Stalking Tender Prey Read online

  As she turned to leave the room, someone called, ‘Verity!’ The voice was urgent, as if warning her of something. Alarmed, Verity wheeled round, for the voice had sounded as if it was in the room behind her. There was, as she should have known, nothing there.

  ‘What?’ she demanded irritably. For years, she had shut out this kind of silliness, messages from nowhere. It annoyed her. But there was no response to her enquiry. As she passed from the drawing room into the hall, she felt the day change. Involuntarily, she shivered, then repressed the feeling with a firm thought. The only prospect for the future was the preparation of dinner, the consuming of dinner, and all the other regular routines she had created for herself. She would let nothing else in.

  Chapter Two

  Lily Winter knew that her brother was going to be out all night again. He always told her he’d be back late, not to wait up, but invariably when he went out at tea time on a Friday, he would not return until morning. Sometimes he’d be asleep in the kitchen when Lily went down for her breakfast. Sometimes he’d be in the parlour on the floor. But she knew he never came in and went to bed. What he got up to on his mysterious nights out, she did not enquire. Not that she wasn’t curious — she was — but they had a mutual respect for one another. Owen needed his private times. They shared so much, knew each other so well, yet he had a need to escape their relationship sometimes. Lily did not begrudge this.

  Now, Owen sat at the kitchen table, one foot up among the milk bottles, dirty plates and old papers, lacing his boots. He possessed a startling, pale beauty, which only became apparent upon long acquaintance. People generally thought there was something strange, or even unpleasant, about Owen when they first met him. Like Lily, he was very tall, but whereas Lily dyed her fair hair red, Owen’s was a white-blond mane, invariably unwashed, and generally held back in a pony-tail at his neck. On the occasions he allowed Lily to brush it or wash it for him, she told him he looked like an angel. ‘You only need wings,’ she’d say.

  Lily was listlessly transferring dishes from the table to the sink. She cleaned the house properly once a week, on Fridays. Owen was generally out for the night, and she took pleasure in relaxing in tidy surroundings, playing CDs, drinking a bottle of wine all to herself, dancing alone in the firelight of the parlour. She never wanted anyone else to share these evenings with her; it would spoil them.

  ‘Barbara Eager invited me to her writing group today,’ she said.

  Owen made a disparaging sound. ‘Whatever for?’ His voice, accompanied by his satyr’s smile, was not the debased drawl that might be expected, but clipped and cultured.

  ‘I thought I might write something.’

  ‘You don’t need her kind for that!’

  Lily smiled to herself. Owen always supported her whims, however impractical they seemed. If she wanted to write, then she would and could, as far as he was concerned.

  ‘I don’t know what to write about,’ she said.

  Owen went across to the sink and hugged her. He kissed the top of her head. ‘Just do it,’ he said. ‘Will you let me read it?’

  ‘Of course I will — when I think of something.’ She paused. ‘O, is it a normal day today?’

  Owen grinned. ‘Well, it was until now. What’s happened?’

  She shrugged. ‘I don’t know. I feel excited. It’s hard to explain, but it’s how I used to feel when I was a kid, on my way to a party or something. Haven’t you felt anything?’

  Owen pulled a face and was silent for a moment. ‘No, I don’t think so.’ He ruffled his sister’s hair. ‘It must be a female thing. Anyway, I’m off now. Don’t wait up.’

  Lily watched him walk down the lane from the kitchen window. She saw him turn into the drive of Low Mede, which was just visible if she leaned forward. Owen had struck up a friendship with Daniel Cranton. Lily couldn’t work out why. She knew all three of Owen’s other regular friends, who were locals, and Daniel didn’t seem to conform to their type. He was an outsider, less rough, less mature, but more educated. Unlike the other three, Luke, Bobby and Ray, Daniel was never brought into the cottage. Lily wondered if her brother had a special purpose in mind for the Cranton boy, and hoped he knew what he was doing. Little Moor was their home, but they still had to be careful. She remembered her mother, Helen, saying to her, ‘You are my little jewels. You are precious and you are different.’ Perhaps mothers said things like that to their children all the time, but Lily had always felt there was some secret message in the words. Helen Winter had repeated the message often, in many different ways. ‘Look at the snow. It is as strange and wonderful as you are. You cannot see all the stars in the sky, but they are there. Just imagine them. Then you can see. You can do that. Look, look at Orion. That is the stargate, and it is a secret.’

  Lily wished she had kept a record of all the messages, because surely together they would have told a whole story. Like who their father was, for example, and why Helen had been so secretive about her past. Lily had accepted that she and Owen were different, and not just in obvious ways. It scared her that he had started seeing Daniel Cranton so much, but she couldn’t identify why exactly. Luke, Bobby and Ray were no great intellects and they were native to the area; from them she felt no threat. But the other... Tomorrow, she must go to one of their secret places and think for an answer to it all. Sometimes, that worked.

