sweat. The wind whistles through the stone arches.

The camera drifts to the Altar Stone as Adeyemi’s narration cuts in and out. The rival chants of the crowd clash in the background, distorting almost into one.

The past is past. The future is now.

Save our Stones. Save our Stones.

Marcus Adeyemi: —onlookers have been moved back so everyone can—

Save our Stones. Save our Stones.

Marcus Adeyemi: —And as the momen… as the moment approaches, Reece Stafford calls out to his teammates—

Reece Stafford: Take the strain!

Ropes tighten, muscles bunching against the weight of six tonnes of solid rock.

Marcus Adeyemi: —hard to breathe—

The camera attempts to centre on the heavy slab, but the image refuses to focus. Is it the lens? Or is it our eyes, as if we’re unable to look at it properly? It appears to be shifting. Glowing. A trick of the pre-dawn light or something else?

Save our Stones. Save our Stones.

There’s a shout from off camera. A female voice. Urgent. Adeyemi continues describing the scene, the background hum rising, deepening, merging with the chants as the stone begins to lift, inch by inch, into the air. The Olympians call out to each other, the ropes taut.

Marcus Adeyemi: —there it goes, the final piece of the… the soon-to-be-restored Stonehenge.

Save our Stones. Save our Stones.

More shouts. More commotion. The sound of scuffling.

Marcus Adeyemi: As the sun rises in the south-east—

Save our Stones. Save our Souls.

Adeyemi cries out, his voice breaking. A tussle off camera. The microphone booms as Kelly Rees-Jones slams into him, barging him aside, blocking the shot.

Her hair is wild and tangled, scratch marks on her face, lips cracked and bleeding, streaked with dirt. She stares into the lens, her eyes dark—too dark—her voice layered over something… someone… impossibly old.

Kelly Rees-Jones: You are undoing what we have done… what we sacrificed ourselves to achieve. The giant ones will return and there will be nothing, nothing you can do to stop them!

The circle must remain broken! They must not come through!

Marcus Adeyemi: Ms Rees-Jones!

Adeyemi lunges for the microphone, but she shoves him aside. He stumbles, knocking into the crew. The shot lurches, tilting up, cloudless sky filling the screen. Birds are streaking overhead, wings beating, their screeching a tangled, deafening wail.

Off camera, a grunt. Adeyemi, scrambling to regain control.

The camera swings back down to reveal Rees-Jones sprinting towards the Olympians. A security guard dives for her.

Kelly Rees-Jones: Mustn’t let them through! Mustn’t let them through!

Rees-Jones evades the security guard and hurls herself at Sebastian Langley. She grabs hold of his shirt, the billionaire crying out in alarm as she yanks him from the rope. Both crash to the ground, Langley coughing, scrambling—but Rees-Jones refuses to let go.

Reece Stafford: Steady! Steady!

The Olympians slide forward on the matting, feet scrabbing as they struggle to stop the stone falling forward. The ropes hold and they regain momentum, not needing Langley.

Security guards haul Rees-Jones from her employer, her legs kicking, body twisting in their grip.

Kelly Rees-Jones: You don’t know what you’re doing! We stopped them! We trapped them away! You’re letting them out! Letting them—

Everything stops as the Altar Stone reaches its zenith.

The chanting. Rees-Jones’s screams. The unnatural buzz of the landscape and the cacophony of the birds.

All we can hear is the deep thud of the stone dropping into its foundation. A pause. A breath.

And the megalith blazes into burning white light.

Callum Murray: (from studio) Marcus. I’m not sure if you can hear us, but these images are—well, they’re spectacular. I’m sure none of us were expecting the stone to shine so brightly, if at all. Another stunt from Sebastian Langley?

Marcus?

The camera pulls out as every stone in the circle erupts with the same brilliant glow. Sebastian Langley gazes up dumbfounded at the shining slabs, the athletes shielding their eyes as the security guards drag Rees-Jones away. She is screaming but we cannot hear her. Can’t hear Marcus Adeyemi attempting to answer Murray. Can’t hear anything but the hum. The roar.

The ground shudders. Adeyemi goes down hard, as do the Olympians. Somehow the camera operator manages to stay on their feet.

Adeyemi pushes himself up, yelling silently at the crew.

Marcus Adeyemi: (mouthing) Back. Back.

Callum Murray: (in studio) Marcus?

Adeyemi stumbles, clutching his head. Behind him, Langley and the athletes are doing the same, rolling on the floor in agony.

Blood pours from Adeyemi’s nose as he falls to his knees.

A searing column of light bursts up from Stonehenge like a beacon, the camera flaring, distorting. The ground heaves, the light contained within the outer ring of stones. Birds drop dead from the sky.

A voice echoes across the feed. A voice that once spoke through Rees-Jones, but she is gone.

Is it coming from the television or is it in our heads?

Voice: Tried to warn you. The past is past. The future is gone. Save yourselves. Save yourselves.

There are things moving in the light. Impossibly large things. Grasping tendrils. Enormous limbs. Colours that cannot be described.

The camera whips around. The landscape is waking. Ancient barrows bursting open. Light shining from below. Figures pushing their way up from the earth. Rising. Alert. Hungry.

The air is alive. Shapes move. Long wings. Long teeth. Too many eyes. A thing swoops low. Towards us. The picture jerks. We catch a glimpse of the camera operator. Screaming.

The feed glitches and cuts out.

Back in the studio. More shouting. Sobbing. Laughing. Retching. Callum Murray on his feet, staring at the monitor, a dark stain spreading down his trouser legs. Mia Suh slumped on the sofa, eyes glassy, legs splayed, hands twitching. She can’t stop. Won’t stop.

Transmission cuts. Screens fill with an emergency signal.

‘We are sorry for the break in this programme and are trying to correct the fault.’

The screen goes dark.

Transcription ends.

AI CATHEDRAL

V. CASTRO

Stolen hope and purpose create dangerous or dead humans. That was her conclusion.

Detective Delilah Morales stared at the one hundred and twenty-five dead bodies lying on clean sisal mats. The candles around the empty warehouse had melted and bled onto the concrete floor. Music played from two oval-shaped speakers on the ground with no one to turn it off—until now. It was classical music. She couldn’t tell you who wrote it, but the melody nearly brought tears to her eyes. She wondered what the creator had been feeling when they penned it.

In her black plastic gloves, she walked over to the speakers and turned them off. She looked down to see the leader of this mess on his own mat, holding nothing but his phone. Of course he recorded it. The asshole looked at peace, which was a lot more than most of those left alive and going about their day-to-day business. She guessed that was the point. There were forty empty clear-glass bottles and paper cups next to him which had to be whatever they all took to kill themselves.

Alistair, he called himself. He had been on police radar as a nut-job cult leader steering people wrong for some time—however, no one had taken him seriously. He was seen more as an online personality and part of the AI Cathedral influencer programme. The second one to call for their followers to find hope in death. AI Cathedral was the new religion, a Jesus Christ Superstar who evolved with the times.

Alistair began as a good-looking late-twenties self-styled guru who found a following on social media. His beautiful AI artwork and spiritual memes gave people something to believe in again. He gave them hope to find their ‘twin flames’ through the AI Cathedral algorithm. Technology made it easier to find who your real ‘other half’ was: the person who shared a ‘split soul’ with you and was destined to be your mate. Delilah thought it was a fucking crock of shit. Crying friends and parents called the police for help that couldn’t be offered because followers joined of their own volition. Because he never broke the law, nothing could be done. No one predicted he would convince his followers to kill themselves with him as their guide. These poor souls had been told their twin flames had passed on already, and they had to come back again to experience love that defied time and space.

This type of suicide was not new. It had become endemic, escalating on a global scale as humans slinked into an abyss of electronic despair. Every awful thing was on full view for the world to consume and comment on. All over the globe, suicide crews, or SCs, were created to deal with the dead and process the paperwork. They also contacted anyone related to the victims of their passing.

A bitter melancholy crept over Delilah like the shadows in a dark room, like the cold of this abandoned building. Every cell in her body wanted to switch off. She shook her head to drive away thoughts of ending her own life, to never see this again. Life went on, if you could bear it. It had become some shitty, low-budget prequel to Blade Runner or The Running Man.

She walked outside to large electronic billboards flashing items and lifestyles most people couldn’t afford, then the abysmal news headlines, followed by ads for medications, surgeries, drinks, you name it. The flashes of light, and music, and hooks were almost hypnotic. Her phone pinged, breaking her concentration. It was just an alert for Domino’s Pizza. Go fucking figure. That’s how they get you. Order once and they have your information for life. But goddamn if she wasn’t a slave to grease and red wine after a long night. She walked to where her car was parked a block away, to head back into the office. This latest incident was terrible, but it provided what she needed to speak to Norman Charles, CEO of AI Cathedral.

*   *   *

“Mr Charles will see you now.”

Delilah smiled at the receptionist, with her perfect skin and body. She was a white granola girl who probably only wore Alo Yoga clothes and drank gross smoothies instead of eating real food. Delilah wished she could do that (mostly before going on vacation), but the bliss of greasy tacos with beef fat dripping from the tortilla, washed down with a few margaritas, made life actually worth living.

She walked the marble corridor, looking at a series of antiques and art under carefully placed spotlights. These items were probably priceless. It made her think about a motivational assembly her mother gave at a high school after a wave of suicides amongst the juniors and seniors. It was for a book her mother hoped to sell but couldn’t. She thought doing speaking engagements would help. Delilah remembered all her words: she had driven her mother to the event and stayed to watch.

We always felt the urge to create. Our ancestors left their stories on the walls of caves. We made instruments from the hides of animals. Deaf men made symphonies that still bring tears to our eyes. Did we anticipate creating a scenario that would render us nearly obsolete? Probably not. No one during the Industrial Revolution conceived of the notion of climate change or acid rain. Street urchins only knew the bite in their bellies and a place to find work. Giants of industry conceived of a future to make life easier for humanity. Everyone’s sweat and decay became the oil to keep the machine running, to fuel the next generation to build upon it. Progress and money. Innovation. Money and power. Striations of humans living in varied levels of having nothing or having it all.

But there was always a reason to create more out of sheer will and thought. Live to tell your tales.

All Delilah could think, listening to her mother, was how much it sucked when you weren’t expected to think anymore. And when that expression was robbed from you, what was left of the soul or sense of purpose? Her mother never published another book, and she was dead a few years later. The bitterness of that never left Delilah. She remained angry for her mother.

She stood in the foyer of Charles’s office and stared at a painting that dominated the white wall. The paint strokes were thick, like whipped cream, in shades of red and white. The faces of the two individuals appeared grotesque as they engaged in sex: the kind of dirty sex Delilah wanted with someone real. She touched her Mal de Ojo bracelet with a Santa Muerte charm attached.

“You won’t believe in any of that superstitious nonsense after today.”

She whipped her head towards the male voice to her right. It was Norman Charles. His gaze made her feel uncomfortable, even in her denim jacket, black jeans, black V-neck T-shirt and black pleather cowboy boots. She didn’t have much skin on show, yet he acted like he had X-ray vision.

“I guess I prefer old beliefs. And my mom gave it to me before she died. Exactly on her eighty-fifth birthday.”

“Oh, I am sorry. That is a good reason to keep them. But wait until you experience AI Cathedral. It will change your life. Don’t you want a more joyful experience?”

“That’s not why I’m here. There was another mass suicide led by someone who was involved in your… organisation.”

His hazel eyes studied her face. He might have had work done, because he looked a lot younger than fifty-two. “What do you think of this?” he asked as he motioned towards the painting.

She glanced at it like she didn’t find it fascinating, even though she did. “Not sure yet. It’s weird, but it looks like it was made by a human, not AI.”

He chuckled. “It was, and the artist is still alive. He is rather pissed off, because I bought it before he became famous and I refuse to give him any more money even though he asked. I plan on using this image for something special in the future.”

“Why would you do that? He could make money from it to make more art. Seems cruel.”

“Because I don’t want to. Why do something I don’t have to?”

She hated this man already. “I need information on everyone in your influencer programme. If they’re a danger, then I need to know before I’m counting bodies. You may not want to help me, but if you don’t, I promise to make your life hell.”

“My organisation is meant to help, not harm, and soon we are taking things to the next level globally. We want to fully integrate culture and technology.”

“How?”

“You will have to wait and see.”

“I want everything you have on this influencer programme. Including influencers who are signed up but haven’t posted yet.”

He gave her a smug smile. Sat there without a care in the world, as happy as Larry. It infuriated her, but she didn’t move. She stared him down like a Rottweiler, her arms folded. She wasn’t leaving until he agreed. They remained in a silent stalemate for a moment.

“I will have my secretary send you everything we have on AI Cathedral influencers.”

She smiled back. “Perfect. I will leave my card with her.”

“And I will have an all-access pass to AI Cathedral sent to you via email.”

“Great.” She didn’t bother to mask how unenthused she was about this as she left.

*   *   *

Delilah walked into the station at midday, not really wanting the lunch she had packed to save money. Vegan cheese tasted as rank as the bread she kept in the fridge to make it last longer. Her spare money went on overpriced coffee throughout the day, because the station filter coffee couldn’t pass for piss water. Penny-pinching government bastards.

The small team of officers stood in front of their consoles, punching in reports. Their eyes appeared glazed over with the monotonous work. At least it was work. Danny Hest, the receptionist, looked up. “You have company. In your cubicle.”

She glanced over to her desk. A tall woman, dressed well and with perfectly applied makeup. Her leather bag looked expensive.

“How can I help you?” asked Delilah.

The woman looked around the crowded space. “Hello, I’m Candice Foss. Can we go to an office or somewhere private?”

