The Burning Man

2

England sleeps, England dreams. Across the rolling landscape beyond the capital, chill in the late spring, there is no peaceful darkness. Sodium lights burn brightly everywhere. There is no silence. The arterial roads still throb with traffic.

In the north-west of England, on the edge of the wild but beautiful country that runs down to the Lake District, Caitlin Shepherd sits in her car outside the Tebay motorway service station. The lights are bright, but all is still. Soon it will open for the first visitors of the day, the lonely few for whom travel is life. But not travel in the sense of mind-altering, character-enriching experience. Back and forth travel, mundane travel, a relentless round with no final destination. Perpetual motion with no meaning is Caitlin’s lot, shipping samples of beauty products to shops that will consider stocking them, or perhaps not, and, like Caitlin, will not give it a second thought the moment the decision has been made.

Another dawn approached relentlessly. She craved sleep for escape, even though she was not allowed the luxury of dreams, but sleep would not come.

She was not alone. Several container lorries were parked nearby, their cabs dark. Yet Caitlin felt that in one of them someone was watching her. She always felt she was being observed, tracked, hunted, wherever she was, whatever she was doing. Paranoia, she thought wearily, another mental illness to add to the constant buzzing voices in her head. Her doctor had prescribed pills, several different types, in fact, and for a while she’d taken them; the voices stilled, the unease dulled, and with it went any sense, however slight, of being engaged in life. Eventually she threw them all out and consigned herself to a future of never being happy.

She closed her eyes. Sleep still did not come.

Wake up, Caitlin.

One of the voices, the little girl. She fought against the urge, then gave in and looked around, hating herself for it. It always made her feel queasy when the voices told her things her unconscious could not possibly know.

An attractive, charismatic Asian man loomed up next to the passenger window, his black hair gleaming in the car park lights. A leather eye patch covered one eye, but it did not make him look the least bit menacing. He smiled and tapped gently on the glass. Yet Caitlin could see he was on edge, his eyes flickering from side to side, searching the dark.

‘Go away,’ she said.

‘We need to talk.’ His voice was calm, yet insistent.

‘No, we don’t. If you’re not away from here in ten seconds, I’m going to turn on the ignition and drive over you.’

The sound of a lorry door opening echoed across the quiet car park. The Asian man glanced in its direction, his voice and body language becoming a touch more urgent.

‘My name is Shavi,’ he said. ‘I am a Brother of Dragons-’

‘I’m not interested in your little cult.’

‘You are a Sister of Dragons. We share a heritage-’

‘Six, seven, eight …’

‘Forgive me,’ Shavi said.

Shattering the window with a tyre iron, he yanked open the door. Caitlin yelled and leaned on the horn. Barely one short blast echoed across the car park before Caitlin went woozy from the fumes from a small wooden box that Shavi had thrust under her nose.

‘Just herbs,’ he whispered. ‘Do not worry.’

Dreamily, she saw herself being hauled out of the car as if she was watching a stranger. Shavi carried her effortlessly away from the bright lights to the dark of the moorland that pressed up hard against the service station. Behind them, Caitlin was vaguely aware of movement; rescuers responding to her cries, she thought obliquely.

She was aware of the stars and the moon, the lush smell of vegetation, but she couldn’t muster either fear for herself or any desire to fight back.

It was only when they lay behind a scrubby bush on cool grass with the lights of the service station a distant glow that she began to think coherently once more. Her attacker, she realised, didn’t seem violent; in fact, there was a benign, gentle air about him. Yet she struggled as soon as she was able.

He placed a hand firmly over her mouth and said quietly, ‘Hush. Look.’

Responding to something in his tone, she peered past the bush towards the car park. Shadows shifted across the moorland. People searching for her? Shavi released his grip on her mouth, and it was that action which convinced her to trust him.

‘What is it?’ she hissed. Some quality of the quickly moving silhouettes did not appear right.

‘Keep watching,’ he said. ‘But if they come too close, be prepared to move quickly into the wilderness. If they see us, we will not be able to outpace them.’

His words unnerved her. What’s out there? she thought.

Before she could voice the question, a shape loomed up on the other side of the bush and she almost cried out. It had approached from a different direction, moving quickly. Shavi pressed her down, holding her still. His heart thundered against her back. Their chance of escape gone, they could only hope against discovery.

Caitlin could smell a foul farmyard odour. Breathing like the scraping of rusty iron echoed loudly. Whatever was on the other side of the bush had stopped. It sniffed the air.

Its bestial qualities increased her heartbeat another step, and she became afraid that her body would betray her with some random muscle spasm. Yet she had to see. Twisting her head slowly, she looked through the branches of the bush.

There was not a hint of humanity in the brutish thing that waited beyond. Eyes gleamed with a yellowish light in a face that combined the qualities of hog and gorilla. The body was thick-set and powerfully muscled. From its posture, Caitlin couldn’t be sure whether it moved on two legs or all four. She noticed it was clothed, and with a second, chill glance realised the nature of those clothes: flayed human skin, scalps and internal organs had been stitched together in some sickening amalgam of uniform and war trophy. An eyeless face stared back at her blankly from the side of the creature’s head.

It waited for a full thirty seconds that felt like as many minutes and then moved off rapidly, keeping low.

When she was sure it was gone, Caitlin asked shakily, ‘What was that?’

Shavi searched the moorland until he was satisfied they were safe. ‘A Redcap,’ he said. ‘They are the shock troops of the Enemy.’ He returned his attention to Caitlin and a look of sympathy crossed his face. ‘I am so sorry. The world is not the way you believe it to be.’