LONE
By Kerry Andrew
Alpine Fellowship 2021 – Writing Prize Runner-up
The moors are burning again.
We fight the same losing battle. Wind’s up, dragging wildfire across the horizon quicker than thought. The sound burns bones.
Back on site, we fall into our bunks, asleep already, as the next shift goes out.
We dream of nothing but black-orange sky.
Two mornings after. Dead bracken and black heather roots. The smell is dank and charred. The sun’s back.
It’s this or the other – weeks of rain, the rivers blocking both ways out, swatting away bridges, fences, in their rage.
How long has it been? Some of us think on it, some don’t. No point. We’re here, with a job to do, and that’s the end of it.
***
I saw someone.
It’s late. We’ve been clearing another channel for the river and now sit around on the old sofas. We all reek. A pack of cards is out, a few of us smoking fags.
Saw who?
A girl. Woman.
Like fuck you did.
I did.
You’ve been here too long.
I’m telling you, I did.
Where?
Up on Crow Stones.
Don’t talk shite. How would she get up here?
I’m just telling you what I saw.
There’s no one here.
No one but us poor sods, you mean.
***
The drill’s always the same. Up at six, glugging down a tepid brew and longlife milk. Processed ham sandwiches. Out to patrol with the hounds, or dam a stream. We fell a plantation tree once in while, tend the tunnel and allotment. A few unlucky mucks on night duty, watching out for smoke. Listening.
The radio plays the same old songs, on a loop.
Every week, we sit in a circle and unburden ourselves. Childhoods, nightmares, guilt, grudges about rotas – it all comes pouring out. The generator clicks, the hounds slump at our feet, and we stare at the floor as whoever’s talking talks it all out. None of us allowed to talk back. It takes the edge off.
***
She’s seen again.
A different one of us this time, thinking it’s pheasants up on the ridge, thinking it can’t be. She turns, and there’s only bright white sky.
Tales are told of the way the hills used to be, stacked with snow as high as your hip, villages stuck for days, weeks. Wind that sang its cold notes right through you. Sheep were dug out, their dead newborns birthed straight into a drift.
No sheep now. A few farmers refused to move – stories about them, too, ordinary names becoming heroic – but they all went in the end. One way or the other.
Sometimes it feels like we’re the only ones alive to see clouds chasing each other across the moor, grouse scuttling in panic. How the trees bend like old men’s backs, how the becks can be still and silent on one bend and raucous on the next. The other side of things doesn’t feel real, until the supply van comes in with news of fresh havoc.
***
More of us see her. Up at Blue Man’s Slack. Widow’s Scar. Broken Bog. Stepping out from behind a Scots pine. Standing in a rill, far down. Rising from moss.
We don’t admit it. Thoughts tight and stewing in our heads. Tell ourselves it’s light and shadow.
The gorse has come and gone. Hot mustard fading along the forest road. A last cuckoo.
***
We’ve got her.
It took two days – she kept giving us the slip. Now the mess room’s loud with steam and shouts. She’s been put in the silenthole, and we’re all busting to get a look.
She sits on the concrete floor in one corner of the cell, cross-legged. Wax jacket, too big, black leggings, long curly brown hair. Skin as white as silver birch bark, cheeks blotched red. Late twenties.
What’ll happen now?
We’ll have to tell top.
What for?
It’s not for us to keep her.
She’s brought scran in a metal bowl. A blanket.
Who are you?
She says nothing .
Which Area are you from?
She says nothing .
How long have you been out here?
She says nothing .
In the morning, she’s still sitting upright, legs crossed and hands folded. Food’s untouched.
She’s not helping hersen.
Maybe she’s mute.
She’s not mute.
Fucked in the head, then.
No. She’s playing with us.
You try. She has to talk eventually.
She pisses and shits in the bucket, hair hanging in front of her face. Her eyes flick up when the hatch is opened. They’re brown and keen.
Who are you?
She says nothing.
It’s speak or stay put.
She says nothing.
There’s no one coming for you.
She says nothing.
Try East Post.
I have.
Comms go down sometimes, in weather. We can live off our own backs for months, years even. Seed packs, though all we want is meat, not fucking cabbages. But weather’s clear, and still, comms are down.
West, then.
I have.
We sit by the burner, hands out.
She gives me the fucking creeps. There’s summat wrong with her.
Just ‘cause she’s not giving you the eye, you mean.
Fuck off. I wouldn’t want to.
Did you see her hand?
What?
All the scratches. They weren’t there when she first came in.
Maybe she was escaping. Heading for the water.
I don’t think so. She looks wise.
Wise? You bloody knob-end. Wise.
