Necroscope 9: The Lost Years (37 page)

To further bolster her confidence in that respect, there was the fact

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that despite all her vigilance there had been no further spying on her place as reported by Harry Keogh. So perhaps it had been a one-off sort of thing after all, a coincidence that hadn’t involved her directly. Well, maybe … but B.J. was becoming less and less inclined towards coincidences, and in any case she hadn’t been willing to risk it.

And now there was only one hazard, one gauntlet left to run: the Firth of Forth bridge, the only way into or out of the city from the north. If anyone had seen her leave home, and assuming they knew she would ultimately drive north, the bridge would be the ideal place to pick up her trail.

But the bridge came and went without incident, and so did B.J.’s escort. A mile or so beyond the Firth of Forth, heading for Perth, the headlights of the car behind flashed three times in her mirror, and she knew what the signal meant: there was no one in pursuit, no one to track her to the lair in its mountain fastness. But even so her lieutenant would park at the side of the road, and wait there a good hour, recording the details of passing cars and observing what she could of their drivers.

And the rest of it was all down to Bonnie Jean Mirlu …

Dawn found B.J. at ‘a friend’s house’ in tiny Inverdruie; she stayed there whenever she was up this way, which of necessity meant regular quarterly visits. But Auld John was always here, as his father had been before him. John

‘belonged’ to her Master no less than Bonnie Jean herself, but his blood was not of
the
blood, and so he was merely a thrall - a watcher or sentinel - here on the approach routes to Him in His lair high in the mountains. But having been sworn to Him by moonlight, John was nevertheless his Master’s true man.

B.J.’s route had taken her through Perth, Pitlochry, Kingussie and Kincraig, and finally across the Spey to Inverdruie. And as true dawn’s light limned the misty horizon of the Grampians, so Auld John was there to greet the ‘wee mistress,’

as he thought of her, when her car pulled into his drive. And:

‘Better garage the car, John,’ she told him, after a brief hug. ‘I’ve had snoopers at my place in Edinburgh, and we cannot afford such up here.’ And entering his small house where it was almost hidden from the road in a copse of birch, rowan and juniper, she waited for him.

‘It was dire cold last time ye were here, Bonnie Jean,’ he told her, coming in and closing the door. ‘Me, ah could’nae hae climbed wi’ ye. Not this time. It’s these old bones … mah fingers hae no grip in they!’

‘You’re for watching, John,’ she reminded him. ‘No for the climbing.’

‘Aye, but ah’d hae dearly loved tae see Him just one more time,’ he said. ‘Perhaps next time, come summer. But…

surely ye’re early, lass?’

‘Snoopers, as I said,’ she nodded. ‘And maybe worse than snoopers. Things He should know, anyway. And a stranger, John. All very

mysterious. But as for him: wel, I’ve no doubt you’l be seeing him soon enough, if I’ve gauged it right.’

The old man cocked his head. ‘A stranger? Here? And “mysterious,” did ye say?’ His eyes were suddenly bird-bright.

Again her nod. ‘Who knows, who knows?’ She gave herself a shake, turned to the fire and warmed her hands. ‘Reasons enough to come up here a few days early, anyway.’

Auld John was maybe sixty-five, but still spry for al his complaining. He was tall, gangling, walked with a woodsman’s lope (an entirely
natural
one, the insignia of his caling as a gillie and tracker, if anything, and not rooted in any condition), and wore his long, thinning grey hair tied back in a clasp, to keep it from his weathered face.

He had on occasion accompanied Bonnie Jean high into the Cairngorms, to the lair. But
that
was a climb, and Auld John was no longer up to it. As for their relationship … that was strange as can be. For more than sixty years ago B.J. had used to bounce him on her knee! And here she was a young girl, and him an old man …

The blood is the life!

Auld John sat down opposite the wee mistress, reached out to put a log on the fire in the great wide hearth, and said, ‘A body grows auld. Truly auld.’

‘But slowly, John,’ she answered, ‘very slowly. And you’l outlive most men. Aye, and you’ve a lot to be thankful for. For after al, you’ve known Him.’

‘In His sleep, ah’ve known Him, it’s true. But tae see Him up and aboot…! D’ye think …?’ And now his voice was low and his eyes narrow in the firelight.

