Black Cairn Point (5 page)

But not me. I was eyeing the inky landscape, sudden fear twisting my stomach. Not a single house light anywhere; not a single soul. Just empty blackness where, I now imagined, evil spirits lingered.

Suddenly our campfire seemed far too small, far too insubstantial. Its glow barely illuminated our faces, close as we were to the flames. How near could evil get without us noticing?

Beside me, Dougie rose and brushed the sand from his jeans, then yawned and stretched.

‘Right, I’m knackered. I say we sleep.’ His voice was back to normal and as he looked down at me, hand outstretched to help me up, all at once he was my friend again, his mouth tugging into a smile, dimples winking in his cheeks.

There was a murmur of agreement. Only Darren looked put out, though I wasn’t sure whether that was because his story hadn’t had the same spellbinding effect as Dougie’s, or because of the sudden end to the night. He was holding mulishly to the remains of the whisky. No doubt he wanted to stay up till dawn, drinking. This probably wasn’t his idea of a party. Still, Dougie’s actual birthday wasn’t for another two days.

I made my way wearily to our tent, chilled now that I was away from the flames. Teeth chattering, I pulled off my clothes and yanked on my warmest pyjamas before I turned on the torch, aware that my outline would be silhouetted against the faded red of the tent. Shoving my feet back into my trainers, I tripped back outside, toothbrush in hand. The boys were dumping spadefuls of sand onto the fire, trying to douse the final flames. At least, Dougie and Martin were. Darren stood to the side, his arms around Emma, lips locked against hers.

They were still like that, glued together, when I returned from the bushes where I’d created a makeshift bathroom. I forgot, momentarily, about evil figures in the dark. I looked at them, half amused, half uneasy. I’d made it quite clear to Emma that the tents were single-sex. I hoped she hadn’t thought I was saying it just for the benefit of our parents. If she wanted to shack up with Darren, she’d have to sleep in his car.

‘Night,’ I called to Dougie and Martin as I slithered for the final time into the tent.

As I’d hoped, my farewell acted as a spur to Emma. She disengaged herself from Darren’s octopus grip and, after planting one final kiss on his cheek, ambled in my direction. She didn’t bother getting changed or brushing her teeth, but buried straight down into her sleeping bag, watching as I shoved clothes and toiletries back into my rucksack, tidying up the space.

‘That story was really spooky,’ she commented as I unzipped my own bag and crawled inside. ‘You looked totally freaked out.’

‘It was creepy,’ I replied honestly. ‘Dougie really knows how to tell a scary story.’

‘Mmm,’ Emma agreed. ‘Think it was really all true?’

‘Most of it,’ I replied. At least, I hoped it was only most of it. The idea of druid spirits haunting the land freaked me out too much to contemplate.

‘You reckon? How does Dougie know all that, then?’

‘Well, he’s really interested in that stuff.’

‘What, ritual sacrifice?’ Emma stared at me, her expression wide-eyed with put-on horror.

‘No,’ I scowled. ‘History and archaeology and things. He’s got loads of books on it. It’s what he wants to do at university.’

‘Oh, that’s right,’ Emma purred. My ears pricked up at the change and I turned to look at her. She was grinning slyly. ‘You’ve both applied, haven’t you?’

‘Yeah.’ I knew where she was going with this and I didn’t want to talk about it. I held my hand over the torch, ready to douse the light. ‘You all sorted?’

Emma nodded and I hit the switch, plunging us into darkness.

Everything was immediately different. Blind, my ears automatically tuned in to every noise, inside the tent and out. I could hear Emma’s quiet breathing, the rustling of her covers as she shifted, trying to get comfortable on the air mattress. Further away, I caught the quiet murmur of the boys, huddling down. Comforting noises, reminding me that I wasn’t alone. Below that, though, there were more eerie sounds: the rhythmic whoosh of the water, hissing like a whisper; the higher pitch of the wind through the reeds high up on the sand dunes like a scream. The distant bark of a dog, snapping and jarring at my nerves.