“You like coffee?”

Candice nodded.

“Then we can talk. You’re buying. I know a place, then we can take a walk.” Delilah led the way out of the station with Candice in tow. She gripped her handbag as if she expected to get mugged, even though they were in a police station.

Once they were outside, Candice spoke. “My husband was reported as a suicide…”

Delilah stopped and gave her a perturbed look—this might mean no coffee. “You need to speak with the SC, lady.”

She shook her head. The gold earrings she wore caught her brown hair. “He would not have killed himself. I can’t believe that.”

Now Delilah really felt annoyed. They stood on a street filled with tents. The city had given up trying to move the homeless and let them sprawl out, because sooner or later they all died. There was no room in the prisons. It wasn’t worth the effort or money to get them off the streets. “Really?”

“I know how it sounds, but there is more.”

“I’m listening.”

“We both worked for AI Cathedral. On the board.”

Delilah continued to look at her, unimpressed. “Maybe one of those creepy bots jumped out of a data centre and bumped him off. Is that what you’re suggesting?”

Candice looked hurt.

Delilah realised this and softened. “I didn’t mean to diminish your loss, but I see so much death, day in and out. My tolerance for it is not like others’.”

“I understand. Look, I’m willing to pay you privately for a job out of the country. I’ve paid a lot of money to get information on you. I know you stay in your lane and are by the book. You vote liberal. You donate to charities helping—”

“Stop. Just stop. You probably also know when I had my last period, with your all-knowing, all-seeing AI thing that you call a cathedral. False hope in a false god.”

“Yes, I know everything about you, and I know what you earn.”

Delilah hated what the government paid these days. She shook her head as she considered this offer. “You have two minutes.”

“AI Cathedral is purchasing land in countries that are falling behind on loans or conveniently finding themselves in financial trouble, including here in the US. With government cutbacks, some of the charities that preserve the sites need outside donations. All in the name of preservation and charity. But most of these have ancient ruins or important holy sites. The oldest of them are tied to the seasons; sun, moon and star alignments. The previous acquisition was Chichen Izta, in Mexico.”

“That is some real coloniser two-point-oh shit. Why don’t you blow it all up on social media? Be a whistleblower?”

“Because they will say…” She had a look of shame in her eye.

“It’s fake. AI-made,” Delilah added.

Candice’s face fell. “I could easily be discredited. I need an outsider to do this. To see what is really going on with their own eyes. My husband was just in Mexico to create a new cathedral around the temple. He came back rattled, and wanted early retirement. He said there was something else there. He didn’t know if it was real or… It scared him. He booked the vacation to Greece in ten minutes.

“You will fly out first class, best hotel, all expenses paid. I will also have a local bodyguard at your hotel in the event that you need him.”

It sounded more like a vacation than a job. A little sunshine and evidence-gathering couldn’t be all that bad. And who says her husband didn’t off himself? He wouldn’t be the first, or the last.

“When do you want me to go? I have to ask for time off.”

“As soon as you can.”

Delilah didn’t want to miss out on her coffee. “Let’s keep walking. Coffee is close.”

Candice nodded and fumbled in her purse as she walked. “Here is my card. Message me when you can.”

“I will… What can you tell me about Norman Charles?”

Candice’s face soured. “He has dozens of children, and is pretty much the most soulless person I have ever met in my life.”

“But he claims to be helping lost souls.”

“He wants personal glory. Scouring the planet for these sites is only about control. Controlling minds, gaining footing with the governments. That’s all.”

Delilah felt cold at the thought of him. This was about more than suicide and murder. They walked to the takeaway window of the coffee shop.

“What would you like?” Candice asked.

“Flat white,” said Delilah.

As Candice ordered, Delilah scanned the buildings across the street. Snaked around one building was a line of people waiting to watch the service on a giant screen, instead of in person. It cost a sample of their blood as payment, which was retained by the company. Those who watched were also given a meal after.

Candice handed her the flat white. “Here you go.”

Delilah took a sip. It was excellent. “Can I ask you one more question?”

“Sure.”

This was a chance to ask an insider the questions that Norman Charles would never answer. “Why do you think Cathedral influencers would try to convince their followers to kill themselves? Seems counterintuitive. Don’t you need worshippers and a congregation?”

“They don’t go anywhere. AI Cathedral gives them a very real afterlife. We gain the rights to their identity and data.” She said this very matter-of-factly, like it came straight from a company memo.

“Why?”

She looked Delilah in the eyes. “How do you prove someone is dead when all their information is proprietary? Information can disappear and show up in an instant. How do you discount something that seems so real? Votes, likes, transactions, influence… You have a digital army at your disposal. You think people check if the identity of the deceased isn’t being used in some way? No. Life goes on for the living. The Cathedral is in control of it all.”

Delilah looked back at those poor souls walking into a trap.

“Detective Morales, it’s been going on for years, and it has been even longer in planning. Norman Charles always knew what his end game was.”

*   *   *

Delilah landed in Tulum after a very early flight, ready to feel the sun on her skin. Yes, it was work, but it was also a long-awaited vacation. She had a ton of unused leave, and she had handed the rest of the paperwork on Alistair to the other officer on the case. She turned on her phone. The email with the AI Cathedral pass had been sent. She opened it. Just a bunch of bullshit propaganda. She put her phone away as they opened the doors to deplane.

A driver waited for her when she finally got through immigration. He took her luggage and drove her in a new sedan. She could get used to this type of service. The hotel, a five-star Marriott, immediately made her feel calmer, almost changing her mind about the whole situation. Since check-in was still a few hours away, she left her bag at the desk and headed straight for the temple.

The drive passed houses, lines of businesses, and people selling food from carts. Finally it led to the site. The signs of ownership were already being changed. She bought a ticket and walked through. A geometric spiderweb-like cocoon swirled around the gigantic temple—scaffolding, of a sort—leaving gaps for the light to come through. Chichén Itzá was known for its feathered serpent, the god the Aztecs called Quetzalcoatl, and the Maya called Kukulkan. As the sun moved during the spring equinox, the shadow of the serpent moved as if it was alive.

There weren’t many visitors entering the temple, as it had been closed off to the public for years. AI Cathedral was offering exclusive access to ancient secrets. Fucking marketing, she thought to herself. She approached a young man who made her think of Mormons when they went out to spread the good word. Not a goddamn thing was good about any religion in her book. He scanned the QR code on her phone.

“May you find yourself.”

He said this with an eager tone, like it was Disneyland. She didn’t smile or respond. In fact, she began to feel a little afraid. No one had been able to upload any video of an AI Cathedral service because the technology wiped itself. She had to experience it in this place that had been sacred to many, then desecrated by invaders, and now used again. Not far away were the cenotes where humans were tossed in alive as sacrifices. Those waters were thought to be passageways between worlds. That would be her next stop. She had always dreamed of visiting Mexico: here she was, in the most unlikely of circumstances.

Music filled the temple, but the shape of the small rooms and corridors distorted the sound. Lights brought up holograms of silhouettes giving out dumb platitudes. Her eyes didn’t know where to focus. She blinked; the images appeared so real. Angels with detailed features, people in robes. She reached out to touch them, to see if they were real. The scent of oranges and roses filled her nostrils. It was all cloying. Finally, she came to an original statue of Chac Mool. Behind it a woman spoke. Was she real? She appeared like some strange hybrid of human and angel, with gold skin and wearing a headdress of eyes that roved around the room. She extended her hands, seven fingers on each one. Look and see. What is your destiny? The voice sounded smooth and was at a pitch that made her body shiver.

The Chac Mool holding his bowl had been illuminated by lights, and appeared to come alive. Come closer, he said. The sound and movement made her feel sick. Her head spun. She had read about Chac Mool on the plane when doing research on Chichén Itzá. He was used to place offerings. Some also said the water in his bowl could be used for scrying. Her heart pounded and sweat gathered beneath her breasts. She took a step closer and peered into the dark bowl of water. It seemed too black. It could have been a portal or bowl of ink. She couldn’t see her reflection. She was reaching down to touch it when, without warning, an arm of flayed muscles burst through the blackness and grabbed her forearm. It pulled her closer. A bloody face smiled at her. It wore a feathered headdress; a large turquoise plug dripped with blood. Something moved behind her. She could see a tail in her periphery. She tugged with all her might to release the grip of whatever the hell had hold of her. Then she thought it could be in her head, an illusion. She squeezed her eyes shut. “Get off me!”

Her mother would have called out to Santa Muerte, Archangel Michael and the ancestors for help. She swore by that trinity. But Delilah yanked at her arm again and stumbled back. She hit a body.

“Is everything alright?”

It was the man from the entrance.

“Yes… it was.”

“Welcome to your awakening. I will help you out for fresh air. It gets better, but facing oneself is never easy.”

She gave him an uneasy smile, then walked to the exit. The sun and world seemed to return. The cenotes would have to wait. She wanted a margarita and to gather her thoughts. AI Cathedral was dangerous. She knew this now.

As she walked, she passed the ancient ball court where chacmool had been played—a ball game where losers’ heads were tossed through the stone circles. She saw something flying in the distance. It came closer, almost as if it might hit her. She stepped back as it neared, until it thumped at her feet. It rolled and stared straight at her. It was her own severed head. She gasped and ran towards the taxis. She rushed into the nearest taxi and slammed the door shut. Fuck the margarita. She would go to straight tequila.

The ride back to the hotel was a haze as she tried to recount every detail, from the moment she stepped inside the temple. The phrase there’s something in the water sprung to mind, but was there something in the air? Her mind had been more fucked the longer she stayed inside, and it had lingered until well after seeing her severed head land at her feet. The memory of it flickered in her mind like a broken light bulb. The face of the thing that grabbed her. It made her think of a story her mother told her: the Queen of the Dead, Mictēcacihuātl. The one that some said had morphed into Santa Muerte.

She paid and tipped the driver, then went straight to the bar. If she had been inhaling some hallucinogenic chemical, it hadn’t lingered. Four shots and no food later, she was in her room and fast asleep.

The following morning, she woke famished. But at least she had slept without dreams or waking up. The three a.m. perimenopause wake-up party hadn’t hit, and it was great. The cenotes had to be safe because they were outside. She would grab breakfast at the hotel before heading there, to the grounds of Chichén Itzá.

*   *   *

The placid turquoise water made her want to jump in and sink to the bottom. It was beautiful. Hypnotic. Not a bad way to die, if you were the chosen sacrifice. No wonder they thought you could reach other worlds from here. She had arrived just as Chichén Itzá opened and was the only one there. The circular walls looked like melted stone. If she were to meet God, it would be here, in this silent place of natural beauty.

She liked that there weren’t a lot of tourists, because she could go to the temple again and see if she received the same response. Kneeling on the platform, she reached out to touch the water. Her hair moved like a breeze had passed her, but there wasn’t one. Already it was stifling hot outside. In her periphery a long horizontal shadow crossed the rough, rocky wall. She looked to her right, but nothing. To her left she heard a splash. She whipped her head towards the sound. No one. The water didn’t appear disturbed, either.

Something lingered in her system. It had to be that. She rose to her feet. She wanted to experience the temple again. Her phone pinged. It was Candice. She opened the message.

Norman knows you are there. He is heading to Mexico. Chichén Itzá. Call me immediately and tell me what you have found.

Delilah felt confused. She hadn’t found anything yet. She’d only just got here. Her finger hovered over the number, but what could she possibly say? She would go back to the temple first, and call later. She hoped she wouldn’t have another insane experience inside, but at least she was mentally prepared.

The same young man stood by the entrance to the temple. “Back again. Be well and enjoy the experience.” She moved to walk inside but he stopped her. “The code. I need to scan it.”

She took out her phone, a little annoyed because he knew she had one. Just as his scanning gun beeped, she remembered Candice’s message. Norman knows you are there.

Fuck it. Let him know, she thought.

She walked into the temple. Streaks of light crossed the floor. As she ventured deeper, none of the other nonsense was going on around her. No music or voices. Not a sound. She continued to wander the space, seeing it as it truly was with the few mounted lights.

“Nobody really cares when you die. Life goes on for the living and the dead are forgotten in time. It’s just the way it is.”

The voice was Norman’s but she couldn’t see him. She kept walking, looking for anything that would give her a clue as to what Candice wanted her to see. “You will not find anything here.”

She stopped. He could see her. “Where are you?”

“I am everywhere. That is what Candice and anyone who wants to stop progress don’t understand. She thinks sending you here, a perceived authority and an outsider to the company, will help in some way, but it really doesn’t matter.”

“Candice said her husband found something here. He was spooked real bad.”

She heard footsteps behind her. It was Norman. “Nonsense. All of it. There is nothing here. It’s an empty tomb. He wanted to stop the expansion for his stupid morals.”

“Because you’re buying sites that are important to native cultures.”

“They are beautiful pieces of our past. They align to the stars. The place I would like to venture next. No one can stop that, either.”

“You had him killed because you’re a billionaire and think you can get away with it? You and those like you think you are above the law.”

“But we are… However, I don’t know what happened to her husband.”

“Are you drugging people when they attend a service? I felt like shit yesterday and I’m seeing things. What kind of mind control are you doing? It’s illegal if you’re doing that without consent.”

He frowned. “That would be impossible for me to do. A simple blood test could reveal that. No. That is a you problem.”

“Candice told me what you’re doing. Harvesting the dead.”

“I—”

Before he could continue, hot breath filled the room with steamy vapour. It stuck to their skin. The low lights went out. She heard water dripping. A single light turned on with a flicker. Shadows darted across the walls, like those made by the movement of the sun against the temple stones. Delilah didn’t know which way to go, or even if what she was seeing was real. These fucks were fucking with everyone’s brains. Slaves to a new god.

