Chapter 13
1704 Words
Well-rested, Jake rose early, breakfasted, and went for a walk. The crisp, clear morning air invigorated him, so he decided to hike along a public footpath rather than the road. The only footpath he knew without consulting a map was the one he had already walked. It took him to the b****y Field, and he followed it willingly. Afterwards, he reflected on this decision and wondered if there had been any element of choice or, more likely, some unnoticed compulsion.
Whatever the case, Jake strode along the footpath, his mind free of bothersome thoughts, enjoying the sweetness of the dew and the bird songs. At a certain point along the path, he spotted a small, white bone. He stooped to pick it up to verify whether it was from a human finger – he tried to remember his biology lessons at school. What were they called – phalanges, or something similar?
As he turned it in his hand, concluding that it was indeed human, out of the corner of his eye, he noted movement, nothing more than a shimmering in the air. Turning to identify the cause, he swayed under the effect of a dizzying faintness. The shimmering air began to transform into discernible shadowy forms. Jake wanted to shake his head to clear his vision but could not. Beset by an icy grasp, he could no longer see or think of anything but the spectral shapes. In a normal state of awareness, Jake would have gazed in disbelief; instead, he watched helplessly as the wraiths solidified into ghastly, gore-spattered warriors. Before his eyes, he witnessed the Battle of Ebberston in full swing.
Jake experienced no fear. It was cinematographic. He was in a place where nothing happened and therefore not in danger. He could not reason, nor analyse, nor think at all – just watch. He saw men in mail fighting with half-n***d blue-daubed warriors. In other circumstances, Jake would have been aghast at the violence and bloodshed. He was a pacifist who abhorred warfare. Involuntarily, his gaze was drawn across to the far side of the field, where a banner of crimson and yellow stripes fluttered in the breeze. He knew it to be the Banner of Northumbria, but this was passive recognition. He saw a group of warriors fighting, densely ranked around one man. Could that be King Aldfrith? He would have asked himself the question if he’d had control of his thoughts. He only presumed it afterwards.
The onslaught around the banner was intense. The blue-painted warriors were among the defenders, hacking and stabbing, slipping and dying. The moment came during the most severe pressure from the mail-clad and be-helmed assailants when an arrow struck the King in the upper chest. Jake saw it clearly, as well as the subsequent confusion the incident caused. But then, as if the first spool in a projection room had come to an end, the figures faded, and Jake returned to twenty-first century reality.
Out of relief and superstition, he flung the small bone he had been clinging to as far away as possible. Had it been these remains of a fallen eighth-century warrior that had channelled the apparitions?
Badly shaken, but a privileged observer, Jake stood for a moment reflecting on what he’d seen. It was as if some uncanny force had intended him to see the moment the arrow struck the king. But why? What was happening to him? Was all of this pre-ordained in some way? The blue-painted warriors had been Picts. But the history books didn’t say they were allied to Aldfrith. He’d have to investigate that. Failing to reach a rational conclusion and not feeling at all well, he returned to his lodgings. A strong cup of tea was infinitely preferable to the return of the vision. If he delayed, there was the risk the air might shimmer again and present him once more with the horrors of Dark Ages warfare. That he did not want! His determined stride turned into a jog, and to his relief, he reached the signpost marking the beginning of the public footpath. He counted himself lucky that spears and arrows had not pierced his flesh, but maybe he’d been invisible to ancient combatants.
ThatNo sooner had he turned the key in the lock of her front door than Gwen McCracken appeared.
“My goodness, laddie, you don’t look at all well! Coming down with a temperature, are you?”
“Something terrible has happened,” he said, needing someone to confide in. “I don’t suppose you could manage a cup of tea, Gwen?”
Her solution to any stressful situation being exactly that, Gwen went to put the kettle on.
“You sit yourself down, then you can tell me all about it, Jake. Back in a jiffy!”
As good as her word, Gwen arrived with a tray laden with tea and biscuits.
“You look pale. Has there been an accident on the road?”