Stop it, I told myself. You’re surrounded by people.

Still, the haunting tones of Dougie’s voice murmuring his tale of druids and bloody sacrifice seemed to have followed me into the tent. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was being watched. That there was something out there in the dark, something other than Emma lying beside me or Dougie, Darren and Martin in the other tent …

My scalp started to tingle and the alcohol I’d consumed churned uneasily in my stomach.

‘It’s a pity Martin’s here,’ Emma said, carrying on what I’d hoped was our finished conversation in a voice loud enough to carry to the adjacent tent.

‘Emma!’ I hissed. ‘Keep your voice down.’

‘Well, it is,’ she repeated, only a little more quietly.

‘What? Why?’

I stared in her direction, though it was impossible to see her in the pitch black.

‘Think about it,’ she said, as if it was glaringly obvious. ‘If it was just the four of us …’

If it was just the four of us, Emma would disappear with Darren, and Dougie and I would be left to look awkwardly at each other, trying to think of things to say. No, I was very glad Martin was here.

‘Wonder who it is Dougie fancies,’ Emma mused. ‘It’s rubbish that he wouldn’t answer that.’

‘Mmm,’ I replied half-heartedly. I wondered, too. But given that I wasn’t going to get the answer that I wanted, I was pretty sure I didn’t want to know.

‘Maybe it’s you,’ she suggested.

‘Doubt it,’ I shot back, not even wanting to discuss the possibility. No point getting my hopes up. ‘Maybe it’s you.’

I tried to infuse my voice with indifference, like it was just a throwaway comment, but the words were bitter on my tongue.

‘Might be,’ Emma mused, not seeming remotely disconcerted or embarrassed by the idea. ‘I don’t think so, though. I’ve never seen him looking at me like that or anything.’

‘He was looking at you tonight,’ I pointed out, scowling at the memory.

Emma’s laugh tinkled across the space.

‘Of course he was, I was half-naked! You should be more worried if he wasn’t looking.’

‘Shhh!’ I growled. If we could hear the boys, they could hear us.

‘Stop worrying,’ Emma replied, refusing to lower her voice. ‘Besides, don’t you want him to know?’

‘No.’

‘How’s anything supposed to happen then?’

‘It’s not going to,’ I snapped. ‘He likes someone else, remember?’

‘It might be you, Heather,’ Emma reminded me.

It might be. But I doubted it.

‘I’m tired,’ I said, shutting down the conversation. ‘Let’s go to sleep.’

I turned my back on her sigh of frustration. Shutting my eyes, I tried to lull myself to sleep with thoughts that Emma was right, that I was the one Dougie had his eye on, but instead my dreams were filled with formless black shadows, swooping down with glowing eyes and gaping mouths.

I woke much earlier than I wanted to. The sun was rising on what would be yet another glorious day and its penetrating rays turned the tiny interior of the tent into a sauna in a matter of minutes. One moment I was snuggled tightly in my sleeping bag, covers up over my face to warm my nose, the next I was sweltering, fighting my way free of the thick cocoon, pyjamas sticking to my body. I didn’t hesitate but scrambled across the space and yanked the zipper to open the door.

At once frigid air poured in through the gap. I gulped it gratefully, oblivious to Emma’s mewls of protest.

‘What time is it?’ she muttered groggily.

I reached for my wristwatch, abandoned in a corner, and peered at the dial. Whoops.

‘Just before six,’ I admitted.

‘Heather! What the hell is wrong with you?’ Emma flopped over in disgust, bashing her pillow into a more comfortable shape before burrowing back down. ‘Shut the door or get out,’ she griped, her voice muffled by the thick padding of her covers.

It was stupidly early but I knew I wasn’t going to sleep. Snatching up my jumper and shoes, I stole outside. Stretching the stiffness out of my back – and trying not to grin about the fact that my disappearance had shifted the air in the half-deflated air mattress, dumping Emma on the floor – I saw that I wasn’t the only one up early. Martin sat perched on one of the folding chairs, watching the lightening sky and sipping at a bottle of water.

