The first step in getting me ready for the rescue of my best friend, it turns out, is gathering the entire team in the living room. Dr. Pendle introduces Robbo to them as my mentor and, although I can see that they all want to ask more, no one does.
“What we need to do now is gather our collective wisdom about all of the types of sea beasts we know of – those we’ve heard about from participants, and those we’ve read about in the lore.”
Alan puts his hand up. His hair is standing on end, and he has the look of someone who hasn’t slept in a couple of days. “It’s okay Alan, you don’t need to put your hand up,” Dr. Pendle tells him. “Your contributions are very welcome.”
“Uh – well, I’m just wondering – are we creating a compendium of sea beasts, or is it to check how much knowledge we’ve retained?”
Dr. Sidris says, “There’s no hidden agenda on our part, in terms of assessing your knowledge. We need this information for something we’re working on – something we can’t share with you yet – which is why we’re calling on the best minds we know of for help.”
Dr. Pendle looks uncomfortable, and I guess it’s the phrase no hidden agenda. Preparing me, a sentinel, to rescue my friend from The Wash, is what my peers are helping me do. They just don’t know it yet, and I don’t know if they ever will.
“Well, in that case there’s the Tumbletay,” Alan says. “Which has given me nightmares ever since I heard about it, if I’m honest.”
Alan hadn’t been a member of MFIT long when he went along to an interview with someone on the other side of Loch Tay, who described a fluffy blob of a sea beast that burst through the surface of the water, and rolled across it quickly, like a tumbleweed. It caught a fresh water swimmer in its wake, and disappeared into the depths, as the witness watched, helpless.
“You’re not the only one,” Max said, mock-shuddering.
“A similar creature has been reported in Orkney, and Shetland,” Dr. Sidris says, “although not recently. Witnesses there described something like a huge black cloud passing quickly across the water, dragging down whole fishing boats.”
“Creepy,” Ondine says and I have to smile, because she has seen something just as hideous in the past few days, in the form of the leperby.
“Grindylows. Where I come from, in the north of England, almost everybody has a story to tell you about them,” Lin says.
Robbo nods. “Grindylows have been reported here on Skye, too. They hide in the fairy pools, waiting for unsuspecting children to come along so they can drag them down and drown them.”
“Nasty little beggars,” Dr. Sidris says. “Some of the most insidious beasts in all the lore. Child killers.”
“Finfolk,” Max says. “I mean, they’re part of Orcadian lore because their invisible island kingdom is there, so we have many accounts from Orkney. And the far north east. But there are overlapping accounts, of creatures that look fairly similar, abducting a husband or wife.”
“That’s true, although in the Finfolk lore the abduction of a mortal being is to preserve the Finman or Finwoman’s physical appeal. Do we have any other accounts in which witnesses believed the abduction was for the purpose of a forced marriage between sea beast and mortal being?”
“Or are we projecting our assumptions onto the accounts, you mean?” Max asks.
“Precisely. And I don’t mean just us – I mean all of the witnesses, too. The why of abductions is something we cannot rationally know, unless – or until such time as – we are able to communicate with the beasts.”
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I think about Rufus and Saphrine, how she ingratiated herself into his life that last summer in Juniperville, forcing him to fall in love with her, with her over-the-top, overly sensual behaviour. Was that really what happened, I wonder now, or is that what I saw because I didn’t like her, didn’t trust her from the moment I recognized her as the creature from The Wash. Did I really see all of that? Or was it jealousy, caused by the realization that my friendship with Rufus changed that summer, almost beyond all recognition, because someone had become more important to him than me?
Max’s voice brings me back to the present. “Agnes in Kenmore told us she started having dreams about her abducted daughter – do you remember? She thought they meant her daughter was telling her she was fine – happy even.”
“Well-remembered, Max. That was the first time we heard about the Silberflöte, if that’s what it was. The beast in Loch Tay told Agnes it was taking her daughter and there was nothing she could do to stop it.”