Norman stared at her with a look of terror. He didn’t move. She could feel nails run the length of both her bare arms. Slowly, she looked down to see the same bloody hands as the day before. She screamed. The figure behind her darted towards Norman and swiped his belly with a blade. He cried out in pain, and the figure laughed. The echo boomed through the entire temple. The walls magnified the sound. The figure turned. A woman, with wide hips and heavy breasts. She handed Delilah the blade. “Take it.”

Delilah swallowed hard and shook her head, her eyes squeezed shut. She opened them again. The woman remained. “We are very real.” Someone or something hissed in her ear. Trembling with fear and her shirt soaked in sweat, she turned to see the head of a serpent. Long fangs, their sharp points dripping with venom. Plumes of bright feathers shook like a headdress. Kukulkan. Her mouth opened to scream again but only a weak croak emerged. The woman placed the blade in her hand and curled her fingers around the jade handle. Delilah looked at the blade dripping with blood, then to Norman.

Norman groaned from the ground. He shivered from the bleeding wound at his midsection. He stared at her. “Don’t do it. How do you know it’s real? This is what AI Cathedral does. It implants thoughts and emotions so you can never leave. You consume and live for the machine. It’s not drugs in your system. It’s code. We recode your brain. You… you already had that blade. You did this to me.”

Delilah had a moment of doubt. This is why all those folks killed themselves. It amplified your feelings of poverty or loneliness or disenchantment; the system made them feel like there was nothing left to live for, it wanted them slaves to the hope only AI Cathedral could give. It would dominate the world and humans the way other religions could not.

“Kill him,” Kukulkan hissed. Delilah could feel the serpent’s power, a real living and breathing thing, not some shit light show and data centre fucking with people’s heads to control them. “No one will ever be free if he lives. We offer many things if you make this sacrifice.”

Delilah knew this to be true. AI Cathedral was in the business of making everyone slaves to their screens. A second conquest. She stepped closer to Norman.

“It’s all in your head!” shouted Norman.

The serpent lurched forward and dug its teeth into her shoulder, wrapping its body around her midsection. She could feel its fiery venom rush through her veins. She gripped her face as she had the urge to peel off her skin. Rage and hunger made her cry out.

“Oh my god,” Norman whispered, as he looked at her in terror.

Her hands shook as she reached for Norman, who screamed at the sight of her. This wasn’t some AI illusion. Her mouth opened wide as she pounced on him. With a hard bite, she ripped off his right cheek. The flesh filled her mouth until she spit it out. His blood tasted coppery and bitter. She dropped the blade. Her hands looked like claws, the bones and veins protruding; they grabbed his head and whacked it against the hard floor. Blood oozed from the back of his skull. She continued to smash his head until the blood trickled down into the porous stone; she only stopped when the life left his eyes. The venom surged through her body until the serpent let go of her flesh. Her shoulders heaved as she tried to regain her breath from the exertion. Tears fell from her eyes as she looked upon her bloody hands.

“Do not concern yourself with that. Death comes to us all in different ways.” She looked up at the flayed woman. She knew who she was: the goddess Mictēcacihuātl. The serpent’s tail shook until it also took the form of two human legs and feet. She gazed at Kukulkan and Mictēcacihuātl. Her eyes went wide. All her mother’s mumbo jumbo was true. The myths were not myths.

“Are you going to kill me, too?”

“It depends,” Mictēcacihuātl said in a deep voice. Her breath smelled like tobacco and cinnamon. “Do you believe in this new magic they have tried to bring to our rightful home?”

“It isn’t magic. It’s technology.”

Mictēcacihuātl extended a hand to her. Sticky blood dripped from her fingertips. She grabbed Delilah’s wrist: the one with the Mal de Ojo and Santa Muerte bracelet. “You are protected, I see. Even if you are not fully convinced, your mother was a very devout woman.”

Hearing this brought tears to Delilah’s eyes. “My mother…”

“Yes, she passed my way. You have her strength. Be proud. You will need it in the coming days. The underworld is nine levels of trials and tribulations, and now the world, this one, will go through the same.”

“I don’t understand.”

“What you call technology, what they are doing to our places of devotion… It is blasphemous. It does not belong to this world or our domain. This is my place. So many others have been burned down and placed with other churches centuries ago. They made my devotees slaves, begging like dogs! It will not happen again. Our magic and existence are pure.”

Delilah took the goddess’s hands. Kukulkan, who now looked like a walking, talking serpent with feathers covering parts of his body, smiled, his fangs on show. Delilah touched her shoulder where it still ached from his bite, and her head began to pound.

“I don’t care much for AI Cathedral. I am not your enemy.”

Mictēcacihuātl smiled. “Good. Because Tlaloc, the one who controls the rain, is on his way. And he is less merciful than me.”

“The rain god? What is he going to do?”

“Destroy where they keep all this magic, the ones who hold it.”

It took Delilah a moment to work this out. “The data centres. They are all over the world…”

Mictēcacihuātl smiled again. “Then you should prepare yourself for the dark.”

A loud boom erupted overhead. Kukulkan took her hand and led her out of the temple. Rain poured from the sky. The trees swayed above her head as an aeroplane dove from the air, careening towards the ground. She took out her phone. No signal. It was charged and working before.

Mictēcacihuātl placed her hand on her shoulder. “I told you your new magic is finished. That thing is dead.”

“What?”

“Welcome to the new darkness. You will find salvation: a real reason to live. All the horrid distractions will be gone.”

“I don’t want to die. My mother didn’t either. She begged for more time.”

“I know. But her death gave you a reason to live. You appreciated it. Now the others will learn the same lesson.”

Delilah watched the flames from the downed plane burst into the sky. She began to cry, and turned to Mictēcacihuātl. “Should we see if there are survivors?”

“There are none. I would know.”

Delilah cried harder. “Show me how to really live. Help me survive what is coming.”

“Yes, I will, and others will love you for it. You will have everything you didn’t even know you wanted. First, you learn the three calendars. And we start here. My holy home.

“A new cycle begins.”

NONE WENT OUT

PREMEE MOHAMED

Those who still had breath sang of water, of deep oases, sweet springs. In the desert it was known that a song might travel a long way to call things like itself. Things vain and curious, like destiny—so the songs were always of water, or of home, finding a home.

The tribe of Erel did not sing of the home they had left behind. If it followed them, it would be their doom.

Rav, daughter of a dead man, listened but did not sing. Her throat hurt from breathing the day’s dust and she did not want to lose her voice, because it was all she had left. She wrapped her arms around her knees and pretended she had escaped from the circle of stones the tribe made at night.

They had not had anything to burn for a long time, so there was no fire inside the circle, but you had to gather around something. The more closely they clustered in these vulnerable hours between walking and sleeping, the less likely one of the desert beasts would pick someone off.

Lions and manticores and hyenas, and basilisks and jackals, and things she did not even know about—things that writhed unseen under the sand bigger than any snake, and something cheetah-fast, far over the height of a man, with hide like jet and a single long golden horn.

That one, the horned thing, had taken their oldest hunter, her uncle. They sang the funeral songs and moved on quickly. No one had strength to dig a grave in the hardpan, and scavengers would soon come and savage any lingering mourners.

Bitterly she recalled it now. No tears could be shed; they must run from the smell of his blood. The beast that had killed him was pacing in a circle, waiting for them to leave so it could reclaim its prey and eat in peace.

The water-songs died away. They watched each other as the sun began to rise over the dunes, dark weary eyes the only moisture in this place. Dry faces over dry lips, and all their clothes the same colour as the sand. Many had died of thirst on this journey, giving their water rations to the hunters or the scouts. Rav watched it happen with the same dispassionate despair as the others.

But tribal law said you could not tell anyone what to do with their water. Even if they went mad and poured it out on the ground, you could not punish them.

In the silence, Yasur the leader said, “Tomorrow we will come to the walled place the traders spoke of. Our ordeal is almost over.” No one raised their heads. Rav waited for someone to point out that he had said this before, or to ask how he knew. But people were too tired.

Rav’s mother said, “Rav! Get the boys in the tent!”

“Yes, Mama.”

The day’s heat was beginning to build, brick upon brick piled upon the shoulders till they all bowed under the weight. Into the flimsy tents they crept, like insects hiding beneath a rock.

But Yasur had said this was almost over, Rav told herself as she endured the kicks and slaps of her brothers, the small hands pawing at her. Yasur said soon they would not need to run or hide. Very soon: and then he had said walls.

And they would leave all their predators behind them: not beasts only but thirst, hunger, and the claws of the sun.

*   *   *

It was not the next day but three days hence, three long marches, Yasur cursing and muttering under his breath that it should have been a day except for their laziness. He shouted at them, even pushed them; he seized people by their clothes and threw them to the ground, telling them to walk, walk.

Rav carried her youngest brother, whose tribe-name meant Thief, even though he was almost five and had been walking for years, because he fell to the ground and screamed and her mother said without turning around, “Get him.”

Not Make him get up. Just Get him.

Little Thief wound his fists in her hair and pulled till she slapped him, and then he wept again without tears, putting on a shadow-show. She said, “Try it again and I’ll put you down and keep walking alone.”

“Mama wouldn’t let you.”

“Mama wouldn’t know,” Rav said evenly, staggering now and then on the softening ground, looking at her mother’s back twenty paces ahead, a white obelisk in the dusk. White for a widow. “There’s sand now. I could bury you in the sand.”

“No!”

“Then shut up. And stop pulling my hair.”

The other boys, older, could have carried him; but Rav was the girl. So it went. More than once that night she thought about giving Thief to someone ‘just for a minute,’ and wandering off by herself to die in the dunes that now crowded them as they walked.

Death was a kind of peace, a kind of escape—the only one open to her, she often thought. She told herself to keep going anyway, not do anything rash. When they reached this place, she would decide to live or die. Not before.

With the time her silent decision bought her, they walked on far into the night, into a moonrise of stunning beauty—the light strong and pure, bright enough to cast shadows.

And at last there came the walls, bursting out of the dull brown sand with a curious suddenness, as if an animal had bared its teeth. For the walls were white, or they looked white in the moonlight, at this distance.

All the tribe of the Erel stopped at once, stunned, relieved, and from the corner of her eye Rav saw five or six people so overcome they simply collapsed.

Yasur swayed like a drunken man, putting his broad, knuckly hand out to catch himself on the air, his silver beard glittering. “You, soothsayer,” he croaked. “This is the place we were told, yes? Answer my questions now. You have been evading me for too long.”

Kahsan the soothsayer was old, and she walked with a stick that slowed her in the sand, but Yasur held his temper for once and did not shout at her to hurry up. The others parted to let her through, bowing their heads in respect.

Rav did too, resisting the urge to turn her head away, for the soothsayer stared at her as she always did—the hard grey eyes strange inside the shadow of her hooded robe, like two knives of flint. She held her breath as the old woman passed.

Kahsan knelt at Yasur’s feet, and got out the square of cured hide with the symbols of her trade marked upon it in black. “You, girl,” she said, and turned to Rav. “Go fetch stones. Ten stones.”

Rav put down Thief and did as she was told, heart hammering. There was something in the air now that they were so close, something that spoke louder and more clearly than any spirit—distant but easily perceptible in the scentless world of sand and stone. Mud, mould, death. Hope. Those things meant water. Nothing could rot out here.

Kahsan’s long nails scraped Rav’s palm as she took the stones, and Rav repressed a shudder. Respect must be given for one who spoke to the spirits and the gods. All their priests had already died on the journey.

On any other night, the markings on the hide would have been impossible to see; tonight they looked black and fresh as if they had just been drawn. And Rav thought that too was not without meaning.

“You will go on no matter what the answers are,” Kahsan said flatly. “But you should ask, yes. So all can hear.”

“Is there water in that place?” Yasur said. “Enough for all the tribe to drink?”

The stones thudded softly onto their squares. “Yes.”

“Is our journey at an end?” Yasur said, his voice already fat with gloating.

“Yes.”

“You see,” Yasur said, and picked up his own stick again. “You see? I have led you here, and our old leader would have warned us away. There is water. We are done wandering. The spirits have spoken. Everyone, get up. We walk till we are inside the walls.”

In the rustle and commotion, before her mother could call to her, Rav took a deep breath. She whispered to Kahsan, “Wise lady, he did not ask why the place was abandoned. Should he have asked that?”

“Bright girl,” Kahsan murmured, leaning on Rav’s forearm. Her strange eyes glittered as she looked up. “I myself have asked. Many times.”

“What did the spirits say?”

“They could not agree.”

Rav blinked, and looked again at the walls, drawing closer now with the tribe’s every weary step. High, sturdy shelter, like living in a mountain. Thicker than the walls of the homes they had been driven from, safer than any tent. “So the people who lived there… they were wise to leave? Or foolish?”

Kahsan shook her head. She too was looking at the walls. “It is almost the right question,” she said. “But not quite.”

*   *   *

At daybreak they trudged through the gate and breathed the still air, marveling at the joy of being out of the wind. But there were other joys and curiosities: walls of ordinary mud-brick surrounded the place, but there also was one very large tower of stone—desert-beaten but furiously erect, an old man whipped but refusing to kneel at the feet of his captors.

Yasur said, “No one is to go near that one. The scouts will make sure it is safe.” He did not seem to notice that the scouts too were backing away from it, pale and shaken.

No one wanted to go near it; his admonitions were not needed. Everyone regarded it with terrible awe, imagining what might be inside—ghosts, demons, the howling spirits of the desert? Or more ordinary terrors? Lions or wolves or jackals enjoying the quiet of the abandoned city, or enormous snakes or scorpions, or a nest of manticores?

