Emerald Greene and the Witch Stones Read online

  ‘I wonder, sir,’ said Mr Odell thoughtfully to Mr Courtney, as they sat in the parked Mercedes in a country lane just above Meresbury. ‘About the potassium-argon test and the carbon-dating that the science guys did.’

  ‘You wonder, do you?’ said Mr Courtney. He peered inside his bread roll. ‘Cheese and pickle. What have you got?’

  ‘Ham and egg, sir.’

  They looked at each other for a second, and then swapped sandwiches.

  Mr Courtney chomped with enthusiasm into his. ‘What mff you tthhff thtt thnnn?’ he asked indistinctly.

  ‘Pardon, sir?’

  ‘I said, what makes you think that, then?’

  ‘Dunno, sir. Just a hunch, but I wonder whether we’re dealing with what we think we’re dealing with.’

  ‘We very rarely are, Mr Odell. It’s in the nature of the job. Remember the plague of frogs in Shepton Mallet last year?’ Mr Courtney shook his head. ‘Shocking business, that. Shocking.’

  Mr Odell shuddered. He did indeed remember the incident of the plague of frogs, but was not prepared to dwell on it right now. ‘And it’s... just a feeling about Ulverston, too, sir. Like there’s something we’re missing.’

  ‘Ulverston,’ said Mr Courtney, nodding slowly and drumming his fingers on the dashboard. ‘Professor Edwin Ulverston. I think our deceased Professor holds the key to this mystery, Mr Odell!’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ said Mr Odell. Look.’ He flipped open the lid of his laptop and called up a 3-D digital image of the Professor. ‘I’ve got everything about him from the Internet here,’ he said, scrolling down the text.

  Mr Courtney did a double-take. ‘Have you got wireless fidelity on yours?’ he asked enviously.

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Why have you got that and not me? I’m supposed to be in charge here!’

  Mr Odell shrugged and smiled. ‘Pays to be nice to the techie boys and girls, sir. Especially the girls,’ he added, with a wistful look in his eye.

  ‘Yes, well, never mind that. Is it all downloaded to the secure files back at base, too?’ Mr Courtney asked.

  ‘All done, sir.’

  ‘What about his research papers? Did you get hold of those?’

  ‘Yes, sir. The University authorities were very obliging.’

  ‘And his Government file?’

  Mr Odell folded his laptop shut and looked apologetic. ‘Ah. Well, sir, it’s all in a secure data-store. Top-level security, accessible only with restricted passwords, complex protocols... But we, um, had to change the access codes.’

  Mr Courtney frowned. ‘Why was that, Mr Odell?’

  ‘A ten-year-old kid from Redditch hacked into it last week.’

  ‘I see. I sometimes wonder, Mr Odell, if the Intelligence Corps should consider changing their name.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ said Mr Odell with an indulgent smile.

  ‘Tell me what you know, anyway.’

  The shadows of the trees gathered around the black Mercedes as the two men carried on talking. Sometimes, the shadows almost looked like recognisable shapes, flitting in and out of the hedgerows. The wind passed through the trees, rustling the leaves like the voices of ghosts.

  High above, a pale moon emerged like a watchful eye, and dusk gathered once again over the city of Meresbury.

  ‘Splendid,’ said Emerald Greene. ‘Absolutely splendid.’

  Rooks cawed in the trees beyond the Ten Sisters, their mocking maaahk-maaahk echoing across the shadowy plateau. High above Scratchcombe Edge, behind the meadow which led down to the stone circle, was a rickety five-bar gate. Emerald, in her duffel-coat, sat on the gate and squinted through the telescope.

  Down in the gathering gloom by the Ten Sisters, the small team of Special Measures operatives laughed, chatted and smoked together. Their guns were holstered and their body-language was relaxed. The dish-shaped aerial on the black Transit van swept steadily back and forth.

  ‘Obviously not expecting any trouble,’ Emerald murmured. She collapsed the telescope and replaced it in the small rucksack she was carrying. ‘Idiots.’

  Anoushka, who was walking with perfect balance along the top bar of the gate, paused for a scratch. ‘So why are we wasting our time here, Miss Emerald?’