At night, we lie awake, thinking of her silence and her eyes. How many steps between our bunk and her cell. How many clicks from our outpost to the next. Between Areas. Between here and the fucking moon.
We do our drills, take temperatures, watch the weather.
One day, she speaks.
What’s your name?
Fucking hell. You gave me a heart attack.
What’s your name?
It’s none of your – Harry.
Harry. You saw me first.
Yeah. Listen, you’ve got to eat.
I’m not bothered.
You’ll starve.
I’ll be reet.
What’s your name?
Lone.
Lone?
L-O-N-E. Lone.
OK. What are you doing here?
Living. Or I was.
Where did you come from?
Here.
There’s not been anyone here since – before you and me were born.
Well, I have.
***
Summer is dread season. The sun strikes sparkies on the water, the grass bleaches white. Mozzies every which way. There’s a thrip day, getting into pipes, up nostrils, against window frames like bits of dead skin.
Out on the moor, whispers curl away before they make sense. A lapwing cracks up with its siren call.
She still hasn’t said a word. We come down the corridor after our turn, shaking our heads. Not saying that we feel something dark on our heart, like lichen, spreading.
I brought this for your hand.
You didn’t have to, Harry.
You shouldn’t do that to yoursen. Your face, and all.
I’m not. Not exactly.
How old are you?
How old are you, Harry?
Twenty-two. Where were you living?
Around and about.
In a shelter? One of the old houses?
No. Do you have family?
I did.
They’re away?
Yeah. Like everyone else.
***
One morning, the hounds strain on their leashes, muscles high against the skin. We let them off by Cold Nab Ridge, and they’re away, barks ricocheting off the sky.
Hounds, better trained then we are. Hounds, that can smell fire. Hounds, that snap to every command.
We’re hoarse. Dogmaster and dep stay out ‘til next light, return bleak-faced.
Underneath the table in the mess room, lime-green spores speckle the wall.
***
During quadpatrol, near Black Howl, a deer is half-in, half-out of the river. Eyes open, black. Each hoof is turned round the wrong way.
What the sweet bejeezus.
Fucking witchcraft.
Witchcraft. Are you hearing yoursen?
How could it walk? It’s a grown beast.
Maybe someone broke its ankles.
They’re not broken. I checked.
At least it’s grub.
I’m sticking to the spudpacks, me.
In one corner of the girl’s cell, the concrete floor has started to crack, a short, splintering line.
Did you do that, Lone? To the deer?
I’ve been here.
You didn’t ask what I meant.
You’re different, Harry.
I’m not. I’m just the same.
No. I can hear it. In your blood.
Those of us that eat the deer start spewing, are confined to our bunks. Two of us shiver and sweat more than the others, whisper in our sleep, same sound as the wind.
The hounds haven’t come back.
What’re you doing?
Heading to Central.
We’re not supposed to leave.
If comms are down, it’s the next step.
In an emergency.
You don’t think it’s an emergency?
Two of us take a Land, head into the rainclouds. Few hours later, we’re back, soaked, the vehicle broken down on Gale Pass. A kestrel followed above us the whole way, wings blurred.
Below the mess table, the damp patch has lifted from the plaster, become a green heart.
One of us goes in. Sod this. She’s taking the piss.
***
The moors turn too early. The heather purpling, the ferns high. Flies like black gravel thwack against our helmets.
Tell me a story, Harry.
I’d best be off.
Aren’t you supposed to be questioning me? The others did. Most of them.
Did someone do summat?
Nowt that will leave a mark.
Who was it?
It dunt matter. It’ll all pan out. Go on. A story.
What d’you mean? Made up, like?
That, or the other.
Me mam used to say that a giant lived out here ont moors, ten thousand year ago when it were all wildwood. I never liked storms much, and when it thundered, she said it were him clapping the coal dust off his hands. And lightening were him turning his overhead switches on and off. Faulty electrics. Is that the kind of thing you meant?
Aye. It’ll do.
The crack in the cell floor starts feathering into new, hairline paths.
One of us goes missing. We do a sweep, torches strobing the hills, see shadows of things that aren’t there.
She’s done summat to him.
Who?
Who. Her.
How would she manage that, what with being locked up behind steel twenty-four seven?
I dunno. Just – has she never said owt? To any of you? Harry?
No. Not a word.
None of the vehicles start.
***
The streams dry. Rivers disappear through swallow-holes. Black clouds pass over the bare-brown scalp of the moor, make shapes of anvils, mushrooms, gods. Long back, a stray-fag end would do for it, set the sky ablaze. We dig ditches by the track on Old Owl Wood, as deep as graves.
