Scaderstone Pit (The Darkeningstone Series Book 3) Page 11

  But they would all be angry with him for not warning them straight away. He’d be punished: beaten and cursed. And afterward, they’d shun him and take away what little he had. Even his family would turn against him. And there was Glowan and her baby to consider. The villagers would drive her away, and they’d take no pity on the baby. They’d cast the pair of them out to fend for themselves.

  Cleofan grimaced. It wasn’t right. Alone and without help, Glowan and her baby would die within a few days. Even if they weren’t captured, they’d starve or freeze or be attacked by wolves. It would be a mercy to spare them the pain.

  But perhaps there was another way. If he took Glowan some food and a flask to carry water, she’d stand a chance of surviving until she found a place to settle. In time, he could take her some furs, and perhaps he could even give her a knife. It would be a fair trade; she was giving him two powerful weapons.

  Cleofan pictured the heavy blade and the strange axe she’d shown him. No one would dare to insult him again if he had such wonderful weapons. Let any man try, he thought, and I’ll strike him down. He allowed himself a grim smile. Yes. It would be better this way. He’d help Glowan and then, quite soon, he’d send her on her way. He’d have his reward, and the villagers would never know she’d been there.

  Perhaps Glowan could stay hidden on the ledge for a day or two, to gather her strength, but then she must leave. If these Wandrian people came looking for her, they’d never find her up on the ledge. They’d surely pass by or turn away and give up. And there’d be no reason for the Wandrian to trouble the village, so everyone would be safe.

  Cleofan nodded to himself. He’d made his decision and now he could rest. But when he closed his eyes, the dream returned to him. The unknown intruder was there, slipping silently through the shadows. And while Cleofan held his breath and stared in terror, the dark figure crept closer still.

  Chapter 20

  2021

  I WOKE EARLY and made myself as presentable as I possibly could with my limited supply of clean clothes. I sent my dad a text to let him know I was OK, then I called the office and left a message for my manager; I kept it simple and said I had a stomach bug and wouldn’t be back at work for a few days. I wasn’t completely comfortable with the lie, but it was a damned sight easier than the true explanation. And it meant that I was off the hook; I was free to go along with Cally and see where it took me. So while I did have a twinge of guilt, it was pretty easy to bear.

  ***

  Cally’s car arrived at my hotel just after half past seven, and I was already waiting in the lobby. As soon as I saw the sleek saloon pull up outside, I headed for the door. The driver scarcely glanced at me as I opened the rear door and climbed into the spacious seat, but his surly frown gave me the impression he wasn’t pleased to see me. And the moment I sat down, he swung the car out into the road without even giving me a chance to close the door properly. He glared at me in the rear-view mirror then switched on the radio and turned up the volume, filling the car with the jangling thump of Europop. He wasn’t expecting to pick up passengers, I thought. Maybe he’d hoped to have Cally to himself.

  But Cally gave me a warm smile, so the driver could take a running jump for all I cared. And so long as he was busy nodding along to his trashy music, he wouldn’t be taking much notice of Cally and me. And that was a very good thing indeed.

  “Hi, Cally,” I said. “Are you all right?”

  She nodded then glanced over her shoulder, as if checking that the car wasn’t being followed. I took a look, but the road was quiet and we were travelling quickly, racing through the narrow streets.

  Cally turned to face me, and although she smiled again, she looked tired and anxious. “I’m OK. I just didn’t get much sleep that’s all.”

  “Sure. I can understand that. You must have been upset.”

  “It wasn’t just the burglary,” she said. “I had a lot on my mind. I started to do some research.” On the seat between us, there was a rucksack, and she opened it and pulled out a laptop. “I borrowed this from Imogen. I’ve got something to show you.”

  She flipped the laptop open and pressed a couple of buttons then passed it to me. She’d opened an image—a screenshot from a website—and although the text was in French, the illustrations seemed to leap from the screen. For a moment, I stared at the screen in silence. The car sped around the corner, and my stomach lurched. I swallowed hard and closed my eyes, fighting off a wave of nausea. “Oh my god,” I murmured. “Oh my god.”