  ‘Just checking,’ said Emerald Greene. ‘I like to cover all eventualities.’ Emerald rummaged in her rucksack and fished out a tangle of wiring and a small disc with a dial built into it.

  ‘Don’t tell me,’ drawled Anoushka, who was sniffing around the bottom of the gate. ‘Another device you haven’t properly calibrated.’

  ‘In an ideal world,’ said Emerald Greene, frantically connecting wires around the outside of the dial, ‘I would have had time to overhaul all of the equipment properly before we left. Such a thing was not possible. Now...’ Emerald flicked a switch, pointed the device across the field at the stones and nodded grimly at the reading which the pointer gave. ‘As I suspected.’

  ‘You’re certain?’ Anoushka hissed, hopping on to her shoulder to verify the readings.

  Emerald showed him the dial. ‘I just hope the fools have not subjected the remains to any light from the non-visible spectrum.’

  ‘Such as X-rays?’ Anoushka suggested.

  Emerald narrowed her eyes. ‘Let us be honest. We are dealing with simple-minded imbeciles. I imagine their first act would have been to X-ray the Enemy.’ Emerald shook her head, stuffing the dial and the wires back into her rucksack. ‘Botheration! If only I could get in there.’

  ‘They would have you arrested and impounded,’ said Anoushka casually. ‘And what good would that be?... Leave it to me.’

  ‘Good advice, as ever, dear Anoushka.’

  Anoushka leapt up on to her lap, and the two of them briefly touched foreheads. Then the cat jumped down from the gate into the bracken and was softly, swiftly heading for the stones.

  Anoushka was a clever cat.

  He wasn’t sure who had given him the name Anoushka. It had not been Emerald. A previous owner, he supposed, some ignorant human who couldn’t tell the difference between a boy kitten and a girl kitten.

  Never mind - it was a striking, noble, exotic name and he was fond of it. He didn’t answer to it as often as Emerald might like. He was a free spirit, and one with nine lives - and a bit of investigation of his own often proved more fruitful than anything Miss Greene might ask him to do.

  The other thing, of course, was that people were used to cats.

  They didn’t, in general, try to keep them out of secure areas. Although he had been chased off a few gardens in Meresbury with the aid of a hosepipe, he was free to roam around private spaces in a way that humans just weren’t.

  The red-and-white tape barrier around the stone circle might as well not have been there for Anoushka. In the gloom, the patrolling Special Measures men didn’t even see him. He could smell them all at a hundred yards, though; their scent was distinct, a mixture of synthetic clothes, normal human smell and cigarette smoke. For a hunter as seasoned as Anoushka, they might as well have been carrying big flashing beacons announcing their presence. He allowed himself a little purr of pleasure as he trotted over to the stones. Foolish humans. He wondered how they had ever become the dominant species on this planet.

  He sniffed the earth beside one of the stones, and shrank back, hissing. Yes. As he had thought.

  He trotted across the stone circle and hopped up the ramp through the tattered entrance of the tomb. The two guards on duty didn’t even react.

  Here, the soft red lights cast an unearthly hue over everything. Even Anoushka almost baulked; there was something in here which made his senses, more acute than those of a human, tingle in alertness. But he padded further inside.

  The bones lay there, still half-submerged in the peaty soil, surrounded by soft red lights and electronic
probes. A thin film of some plastic material had been laid over the top, but Anoushka could still make out the eye-sockets of the cracked skull and the neat, even bones of the ribcage.

  And there was something else.

  For Anoushka, who lived at a slight tangent to humanity, could sense things which human beings could not. And the aura around the bones was one which shot through several of his senses; it had the smell of fear, the colour of blood, the taste of... what? Old bones, old hollows and caves...the taste of death.

  Anoushka shrank back with a growl, the hair rising on his arching back, as he dug his claws deep into the peaty earth of the burial chamber.

  That feeling, wrapped around his head; he knew what it meant as he had encountered it before. There was a presence there, something to be sensed, something to be.... communicated with? Anoushka could feel his heart beating. His whiskers twitched in fear. He moved forward, and yes, there it was again, like a forcefield of fire enclosing the skeleton. His mind sensed the powerful intelligence immediately.