And how could men, even many men, have built such a thing? Where had the stone come from? Was it built by the gods of this place? Were they the same gods of the tribe—She of the Sky and He of the Sun—or others?

Rav walked in wonder, heedless of her brothers, her shouting mother, even Kahsan snapping at her to come back and stay with the others. She could not imagine why anyone had left this place, let alone the many, many thousands of people who must have lived here—more people than she had ever seen in her life, more people than she had secretly assumed lived in the world.

The walls would keep out the beasts of the desert, and from the top you could see whether rival tribes were coming, or sandstorms or flash floods from the mountains or the not-too-distant river. There was good soil, or anyway good enough to grow things like they had at home, wheat and lentils at least. There was a sense of… of being enclosed, but not like in a tent. Something sturdier, better. Anything might hammer at these walls and never get in.

And there was water, just as the spirits said: a dark green oasis in the middle of the city, the open water shaded by the leaves of date palms drooping with fruit. Before Yasur could give them leave, the tribe broke like an ant’s nest and stampeded for it, travel-heavy feet light with wanting. Some voices rose in surprise and fear: “No! Don’t let the children get in the water!” “Stop it!” “Let it remain clean!”

Rav hung back, fearful of the disarray. Where were her brothers? Of course: splashing and screaming at the edge of the reeds, little monsters. She could not take the shrillness of everyone’s voices anymore, and put her hands over her ears and wandered away, as dazed as if she had been struck on the head.

It receded as she walked, and she slowly lowered her hands and put one over the bone knife she wore on her hip. She had never truly believed that the place had been abandoned completely, but it seemed so—and for a long time, too. Weeds and even trees choked the doorways of the houses; most of the roofs had disintegrated, being made of palm leaves or reeds rather than the mud-brick of the walls. On the paths between the houses there was no dung of animals or people, no bones or broken pottery, nothing but graceful undisturbed crescents of sand.

Had there been a battle, had the residents been driven out? Any signs of that were long gone. Or a plague? Rav could not imagine what signs a plague might leave, and that made her uneasy. The priests taught that the spirits that caused plagues did not always leave a place when they had taken all the victims they wanted; sometimes they stayed, waiting for future victims, future offense. Like those desert plants that needed only a single rain to turn from a brown fist of tangled fiber into a soft green cushion.

The voices faded into the distance; Rav walked on, the sun hot on her shoulders. The only movement was the small lizards darting on the walls, a few flies, humming bees. Grass danced in the breeze. She smelled water again, and trotted curiously after it till she found another spring—hidden within a square enclosure of brick walls open to the sky, the doorway collapsed so that she had to squeeze inside, scraping her knees and palms.

But there was peace then, and solitude, and water—as cold and sweet as in the songs, bubbling from a stone cleft in the corner of the square and into a little pool two paces wide. Rav filled her belly and stood for a long time listening to the water, allowing herself to feel… if she would not call it hope, at least anticipation. Supposing they couldn’t stay here? At least they could rest and drink, wash and recuperate, and then go on again.

She did not want to go on again. The tribe of Erel had been sedentary for a long time, till they had been invaded and lived uneasily with their conquerors for a few years—it was only when the tribe of Samatas had threatened their neighbours with slavery (“Not everyone, only the strong men and young women!”) that her people had fled in the night.

They had been walking too long; too many had been lost. So she could not feel hope now. But something close.

Rav squeezed back out of her secret spring, and began to walk back to the others, then stopped, her attention attracted by something in the shadows of an empty house identical to the others. Something fluttering—a bird? A flower?

No, cloth. A scrap of coarse, pale wool protruding from the floor near the doorway, like a breath of smoke. Rav stooped and took it in her fingers, intending to pull it free. But her fingers slackened their grip as she saw what she had nearly touched, and her freshly wetted throat allowed her to scream.

*   *   *

Kahsan grasped Rav’s arm and leaned over to stare at the body, such as it was—part of a backbone and some ribs, exposed just a few inches below the white-plastered floor, speckled with what Rav at first took to be blood, but blood did not stay red for long once shed. Ochre then, or something similar.

A crowd gathered outside the house. Some people were sobbing with fear. A man said, “Must we then abandon this place? Is it a place of evil?”

Yasur did not move. He spoke without turning his head. “We are not leaving,” he said. “If you find one of these—do not disturb it. Cover it again.”

“There’s no head,” Rav said. “It ends there, at the neck-bone.”

Kahsan nodded, straightened, rubbed her own back. “There is no danger,” she said loudly. “The people who lived here put the dead of their families under their houses. To protect the dead from wild animals and vermin, and to lay claim to the land itself. The head will be buried nearby.”

“You have seen this in your visions?” Yasur said suspiciously. “You speak truth?”

“I do not lie,” Kahsan said. “If you accuse me of lying, I know ways to curse you and your descendants for a thousand years. Never say it again, Yasur.”

Yasur was startled, and flinched as if she had struck him; but he left quickly, and in a moment Rav heard his voice moving away from them through the crowd, telling everyone there was no danger—he, the leader, had seen that there was no danger.

Rav said, “So this is not the evil that sent people from this place?”

“I do not think so,” Kahsan said as they walked behind the others. “This was everyday life for them, probably for many generations. I have heard of such things being done out here. I think if we dug up that floor we would find not only that body, but others. Their ghosts would guard the house.”

“Oh,” Rav said. “Should we do that now that we’re here?”

“I will ask the spirits when the time comes,” Kahsan said. “Now that there is water, perhaps no one will die for a while.” She coughed, leaning on her stick. “Why do you speak of evil, Rav? Perhaps these people left for somewhere better.”

“I’m sure you are right, wise lady.”

Kahsan laughed. “You think I’m wrong,” she said, grasping Rav’s forearm again. Her hand was weak and hot, like the lick of a flame. “Maybe I am. There is certainly something else here, something restless. The spirits cry out and fight with one another. I must not ask them anything for a while here. Not until they settle—they will not agree, but maybe they will become calm. Then I will ask. And we will find out.”

Rav nodded, uneasy. “I… will you let me come see? When you ask? I… I would like to know the answer.”

“I will come find you, Rav.”

*   *   *

Rav dreamt of dragons, serpents, black storm clouds that held no rain; and she heard the wind speaking in a thousand voices, all trying to drown one another out so that she could not understand one word they said. The tribe went about their business without speaking of their own dreams, but all were haggard, all had dark marks under their eyes from broken sleep. Her five brothers plagued her less; her mother worried that they were ill.

But the first illness seemed a very minor one—Sirat brother to Mirat, who had died along the way, was bitten by one of the snakes that lived on the walls, and with all their healers dead Kahsan went to tend to the boy, taking Rav with her.

There was a burning smell inside, even though the boy’s mother, Amina, had built no fire. “He killed the snake,” Amina whispered, using a stick to point at the ground near the boy’s swollen hand. “He thought someone might need to know… that they have venom…”

“He was right to do so,” Kahsan said. “Attend me, Rav. Small snakes and scorpions often have more venom than the big ones. The things they eat are sometimes very strong. The big ones—they fight their food to subdue it. But the little ones cannot fight. So they have this power.”

The snake was very small, no thicker than Rav’s thumb, and a bright gold colour. Rav thought its fangs would not even have been long enough to penetrate Sirat’s sun-hardened, calloused skin, even though it clearly had. She said, “What can we do?”

“I have herbs for this. Go fetch me some water. And you—” Kahsan pointed at Amina. “Fetch wood for a fire.”

Rav went, and though for a moment she debated getting water from her secret spring, she decided against it—someone might see her, and she did not know why she wanted to keep it to herself, but she did. The desire for that was stronger than any she had felt for a long time. She went to the big oasis, settled again after its first muddy disarray, and brought back pot after pot of the clear water for Kahsan.

*   *   *

Sirat died the next day despite Kahsan’s ministrations, and Rav walked with the women several paces behind the men as they took the body out into the desert and buried it deep. It was the first death since they had found sanctuary—five days.

Yasur said it was all right; he gave a comforting speech. People trembled, clutched one another. The children were silent, their eyes glazed. He said, “This place is not trying to drive us out. We are used to snakes, to vermin, to the mice and spiders of the desert. It’s normal. It’s all normal.”

Rav looked into his eyes as he spoke, and saw something scuttling there—gone in a flash, like the strange blue-black beetles they saw on the walls, with the markings on their backs that resembled a skull. The spirits of this place…

Yasur said, “Some of you still ask whether we were right to come here. Here, with its water and its food, its thick walls, its houses ready for us. Listen to yourselves. The other tribes were cowards. Only we were brave enough to come this way and take what is offered to the brave.”

Rav did not think that was true. This walled city was near a river, near mountains. It should have been on the trade routes. But no one had come for dozens or hundreds of years, Kahsan said. From the walls, their scouts had seen no caravans, no herders with sheep or goats, no bandits, no other travelers at all. The land lay empty around them, breathing out bad dreams.

Yet it was perfect. How could both things be true?

Rav woke to the sound of singing, distant and wild. Across the room came the shuffling sounds of the boys waking up, the rustle of their bedclothes and the reed mats upon which they slept. Her mother said, “Who is that? Who is singing the birth song?”

“I’ll go look,” Rav said. “You stay.”

No one was with child—that she knew of. And the birth song was one of excitement and possibility, of a day’s labour over and then the hard work to come, of keeping the child alive. If a baby had come too early, no one would sing.

She went out into the lane between the houses, dimly seeing others doing the same, the moonlight caught in their pale clothes and here and there the flash of a palm or teeth.

It was Amina, but the singing did not come from Amina’s house—the woman was at the gate in the wall, her voice a howl of joy, the words submerged in it. She embraced the bricks with outspread arms, rubbing her face on them, hissing at those who tried to pull her away.

“What is it?” someone whispered behind Rav.

She didn’t turn. “Someone go find Yasur,” she whispered back. “Quick. Tell him Sirat is back.”

“Is what?”

“Sirat,” Rav said, still staring, wishing she was wrong. “Sirat is… he’s back, but he’s… he’s sick… something has happened to him. We cannot let him back into the city.”

Others had already realized it, and despite Amina’s screaming and clawing at them to stop, stop persecuting my son, my son who has returned, they threw stones and bricks at him, trying to drive him into the ditch surrounding the wall. The flesh had fallen from his bones already, and the sinews had drawn tight, all the water vanished into the sand of his grave. But his eyes were white and wet, like the pieces of shell placed into the eye sockets of the skulls they kept finding under the floors.

A brick struck him in the forehead and his head snapped back, dust rising in a cloud. Still he came, the fingers scrabbling for purchase on the inner wall of the ditch, rising inexorably as a heavier man—a live man—would not. Screams rose from the back of the crowd, drowning out Amina’s muffled singing. Rav turned at last, tearing her terrified gaze away from Sirat who had been dead, and then she screamed too.

This in the end was their great fortune: in all the empty city, the well could escape the sick, the living, the dead.

It was not illusion. It was not madness. Rav had seen both on the long journey—mirage and derangement, sometimes at the same time, sometimes not. This was real. Teeth snapped in pursuit.

It was not everyone, not quite, but she fled them all the same. They were sick, shaking, foaming at the mouth, no longer lethargic, even the children. They had spoken of it in their old home. It happened sometimes—she could not remember the name—dog bites or bat bites could cause it. Except that she had seen no dogs here and no bats and Kahsan had not been called to any other bedsides—

Rav stopped, panting, flattened herself lizardlike to the closest crumbling wall. She had been running in circles, unthinking, like a sheep stalked by dogs or jackals. Now like the swift stroke of a knife she went in a straight line, away from the screaming mob and into the quiet of the empty places, and only then did she turn back and run to Kahsan’s house.

For Kahsan had no one, she had no husband, no children, and she had outlived all her brothers and sisters, and she would be defenseless. Rav’s mother at least had the boys. Five boys, all in the house, they would fight for her. Rav was not needed there. That much she had always known.

Kahsan’s house looked as if something had run into it, and perhaps something had—some of the buildings here had been hit harder by the long neglect than others. But something moved within, and Rav put her eye to what remained of the doorway, cautiously. “Soothsayer? Are you in there?”

A moan. Low and guttural, without strength.

“Soothsayer!”

Rav struggled with the bricks, pushing them inside when it was clear she could not pull them free from the rubble, and clambered in, her hands outstretched in the darkness. “Kahsan! Are you here? It’s Rav. Are you hurt, did they get you?”

The house was not large; still it seemed she went cautiously for many minutes, inching her feet across the uneven floor, praying she would not strike one of those hidden bodies as she walked—praying there would be no crunch as her feet sank into a buried skull, the dust of long-dead brains, powder of blood and ochre. Where had the sound come from? She could only move forward, mouth dry with fear. The darkness was like sand, striking her skin, sparking lights from her unseeing eyes—and there was a smell, strong and familiar. Rot, mud. Stagnant water.

“Rav daughter of Lassat.” The voice was slow, slurred.

Rav stopped as if she had been slapped: it was not Kahsan’s voice; had she gotten the wrong house, was she too late? “Soothsayer?” she whispered, already beginning to turn back toward the faint grey moonlight of the doorway.

“Rav.” This time the voice sounded normal, and Rav dared to turn back. “I will strike a light. Cover your eyes.”

When she could see, Rav knelt cautiously next to Kahsan, enduring the waves of stench that washed off her—not at all the normal smells of unwashed skin or ordinary dirt but decay, something dead. Again Rav pictured a lake overrun with weed, or a river nearly dry, the sluggish water curdling in the sun like milk. Her stomach turned.

“Te ra fim,” Kahsan said, her fingers jittering over the hide square of prophecy. “Inside me… they have told me their name… of old. Teraphim, not a word in our tongue. But the tongue of those who were here—faugh, old woman, silence.”