  “I know,” she said. “It’s just an artist’s impression, and it’s much taller than the one in Scaderstone, but it’s a black stone, I’m sure of it.”

  I looked at Cally. “It’s not just a black stone, Cally. This is the one. This is the place where it happened—the place I arrived, thousands of years ago.”

  Cally searched my expression. “I think…I think I believe you now. I think I have to.”

  I let out a sigh of relief. “Thank God for that. I thought I’d blown it. I thought I’d convinced you I was completely delusional.”

  “No, not delusional,” she said and gave me a little smile. “I’ve seen things myself, remember. I just didn’t want to think about it anymore.”

  “But that’s changed?” I said hopefully.

  She nodded. ”I don’t know who’s behind this, but they’ve interrupted my work, they’ve burgled my room, they’ve been hassling you since the moment you got here. There’s something they don’t want us to see. And the only thing that links you and me is the black stone. So I don’t know about you, but I’ve had enough. I’m going to find out exactly what all this is about if it’s the last thing I do.”

  I watched the way she tilted her chin upward as she talked, and when I looked her in the eye, I knew she was determined. “Yes,” I said. “Let’s do it. We can work it out between us, I’m sure of it.”

  “Good. We’ve got two hours before we get to Grand-Pressigny. To start with, I want you to tell me everything that happened. Don’t leave anything out.”

  I glanced down at the laptop’s screen, fixing the image of the dark stone in my mind. I remembered the way it had glittered in the sun, and the feel of the long, damp grass against my legs as I’d walked down from the high green hilltop. And I began.

  I told her everything, dragging up every detail from the dark memories I’d tried so hard to forget. The only parts I left out were the terrible things my dad had done when he’d been certain I was dead.

  Cally listened to my long, rambling tale without a murmur, taking in everything I said.

  While I talked, I gripped the sides of the laptop and continued staring at its screen, long after it had gone blank. And when I finally reached the end of my story, Cally reached across and laid her hand gently on my arm. “You poor thing,” she said. “You’ve been through a lot.”

  I nodded and looked down. “I think I’ve told you everything. I don’t know what else to say.”

  “It’s all right,” she said softly. “You’ve said enough.”

  I looked up, and when I turned to Cally she was watching me carefully. “I’m sorry,” she said. “You tried to tell me all this before, but I didn’t listen. I should’ve given you a chance to explain properly.”

  “It’s not your fault. It’s not easy to believe.” I paused. “And do you? Do you really believe me?”

  She squeezed my arm. “Yes. I believe you. In a weird way, it all makes some kind of sense. It fits together.”

  I looked at her for a long couple of seconds and I knew I’d finally found someone who understood. I gave her a grateful smile. “Thank you.”

  “You don’t have to thank me,” Cally said. “I’ve been pushing all this to the back of my mind for a long time. But not anymore.” She sat back and took her hand from my arm. “The question is, what do we do about it?”

  “I’m really not sure. I’d say we ought to get someone to help, but we’re probably the only two people in the world who might understand.”<
br />
  Cally’s expression clouded. “No, there are others. There was one man back in Exeter, he knew something about it for sure. He tried to stop me from finding the black stone—the one I told you about—in the tunnel.”

  “What happened?”

  “Someone helped me, and I managed to get away. It was all very strange, but while I was down there, something happened. I stood on the stone by accident and…I don’t know how to explain.”

  I swallowed hard. “You were on the stone? But, you never said anything before. What happened? Did you go somewhere? How did you get back?”

  She shook her head. “No. I didn’t go anywhere. It was like there was some sort power, and it kind of wrapped itself around me. Like beams of light.”

  “Was it blue?”

  Cally tilted her head on one side and looked at me. “Yes. Bright blue. Dazzling. Like sparks or lightning. Almost too bright to look at.”