Narow and feral over a long flat nose.

‘Al things are possible in Him, John,’ she told him. ‘As the stars and mistress moon spin their tracks through space and time, slowly but surely His time comes around. He may not stay down forever. For just as your bones age and wither, so do His - and He has outlasted the centuries! I’ve calculated his time over and over again, and always it comes out the same.’

‘Four years, is it?’ The old man’s voice was low, almost a growl, yet pleading in its eagerness. ‘Is it down to just four years?’

Bonnie Jean nodded again, and repeated him, Three or four at most, after six long centuries! A drop in the ocean, John.’

‘And then, and then …?’ It was an old story, but he would hear it again.

‘Then, a legend born anew,’ she answered. ‘A new creature in the heights, along with the pine martens, the golden eagles, and the wildcats. But just think, John: in His horseshoe mountains, He knew the real cats: the last of the sabretooths!’

‘A new creature in the high crags,’ he whiningly repeated her, his yelow eyes blinking his excitement.

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‘And in the cities!’ Bonnie Jean added. ‘Don’t forget the cities. Oh, our Master tried the other way - the secret way -all those many centuries ago. It didn’t work then, and won’t now.’

‘But,’ the old man protested, ‘only show a man something that’s different - be sure he’ll murder it! Come hell or high water, if it’s strange and fails to conform, it’s a goner. And if it’s like Him up there?’ (A toss of his head, indicating the Cairngorms). ‘If it’s like the Master? War, Bonnie Jean, war!’

‘Indeed,’ she agreed. ‘And as it was then, when He first came among us, so it is now. Except men have forgotten the old times, the old legends, and no longer believe. And by the time they do, it will be too late! Aye, and there’s no Great Black Death now, John, to plague Him and His. And just as our Master was driven here, driven west, and north, by that black, devouring fire, so now
He
will light a flame and drive east. Except He’ll not stop, but drive south and west too! For in His time the world was so small; why, there are entire
continents
that He never saw or knew about! But He will, He wil …’

The Black Death stopped Him, consigning Him to the everlasting dark … ” Auld John shivered.

‘… Not everlasting, John,’ she told him. ‘And when He’s up, it’s the Red Death that wil light His way! Ah, but nothing from poor Mr Poe, though certainly it wil seem like it. No more hiding, John, when next He comes down from the mountains. And the name of the pack … ”

‘… Shal be Mankind!’ (His turn to interrupt).

They shal be legion,’ she tossed back her hair, grey as Auld John’s in the firelight. ‘And His enemies, who or whatever remains of them …’

‘… The true death,’ he nodded. ‘Neither undeath, nor any sort of sleep such as He has known, but death forever!’

‘Amen to that,’ she said, and smiled.

‘When wil ye go tae Him?’

‘Give me soup, your good broth, and tea to brew and a little strong, wild meat to take with me. Inverdruie sleeps; when she wakes I’ll be long gone. You’l see me along the trail into the foothills, as always, then return and wait for me here. But I may be gone a while, so don’t worry if I seem late.’

Til no worry,’ he told her.

‘And my equipment?’

‘Safe and sound. But, are ye sure ye need it?’ There was a chuckle in his voice. She answered with a laugh of her own:

‘I could climb it blindfold, as wel you know!’ Then her laughter stilled and she sobered in a moment. ‘Except I can’t afford to slip.

My life means nothing, but His …’

‘Aye, lass, aye,’ he leaned across and took her hand. ‘He has lived too long to die like that: cold and alone, lonely in His lair.’

Bonnie Jean said nothing but stared into the fire. Shortly, John went to see to her food and make his preparations . .

.

B.J. ‘s climbing skils were prodigious; working with enormous efficiency and at great speed, and using only her sense of balance, and the natural tenacity of long fingers and toes to defy gravity, she seemed almost to adhere to a rock face. And in all truth she scarcely required Auld John’s ropes, pitons, karabiners, and similar paraphernalia of the professional climber.

But she took them with her anyway.

It was as she had explained: as His guardian, His keeper, she simply could not afford to slip. For while to Bonnie Jean the climb itself was little more than a thrill - and her faith in her skill was absolute - still she
might
make a slip.