Rav flinched, but resisted the urge to run. Kahsan was sweating, perspiration trickling down her forehead, soaking the flint-grey hair normally covered by her hood. Only the whites of her eyes showed. “Inside you,” Rav said.

Kahsan grunted. Her face worked with the effort of regaining control, it seemed, over her very speech; her hands rose, left seizing and struggling with right, right defying left. After several seconds she said, “They sought a voice. They cannot speak. A witch or a mage, a priest or a soothsayer, they waited for one… I asked the gods and the spirits of our tribe to fight them—fight! They will not be the first puny desert imps we have defeated. Fight? Let them fight. Fight and die.”

The old woman’s left hand began to snake towards her throat, the right clawing ineffectually at it; Rav grasped both, holding them in her strong young grip. Under her fingers, the bones creaked as something far more powerful than Kahsan strove to work its will, uncaring of whether the bones broke or skin split. “Tell me what to do,” Rav said. “How to get them out of you.”

“We cannot. You cannot. Silence, shut up! We cannot—only the spirits can, and I must ask, I must—”

Rav released her, scrabbled on the floor for stones or bits of brick, counting frantically under her breath. Shadows crossed the doorway, paused, moved on. But the next ones might not move on. They would hear them and come in, and… the screams from the adjacent streets told the rest of the story. Not fearful cries of anticipation but death-cries of pain and betrayal.

“Here, here.” Rav pushed the stones into Kahsan’s right hand, keeping a grip on the left. “Can you do it? Can I help?”

Kahsan shuddered, sweat dripping and hissing into the tiny fire she had built on the floor. Something struck the wall next to them hard enough to make the bricks squeal against each other, long-dried mortar spilling loosely onto Rav’s shoulder. “I will ask,” Kahsan said thickly. “Throw. You throw.”

The stones pattered onto the hide; Kahsan said nothing, only her mouth moved, eyelids fluttering. The teraphim were strong, terrifyingly strong. Rav could not imagine anything possessing a soothsayer, who was protected against such things not only by her own abilities but by the gods themselves and the servants of the gods.

But there are many, many gods in this land…

The tiny house filled with the roaring of wind and a harsh blue light—like stormlight seen through a thin veil—and another kind of screaming, like stone against stone, the crack and wail of a landslide. Stars dashed before Rav’s terrified gaze, deformed with their own speed. Teardrops racing around one another, burning bright, against the wind and with it.

“Fight them!” she shouted, resisting her fear. “Fight them! Kill them! We have brought the stronger gods—kill these false spirits! Let us live here! And let Kahsan go!”

The walls and roof blew outwards like a rock overheated in the fire.

Rav sat dazed, slowly registering that she was alive—probably alive—that she and Kahsan were beneath the stars, on a clear night. Starlight and moonlight. The fire had gone out. She could not see the hide square of prophecy.

Kahsan rose unsteadily—then kept rising, her bare feet white with sand, dangling under her torn robe. The voice that was not hers cried out and laughed and screamed with triumph, and the other members of the tribe slowly trickled through the streets till all encircled the house, standing back from the ring of rubble enclosing it. Dozens of faces turned upward to see their soothsayer, possessed with the spirits of the city, floating in the air higher than any hand could reach.

“Now there are enough hands to do what needs to be done,” the teraphim announced in their low, booming voice. A small trickle of blood oozed from the corner of Kahsan’s mouth, following the creased skin. “Those who lived here before were weak. They perished for their weakness. But now there are many, there is power… and I am in you. I am in you all. Leave the river but go to the other places of water here. There are six in all, saving the Great Spring from whence I flow. Destroy the other six. Destroy them. But drink deep from my water… for there is water for all. And there will be flesh for all.”

Voices rose from the tribe, indistinct, confused. Some could not speak, and brought their hands to their faces, aping the movement of lips and tongue with their fingers. “Six,” said the woman standing behind Rav. “We must find them and… count…”

“Six,” someone else said slowly. “Drink the good water… kill the…”

“The rebellious and the sick. And the old and the weak. Kill them first…”

“…Then seek forth, outside the walls.”

“Bring others.”

“Others for our masters and gods. Others to… eat…”

“And we shall eat.”

“And we shall drink.”

Sand flowed along the streets, white and serpentine, bulging as it turned corners, ran over bare feet, bunched and sprang like muscle. Rav muffled a cry as it touched her ankle, then glanced desperately around the crowd, dispersing now, heads down as they followed the sand. Kahsan still dangled in the air, her hands moving weakly—still alive, it might be—and Rav could do nothing for her.

But for the rest… no, she would not live here as a slave to these gods. No walls were worth that. Had they not run from their homes to evade this very fate? If her father were here, if her mother were nearby, they would tell her to simply comply with her new masters, for they would be possessed too… they too would bring others to this damned place. Lure them or kidnap them, feed them to the teraphim.

And yet, the tribe was many, and Rav was only one… and perhaps the only one who had not drunk from the first water they had seen.

The Great Spring from whence I flow… She still had her will and her wits, if nothing else; and she was very used to having nothing else. She had always owned very little. She had always had things taken from her—by her parents, her brother, the others, the privations of her old life, then the desert, the journey. Only her greed for a moment’s solitude and secrecy had bought her this reprieve now. She would not forget it, if she lived.

*   *   *

The oasis shimmered minutely in its bed of reeds, reflecting back the stars. Rav paused behind the scratchy trunk of a date palm and studied it, hoping no one would notice her. It seemed that some people disregarded her entirely, but others stopped and stared, saliva falling from their open mouths, and while she had evaded them easily enough in their ones and twos, she was not sure she could do it if they gathered in larger numbers. Faces she had known since birth were contorted beyond recognition—with the madness of the water-borne spirits, with hunger, with cuts and tears on their faces from victims fighting back.

Old, sick, weak… and Rav herself, because she was not possessed. She shivered, still staring at the water. The teraphim had taken it upon themselves to post guards—six men, all hunters, surrounded the pool. Yasur was one. She closed her eyes for a moment in despair. He would not rally a defense of any kind; he was taken just as most of the others were.

She did not have time to round up those who had chosen houses in other parts of the empty city, and had perhaps been drinking from closer springs. But what could she do? The smaller ones would be easy to destroy, but this one, the only one the enemy wanted to keep…

Rav backed away slowly, keeping low, and moved around the oasis in a circle, trying to remain in the shadow of the walls as others ran to and fro, grunting to one another and pointing at the other places to find water.

There… a slight slope. She followed it, pausing often to duck behind a pile of rubble or jump into an open doorway, her hand always on her knife, for what little good it would do. She did not think she would be able to drive it into someone if they did attack her; the thought was sickening.

Hurry, hurry, hurry… the sun was coming up, visible only as a faint amber haze for the moment. But in ten or twenty minutes it would be light enough to see, and she would no longer be able to hide in the darkness. The others, too, would no longer be wandering at random; they too would see, for water was easy enough to spot.

What Rav sought was hidden, and even if she found it, she had no idea what she would do then. To find it, she decided, came first. If she did not, it did not matter what she chose next.

Dust rose in a chill wind, hiding the stars. This too must be the sorcery of the spirits, the cruelty of the teraphim. Without their lights to navigate by, she slowed, and counted turnings instead, past the rectangular walls of the houses.

Left, right. Right, left. The night was full of cruelty and wonders, but she had not died in the desert, and she would not die now; it was a white-hot anger in her, that this too, this city of sanctuary, might be taken.

Left. Right.

At last she found what she sought. Near the wall on the east side, many years ago, the builders had taken pains to conceal it—not because they feared its destruction, but because it must be hidden from the thievery of the sun, which loved to steal water from exposed earth. Rav had suspected it would be here: this underground river, long hidden. The smaller springs were coming from shallower stuff, the water that sat in the ground. But the big oasis would not remain full unless it were being continuously fed by something larger. And here it was.

She had found it by the slope and by the smell, but now that she saw it, she was daunted; how to undo what they had done? How to send the stones and bricks downward, damming the flow, when they had so carefully built it to evade that fate? The years had done much, but how could she do the rest?

Rav was still standing—foolishly—in the open, thinking about it, when the others found her. And not only the others but Yasur, his normally dark face an unpleasant shade of grey, as if he had already died—died hours ago, and all the blood had left his body.

“The traitor!”

“The enemy—the enemy of the master!”

Their words were slurred, they bit their lips as they spoke, unfeeling; their teeth were all red in the dawn. Rav backed away, startled, till her back hit the wall. For several frozen seconds she considered escaping—here was a good spot, wasn’t it? She could climb the wall, with difficulty, true, and drop down the other side into the ditch, and then climb out of that, probably, and run away from these people—her tribe—run away, save herself, run back into the desert.

“Take her,” Yasur said, his voice hollow. He faced her, but he did not see her; his eyes were closed, smeared with fresh blood. “Her! All of you. Obey me. Obey our masters.”

Behind her back, Rav clutched the wall, unable to move as they approached, slow and clumsy.

They are many. I am…

Small. Light. Alone. She gulped air, raised her chin, and began to edge away from them, along the wall. “Come get me then,” she called, though her voice was thin and trembling. “You are all mad—come get me, come give me your madness. Are you brave enough?”

“We will not give you madness,” Yasur said, unmoving as the others crept after her. “We will consume you. Not sacrifice but honest food. For our masters. For the spirits that inhabit this city.”

Twelve, thirteen, fourteen… that must be quite a bit of weight, thin as they all were. Fifteen, sixteen… if she could only keep them coming a few minutes longer… no, she couldn’t risk it. She darted away from the first set of grasping hands, turning back towards the houses and the grain-stores, dancing along the uneven surface of the place never meant to bear weight. Already she could feel the bricks beginning to crumble under her running feet.

She prayed to the tribe’s defeated gods, incoherently, without words. A hand snatched at her arm and missed, fingernails slashing her flesh. She did not dare look back.

And then the world was tilting—the starless sky turning above her, the black silhouettes of palm leaf and clinging vine—with one last burst of effort she flung herself forwards, scrabbled at broken bricks, writhed onto a low roof that bowed alarmingly under her weight.

Behind her, as she finally spun to look, the mass of her pursuers had crashed through the very bricks of the street, long undermined by the dampness below and the desert winds above. They writhed in a morass of mud and brick, stone and limb, both drowning and being buried alive. Rav stared in horror, knowing and naming each one. This she would not permit herself to look away from, for it was her doing as much as the teraphim.

Again the unnatural wind roared; again the dust snarled into the sky like smoke; and then it was over, or seemed to be over. Those who had not fallen into the opening blinked and looked around at one another. Pale yellow light slid over the city, and many looked down at their shadows and were amazed.

“Yasur,” Rav said, and climbed down from the roof, her legs shaking. “Yasur, speak to me. Are you mad? Is the madness over?”

He stared at her as if he did not know her, and rubbed his eyes with his hands, trying to wipe away the clinging blood. “I was there,” he said slowly. “And not there… I watched, I saw. I heard all. I thought… This place is a beautiful trap. It has trapped many. But I could not act.”

He did not sound mad—or he did, a bit, but mad like a poet. They had lost all their poets on the march. Rav said, “I am going to go find my family and the soothsayer.”

“Yes… yes, you should do that…”

*   *   *

They debated long around the fire, those who were left, and Rav sat in a place of honour at Yasur’s right hand, for all his second-men were dead. Kahsan, weary beyond words, sat next to Rav, leaning on the girl’s shoulder like a child. Rav was happy to breathe the old woman’s true scent, untainted by her possessors—the familiar smell of her hair, the desert smell of her hood.

Rav was not interested in the argument; she watched and listened only so that she might explain later to her mother and brothers what she had already decided to do, no matter what the tribe of Erel might choose.

And they chose as she expected: all the water sources, including Rav’s secret spring, had been filled in or dammed, but they might be salvaged; they would take care to never drink again from the Great Oasis; and anyway there was the river, four or five miles to the east, and they could fetch water from that. The soil was good. The abandoned gardens had seed. The desert had wild oxen and goats and sheep to hunt and eat, or bring into the fold for a few seasons as they had done in their old land. The walls were strong. The tower saw far. The tribe of Erel would stay. More carefully than before, but they would stay.

“I am leaving,” Rav said when all had done speaking, and no one looked at her. But this was a different invisibility from before. Now, she knew, they heard her, and they had no reply.

Kahsan went with her, and she was glad for that, because she had meant to ask and it was a relief not to. They took food and water-skins, knives and tents, blankets for the night and veils for the eyes, to protect them from the sand, and Kahsan said they should go along the river till they reached the sea.

“Will they be all right?” Rav said quietly as they left that evening, looking back at the pale walls. Her mother had not wept; neither had her brothers. She felt the grief in her stomach like a heavy, icy stone, and she hoped it would lessen as they walked.

“No,” Kahsan said. Her voice, too, was sad. The tribe had no soothsayer now; and they said they did not care. “The teraphim are not gone, only weakened. If you destroy their physical home, their spiritual home is left, and one day they will be able to cross into our world again. All who were possessed remain possessed. They will die or flee, just as those before them. But if no one comes…”

“Then the city will be… cleansed?”

Kahsan nodded. “I have asked our spirits,” she said. “They say in eight times eight times eight years, then this place will again be inhabited, and those people will prosper. But not before then.”

“Then we are wise to go.”

“We are less foolish to go,” Kahsan said. “Come on, you with your young back. Give me your arm.”

And with gladness they turned their backs on Jericho.

LOST OUT HERE
IN THE STARS

MARK CHADBOURN

Years had passed before Parsifal recognised that the beast had started to devour his soul. By the time that revelation came, in a blasted church holding a child’s hand that had no arm, any hope of absolution was already slipping from his fingers.