  I stared at Cally, a jumble of tangled thoughts racing through my mind. When we’d talked in the restaurant, she’d kept all this to herself, even though it could’ve helped me. She must have known straight away I was telling the truth, but she’d pushed me away.

  I closed my eyes for a moment and pinched the bridge of my nose.

  “I really am sorry,” Cally said.

  I looked at her, and when I saw the sadness in her eyes, I couldn’t bring myself to judge her too harshly. I knew what it was like to live with a terrible secret. And I understood how she must have struggled with her conscience and tried to bury her dark memories.

  I took a breath and exhaled loudly. “At least you’ve told me now. But listen, none of this is going to get us anywhere unless we trust each other. All right?”

  She nodded. “You’re right. I should’ve…I should’ve told you before.”

  “That doesn’t matter now. We just have to figure out what it all means. How come you didn’t wake up somewhere else? Why didn’t the stone take you?”

  “I’ve no idea,” Cally said. “I guess I was just lucky. It was a different stone, so maybe they don’t all work the same way. I don’t know. It was frightening. It shook me up.”

  “Tell me about it. It takes away your confidence. It makes you doubt everything. It makes you…it makes you feel like you’re going crazy.”

  Cally bit her bottom lip. “Yeah. It was pretty rough. It was nothing like as bad as what happened to you, but for quite a long time, I was scared. I didn’t want to admit it, but I used to wake up in a cold sweat. It was awful. I…”

  She let her voice trail away then she sniffed loudly and dabbed at her eyes with the backs of her hands. “I’m sorry,” she went on. “I don’t usually get like this.”

  “Don’t be silly. I don’t mind. I know exactly what you mean.” I hesitated. “So, what happened—after you got away from the stone?”

  “It was bizarre. It was as if none of it had really happened. The man who helped me escape, he said he worked for the government, and the whole thing was hushed up. My tutor knew I’d been interested in the stone and he suddenly got the sack. I never saw him again. And after that, they gave me a new tutor and things kind of settled back to normal.” She paused and shook her head gently, as if she couldn’t quite believe what she was saying. “I just went on with my life. I tried…I tried to forget about the whole thing. I pretended it had never happened.”

  She looked away, staring out through the car window. An uncomfortable silence hung in the air.

  “Where is it?” I asked. “The black stone on the website—the French one—where exactly is it?”

  Cally gave me a look, her brow furrowed. “It should be about 25 kilometres from where we’re going—just outside Grand-Pressigny.”

  “How do you mean it should be there?”

  “I can’t be sure. The sources I checked didn’t agree on exactly where the stone was, so I checked through the possible sites online, but I couldn’t find it marked on any map.”

  I shrugged. “That doesn’t mean it isn’t out there somewhere.”

  “But the French authorities are normally very good at that sort of thing. Their Ministry of Culture records everything. They’re very keen on protecting ancient sites and promoting their history. It seems very strange for something so large, something so significant, to be missing entirely.”

  I suddenly realised exactly what she was getting at. “So they must have hidden this site deliberately.”

  Cally smiled. “I think so, yes. And it fits in with what we’ve been saying. They don’t want anyone to find it.” She gave me a meaningful look, and there was a glimmer of excitement in her eye.

  “You know where it is,” I said. “You’ve figured it out.”

  “Not exactly, but I’ve narrowed it down to a few possibilities. Look on the computer—I made a list. It’s on the desktop.”

  I pressed the touchpad to wake the laptop, then I minimised the screenshot. Beneath it, on the desktop, was a document called possible stone sites. When I opened it, it was clear that Cally had been thorough. There was a list of seven locations, each one with a set of co-ordinates. “Are these in any particular order? Is one more likely than another?”

  “No,” Cally said. “That’s just the order I found them.” She took a deep breath. “I think we ought to borrow a car and go out to each one, see for ourselves.”

  I nodded slowly. “I’d know it straight away,” I said. “And the timing feels right. It’s like it’s all starting to fit together. If I could just see the place for myself, maybe everything will make a bit more sense.”