“No, but I saw more blood than a thousand accidents!”
She looked at him in disbelief.
“What on earth are you on about, laddie?”
“That’s exactly it, Gwen, I don’t think what I saw had anything to do with this earth. Not today’s, at any rate.”
He had lost her and could see her confusion. He needed to explain as lucidly as possible.
“I was walking across the b****y Field when…” He continued to explain the sequence of events, and the horror he had witnessed was writ so large on his face that Gwen never doubted it had occurred. When he’d finished, emotionally drained, she said, “I can explain what happened, Jake.”
He gaped at her. How could the simple, affectionate landlady of a boarding establishment explain such a phenomenon? She wasn’t exactly Einstein in the intellectual stakes.
“My family are from the Highlands of Scotland, and our folk call this an da-shealladh.”
an da-shealladhOf course, McCracken. Is that Gaelic?
Of course, McCracken. Is that Gaelic?“That’s Gaelic,” she said, confirming his thought. “It means the two sights or the sight of the seer. It runs in our family. It gives you the ability to see apparitions of the living and the dead. I can’t say anything like that’s happened to me, but it did to my mam. It was in the War. She saw our uncle Jackie, who came to smile at her an hour before his death. There he was, as plain to her as I can see you, Jake. Standing in his naval uniform. He was on a minesweeper, blown up by a German mine, no survivors. So there you are, you see – an da-shealladh.”
the two sights the sight of the seeranda-shealladh“I can understand that, but a whole battle, with hundreds of men?”
“If you think about it, it’s even more likely. All those deaths all close together. You need a person able to channel his per- per- extrasensory powers!” She struggled to find the right words.
perper“I’ll admit to you that I’ve been experiencing strange things since my accident.”
“Aw, did you have an accident then?”
Jake told her about his coma and the after-effects and why he’d come away for peace and quiet with the intention of rambling and visiting a few historic churches.
“Oh, you poor thing! You’re not exactly finding peace and quiet with these goings-on at Ebberston, are you?”
“It’s not the quiet village I took it to be.” He wolfed down another ginger nut biscuit, his favourite. “I have to fathom out this mystery, Gwen. It’s not what I came here for, but it’s a book in itself.”
“I should be careful if I were you. You might not do yourself any good pushing on with this.”
“The fewer people that know what I’m about, Gwen, the better. You won’t tell anyone, will you?”
“My lips are sealed, I promise you.”
He saw the stubborn determination and thought in that moment she seemed what he imagined a determined Scottish Highland woman to be like.
“Now, I want you to promise me something, young man.” Her steely grey eyes bored into his.
“What?”
“You won’t go back to Elfrid’s Hole.”
He shook his head. “I can’t promise that, Gwen. Else how am I going to get to the bottom of this mystery?”
“Why don’t you just make it up? I’m sure you can write a good enough story without risking your life.”
“Do you really believe that could happen?” He crunched another biscuit. “Sorry, I’m eating them all.”
“That’s what they’re there for. And, yes, I do think there’s that risk. You wouldn’t be the first to disappear or die, would you?”
“No, but if I solve the mystery, maybe no one else needs die. Think about that, Gwen.”
She did for a moment, then said, “Why don’t we go to the police? They could try again.”
“We’ve nothing concrete to give them.” Jake deliberately kept silent about the ear and the missing boulder. “Anyway, you just promised not to tell anyone.”
She looked at him with a pitying gaze. “I don’t want anything to happen to you, that’s all.”
“Would you like me to find different lodgings, Gwen?”
“Why would you do that?”
“I thought, well, if anything happened to me, people wouldn’t associate it with your bed and breakfast.”
“Now you’re being silly!”
“Good, I like it here with you, Gwen. You’re so very kind.”
“One does one’s best, love. Besides, nothing’s going to happen to you. I’d have had a warning with an da-shealladh.”
anda-shealladh.Jake considered this, smiled at her, and said the exact opposite of what he was thinking.
“I’m sure you’re right. Nothing is going to happen to me.”
Nothing
- Writer