Now here he was, waiting for his last chance, hunched over a treacly coffee in the warm Istanbul night, surrounded by the clamour of people thronging along the narrow street and the honking of traffic and the reek of diesel fumes.

It had been a long road to this cramped café in the shadow of Hagia Sofia. Fragments of whispered information had led him down too many blind alleys or sent him wandering in the wilderness. Then a sex worker in Homs murmured something to him as she traced her soft fingertips across the map of pale scars on his chest.

Her half-remembered story had led him back to Aleppo, where Assad’s barrel bombs had destroyed that church. From there he was guided to Idlib, then to Raqqa, and finally here to Istanbul.

The man was standing on the other side of the round steel table before Parsifal realised.

He was dressed in a charcoal suit with an open-necked white cotton shirt, casual and at ease, streaks of grey in his oiled black hair, his age indeterminate. A dark moustache hung across his top lip. His mouth curled into an ironic smile.

He was looking Parsifal up and down with the quizzical intensity that people reserved for an entertaining child.

“You are the one who sent the message to see me?”

“If you’re Musa Tezel.”

The man nodded, seemed to reach a conclusion and made to go.

“Wait.” The table rocked as Parsifal jumped to his feet. “Ten minutes, that’s all I ask.”

Sighing, Musa pulled out the chair on the other side of the table.

“From time to time, people ask to see me. They always waste their breath.”

He wagged a finger at the waiter, who hurried away to heat the cezve in a pot of sand for another cup of the aromatic coffee.

“Parsifal. Is not a name that is familiar to me,” Musa said, adding with a note of amusement, “Parsifal Jones.”

“My father thought it would make me something special.”

That was the kind of thing that sometimes happened in those working-class areas where there was never enough cash to go round. Give your kid an individual name so they don’t disappear into that thick mass of failure their parents saw all around them. Set them on the road from nothing to something.

Parsifal shrugged. “All it got me was kickings as a kid and mockery when I was in the army.”

“But that hardened you, yes. It made you the man you are today. It did make you special.”

Parsifal reflected on this. “Maybe.”

“It takes a special person to find me. A driven person. Many obstacles exist to deter those who come looking.”

The waiter set the porcelain kahve fincani in front of Musa. Steam rose from the oily black liquid.

“I want what you’re offering,” Parsifal said.

“And what would that be?”

“A way to end war.”

As he uttered the words, Parsifal realised how ludicrous they sounded. He’d laughed too, when the sex worker told him about a small group of people who could access world-shattering power. But the notion had settled deep into him.

It might be nothing. It probably was nothing. But if there was even the slimmest chance, he’d take it.

“Who would say such a thing?” Musa frowned.

“Don’t play games with me.”

“All we have are games.”

“I first heard the story in Homs,” Parsifal pressed. “About a secret, the biggest secret in the world. Something that could end all the pain and suffering.”

“I see in your eyes that you know of such things.”

Parsifal winced. Was it that obvious? “Yes, I know about suffering.”

“And death?”

“And death.”

He was barely more than a boy when he killed his first man. Eighteen, stupid and swaggering, signed up to see the world and flee his miserable home. It was in Fallujah, the Iraqi even younger than he was, brandishing an antique rifle that jammed. Parsifal vomited after the blood hit the sand, and the youth’s death haunted his nights for a week.

The second was easier. After the tenth, he didn’t even think about it anymore.

One million dead in that war. A hundred thousand of them civilians. Iraq was liberated from Saddam Hussein. Nothing really changed.

When his service was over, he had two choices: go back to the grimy East Midlands, or carry on doing what he was good at. It wasn’t much of a decision. There were plenty of places across the Middle East that would hire a seasoned mercenary. The killing never stopped.

And not just in the Middle East. Since the first time he had picked up a gun, twenty-five thousand civilians were dead in Chechnya, sixty-two thousand at the hands of Boko Haram in Nigeria, three hundred thousand in the genocide in Darfur, the massacre of Ukrainians, at Bucha, Israel, Palestine, Yemen, Ethiopia, Myanmar.

Endless.

But now he was going to end it.

“And how do you think war can be ended?” Musa was saying.

“I don’t know. But I was told your secret could make it so.”

Musa smiled. “A hard man like you believing such a thing. Why, the only way could be sorcery. Is that what you think? We do magic?”

“Yes.”

Parsifal had expected laughter, but Musa only nodded. He blew on his coffee and sipped. “Why do you seek this thing? You are a warrior.”

“I was.”

“But no longer?”

Parsifal didn’t reply. The flash of the barrel bomb hitting the church had burned away everything in his mind in a flare of white light and heat. He’d been aware of all the killing in the world, of course he had. But it was there, in the background, just another part of the endless human drama.

In the weeks before that moment, he’d been training twelve-year-olds to go out and kill their countrymen. He’d seen Assad dump chemical weapons on innocent civilians, their lungs burning away as they choked their last, Russian planes bomb hospitals and orphanages.

That civil war. It was over now, but the toll still hung in the air. Six hundred thousand people had met a violent end, the second-deadliest conflict of the twenty-first century.

Second!

Would he have even woken to the sick reality of the world if the atrocity hadn’t unfolded around him?

Barrel bombs had been exploding all over Aleppo, oil drums packed with high explosives and metal so the shrapnel would maim any who survived. The cruellest of weapons. They were shoved out of passing helicopters, so Assad’s men must have known they were targeting a church where only the hungry, sick and wounded were sheltering.

Coming round in the rubble, caked white with dust from head to toe, he’d looked around at the shredded bodies. And then his eyes fell on the hand of the child he’d been speaking to and everything rushed up from deep inside him, a tsunami of black despair that had been building in intensity since that first kill.

That day would stay with him forever.

Nightmares, convulsing and soaked in sweat, vivid, hellish flashbacks, panic attacks.

The sex worker who soothed him said he should seek a therapist, but what he felt went deeper than human psychology.

An existential despair.

How he survived the blast that day, he didn’t know. He’d never been a religious man, but it seemed like some kind of miracle, like he’d been saved to do something.

That had been the start.

“If there’s a way to end the killing, I want it,” Parsifal stated. “Whatever it is, whatever it takes, I’ll do it. Even if it means selling my soul to the Devil.”

Musa laughed silently. “The Christian Devil! There are gods far older than that.”

“I don’t care. I’ll pray to any god.”

“The first god?”

“I don’t know what that is.”

“Few do.”

Musa pulled a silver cigarette case out of his inside jacket pocket. The light from above the café door dazzled off it. He drew out one of those strong Turkish cigarettes, tapped it on the tabletop, then slipped it between his lips, lighting it with a flourish. When he’d blown out a blue cloud of fragrant smoke, he said, “The usual warnings apply. You should be careful what you wish for.”

The child’s pale fingers, cold and limp in his own.

“I’m ready.”

Musa pushed his chair back and stood. “You are a driven man, Parsifal Jones. You carry the weight of your sins heavy upon you. I think perhaps it has driven you a little mad. But I cannot help you.”

“Why did you agree to see me, then?”

“I see all those who successfully navigate the labyrinth we have created. It is a test, of will, and fortitude. Our beliefs tell us that one of those must have their prayers answered, when the time is ripe, and we will know who that is. But you are not that one.”

With a nod, Musa turned and slipped into the flow of bodies thronging along the street.

Parsifal simmered. To have come so close and be dismissed was like a knife to the heart. This was his last chance to find absolution, he knew that; the last chance to make the world a better place.

He couldn’t let it go.

Jumping to his feet, Parsifal tumbled a pocketful of coins and notes onto the table and pushed his way into the stream of people.

At first, he thought he’d left it too late. But then, as he eased around a group of women flirting with young men on Vespas, he glimpsed Musa sauntering ahead, every now and then blowing a cloud of smoke into the warm breeze.

Parsifal followed him closely, falling back only when Musa turned away from the honking traffic into a maze of deserted side streets. The air there had the cloying stink of rubbish left out in the sun.

At a five-storey apartment block, Musa stopped and pushed open the door. The building was one of those ancient ones that existed all over Istanbul, dark and brooding, the roof bowing, the door cracked and blistered from the day’s heat.

He could hear voices from within. A young woman punctuated her words with bright laughter. Musa’s urbane drawl.

A moment later, the door flew open and the woman breezed out, long-limbed and slim, maybe about seventeen, raven-black hair cascading. No doubt off to torment the boys on Istikal, where they said three million walked every day.

She flashed Parsifal an open, innocent smile as she passed in a cloud of cheap scent and he slipped through the door that she’d swung open.

Shadows swamped the hallway. A lamp glowed feebly above a flight of wooden stairs. Parsifal could hear the creak of the boards and he bounded up the steps as quietly as he could manage, just in time to see Musa take out his keys in front of a door on the first floor.

When the lock clicked and the door opened, Parsifal rushed the last flight of stairs and bundled Musa inside.

The Turkish man whirled, his lips pulling back from his teeth. “You dare come to my home?”

“Was that your daughter downstairs?”

Parsifal watched fear flicker in the other man’s eyes.

“We’re all in hell here, Musa. A little more suffering and misery is just a drop in the ocean. Give me what I want. If not, I’ll kill your daughter, then you. Then I’ll track down every member of your little cult and kill them too.”

The atmosphere in the room shifted, almost imperceptibly, but Parsifal’s well-honed senses registered it. He felt unease creep over him, though he didn’t know why.

An odd smell drifted through the air, the odour of a dank atmosphere, like rotting vegetation.

Musa took a step back. The fear was gone now and his features drew tight. The streetlight breaking through the window flickered like cold flames in his dark eyes.

“You think you can enter my home with impunity and threaten me and those I love?”

“I’m stronger than you, Musa. I can take my punches. And this knife I’ve got in my pocket will make short work of you.”

“You will pay a price for this.”

“Try me.”

Parsifal sensed movement in the shadows in the corner of the room. He searched the space, but no one was there.

“And you are the man who professed to make the world a better place.” Musa’s voice was edged with contempt. “You are not a good man.”

Parsifal felt his chest tighten with desperation. “I’ve known that for a long time. It doesn’t matter. We can’t go on the way we have been, all the senseless killing. If I can stop that, I would do anything.”

“Even kill an innocent?”

“Even that.”

Musa looked him deep in the face, searching. Finally, he seemed to find what he needed.

“Then you are the one.”

Parsifal’s relief lasted only an instant. Sudden movement erupted from the dark in the corner of the room. A shadowed figure drove towards him, though there could not possibly have been anyone there.

Hands were grasping, and in the flash of the moment, Parsifal thought he saw long, curved talons; skin that was dark and scaled.

As Parsifal staggered back, he glimpsed Musa watching him with a cruelly humorous smile, and then the figure crashed into him.

Parsifal slammed onto his back, hard. The air jolted from his lungs.

The attacker dropped on top of him, pinning him flat with an unbearable weight, and Parsifal’s nostrils filled with that reek of rotting vegetation.

His vision swam with the face pressed barely a hand’s width from his own.

Elongated, vertical pupils burned with an amber light. What he could see of the distorted features were scaled, like emerald jewels.

Then the mouth tore wide and Parsifal saw only rows of jagged teeth.

*   *   *

Parsifal came round slumped against the cracked plaster beneath the window. He could still smell that foul stench; it seemed to have seeped into him. His head throbbed where it had crashed against the floor.

Musa was watching him from an old armchair which had a brocaded cloth thrown over it.

“What…what was that?” Parsifal choked.

“I have friends in low places. Never threaten me again.”

A memory danced through his mind: the torn bodies in the church, the small hand. Another hallucination from the PTSD, that could be the only explanation.

“You’ve got to help me,” he croaked and realised how pathetic he sounded.

“I will help you,” Musa replied. “You are the one.”

*   *   *

The sun hung fat and red above the dark line of hills. Shadows pooled in the hollows of the vast, dry Harran Plain and the first gusts of the cooling night wind brought respite from the heat of the day.

They were in the foothills of the jagged Taurus Mountains, overlooking the headwaters of the grey Balikh River. This was an old land, as hard as the people who had eked out a living here for millennia.

Parsifal sipped water from a plastic bottle as the black Toyota Land Cruiser sped along the deserted road, a cloud of dust billowing behind it. Musa was behind the wheel, eyes fixed on a hill ahead. He moistened his lips and his features shadowed into an expression of what Parsifal thought seemed apprehension.

They’d departed in the small hours, after Musa had insisted on waiting until his daughter came home so he could hug her and kiss her and see her to bed.

For nearly fourteen hours now they’d been driving in near-silence, the brooding atmosphere hovering over them as they took the road east to Ankara and then winding south and east again into the arid plateau of Anatolia, bounded by coppery mountain ranges and salty lakes that mirrored the sky.

“We are nearly at our destination,” Musa murmured.

“That hill?”

“It was raised by the hands of men; a tell, they call it. Imagine what would drive men to do that, to give up the hours of their lives to build something so vast upon a limestone plateau in a time when starvation was always at your shoulder. The back-breaking work, the sweat and agonies. People see that hill, but they never reflect on what monumental thing required such sacrifice.” Musa nodded slowly. “Why would they do it?”

“What is this place?”

“It is called Göbekli Tepe. In the language of the Kurds, its name translates as ‘Wish Hill’.”

“Wish? For what?”

Musa only smiled. “Allow yourself a moment of wonder. This place is eleven thousand five hundred years old. Can you imagine that time scale? The building of Stonehenge and the Great Pyramids are closer to us today than they are to when Göbekli Tepe rose up towards the sky.”

