Emily
The tall meadow grass between the farm and Morbed woods rustled gently in the light breeze as Rebecca walked across the fields to the old barn. Reaching the doorway, she turned to check she was not being followed. She climbed quickly up into the hay loft and removed the envelope from its hiding place, shaking the contents onto the floor.
‘Aha!’ she said, picking up the spare boat key. ‘Just where Rupe said he left it.’ She pocketed it with a satisfied look. A short while later she was inside the boathouse, untying and jumping aboard the little cruiser and turning the key in the ignition.
She headed out into the estuary and turned towards Druid’s Rock, her plan to somehow rescue the others. Almost immediately another boat appeared around the point some way in the distance. The Mary Jane again, she was sure. She now knew she could not risk being discovered by Brough and his crew. Rebecca quickly altered course to head out to sea and was happy to see the other boat vanish from sight into the estuary from which she had just come. She was now in a quandary. She could neither continue on to Druids Rock, nor return to the boathouse. Either option ran the risk of being caught. She needed to find somewhere to hole up until the Mary Jane moved on.
* * *
Rebecca must have dozed off and woke up with a start. It was now pitch black.
She was afraid that she might have been asleep too long and cast an anxious look at her watch. There was still some time before dawn. The boat was rolling gently on its anchor, the comforting sound of the waves lapping gently against the side. She stretched and stood up, squinting into the gloom. She had anchored a few hundred metres off the Horns of Lucifer which gradually took shape before her, eerie and foreboding. A cold breeze blew across the boat, taking her by surprise. And now she could see nothing. It was as if things were closing in around her.
Rebecca felt as if she was being watched.
‘May you never forsake us!’
She looked round with a start. She could not pinpoint where the voice had come from but it had seemed very close. This time, though, it was a woman’s voice, plaintive, beseeching.
May you never forsake us! Rebecca recognised the familiar words of Emily’s entreaty to Nathan from the parchments Grendel Baverstock had sent. She clutched the handrail on the side of the boat but let go instantly. It was ice-cold.
‘Emily?’ Rebecca ventured tentatively into the dark, half in hope, half in fear. Somehow, she was not as unnerved this time. She tried to rub warmth back into her hand.
The Claw started to emerge again from the gloom. Surely the voice could not have come from there? Emily had been abandoned on the Horns to perish but people said it was impossible to set down on the Claw. But from somewhere on the dark bulk of the rocks, a strange glow now became visible. It came and went, as if somebody was passing something in front of a dim light. Rebecca squinted but it did not help.
And then the voice again. Her heart started to thump.
‘He will find us, he will not leave us here. He will come.’
For a split second, Rebecca glimpsed the outline of a woman, arms out, beseeching. The light died again. This time, it did not come back. Rebecca was more and more certain that this mystery involved more than simply the monks and their gold.
Something had been disturbed, something deep-rooted that seemed to link the Black Monk, Nathan Trevellyan, his lost love Emily and their time here in this place with what was going on now. Rebecca’s fear began to give way to resolve.
More than ever, she was determined to find out what was happening.