Which to Him in His centuried sleep could easily mean the difference between undeath and the true death. For the balance B.J. was required to maintain on the rock face wasn’t nearly so delicate as the balance of His continued existence.

Auld John knew all of this, and though he was silent on the woodland trail where they walked, stil al of his thoughts were for Bonnie Jean and their mutual Master. ‘Ye’ll take care, lassie, in the heights?’

‘You know I wil, John.’

There has been a rockfall or two.’

‘Good! I’m always on the lookout for new routes.’

Early spring sunlight, sharp and bright, dappled their path through birch and Scots pine. B.J. didn’t much like the sunlight; stepping aside from the larger yellow splotches, she felt glad that her climb would be mainly shaded by the bulk of the mountains.

Back in Inverdruie, most people were still abed, barely awake, tossing and turning … but mainly turning their backs on the light coming in through their windows on this fine but chily Sunday morning. There’d be church, of course, and animals to feed at the nearby nature reserves: brown bears, bison, antelope, and reindeer. And maybe even a handful of visitors, tourists, at the gift shops in the villages. Nothing like the crush of a few months ago, when the snow was deep at Aviemore and the skiers dotted the slopes like a myriad brightly hurtling insects against winter’s blinding white backdrop.

‘Aye, and there were climbers, too,’ Auld John reminisced. ‘But no out this way.’ No, for this was the Cairngorms Nature Reserve: more than a hundred square miles of mountain heights and wilderness; the haunt of deer and wildcats, of foxes, otters, and other creatures of the wild - but rarely men. And it was John’s domain, too. These were the trails where he was a guide, which made it easier to ensure that the most secret of the forest tracks remained secret. Oh, sometimes, even in the winter months, some idiot climber would ignore all the posted warnings to bring his team in here and stray this way … and sometimes they wouldn’t make it out again. It rather depended on Brian Lumley

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where they walked, and especialy where they climbed - and also on who else might be climbing there …

Now the ground was rising. At a break in the trees Bonnie Jean and Auld John paused and looked back along the way they’d come, across Loch -an Eilein with its crumbling castle. Bonnie Jean was wel acquainted with a local tradition: that the old castle in the lake was much associated with the outlawed son of Robert II, caled the Wolf of Badenoch; Badenoch being the area east of the Spey and along the Cairngorms foothills. Ah, but she also knew that ‘the Wolf had been dead for a hundred years before the castle was built; which seemed to her to beg the question, just which wolf was remembered here - and just how wel had diverse traditions kept themselves apart? Or how badly?

Among the trees, mossy granite outcrops began to show: ‘the tears o’ the titan mountains,’ as Auld John was wont to cal them. And at last they were through the foothills to the base of an almost sheer rock face. And: ‘Granite,’ Auld John informed unnecessarily, ‘an’ more than four thousand feet of it, at that -perpendicular!’ Wel, not quite.

He had carried her pack; now he helped to transfer it to her person, tied back her hair with his own clasp, and filed a smal pouch at her belt with chalk powder, to keep her fingers dry for the climbing. Finaly: ‘Where the going’s rough, use the rope,’ he advised, for he dared not order.

And up she went…

Four thousand feet of granite. But by no means perpendicular, not al of it. In places the going was flat, or very nearly so: scree-filed basins, domed plateaux, rocky re-entries and pine-clad saddles. Oh, in one or two places it was sheer, and in the worst place of al vertiginous to overhanging through five hundred feet of a traverse that would cause the best of climbers to blink and cringe back from it, if only for a moment or two, before the actual assault. But to Bonnie Jean’s mind that was what climbing was al about: the chalenge.

. Not so much of a chalenge to her, though, whose business, whose
duty
it had been to climb these rocks at least once in a three-month, every season of the year, for the last
one hundred and seventy years!
Some six hundred and eighty times now - she occasionaly lost count -B.J. had pited herself against these heights, and so knew each crack and crevasse, every cave, ledge and chimney along the way.

She knew where veins of rose quartz shone pink and purple in the grainy granite face, and a chimney where curious smoky crystals or ‘germs’ (cairn gorms) had weathered loose and lay in a neat pile, like a natural cairn. She knew where to avoid the aeries of the great Golden Eagles, especialy now, in the mating and nesting season, and used as landmarks the bruised and rusted pitons of yesteryear, more often than