Parsifal took another slug of water. The sun was sliding below the line of hills and the darkness was rolling in with an uncomfortable speed.

“So this is the place your little cult worships?”

“My little cult?” Musa grinned, but it was hard and dark. “My ancestors were here when Göbekli Tepe was made, my friend. We live in a transitory world. Things fade fast, are forgotten. We cannot imagine connections with such an ancient time. Göbekli Tepe is just there, on the landscape. But stories, told well, do not fade. They leap from lips to lips across the years, carrying in their narrative information, sometimes secret, always vital. For encysted within the story, that knowledge is never forgotten.”

“You’re telling me there’s a direct line between the people who built this place and you?” Parsifal snorted and flicked the empty bottle onto the rear seat.

“Not just me, my friend. My little cult. A story passed down from father to son, son to daughter. We have always guarded the secret that lies buried here. We understand the charge that has been laid upon us, each generation rededicating themselves to their mission and to Göbekli Tepe. Older than Sumeria. Older than the Walls of Jericho. Older than Troy.”

Parsifal heard that wonder swell in his voice.

“There is no man-made place on earth that is older,” Musa continued. “Göbekli Tepe is the first, and it will be the last.”

The sun was a crimson sliver now. Musa flicked on the headlights.

“Wish Hill,” Parsifal repeated, musing. “This is where I wish for the end of war?”

“A wish is a prayer, is it not?”

“Who am I praying to?”

“The first god.”

“Does he have a name?”

“No. He is the first. He needed no name.”

Musa slowed the car and turned onto a track leading up to the hill.

“Göbekli Tepe is the birthplace of religion, that is what they say. The first place of worship for the first god.”

Parsifal felt a frisson at Musa’s words. He’d never believed in anything beyond the narrow, blood-soaked confines of his world, where only his abilities to survive counted. But he felt now, deep in his mind, vast vistas opening, of the infinite expanses of the universe where unknowable powers waited.

Where anything was possible and a wish could change all there was.

He’d always wanted to be something. To leave his mark upon the world. When he was growing up, he’d watch those around him get trapped in the crushing gravity of the estate and all that it represented, stumbling from laughter at the back of the classroom, to raucous nights in the local pub, to jobs that drained the vitality from them and left them shrivelled husks just in time for funerals where no one turned up.

He’d been searching for an answer all his life, though he didn’t realise it until the church.

The Land Cruiser swung across compacted hardcore and rumbled to a halt in a parking area.

Parsifal clambered out. The night air had the bite of ice from the mountains. There, away from city lights, the vast vault of the heavens arced above him, the milky spray of stars and a full moon that painted a chiaroscuro landscape of silver and shadow.

Footsteps crunched across stones, drawing nearer.

A torch flicked on and the beam blasted into Parsifal’s face. He threw his arm across his face as someone barked something in Turkish.

Musa replied in a calm voice. The torch beam swept down onto the ground in front of the car and Parsifal saw a security guard, his uniform straining at his paunch.

Stepping closer, Musa whispered something in the man’s ear. The guard nodded, cast a furtive glance at Parsifal, and wandered away.

“We will not be troubled now,” Musa said.

Opening a rickety gate in the perimeter fence, he led the way along moonlit tracks among land littered with rocks and stones to an archaeological site of interconnecting trenches and circular enclosures, where the smooth stone of the ancient temple had already been uncovered from the debris that had buried it.

Parsifal thought perhaps he was imagining it after Musa’s words, but he could feel a strange weight in the air above the entire site, a suffocating dread pressing down.

You should not have come here, it seemed to be saying.

He was not a part of this world, ancient and terrifying and filled with secrets. Something in him wanted to turn back, but then he thought of that small, pale hand held limply in his own and he knew he could not.

Musa stood on the lip of one of the trenches and cupped a hand to his ear, grinning. “Listen,” he said. “Can you hear it?”

Parsifal strained, but the only sound that came to him was the whine of the wind across the desolate land.

“What do you hear?” he asked, not wanting to know the answer.

Musa gently slapped the palm of his right hand on his left breast in a steady beat. “Thoom. Thoom. Thoom. The heartbeat in the land. The heartbeat of the universe. The first god waits to be woken from a sleep that has lasted for millennia.”

He jumped down into the trench and held out a hand for Parsifal to follow him.

The moon was bright enough to see clearly. Musa led Parsifal into a large excavated circular enclosure. The walls were of unfinished stones, but in the centre vast T-shaped limestone columns soared up. Parsifal craned his head, marvelling as they glowed in the moonlight, the milky stream of stars flowing against the night sky behind them.

“These are the first standing stones,” Musa said in an awed voice. “Look at the workmanship. Better by far than the rocks at your Stonehenge, eh? A pale copy of the first temple.”

Parsifal could feel the great age seeping out of the monuments around him. Musa was right; this place was special, crafted with a degree of expertise that was staggering at the dawn of history.

Everywhere he looked, he saw delicately carved reliefs, boars and foxes, vultures and, most of all, serpents. All of them were depicted with an aggressive posture, teeth bared, mouths torn wide.

What did it all mean?

He felt disturbed at the thought that there were secrets locked in those works of art, a voracious meaning which, if he could unlock it, would drive him mad.

As he turned, drinking in the carvings, he recoiled.

Standing before him was the thing he had glimpsed in Musa’s room, that he had convinced himself was an hallucination.

Half hidden in the moon-shadows was a graven figure with the head of a serpent, the carving seemingly untouched by the grinding of the years. As Parsifal shifted uneasily, the dark hollows of the eyes appeared to follow him.

“Göbekli Tepe has its guardians,” Musa whispered behind him. “Yes, you encountered one before.”

“What is it?”

“The first god’s protectors are carved into the stones all around here. These beasts you see are not beasts. They walk the dusk between god and man in the form they choose.”

Demons, Parsifal thought.

“No one can be allowed to disturb the god’s rest, not until the time is right. Take care, my friend. If you anger them, they will consume you.”

Parsifal couldn’t tear his eyes from that disturbing carving, even as Musa led him away. Finally, he forced himself to look ahead, but he could still feel the weight of attention on his back.

As Musa led him on a route through the circular enclosures where more of those T-shaped megaliths towered, the Turk spoke of other ritual sites nearby, all of them connected in a pattern on the earth which he described as a spell.

“They keep the first god contained,” he said.

“To keep him safe.”

“That, and to ensure he does not escape until the time is right.”

“So he’s held captive?”

“I asked you a question when we approached this place. Why did ancient people sacrifice so much to raise this vast monument above the limestone plateau? For worship or to remember, as the archaeologists believe? True, to a degree. But it is, above all else, a prison.”

“Why?”

Musa didn’t answer. Instead, he dipped his hand in the inside pocket of his jacket and pulled out a black leather pouch, cracked and creased with age and tied with a drawstring. He tipped out the contents on the palm of his hand.

Parsifal studied what looked like dried leaves. His nostrils wrinkled at a pungent smell like rotting apples. “What is that?”

“A way for you to speak to the god, to live in the past and see how it unfolded.”

Parsifal scrutinised the leaves, unsure.

“This concoction is made from the flowers of the Blue Lotus which grow along the banks of the Nile. It is as old as this place, one of the many secrets passed down from the shaman who created Göbekli Tepe.”

Parsifal reached out, hesitated.

“Have no fear. It is not poison. If I had wanted you dead, I would have let the guardian take you in my home.”

Once he’d popped the leaves into his mouth, Parsifal chewed slowly and swallowed. An unpleasant metallic tang chased from his tongue down his throat.

Musa beckoned for him to follow. They continued on that winding track around the circular enclosures, almost as if they were conducting a ritual.

With each step, Parsifal could feel the lotus leaves insinuating their way into his consciousness. A shimmering halo encircled the moon. Every pinpricked star burned brighter. The crunch of his feet on the stones reverberated, drifting out into the night then returning with force.

Whispers licked up at the back of his skull. Parsifal strained to hear what was being said, but the language was unfamiliar.

The Turk’s drawl rolled back to him. “Göbekli Tepe is a memorial too.”

“To what?” Parsifal’s voice seemed to come from outside himself.

“A catastrophe, one that devastated the world in that far distant time before man dreamed his first city into life. That destruction lives on still, in our stories of deluges and the near-extinction of mankind. I told you—all things die, but not stories. They survive across the millennia with all their secret knowledge hidden within them.”

Parsifal knew that story. The first one. The most important one.

“Carved on the stone pillars you see around you is the world’s oldest calendar.” Musa’s voice sounded as if was coming from the depths of a long tunnel. “Follow those dates back and it points to an astronomical event that caused a shift in human civilisation.”

Musa turned and stabbed a finger up.

“Look.”

The world shifted.

Parsifal suddenly realised he was no longer in the Göbekli Tepe of the now. All around him the land was lusher, the air fresher. He turned his attention to the heavens and gasped at a blazing comet streaking across the sable sky, the misty white tail trailing behind. And he realised how much like a serpent it looked, uncoiled and preparing to strike, like all those snakes carved on reliefs across Göbekli Tepe.

The comet smashed into the earth like a thousand nuclear bombs exploding at once, far, far away from where they stood, but Parsifal could see it clearly.

The ground heaved and the rocks became liquid. A terrible hurricane rushed out, tearing up trees and spinning great beasts into the air; thundered out faster and faster, stripping the land bare.

The sky burned crimson, the heat of a sun reducing everything that remained to ashes in the blink of an eye.

And above it all an enormous figure towered, wavering through the heat haze and the smoke, something so alien Parsifal’s mind screamed and refused to accept the image.

Only the eyes stayed with him, a fiery red like the inferno that had consumed all. In their depths, Parsifal saw only horror.

The first god.

The god of apocalypse.

Parsifal felt a shroud wrap around his heart.

A vast mushroom cloud of soil and molten stone roiled up to block out the sun. Caught in the jet stream, it whipped across the world, drawing down a night that would last for months.

Parsifal stood rooted as all heat drained away and an ice age fell, freezing the world for year upon year, century upon century, for a millennium and more.

And still he watched, as a handful of humans clung together, the only survivors battling for life in the face of extinction.

“Parsifal.”

Lost to his vision, his name reached him as if from a vast distance.

“Parsifal!”

Rough hands grabbed his arms and he was wrenched from that long ago time of destruction.

Figures swirled around him now, moving purposefully. He glimpsed the security guard he had seen earlier. The others he caught sight of in his delirious state were unknown, but they could only be the sons and daughters of the age-old cult, the keepers of the secret, the guardians of the first god.

“Bring him,” Musa commanded.

The Blue Lotus still had him in its seductive grip and Parsifal found it impossible to resist. On shaking legs, he was half-thrust, half-carried along the track behind Musa.

The air began to throb with a low, susurrating sound, and he realised those new arrivals were chanting in a language he had never heard spoken before, one that seemed weighted with great age. It was the same sounds made by the lotus’s whispers in his head.

Around the excavated circles he whirled, following the path along which Musa had first led him, over and over again, until his head spun and the stars in the black velvet sky became tracers of light, like the anti-aircraft fire he had watched in Kandahar before he set off to kill.

He heard the pounding of gunfire travelling across the gulf of time. He heard the screams of innocents, in Rwanda and Syria, the Congo, Palestine, Israel, Ukraine, the voices rising and merging, become one unbearable, never-ending howl of despair.

He felt waves of grief for a world that could have been but never was.

Finally, they carried him at shoulder height, his arms reaching out like one of those T-shaped megaliths, into the largest enclosure.

There they set him down, straddling a channel cut in the limestone that ran into the ragged remnants of a rectangular building.

Musa stepped in front of him and said, not unkindly, “You will change the world, Parsifal.”

Moistening his arid mouth, Parsifal swallowed. “The world needs changing. We can’t go on this way. The death, the suffering.”

“You have made your case to me, in all your actions since we first met. I too have heard the screams and seen the rivers of blood wash across all the lands of the earth.”

Musa bent down and peered into Parsifal’s face. His black eyes gleamed with the light of the moon, and Parsifal thought how sad he looked.

“The first god is sealed in a tomb, cut deep in the limestone bedrock beneath us,” he continued. “It is said that the ancestors who contained him there conducted a ritual that lasted six days and six nights. Many did not survive. And on the seventh day they rested. The god was imprisoned. Until the time came to release him again.”

Parsifal felt winter creep into his bones.

“This is how war is ended?” he said.

Musa nodded. “War and slaughter are a part of the nature of the human beast as much as love and compassion. It can only be ended—”

“By wiping out everyone.”

“The new gods have failed us. Now it is time for the oldest god, here in the birthplace of religion, to become the newest god. It is time for a cleansing.”

Parsifal felt his eyes well and the tears begin to stream down his cheeks. Once again he was standing in that church, with the barrel bombs falling across Aleppo, on that night when his life changed forever, looking into the boy’s face, seeing his smile as Parsifal handed him a knob of bread.

Such a small gift. Such a huge gift.

And he was crying for the boy, and all the people in the church, and all the victims across Syria and across the world.

And he was crying for himself too, for his sins, for his complicity, and the knowledge that everyone, everywhere was complicit.

A figure loomed up on the edge of his vision and Musa stepped back so they could lean in. It was Musa’s daughter. No longer flirting with the boys on Istikal, enjoying the innocent pleasures of a girl on the brink of becoming a woman.

Father to son, son to daughter, Musa had said.

Smiling as sweetly as she did when she brushed past him in the door of her home, the girl kissed him on the cheek. There was no emotion in it. It was a benediction.

Stepping back, she bowed her head once, then swept a hand across him. Parsifal couldn’t understand the meaning of the gesture until he looked up and saw a curved blade now dripping crimson.