“Okay, getting back to Alasdair’s point, so far we have one known motivation – intent to kill, and one suspected – abduction of a desired spouse.”
“In the intent to kill category, we can add the Bäckahästen of Scandinavian lore, brook horses that offer rides to humans in the fog, only to jump into the river, drowning their riders. And our own Kelpies, parallel lore.” Alan’s cheeks are pink, like he doesn’t enjoy being the centre of attention.
“In Japan, the Kappas are like our Grindylows. They pull children into the water to feed on their blood. These child-killing beasts are the worst, in my humble opinion.” Lin’s a fiery character, and her eyes are burning now with a fury worse than anything I’ve seen before.
“The creatures that attack passing ships,” Ondine offers. “The cave dwellers of the Minch, the Blue Men, a.k.a. the Storm Kelpies. Conjuring storms to force sailors into the sea, after shipwrecks.”
“With their tendency to force ships’ captains into a kind of poetic pub quiz,” Dr. Sidris says, eyes twinkling. “Feeding them two lines of verse. If the captain can recite the next two lines, the ship passes. If not, they capsize the ship.”
“I guess we can add sirens, merfolk, the kraken and the Jörmungand to that list. Minus the poetry quiz, but with hypnotic music, in some cases.”
“A third motivation has just occurred to me,” Alan says. “Slavery. The Slavic legends tell of the Vodianoi, water spirits who live in sunken ships turned into glorious palaces. They’re depicted as old man with green beards, covered in hair, scales and slime. Human boldness offends their sensibilities, so they drown them and take them to their palaces to serve as slaves. Millers and fishermen are the only ones they absolve.”
My heart starts pounding so fast it hurts, right across the breadth of my chest. It’s the image of Rufus, a chained slave doomed to the eternal service of angry sea beasts, that does it. Now that I’ve pictured it, I can’t stop, and it makes my failure to save him from abduction much, much worse. I grab my chest, hoping that pressure will ease the pain, and I’m aware of Ondine looking at me.
“Thom? Thom are you okay? You’ve gone very pale. What is it? Is it your heart? Are you having a heart attack? Oh god, someone call 999. Hurry!”
I’m trying to tell them not to, that it’s not a heart attack, just the accumulation of five years of guilt, coupled with the sudden realization that my best friend is, at best guess, the underwater slave of unknown sea beasts in The Wash. But my voice isn’t working, and I hear Lin shout at someone to hurry up and dispatch an ambulance, because her friend is having a heart attack.
Dr. Pendle’s kind face looms in front of me, as he grips my wrist and takes my pulse. “Thom, take some deep breaths if you can. Stretch out on the sofa, and we will get some pillows under your legs.” Someone’s hands are lifting up my legs, gently, and I feel the soft pressure of pillows underneath them. The pain in my chest is still intense, and the pounding so fierce it’s like my heart has moved up beside my tonsils.
“It’s all this bloody talk of sea beasts,” Ondine says angrily. “I mean, it must have felt like an avalanche of his worst fears rushing down a mountain. What a stupid thing to do!”
“But he’s a Sentinel – he has to deal with this, and worse.” Dr. Sidris’s voice is matter-of-fact, and then he adds, “Oh dear. I didn’t mean to let the cat out of the bag.”
“What? What cat and bag?” I hear Alan ask.
“What’s a Sentinel?” Lin asks.
“Everyone just stop talking for a minute, and let Thom get some air.” Robbo’s voice is calm and authoritative. “We need someone to write down everything that we’ve just talked about, so we don’t forget.” Alan offers to do it.
Robbo’s face looms in front of me, serious, and also concerned. “How do you feel Thom?”
“Cancel the ambulance,” I croak.
“We could – but I wonder if you should let the paramedics have a look at you at least. You’re as white as my arse cheeks, and that’s saying something. Where’s the pain in your chest?”
“Right across both sides,” I manage to say.
“Right well, yeah, I think we’ll go ahead and let them come and check you out. I’m not having someone I’m mentoring die on my watch.”