‘Couldn’t sleep?’ he asked as I wandered over.

I shook my head.

‘Me either, too hot. Plus, Darren snores worse than my dad.’ He grinned. ‘How’s your head?’

‘It’s –’ I stopped short of saying fine. ‘Bangy,’ I realised.

‘Here.’ He handed the bottle of water to me. ‘Booze makes you dehydrated. This your first hangover?’

‘Yeah.’ I took a gulp, sat down on another of the chairs. ‘It’s not as bad as I thought it would be.’

‘I think it varies in strength relative to your alcohol consumption,’ Martin said sagely.

‘I see.’ Another grin to smother. Such a Martin answer.

Taking another large mouthful of water, I leaned back in the chair and sighed. Yanking my jumper on over my head, I contented myself staring in the same direction as Martin. We sat in companionable silence. It wasn’t awkward the way it would have been with Dougie. Or uncomfortable like it would have been with Darren – and it would be damned impossible with Emma! It was relaxing, listening to the rhythm of the waves – a nice sound now that daylight showed it was nothing more sinister than the gentle stroking of water on sand. I shut my eyes and leaned my head back. I might even have fallen asleep again if it hadn’t been for the taut fabric of the chair, digging into my neck.

No one else emerged until almost eight. By that time Martin and I had succumbed to hunger and dug out the little gas-fired burner. He was slathering slices of bread with butter and ketchup while I prodded half-cooked rashers of bacon around the frying pan with a spatula.

‘I thought I smelled something,’ Darren commented, scratching his head. ‘I’ll take two.’

He gave me a wink to solidify his order, then disappeared into the privacy of the long grass behind the tents.

‘Would it be wrong of me to spit in his sandwich?’ Martin asked me in an undertone.

I laughed. ‘Only if he catches you.’

‘Need any help?’ Dougie emerged from the boys’ tent fully dressed, only his feet bare, a toothbrush hanging from his mouth.

‘We’re just about done.’ I smiled brightly at him. ‘You could dig out the orange juice?’

‘We need that to mix with the vodka!’ Darren hollered from behind the dunes, somehow hearing me across the distance.

Dougie rolled his eyes.

‘I think Darren’s an alkie,’ he joked. ‘I’ll go hunt it out of the car.’

Emma climbed lithely out of our tent just as the bacon sandwiches slid onto paper plates, her expression expectant. Despite the fact that she’d gone to sleep in last night’s clothes, she was now wearing pyjamas. It wasn’t hard to work out why. The little camisole and shorts set was clingy and revealing, showing off her long legs and tiny waist. As she sauntered over every pair of eyes was fixed on her, mine the only two that were disdainful.

‘Oh, I’m sorry. Am I too late to help?’ she asked, eyes wide and innocent.

I suppressed my sigh. When had my best friend turned into this complete and utter airhead?

‘Don’t worry, we made you one.’ Dougie held the plate out to her, smiling, and I wondered yet again if she was the mysterious girl he fancied. At least I had the comfort of knowing he’d never act on it, not when she was going out with someone else.

For a short while everyone was quiet as they munched on breakfast, washed down, despite Darren’s complaints, with the orange juice.

‘So what are we going to do today?’ Martin asked, licking the grease and tomato sauce from his fingers.

‘Do?’ Darren asked, looking at him with feigned confusion.

‘Yes, do,’ Martin repeated. ‘You’re not planning to just sit here all day, are you?’

‘Sunbathing,’ Emma asserted, lifting one leg to run her fingers along her silky-smooth calf. ‘That’s what I’m doing. I’m pale.’

Martin pulled a face that made it clear sunbathing was about as appealing as stabbing himself in the eye.

‘I’m up for a bit of exploring,’ Dougie offered. ‘My dad said there are some ruins of an old castle or something up over the hill.’

‘Exploring sounds good.’ Martin grinned.

Dougie turned to me. ‘Heather?’

‘Heather’s going to sunbathe with me,’ Emma announced.