  He lowered his head, blinked his green eyes and, digging his claws in further still, Anoushka tried to tune his mind to the other.

  Something there.

  Like... like a smell. Or a taste. The cat hissed as the sensations flowed through his body. His fur stood up in menacing spikes and his back arched as if he were about to pounce.

  Earth. Mulchy, wet earth.

  Longing. Deep, angry longing. A sense of containment, something scrabbling for release, skittering like rats’ claws in the skirting.

  Alone. So alone. Down there in the soil, in the dirt.

  In the dark.

  And now, Anoushka sensed, probing further, the longing had a name. A murmured name, calling out like a whisper in a vault, like a low sigh of anguish in the deepest of caverns.

  ‘Frey- gerrrrrrrrrd...’

  And now pain.

  A crimson, angry pain, reaching out with a giant finger into Anoushka’s mind and -

  With a sudden skerrowl of surprise, Anoushka jumped back, breaking the connection, his claws scrabbling in the earth as he attempted to find a foothold.

  Hissing and baring his teeth, he backed out of the tomb and ran, a bolt of blackness in the grey. Like a moving shadow, he slipped across the dewy grass, darting between the feet of the security men (who still didn’t see him) before rejoining his mistress at the gate.

  Anoushka jumped into Emerald’s arms and, for a few moments only, pressed his head against her forehead once more, green eyes meeting green eyes.

  Something passed between them.

  Understanding. Information. Analysis.

  ‘I see,’ said Emerald Greene softly. ‘Then it is more dangerous than I had feared. The children... Anoushka, you must go to the Cathedral - make sure they are protected. The cracks in the fabric of Time are growing. Things are starting to emerge. They may not be safe.’

  Anoushka sprang down to the ground, and Emerald hopped from the gate and followed him.

  The girl and her cat hurried along at a brisk pace. With dusk fading into night, they disappeared over the rise and melted into the shadows like ghosts.

  Richie and Jess hurried through the darkening streets of Meresbury, trying to look nonchalant. In truth, nobody was around to see them, but Richie was still fearful that a passing police-car would stop and haul them up for breaking a curfew. He saw Jess pull her black-and-white checked cap lower over her face.

  ‘I hope you realise what a favour I’m doing you,’ Richie panted behind her. ‘I don’t abscond down the drainpipe for anyone.’

  ‘Oh, shut up, Richie. Did you bring everything I asked you to?’

  He patted his satchel. ‘Phone, biscuits, water, candles, a stopwatch and an iPod.’

  ‘I didn’t ask you to bring an iPod.’

  ‘I know. But I reckon it might be a long night.’

  ‘Hmm. Let’s hope we get the information Emerald wants.’

  ‘Just one thing,’ Richie whispered, as they came to a halt in front of the dark Cathedral.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Why did he have to come?’

  Richie nodded down at the flagstones behind them, where the dark, sinuous form of Anoushka was licking his paws and preening himself.

  Jess did a double take. ‘Anoushka! You weren’t there a second ago.’

  ‘And now I am,’ drawled the cat, prowling round them in a circle. ‘You really have to stop thinking of Time in these terribly boring, linear terms, you know. Miss Emerald is trying to educate you.’

  Jess and Richie looked at one another. Richie scowled and folded his arms, but Jess just shrugged.

  ‘Emerald’s orders, I expect,’ she said. ‘Someone to keep an eye on us.’

  ‘Keep an... Jess, it’s a cat!’ Richie pointed accusingly at Anoushka. ‘What’s it going to do if a horrible demon from beyond the gates of Hell pops up breathing fire at us? Cough up a fur-ball at it?’

  Anoushka looked up. ‘That’s right, just mock,’ he said languidly. ‘I’m used to it.’

  With the cat trotting behind them, they hurried across the Cathedral Close, where soft lights still glowed in some of the imposing Edwardian houses. Jess wondered if the Bishop was ensconced in there, kept awake by coffee, hammering away at some evangelical treatise on his iMac. At the main Cathedral doors, they stopped. Jess tried the handle, and the door felt firmly locked. She tentatively pushed at the solid oak, but it didn’t give.

  ‘Okay,’ said Richie in relief. ‘Mission abandoned. Let’s go home.’ He turned around, only to find Jess yanking him back by the collar and lifting him up to her height with both hands.

