Trespass: A Tale of Mystery and Suspense Across Time (The Darkeningstone Book 1) (3 page)

2010

I LEANED
MY BACK
against the fence and kicked at the dead leaves around my feet, then wished I hadn’t. The leaves were mixed with decomposing litter and filthy plastic bags, ankle-deep, piled against the fence by the wind. It smelt like a wheelie bin on a hot day. I wrinkled my nose. At least the leaves must’ve broken my fall, but what had scratched my hand? I looked back to the patch of disturbed leaves that showed where I’d landed—and gasped. There, just to one side—a jagged row of thin metal rods thrust upwards, the rusting skeleton of some metal contraption. The remains of corroded wheels stuck up into the air. It was upside down, but had once been a supermarket trolley. I rubbed my injured hand. The trolley was probably to blame. But if I’d fallen just a little farther to the right, I’d have landed on top of it…I shuddered, tried not to picture the metal tearing my flesh. “I told you,” I said. “I knew there’d be a supermarket trolley.” But this time I couldn’t smile at my own joke.

I looked up to the top of the fence. I couldn’t climb over because I couldn’t reach the top. I had to find something to stand on. I went over to the trolley. Parts of it were rusted through completely, but at least it was already next to the fence. I pushed my foot against the trolley’s side. It didn’t move. I pressed my right foot onto it, to see if it would take my weight. It bent, but only a little. Carefully, I stepped up onto what had once been its underside—first my right foot, then my left. The trolley settled a little into the soft ground, but it seemed OK. I leaned forward against the fence, stretched my fingers toward the top, balanced on the tips of my toes. Almost there. If I could just…

“I know you’re in there!” It was the old man, roaring at the top of his voice. “I know what you’re up to, my lad. I’ll call the police.”

I thought he’d gone, given up. But no, here he was, hammering against the fence. His dog barked, snarled ferociously. Startled, I pushed myself backward, away from the fence. I felt the rusted trolley give beneath me, heard it creak. I swayed. My fingers scraped the surface of the fence, found nothing to hold on to. It was fall, again, or jump. I jumped.

I bent my knees, landed in a crouch. At last a gym lesson had come in useful. I breathed a sigh of relief. But the dog was still barking, the old man still yelling, “I can hear you! It’s no good hiding in there.” He pounded something against the fence. I guessed he was hitting it with his walking stick, and I had a horrible picture of him doing the same to me: lashing out, beating me down.

“I know you can hear me,” he bawled. “Why don’t you just clear off?”

I stood, leaned back against the fence. It was solid, strong. What could the old man do? Nothing. That’s why he was so angry. But I was getting fed up of his shouting at me. I’d had a tough day, and it wasn’t getting any better. I had a wicked thought.

“Why don’t
you
clear off?” I shouted back. He stopped shouting. I giggled, picturing his face. His silence didn’t last long.

“Right. That’s it,” he said. He wasn’t shouting now, but he sounded very determined. “You stay right there, my lad. I’m calling the police.” He whistled for his dog, which finally stopped barking, and they were off. I breathed a sigh of relief. I was safe—for the moment. But if he really was going to call the police, and I didn’t doubt it, then I’d better get out of there.

I turned away from the fence. The trolley had collapsed in the middle. It wouldn’t take my weight, but there must be plenty of other junk lying around. Surely I could find something strong enough to stand on, and then carry it to the fence. A quick scan showed there was nothing useful nearby. And a line of bushes prevented me from seeing farther in. I’d have to go on, into the quarry itself. But hey, what could go wrong?

I waded forward through the debris and decaying leaves, felt them drag against my legs. The smell wasn’t great, but I could manage. “Come on,” I said. “You’ll soon be out of here.” Then, as I stepped forward, my foot just kept going down, sank straight into the ground halfway up to my knee. Cold water soaked though my sock, trickled into my trainer. Mud oozed against my leg. I closed my eyes, moaned to myself. “Oh, man.” I leaned back, steadied myself and tried to pull my leg out. At first it wouldn’t budge, but then there was a sickening squelch, and slowly, slowly my leg emerged. The sensation of slime and suction was unpleasant, but much worse was the rancid stench. I grimaced, tried not to breathe it in, tried not to think about what might be causing that smell. And then my foot was free, and I could inspect the damage.

I didn’t like what I saw. The sodden leg of my jeans clung to me, black water staining it almost up to my knee. But the real pain came when I saw the state of my trainers. Ruined. I scowled at them accusingly. My best trainers. The pair that was almost exactly like the ones I wanted. They’d both been white, but now, one was very definitely black. It was the last straw. I just wanted to get out of there.