Let it burn. Let it flood. What difference does it make?
Here.
What is it, Harry?
Chocolate. D’you not like it?
It’s strange.
You’ve never had it?
I’ve never had a lot of things. You’ve got nice eyes.
Right. Thanks.
There’s a lot of green in them.
Me mam always said green eyes meant a jealous mind.
That’s just daft.
Are you one of the Separates? You can tell me. I won’t let on.
No. ‘Course not.
But – you’re summat.
I just shouldn’t be here. It’s not me, this.
It’s not supposed to be for anyone, really. Being imprisoned.
Funny. I have to stretch, is all.
You can stretch. Look.
You’re sweet. That’s not really what I mean.
Oh.
I like talking to you.
You still haven’t told me much.
As I’ve said. Nowt to tell.
I like talking to you, too.
The two of us that are sick from the deer are still greasy-palmed and coughing. Two of us have started pissing brown liquid, same colour as the bogs.
Underneath one of the bunks, a stalk becomes two, as long as a finger. Tiny, grey-green arrow tips coming off them.
We sit in the honesty circle, looking at our hands. No one unburdens.
The comms room keeps up its white noise.
Let me out, Harry.
What?
Let me out.
No. I can’t. They’d kill me.
I need to be out there.
Let me take you to one of the Areas. It’s not safe out here.
I’ll never go there.
***
Night. The acid smell of disinfectant. The thrips are back, though they should only come thrice a year. We feel them in the corners of our eyes, the crevices of our ears, our crotches.
D’you hear that?
Go back to sleep.
Don’t you hear it?
All I can hear is your fucking whingeing.
There. It’s wolves.
It’s the wind, like it always is. Wolves.
I know what the wind sounds like.
Go to sleep. Before I cleave your head in twain.
Underneath the bunk, the stalks are calf-height, the arrow tips as dark as fir. The wet green heart below the mess table blooms. Things are starting to uncurl.
Summat’s going on with her.
What d’you mean?
You’d better come and have a look.
We all go. Intakes of breath as we take turns in front of the hatch.
What the fuck.
A tree root twists up the wall of the cell. Crooked, broken clean through the stone floor. She’s in the corner, looking at us.
We sit in the mess room. No one eats.
We should kill her.
She’s done nowt.
Shut your face, Harry.
She’s done summat to Jordan. She’s doing summat to – out there.
What d’you mean, out there?
You’ve heard it, same as I have. You saw the deer. The hounds gone. Don’t fucking look at me like that.
She’s done nowt but sit there, wasting away. We should free her.
Should we fuck. She needs to be punished.
You’ll leave her be.
Three of us go, when the rest are asleep.
The root has become many, crawling along the wall. There are leaves. Oak. She looks at the knives in our hands.
You know why we have to.
It’s not a good idea.
But you know why.
The light goes out. Short, sharp sounds. The slump of a body, and the door slamming shut.
Mayhem. Generators are down, taps running. The alarm blades the air as we all collide.
What’s happened?
We’ve got to get out of here.
What’s happened?
Got to get out. Now.
The cell’s dark. It smells of ferns and heather, fear and blood.
Christ. Lone. I was just coming to get you. What’s – you’re – your –
Come with me, Harry.
Am . . . am I dreaming?
Come on.
Where? I don’t understand.
You’ll see. It’s safe.
I can’t.
You can. Take my hand.
We scatter.
Three of us are off into pines, sinking down, crying, and we never move again.
Two of us shout into the sky until wind takes us out of ourselves and clean away.
Two of us get in a Land and we drive until road crumbles into cliff, into air.
Three of us stumble into a river, are left bloated and blue-skinned.
Two of us shoot at the night, and bullets are found in our bodies.
One of us lives, and lives on with his Lone, in bogs and becks, amongst sundew and crowberry, birch and rowan, bracken and heather, amongst the always-spreading heather.
About the author:
Kerry Andrew
Kerry Andrew is a London-based author and musician, who has published two novels: Swansong (Jonathan Cape, 2018), described as a 'darkly captivating tale of myth, magic and sinister secrets' by the Mail on Sunday, and SKIN (Jonathan Cape, 2021), described as 'a wonderful second novel' by The iPaper. 'One Swallow' saw Kerry's short story debut on BBC Radio 4 in 2014 and 'To Belong To' was shortlisted for the 2018 BBC National Short Story Award. Kerry is the winner of four British Composer Awards, and best known for experimental vocal, choral and music-theatre work, often based around themes of community, landscape and myth. As a performer, Kerry leads the alt-folk band You Are Wolf, and sings with the award-winning Juice Vocal Ensemble.