Page 2 of The Longing

She glares at me with murder in her eyes.

“May as well call a spade a spade,” I add.

“Fuck you,” she says. “I’d shoot you right here and now if I hadn’t made the bargain.” Her voice is edged with rage. “Start walking.”

I don’t move. She lowers the gun and fires at my feet. I jump into the air as pieces of the tarmac leap up at me. A further series of clicks tell me she’s ready to fire again.

“They don’t care if you’re whole,” Aunty Cathy says through gritted teeth. “They just want a virgin.” She smiles nastily. “So, I’d keep your trap shut about your previous proclivities if I were you, and if you want to stay uninjured, start walking.”

“And have you shoot me in the back? Not a chance,” I retort.

If I’m going to die, killed by a woman who was supposed to be my own flesh and blood, then she’s not getting away with anything lightly.

Tires screech on the road, the back end slewing as the car speeds away.

If she wanted to kill me, and I’m sure she did, she must want the supposed reward very much. I feel as if all the emotion has drained out of my body. It wasn’t like we ever really got on. She was always cold and distant. But she was my only living relative, and she’s just left me to the mercy of the Faerie.

A long, low groan rips through the air and sets every hair on my body on end, suggesting it’s not the Faerie I have to worry about.

There’s something hunting out here, on the wild moors, and I’m likely on the menu.

ALICE

Iwalk swiftly along the road, head bowed as I stare at the tarmac, or try to. It’s so dark, the storm robbing the night of any starlight or moon which might have helped me see where I am or where I’m going. The rain has already soaked through my clothing, and I’m chilled to the bone.

I’ve not heard the animal sound again, but I keep imagining the noise of a car engine. Aunt Cathy, if she’s coming back at all, it’s to finish the job.

A flash of light has me leaping into the heather at the side of the road. What I didn’t know about was the ditch, into which I drop. There’s a couple of inches of freezing water in the bottom, and unable to help myself, I curse as it soaks through my clothing.

The road isn’t the place for me anymore. I crawl out, mud sticking to me and, by the dim light of a crescent moon, find a scrappy track leading away over the moor. The rain has stopped for the time being, but, as it clears, the temperature drops.

But it’s enough if I want to make my way across these moors. Whatever humans might think about magic, moors have always been where the veil is thinnest, places you stray across at yourperil. I know now I should have never let my aunt take me on this supposed road trip to pick up a priceless treasure she claimed she wanted, but then hindsight is a wonderful thing for a woman clearly too naïve for words, i.e. me.

How could I have been so stupid to trust her? She never gave me a kind word, so why would she want me to come along on a road trip to London? The last place she would ever normally take me.

I guess I was wanting that human connection she’d always denied me. Maybe I thought she was going to change.

Not a chance.

I shouldn’t follow the path on the moor. But with the road being unsafe, what choice do I have?

My brain is so cold, I’m not thinking straight as I stumble through the heather, half following the way, only slightly more than an animal track. If I can get away…maybe I can disappear.

The long, low cry comes again, and I speed up, checking over my shoulder for anything following, but in the limited moonlight, there is nothing.

I jump as I turn back and see the huge shape looming out of the heather. For an instant, I think it’s one of the monsters we were formerly warned about in ancient times, until the human world turned in on itself and decided to battle each other.

It doesn’t move, and as a cloud moves past the thin moon, I see it for what it is—a large standing stone. Its edges are weathered by the eons it has sat here, unworshipped and watching. I can feel its presence, a tightening of my chest, a constriction in my veins.

And yet I’m still drawn to it, unable to stop my feet walking me ever closer to the monolith even though I don’t want to go.

I’d rather return to the road, to the potential death which lurks there, than approach this stone, yet my feet drag meinexorably on, until I’m stood under it, having to lean back to see where it ends and the star studded sky begins.

Perhaps I’ll be abducted by aliens. Perhaps that’s the way this ends.

Behind me, there’s a slow slithering sound of something absolutely huge moving through the heather. The twigs snap under the weight. My breath flutters from me like moths escaping, my heart slamming in my chest so loudly it’s amazing I can hear anything else. I don’t want to turn. I don’t want to look.

I don’t want to feel the hot breath on my neck or see the massive Jurassic teeth studding a jaw which can only ever exist in nightmares.

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