I glanced back to the fence. It was still too high. I shrugged my shoulders, muttered, “Nothing for it.” I turned back toward the quarry. I’d have to go farther in. But I hesitated. So far I’d narrowly missed being skewered by a shopping trolley, and I’d ruined a trainer in a bog. It was only a few metres across the deep, dead leaves, but even so. “What else is under there?” I wondered aloud. I could be a millimetre from sinking up to my knees—or worse. I’d never know until it was too late. But what choice did I have? I would just have to be more careful.

I picked my way forward, lifting my feet high. At each step I nudged my feet carefully through the leaves, testing the ground. At each step I held my breath as I transferred my weight. If the ground was too soft, I tried another place. I tried not to think about quicksand and leeches, bodies found preserved in bogs, tried to put images of bear traps out of my mind. I said, “You’ve been watching too many cartoons.” Then I gritted my teeth and went on in silence.

My thirteenth step took me out of the leaves and onto solid ground. I’d done it. In front of me, the straggly line of bushes was not as dense as I’d thought. I squeezed through a gap, ignoring the snags and scratches. And I smiled. It was astonishing. I stood on the floor of the pit itself. And it couldn’t have been more different than the dank shadow and debris of the quarry’s edge. The sun shone down onto the wide semi-circular sweep of the quarry floor, an inviting carpet of long grass and wild flowers. The sides of the pit curved away from me and rose to form a magnificent amphitheatre. And I had just stepped onto the stage. I stood, with my head back, my mouth open, and stared from left to right and back again. Once, Dad had dragged me to York Minster. I’d sulked the whole way there, but once inside I couldn’t help but pick up on the magic of the place. There was just something impressive about the sheer space. I had that feeling now. I wanted to take it all in, absorb every sight, every sound.

The edges of the pit, which must once have been brutal bare rock, were now softened by lush green plants. Bracken, ivy, brambles and ferns tumbled from every fissure, crept over every crumbling boulder. It was as though the plants were escaping, emerging from the heart of the dead rock where they’d been trapped and controlled by generations of quarry men. Now, free and unnoticed, they poured out like a living lava flow to reclaim the place for themselves. There were even small trees, scattered across the slope, growing out at impossible angles.

A breeze ruffled through the undergrowth. I could almost see the plants edging forward, growing toward me. And along the top edge of the pit, my new horizon, was the distant hard line of a fence, just like the one I’d fallen from. I was fenced in, surrounded by this barrier between me and the rest of the world.

But the star of the show was the pit floor itself. Dotted across it, standing like works of art in a surreal sculpture park, was a bizarre selection of objects. A huge old TV sat on a ripped armchair, its broken screen staring blindly in my direction. An upturned cast-iron bath pointed its feet toward the sky. A chest freezer balanced on its end, its door hanging open to display the silver interior. An ornate iron bedstead seemed all the stranger for being the right way up. An old-fashioned lawnmower waited for a long-gone groundsman to return and finish the job.

And then there was the prize. The main attraction. Some way away, right at the back of the pit. A car. And not just any car. Even at that distance the outline was unmistakable. This was an MG GBT, my favourite classic sports car. The colour was hard to make out, but it could’ve been British racing green. Fantastic. I whistled under my breath and whispered, “How the hell did that get there?” My dad would’ve gone mad at the sight of it. He loved classic cars—once he started going on about them, there was no stopping him. So it was no wonder that some of that interest had rubbed off on me. It was something we shared—or always had in the past. It was hard to see what we shared anymore. “Doesn’t matter,” I said. “I can’t tell him about it anyway.” For a moment I wondered what he’d say if he knew I’d been in the quarry. Then I jammed my hands into my pockets, pushed the thought away. I was meant to be finding something to stand on. But could I leave without taking a closer look at the car? “I wonder,” I said. “I wonder if it’s got the wire wheels.” A thought struck me, and I felt in my pocket for my phone. I could do it. I could take a picture of the car, show it to my friends. Otherwise, no one would believe it. Of course I’d still be looking for something to stand on, to get out of there. That was still the plan. “Right,” I said, and I set off to cross the pit floor.

3,500 BC

BURLIC SCREAMED
.
He threw back his head and roared a single furious word into the night: “Waeccan!” The name erupted from him in a savage wail that rasped at his throat, over and over until he could shout no more.

His howls echoed along the valley. In the village, the other hunters heard and exchanged glances, shook their heads and said nothing. The women clutched their talismans, told the children to go inside. They had tried to help, but there was nothing they could do for Burlic now.

Burlic slumped, sat heavily on the cold, hard ground. He was drained, exhausted. He squeezed his eyes shut tight. And saw Waeccan’s face. It was the old man’s fault. Yes, he was to blame. He had used his dark magic to deal out this grief, this unbearable hurt.