  “I feel the same,” Cally said. She looked forward, peering past the driver to see through the windscreen. “I think we’re almost there. Let’s get this filming out of the way, and then we’ll see what we can come up with.”

  ***

  The museum at Grand-Pressigny was not what I expected. It was part crumbling ruin and part sleek modernity: a sophisticated modern building grafted onto ancient stone remains.

  We climbed out of the car and stretched our limbs while the driver busied himself unpacking aluminium cases from the boot.

  Cally called to him. “Gerard, nous allons vous rencontrer à l’intérieur.”

  The driver acknowledged her with an upward tilt of his chin, but said nothing.

  To me, Cally said, “Come on, I’ve told him we’ll meet him inside.”

  “Yeah, I got that,” I said. “He doesn’t look happy about it though.”

  “Don’t mind Gerard,” Cally said. “He’s a big fan of Imogen. He doesn’t like to be away from her for long. I think he fancies his chances.”

  I frowned. “Imogen?”

  “You must know Imogen. The presenter. The star of the show. You must’ve seen her on TV.”

  I shook my head. “I saw a bit of the show, but I didn’t really notice her. I just saw you. I knew it was you, the moment I saw you.”

  She grinned. “That’s sweet of you to say, but there’s no need. I was hired for my expertise, and I’m more than happy with that.”

  “I wasn’t trying to flatter you. I was just being honest.”

  Cally looked at me for a moment. “Sorry. I’ve been surrounded by TV people for too long—they spend all day massaging your ego, then they bitch about you the moment your back is turned. It drives me crazy.”

  We shared a smile. “Come on,” Cally said. “We’d better get inside or Gerard will be champing at the bit.”

  We strolled toward the museum and were met at the entrance by a tall, middle-aged woman wearing a silky, pale-blue blouse over slim designer jeans. Her red hair was tied back in a tight ponytail that emphasised her high cheekbones, and her eyes were the deep green of the forest in summer.

  “Bonjour,” she called out as she strode across the museum’s entrance hall. “I am Doctor Monnier, but please, call me Audrey.”

  Cally took the opportunity to show off her perfect French and I smiled and nodded as I tried to follow her rapid stream of words. She said something about the journey
then, judging from the Cally’s gestures, the rest was about how wonderful the museum was.

  Audrey looked suitably impressed, and as the two women talked I went over to hold the door open for Gerard, who was struggling in with more aluminium cases than he could comfortably manage. He gave me a curt nod then put the cases on the floor and stalked back to the car for another load.

  “You’re welcome,” I muttered. I let the door swing shut and went to join Cally and Audrey.

  The two women watched me as I approached, and I did my best to maintain eye contact while still putting one foot in front of the other.

  “Good morning, Jake,” Audrey said. “You are very welcome. We are just about to go through to our little lab. Please, follow me.”

  “Sure,” I said. “Great.”

  Audrey smiled then turned and led the way toward a set of glass doors on one side of the entrance hall. She extended her name badge on its lanyard and held it to an access panel on the right hand side of the door. The door unlocked with a metallic click, and Audrey ushered us inside.

  Cally and I stepped forward into a long, brightly lit corridor. The walls were painted a stark sterile white, and the floor tiles were pale grey. There were several doors along each side of the corridor, and every door had an access panel on the right hand side.

  Audrey breezed past Cally and me, and we followed in her wake. “You must stay with me at all times,” she said. “This is a secure area. None of the doors will open without a pass.”

  “Oh, what about Gerard?” Cally asked.

  “Do not worry,” Audrey called over her shoulder without slowing down. “I’ve asked someone to bring him along in a moment.” At the end of the corridor, Audrey halted outside the door on the right, and unlocked it with her name badge as before. She stepped inside and held the door open for us. “Please,” she said, indicating a rack of white lab coats hanging just inside the door, “you must wear one of these while inside the lab. And gloves also.” She plucked a pair of disposable gloves from a wall mounted dispenser and put them on.