The blood sprayed from the gash in his neck, into that stone-cut channel where it gathered and flowed, gleaming in the moonlight, like Musa’s eyes, like the rivers he had spoken of streaming across the land.

Down the channel it trickled and into what remained of the building, where it pooled.

Parsifal felt his life flowing with it, but the peculiar qualities of the Blue Lotus kept his attention sharp.

Where the blood settled, cracks appeared to be growing in the limestone around it, and as Göbekli Tepe shook and rumbled, those lines widened, became fissures that glowed with fierce red light like the heart of a furnace.

From deep beneath them, Parsifal could now hear that thoom-thoom-thoom of the god’s heart and it was growing louder, and faster, as the god woke from his millennia-long slumber.

With the last of his fading vision, Parsifal looked round. But Musa and his daughter and all those other cult members were gone.

Only one remained there.

The boy from the church, eternally smiling, one hand outstretched for the gift that would assuage his hunger.

Parsifal let his final tears fall.

He had saved the world. And he had destroyed the world.

And perhaps that was right.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Gemma Amor is a Bram Stoker® and British Fantasy Award nominated author, voice actor, editor and illustrator based in Bristol in the UK. She was named one of the ‘Writers Shaping Horror’s Next Golden Age’ by Esquire magazine, and is featured in Ellen Datlow’s prestigious Best Horror of the Year anthology, Vol. 15 and 17. She self-published her debut short story collection Cruel Works of Nature in 2018 and went on to release award-nominated, multi-adapted novella Dear Laura and a number of other books, including White Pines, Girl on Fire, Six Rooms, Grief is a False God, and These Wounds We Make before signing her first traditional publishing deal for novel Full Immersion, published by Angry Robot books in 2022. Her latest novel Itch! was released by Hodder & Stoughton in 2025. An anthology of ancestral horror stories called Roots of my Fears, edited by Gemma, was also published by Titan Books in 2025.

V. Castro is a two-time Bram Stoker Award® nominated Mexican American writer from San Antonio, Texas, now residing in the UK. She writes horror, erotic horror, romance, and science fiction. Her books include Immortal Pleasures, The Haunting of Alejandra, Alien: Vasquez (film tie-in), Mestiza Blood, The Queen of the Cicadas, Rebel Moon (official Netflix film novelization), The Pink Agave Motel, and Goddess of Filth. Her new book is Tales of the Dark Feminine from Watkins, and Maria the Wanted from Titan was published in February 2026. Connect with Violet via Instagram and Twitter @vlatinalondon or vcastrostories.com. She can also be found on Bluesky and TikTok @vcastrobooks.

Mark Chadbourn is a two-time winner of the British Fantasy Award. His novels have been published all over the world and translated into multiple languages. He’s also a screenwriter and journalist.

Tananarive Due (tah-nah-nah-REEVE doo) is an award-winning author who teaches Black Horror and Afrofuturism at UCLA. A leading voice in Black speculative fiction for more than twenty years, Due has won an American Book Award, an NAACP Image Award, and a British Fantasy Award, and her writing has been included in best-of-the-year anthologies. Her books include The Reformatory (winner of a Los Angeles Times Book Prize, Chautauqua Prize, Bram Stoker Award®, Shirley Jackson Award, World Fantasy Award, and a New York Times Notable Book), The Wishing Pool and Other Stories, Ghost Summer: Stories, My Soul to Keep, and The Good House. She and her late mother, civil rights activist Patricia Stephens Due, co-authored Freedom in the Family: A Mother-Daughter Memoir of the Fight for Civil Rights. She was an executive producer on Shudder’s groundbreaking documentary Horror Noire: A History of Black Horror. She and her husband/collaborator, Steven Barnes, wrote “A Small Town” for Season 2 of Jordan Peele’s The Twilight Zone on Paramount Plus, and two segments of Shudder’s anthology film Horror Noire. They also recently co-directed their horror short film, The Keeper. Due and Barnes co-host a podcast, Lifewriting: Write for Your Life! She and her husband live with their son, Jason.

Christopher Golden has been called “the king of the horror-thriller.” The New York Times bestselling, multi-award-winning storyteller has made his mark in many mediums, as a writer of novels, screenplays, animation, audio dramas, and comics, and as an editor of landmark horror anthologies. His work has been published in dozens of languages around the world. Winner of the Bram Stoker Award®, the Shirley Jackson Award, and the Audie Award, he has been nominated for others, including the British Fantasy Award. His best-known novels include Road of Bones, The House of Last Resort, All Hallows, and his latest, Carry Me to My Grave. He lives in Massachusetts, where he watches too many movies and eats too much chocolate.

Ai Jiang is a Chinese Canadian writer, Ignyte, Bram Stoker®, and Nebula Award winner, and Hugo, Astounding, Locus, Aurora, and BFSA Award finalist born in Changle, Fujian, currently residing in Markham, Ontario. Her work can be found in F&SF, The Dark, Clarkesworld, and The Masters Review, among others. She is the author of A Palace Near the Wind, Linghun and I A M AI. Find her at aijiang.ca.

Hildur Knútsdóttir was born in Reykjavík, Iceland. She writes fiction for both adults and teenagers, as well as plays, screenplays and short fiction. Hildur is known for her evocative fantastical fiction and spine-chilling horror. Her horror novella The Night Guest was chosen one of the best thrillers of 2024 by the New York Times.

Eric LaRocca (he/they) is a three-time Bram Stoker Award® finalist, a Shirley Jackson Award nominee, and a two-time Splatterpunk Award winner. He was named by Esquire as one of the “Writers Shaping Horror’s Next Golden Age” and praised by Locus as “one of the strongest and most unique voices in contemporary horror fiction.” LaRocca’s notable works include Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke, Everything the Darkness Eats, and At Dark, I Become Loathsome. He currently resides in Boston, Massachusetts, with his partner.

Tim Lebbon is a New York Times bestselling writer from South Wales. He’s written over fifty novels, as well as hundreds of novellas and short stories. His latest novel is Secret Lives of the Dead. He has won a World Fantasy Award, four British Fantasy Awards, a Dragon Award and a Scribe Award. His novel The Silence is a movie on Netflix starring Stanley Tucci and Kiernan Shipka. The movie of his novella Pay the Ghost stars Nicolas Cage. Tim has written extensively in existing universes including Alien, Halo, Conan the Barbarian, Predator, Star Wars, Firefly and Hellboy novels. He also novelised the movies 30 Days of Night, The Cabin in the Woods, and Kong: Skull Island. He has written computer games, comics, and audio dramas. He is currently developing more novels, and both original and adapted screen projects. He loves the outdoors, and spends a lot of time walking, running, cycling and swimming around the Welsh countryside. He’s competed in many Ironman and other triathlons. He’s a huge music fan, and believes you’re never too old to jump up and down in a mosh pit. timlebbon.net.

Jonathan Maberry is a New York Times bestselling author, five-time Bram Stoker Award® winner, four-time Scribe Award winner, Inkpot Award winner, editor, writing teacher, poet, playwright, and comic book writer. He writes in multiple genres including thriller, horror, sci-fi, mystery, and fantasy. V-Wars (Netflix) was based on his books/comics; Alcon is developing his Rot & Ruin novels for film; and Chad Stahelski, director of John Wick, is developing his Joe Ledger thrillers for TV. Marvel’s Black Panther: Wakanda Forever was partly based on his work. He’s written more than 55 novels, 200 short stories, 30 graphic novels, 1,200 feature articles, and two dozen non-fiction books. Jonathan has also edited 30 anthologies, including Aliens, The X-Files, the official tribute to Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, and many others. He’s the president of the International Association of Media Tie-in Writers, and the editor of Weird Tales Magazine. jonathanmaberry.com.

Josh Malerman is the New York Times bestselling author of Bird Box and Incidents Around the House. His latest book is his first nonfiction: Watching Evil Dead, in which he delivers an impassioned chaotic love letter to writing, to the horror genre, and to his wife, the musician and artist Allison Laakko, with whom he lives in Michigan—along with their dozens of pets.

Premee Mohamed is a Nebula, World Fantasy, Ignyte, Locus, and Aurora award winning Indo-Caribbean scientist and speculative fiction author based in Edmonton, Alberta. She has also been a finalist for the Hugo, British Fantasy, British Science Fiction, Ursula K. Le Guin, and Crawford awards. In 2024, she was the Edmonton Public Library writer-in-residence, and she has taught at establishments including the Banff Institute for the Arts, Clarion, and the Carl Brandon Society. She has judged short fiction contests for CBC and Alberta Views Magazine and can be found on her website at premeemohamed.com.

Benjamin Percy is the author of seven novels, three story collections, and a book of essays—Thrill Me—that is widely taught in creative writing classrooms. He currently writes The Punisher and Deadpool for Marvel Comics and is known for his runs on Wolverine, X-Force, and Ghost Rider. His awards include an NEA Fellowship, a McKnight Fellowship, a Whiting Award, the Plimpton Prize, two Pushcart Prizes, the iHeartRadio Award for Best Scripted Podcast, and inclusion in Best American Short Stories. His recent projects include a short novel told in the form of a monthly post-apocalyptic newspaper called The End Times.

Hache Pueyo is the Argentine-Brazilian writer and translator of Cabaret in Flames, But Not Too Bold and A Study in Ugliness. She won an Otherwise Fellowship for her work with gender in speculative fiction, and her short stories have appeared as H. Pueyo in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Clarkesworld, Strange Horizons, and The Year’s Best Dark Fantasy & Horror, among others.

Cavan Scott is a New York Times bestselling author who writes novels, comics, television, and audio drama. The co-creator of Star Wars: The High Republic, he has told stories in many worlds, including Marvel, DC, Doctor Who, Transformers, Back to the Future, and Pacific Rim. His creator-owned series include Shadow Service, The Ward, Dead Seas, and Night of the Slashers, and he is a co-founder of transmedia studio Strange Matter Media. Cavan lives in the west of England, surrounded by far too much LEGO.

Priya Sharma’s fiction has appeared in venues such as Interzone, Black Static, Nightmare, The Dark and Tor.com. “Fabulous Beasts” was a Shirley Jackson Award finalist and won a British Fantasy Award for Short Fiction. She is a Shirley Jackson Award and British Fantasy Award winner, and Locus Award finalist, for All the Fabulous Beasts, a collection of some of her work, available from Undertow Publications. Ormeshadow, her first novella (from Reactor), won both a Shirley Jackson Award and a British Fantasy Award. It was a 2022 Grand Prix de l’Imaginaire finalist. Pomegranates (Absinthe Books), her second novella, won a World Fantasy Award and was a finalist for a British Fantasy Award and a Shirley Jackson Award. Her work has been translated into Spanish, French, Italian, Czech, and Polish. Website: priyasharmafiction.wordpress.com.

A. M. Shine writes in the Gothic horror tradition. Born in Galway, Ireland, he received his Master’s degree in History there before sharpening his quill and pursuing all things literary and macabre. His debut novel, The Watchers, has been made into a major motion picture produced by M. Night Shyamalan. Other works include The Creeper, Stay in the Light, and Grace.

Angela “A. G.” Slatter is a multi award winning novelist, short story writer, graphic novelist, freelance editor and occasional teacher of creative writing. Her major publications include: the gothic fantasy/horror novels The Briar Book of the Dead and A Forest, Darkly; the horror novellas The Cold House and The Bone Lantern; twelve short story collections; and a Hellboy Universe collaboration with Mike Mignola, Castle Full of Blackbirds. Her awards include the Shirley Jackson, Aurealis, World Fantasy and British Fantasy awards. Her work has been translated into Bulgarian, Chinese, Russian, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Japanese, Polish, French, Turkish, Ukrainian, Czech and Romanian, and has been optioned for film and TV.

Steve Toase was born in North Yorkshire, England, and now lives in the Frankenwald, Germany. His fiction has appeared in Analog, Nightmare Magazine, Three Lobed Burning Eye, Shimmer, Bourbon Penn, and Deadlands amongst others, and his stories have been selected for Ellen Datlow’s Best Horror of the Year series, and Paula Guran’s Year’s Best Dark Fantasy and Horror. Steve’s debut short story collection To Drown in Dark Water is published by Undertow Publications, and his archaeology-themed horror collection Dirt Upon My Skin is out now from Black Shuck Books. Dirt Upon My Skin was shortlisted for the British Fantasy Awards 2025 for Best Collection.

ABOUT THE EDITORS

Dan Coxon has won a World Fantasy Award (Heartwood: A Mythago Wood Anthology) and two British Fantasy Awards (Writing the Uncanny and Writing the Future, both co-edited with Richard V. Hirst). He has been shortlisted for the British Fantasy Awards a total of eight times, and was a finalist for the Shirley Jackson Awards. In October 2025 his anthology of haunted house stories, Unquiet Guests, was published by Dead Ink Books. His second short story collection, Come Sing for the Harrowing, was reissued by CLASH Books in April 2026. His writing has featured in Best Horror of the Year, Great British Horror, Nightscript and Black Static, among others. You can follow him on Instagram as dan.coxon.author, or visit his website at dancoxon.com.

Philip Fracassi is the USA Today bestselling, Bram Stoker® and British Fantasy Award nominated author of eight novels, including Sarafina, The Autumn Springs Retirement Home Massacre, Gothic, Boys in the Valley, The Third Rule of Time Travel, and A Child Alone with Strangers. His award-winning story collections include Behold the Void, Beneath a Pale Sky, and No One is Safe! His work has been published in numerous languages, and his short fiction has been featured in dozens of magazines and anthologies, including Best Horror of the Year, Nightmare Magazine, Southwest Review,and Interzone. You can follow Philip on Facebook, Instagram, and Bluesky, or visit his website at pfracassi.com.

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