  ‘Listen, Fanshawe, I’ve not brought you along so you can chicken out, right? This could be the biggest thing to happen in Meresbury for yonks, and you want to go home?’

  ‘Errk,’ Richie suggested, pointing to his neck.

  ‘Do you want me to tell everyone at Aggie’s that I took you ghost-hunting and you acted like a total wimp? Do you?’

  ‘Rrrrk?’ Richie answered, which was about as much as he could manage with Jess’s hands pressing against his windpipe. Jess let him go and he dropped, almost falling over but regaining his balance at the last moment. ‘That wasn’t fair,’ he protested, rubbing his neck. ‘You hurt me.’

  ‘Well, you’ll think twice before scuttling off, won’t you? Honestly, I thought you’d want to stay here and protect me. Whatever happened to old-fashioned chivalry?’

  ‘Errrr... I don’t think you need protecting, Jess.’ He nodded down at Anoushka, who was sniffing around the base of the Cathedral doors. ‘What’s he doing?’

  As they watched, Anoushka braced himself, hissing and clawing at the ground. Then, the cat launched himself forward like a small missile of black fur, snarling and spitting as he headed straight for the Cathedral door.

  Richie gulped and shut his eyes tightly, but the thud and squeal which he was expecting never came. He opened his eyes, just in time to see a black tail disappearing through the door - the surface seeming, just for a second, to become glutinous, fluid like treacle.

  ‘How did he do that?’ Richie asked in astonishment, his mouth hanging open.

  ‘Maybe nobody told him he couldn’t,’ said Jess thoughtfully.

  ‘Oh, come on. Laws of physics and all that.’

  Jess shook her head. ‘You know, Rich, something tells me that what’s happening in Meresbury at the moment is going to rewrite the laws of physics.’

  The door clicked, and with a long, low creeeeeeeak, it opened from the inside.

  ‘What did I tell you?’ said Jess with a smile. She gestured. ‘After you.’

  ‘Er, no. Ladies first.’

  ‘Get in there,’ she snapped, and pushed him through the doorway.

  Inside, the cathedral was vas
t, cold, unwelcoming. Some candles flickered in alcoves, providing scant illumination and throwing wobbly shadows across the nave. Anoushka hopped down from the font, trotted along the back of the nearest pew and circled around their feet.

  ‘The laws of physics, as you call them, Richard,’ purred the cat, ‘are merely interesting suggestions. People went along with Newton because what he said seemed to fit the facts. Nobody ever came up with any more exciting ideas.’

  ‘But all objects obey Newton’s laws!’ Richie protested. ‘They have to!’ His own voice echoed back at him from the high vaults, as if in mockery.

  Anoushka gave a disparaging miaow. ‘Objects obey them because they have no imagination. I prefer creativity.’

  ‘Cat,’ said Richie firmly, ‘you can’t pass through a solid object.’

  ‘There is actually no such thing,’ mewled the cat, scratching his ear and looking away dismissively. ‘All objects are made up of protons, neutrons and electrons, constantly in a state of motion and flux. Nothing in the Universe is solid. Nothing is still. You just need to learn to move with it, rather than against it.’ The cat’s eyes narrowed. ‘Do you not learn quantum physics in your schools?’

  ‘We... don’t really need it for GCSE,’ said Richie apologetically. ‘But I promise to Google it when I get home.’

  The door slammed shut behind them.

  They exchanged a nervous glance, and began to proceed cautiously. The dark, forbidding cathedral seemed to breathe a chill at them from its very stone.

  Meresbury Cathedral was large for such a small town; the building had been founded in the 1400s by the auspices of a nearby abbey (which had long ago fallen into ruin) and so the city had been given a cathedral building as imposing as any of the greatest in England. Richie knew it was in a desperate condition, though, if you looked closely; the roof was constantly being patched and some of the stonework, both inside and out, had crumbled almost beyond repair.

  ‘Never mind old moggy Einstein over there,’ Jess said, flapping her arms to keep warm. ‘This place has been here nearly six hundred years and it’s hardly changed. I mean, Meresbury would have been like a little market-town when it was built. Which makes it the perfect place.’