Burlic opened his eyes and stared up into the sky. Why had Waeccan done this terrible thing to him? Why? There was no reason, no way to know. Burlic could make no sense of it, and it bewildered him, made him weak.

Burlic scowled. “Weak?” he growled. “Never.” He clenched his fists, pushed them into the ground. He didn’t need to know why Waeccan had done this—he only needed the strength to deal with the old man.
My anger will be my strength
, he thought. The rage surged through his blood. He jumped to his feet. “I will have my revenge on you, Waeccan,” he snarled. The old man must die. It was the only way.

2010

I SKIRTED
AROUND THE EDGE
of the pit floor, keeping the steep slope on my right. I didn’t want to march through the middle of the quarry. It was too open, too exposed. And as I walked, I figured it out—how the car got there. The public footpath, the one I’d been walking along, had once been the road to the quarry. They’d tried to rename it River Walk, but everybody still called it Pit Lane. The place where I’d jumped over the fence (OK, the place I’d fallen) was the original entrance to the quarry. I could dimly remember an older fence—posts and barbed wire. Back then it would’ve been easy to break into the quarry. Someone had just driven the car in there and abandoned it. Joyriders probably.

I was a clever guy. I smiled up at the sunny slope of the quarry’s sides, admired my new kingdom and congratulated myself on finding this amazing place. And stopped. Over to my left, as the long grass moved in the breeze, a flash of bright red caught my eye. I looked back toward the car. It wasn’t going anywhere. Why not look around on the way?

But as I waded through the long grass, I slowed, frowned. I could make out the curve of red plastic: a bulky, vaguely familiar shape. And then a gust of wind parted the grass, and I saw them. Chemical drums. A clutch of them, lying on their sides. Some had been smashed wide open; others were cracked and split. None of them were in one piece. Something fluttered in the breeze. A label, peeling, faded. It had once been bright orange, but the bold black symbols were still plain to see: a cross, a hand with a chunk missing. I felt the soft ground give a little beneath my feet. What had leaked from those drums? What was I standing on? “Bloody hell.” I wasn’t waiting to find out. I backed away, turned, marched back to the path I’d made through the grass.

I shook my head. “No more exploring,” I told myself. “No more wandering off.” I looked over to the car. I wanted to see it, wanted to touch it, make it real. I wanted that photograph. I took out my phone, tried the camera. The car was no more than a blob from this distance. It could have been anything. “OK,” I said. “Straight there and back.” I put my phone back in my pocket. “And on the way, find something to stand on.” I nodded. I’d be sensible and look where I was going. I’d be cautious.

So when I came across the piece of mouldering carpet, laid out as if for a long-forgotten picnic, I didn’t walk across it. Instead, I carefully lifted one corner with my toe, then kicked the carpet back. Nothing dangerous. Just some old wooden fence posts, quietly rotting. I almost laughed in relief. But then I saw the nails. Long, thick, crooked, rusting nails, pointing upwards from the posts. I had a sickening vision of standing on the carpet, feeling a nail puncture the sole of my trainer, pierce my foot. I could picture it bursting out through the top of my shoe in slow motion, covered in blood. I shuddered. Who would leave something with the points upwards like that? And why cover them over with the carpet? It was almost like they’d done it on purpose. Almost like…I had to say it out loud to believe it: “Like a trap.”

And now, when I looked around me I didn’t see an inviting, natural amphitheatre. I saw a threatening place. I saw a place where, just for once, the dangers that my dad had warned me about were real. My dad. I remembered something he’d once said.

We were walking past the quarry, and I’d asked him if anyone ever went in. “No,” he’d said. “No one who’s supposed to.”

“What do you mean?” I’d said. But he’d just frowned, changed the subject. I’d asked him again and again. But he wouldn’t tell me. And he wouldn’t say why.

Now, a chill ran through me as I wondered what my dad had known. Who had been in the quarry? And why would they leave such a vicious trap?

I ran my hands over my face, swore under my breath. I’d been careless, blundering. I’d been lucky to have escaped unhurt—so far. I looked again at the car, squinted doubtfully all around. If I could see something to stand on, I’d grab it and turn back. I’d take it as a sign. And I’d take all the bad things that had happened to me—the stinking bog, the leaking chemical drums, the hidden nails—as signs that I should go no farther, that I should go straight back to the fence and get the hell out of there.

But there was nothing useful in sight. And that seemed like a sign I should go on. “Stick to the plan,” I said. “Now you know what to watch out for. Be careful.” And cautiously skirting around the carpet, picking my way through the long grass, I went on. “You’ll be OK,” I said. “You’ll be OK.”