I raised one eyebrow at her, then turned to Dougie.

‘I’m up for some exploring,’ I said quietly.

Darren opted to stay behind to ‘watch Emma sunbathing’, he said, eyes trailing her provocative outfit, so it was the three of us who made our way slowly up towards the car park. We passed by the Volvo, finding a trail that wound its way in a zigzag from the beach, in the opposite direction to the road. It was a steep climb and I soon found myself lagging behind the two boys, panting for breath. Luckily the sun still hung low in the sky and the air was cool. Even so, I had to yank off my jumper, knotting it around my waist.

‘Check out the view,’ Dougie said to me as I crested the top.

He pointed back the way we’d come and I spun on the spot, using it as an excuse to hide my flushed cheeks and heaving lungs. He was right, though. It was beautiful. The sea spread out like an undulating blanket of blue, bordered by a thin strip of cream-coloured beach. Beyond the sand was a carpet of greenery, emerald in the sunlight. It was breathtaking, maybe more so than the hike to get up there.

‘I think I can see the ruins your dad was talking about, Dougie,’ Martin called from behind me. I turned to see him pointing to the peak of another hill. The ground dipped away from us, so although the blurred jumble of stones didn’t look to be any higher than we were, it would involve trudging up another steep incline. I groaned inwardly.

There was no trail up on top of the hill so we clambered three abreast across the rugged heathland. Despite the sun, the grass was damp with dew that quickly soaked the bottoms of my jeans and slithered into my trainers.

‘So how do you think the exams went?’ Dougie asked me as we walked.

I shrugged, made a face. ‘Not sure. English was okay, I think. Maths … who knows? I probably failed physics.’

‘Reckon you did enough to get your uni place?’

Another shrug. ‘Hope so. You?’

‘I think they went all right,’ said Dougie, smiling impishly.

I snorted a laugh. Dougie had been named the Dux – the top pupil in the school. He was practically guaranteed to get five As.

‘Martin,’ I turned to my other side. ‘What about you?’

He sniffed, shoved his glasses back up on his nose.

‘Sciences went well. English will probably be my downfall.’

‘Think you’ll leave school?’ I asked.

I knew he hadn’t applied to any courses yet, but there was always Clearing. Universities offered last-minute places on any courses that weren’t full. Martin was shaking his head, though.

‘Not allowed. My parents say I’m too young. Plus I’d quite like to do a couple of Advanced Highers. Maths and Chemistry. Maybe Biology if I get a good enough grade.’

‘Will you miss us?’ I asked teasingly.

He gave me a strange look, not matching my jokey tone.

‘Yes,’ he said soberly.

My grin vanished.

‘Well, don’t worry,’ I said. ‘I’ll probably be back in August, doing re-sits.’

He still didn’t laugh.

‘No, you won’t,’ he said quietly.

I looked away, feeling awkward although I wasn’t sure why.

The rapidly inclining hillside cut off the conversation, although it had been dead already. For several minutes there was just the uneven melody of three sets of lungs, panting. The sun, climbing steadily higher in the sky, began to reach out with its heat until I could feel it starting to burn my bare shoulders. I hadn’t thought about sunscreen.

Finally we made it to the top and there, taking centre stage at the very peak, were the ruins Dougie had told us about. He’d said it might be a castle but looking at what was left it was hard to discern any sort of building. There were no walls remaining, just one large mound of stone that spilled over at the edges, sending irregular lumps tumbling into the grass.

‘I don’t think it was a castle,’ Dougie commented, hands on his hips, a thoughtful look on his face. ‘My dad probably just looked at it from the beach; he’s not much of one for exercise. I don’t think this was even a building.’

He moved over to get a closer look.

‘Look at this,’ he called, waving Martin and me over. ‘There’s a sort of entrance here.’

I looked to where he was pointing, trying to see what he saw. This was exactly the sort of thing I wanted to study at university, but I had to admit that all I saw was a jumble of stones. I squinted, trying to create any sort of identifiable shape. It reminded me of when my cousin had shown me her baby scan and she’d pointed to blobs and circles, telling me they were limbs, a head. I hadn’t seen anything then, and now was no different.

‘Do you see it?’ Dougie asked. ‘Right there.’

Martin circled the spot, eyeing it critically.

‘Okay, Indiana,’ he joked, his face sceptical.

At least I wasn’t the only one.

Dougie wasn’t giving up, though. He stood there for ten minutes, gesturing with his arms and trying to talk us through lumps and bumps that he said were an entrance, a roof, a protective wall. At first I was just as lost as before, but the more Dougie talked, the more some sort of hazy structure started to appear. Little by little I began to see what he was talking about.

‘So what do you think it was?’ I asked, when I was sure I had the outline straight in my head. ‘A house?’

Dougie shook his head.

‘A tomb,’ he said. ‘A cairn,’ he expanded, seeing my puzzled look. ‘This is probably what the place is named after. When important people died they used to bury them at the top of the hill then pile all these stones on top. If you could get into it, there’d be a sort of chamber in there. That’s if it hasn’t collapsed.’

I nodded along as he spoke, trying to look as if this wasn’t all new to me. Martin’s sceptical look folded into an incredulous frown.

‘They hiked all these stones up here? Seems it would have been easier to just do it at the bottom. Prestige, I suppose.’

Dougie nodded.

‘You know,’ he said, turning to me, a wicked gleam in his eye, ‘this is exactly the sort of place a druid spirit, hungry for vengeance, might choose to lurk.’

My stomach lurched, a burst of adrenaline making my skin crawl like hundreds of spiders were slithering over me as I stared at the cairn with a sudden horror – and fascination – before I gave myself a shake.

‘Shut up, Dougie,’ I said. ‘You made that bit up!’

‘Did I?’ He grinned, then he turned his back on me to bend over and start hauling at some of the large stones covering what he’d identified as the entrance.

‘What are you doing?’ I asked.

‘We might be able to get in,’ he said.

In. To a tomb.

‘You don’t think there’s a body in there?’ I said, revolted yet somehow drawn forward. I didn’t want to see the cracked, yellow curve of some skull come tumbling out and land at my feet.

‘Doubt it,’ Dougie puffed, still trying to yank a particularly large stone out of the way. ‘This will be thousands of years old. There won’t be anything left. People used them as sacred sites, though. They didn’t know what they were. So you never know what you’ll find if you rake about.’

‘My money’s on an empty bottle of cider and a crisp packet,’ Martin quipped.

‘Wrong!’ Dougie announced, at last getting the stone out of the way and delving deep inside with his hand. ‘It’s a can of juice!’

He held it up triumphantly as Martin and I let out matching cackles of laughter. The can had obviously laid there for a long time; the colours had seeped from the metal so you could no longer tell the brand. Rust surrounded the rim and a gash in the centre.

‘Better call the National Museum,’ Martin chortled.

Dougie ignored him. He was down on his knees, poking his head deep inside the hole he’d made.

‘Anybody have a torch handy?’ His voice was muffled, coming out distorted.

‘Oh yes, I always carry a torch. That and a defibrillator, a pocket guide to Wales and a pair of bicycle clips.’

‘Ha ha.’ Dougie leaned back and threw Martin a scathing look. ‘How about a phone, then?’

‘I’ve got a flashlight app on mine,’ I offered, holding my mobile out.

‘Cheers.’ His face already back in the depth of the cairn, he reached for it clumsily. His fumbling fingers grabbed mine instead of the phone, sending a wave of heat up through my hand. ‘There’s something else in here,’ he called. ‘Maybe I can reach it.’

‘What is it this time, a Durex wrapper?’ Martin snorted.

Dougie made a face at him, his body turned to the side so that he could wedge his shoulder into the gap and reach an extra few inches.

‘I’ve nearly got it,’ he said, straining. ‘Ah-ha!’

This time when he held it up we were all silent. Wordlessly, Martin and I edged closer for a better look.