  Verity was in the middle of her early dinner when the door bell rang. Three long, importunate rings. She set down her knife and fork and waited for the sound of Daniel’s heavy feet thundering down the stairs. It did not come. The door bell rang again, a long, insulting intrusion. Annoyed, Verity put down her napkin and went into the hall. The muffled thump of music drifted down from upstairs. Why on earth Daniel didn’t listen out for his friends when he was expecting them, Verity couldn’t tell. Perhaps he did it on purpose to aggravate her. She went to the door, her face a mask of disapproval.

  Owen Winter was lounging against one of the wooden pillars of the porch. Of all Daniel’s horrible friends, this had to be the worst. Verity hated the way he looked at her, the way he dressed, his idle way of moving. She thought his face was odd, so much so, you had to stare at it, an experience wholly without delight, in her opinion. There was something unwholesome about Owen Winter. If Verity had had any concern for her brother at all, she might have done something to dissolve the friendship. ‘He’s upstairs,’ she said and turned away from the open door. It grieved her to have the creature in the house, treading upon her floors, touching her stair-rail, but it would grieve her more to wait on him and fetch Daniel herself.

  Without speaking, Owen Winter loped towards the stairs. Verity went back into the dining room and sat down, but felt unable to recommence her meal until Daniel and his friend left the house. She waited tensely, every sense alert. What a joyous day it would be when her brother finally left home. He was like a persistent stain that no amount of scrubbing could remove. She was aware that the comforts Louis’ affluence provided would inevitably delay this day of release. Daniel was lazy. She would have to remind her father about his education. Perhaps a little pressure needed to be applied. Daniel’s choice of friends appalled her: local roughnecks lacking any points of merit. She knew Owen Winter sometimes drove them all to towns where they’d go to night clubs which catered for their anti-social tastes. Perhaps Daniel took drugs. She would do nothing to prevent that. It could surely only speed his departure from home. If it wasn’t for the fact he had his own rooms in the house, Verity would have had to take action about him. Fortunately, he could be ignored most of the time.

  She heard Daniel and Owen tromping down the stairs, laughing coarsely in that particularly grating way uncouth young males seemed to adopt. Daniel was a slender, graceful boy. Why he had to sound like a herd of wildebeest whenever he slouched around the house she could not explain. ‘Get out,’ she murmured under her breath, clutching a fork. ‘Just get out.’

  Owen hadn’t brought the car, which meant he’d decided they wouldn’t be club
bing it tonight. This signalled one of the group’s more esoteric pursuits was presaged. Daniel always felt nervous about this, even though he was fascinated by the unseen and the whiff of forbidden knowledge. There was no pattern to Owen’s behaviour, but some Fridays he insisted they all went to the High Place, a hill deep within Herman’s Wood, where a natural circle was formed at the summit, hemmed by ancient trees. Here, Owen enacted his own arcane rituals, in which the others were expected to participate. It was a necessary part of being a member of the group, but something which Daniel didn’t really enjoy. He felt that Owen was partly mad, but as this madness was never threatening, it could be overlooked. Still, the forays into the woods, to the High Place, sometimes frightened Daniel. Perhaps this was because of his own hidden talents, which he never spoke about to anyone, not even Owen. While the others, excepting perhaps Owen, were happy to smoke dope and drink beers, then do whatever Owen directed in intoxicated cheeriness, Daniel was attuned to the energies they invoked, the watching presence of the trees. Often he saw shadowy shapes lurking at the edge of the circle, attracted by what the group were doing. They were not malign, but they had the potential to be mischievous. Daniel eventually found it was better to smoke as much dope and drink as much beer as he could before anything started. Then he could do whatever Owen asked without feeling scared or weird: the chanting, the strange, shuffling dancing, the rituals of snarling words and significant pantomimes of malevolence. The other three didn’t seem to question what Owen did, or asked them to do, but neither did they seem particularly committed to it. This was Owen’s obsession; they simply went along with it to enjoy the benefits of Owen’s friendship. He had money, he had his own house, he had a car, he had charisma. Like Lily Winter, Daniel was unsure why Owen was interested in him. They had struck up a friendship only a couple of weeks after the Crantons had moved to Little Moor. Daniel had been walking past the Winters’ cottage one afternoon and Owen had been working on his car in the driveway. As Daniel had come down the lane, Owen had straightened up from the car, wiping his hands on a rag, watching Daniel intently. Daniel had been sure Owen had recognised something in him, which made him feel ashamed. He’d always been chastised by his parents for his peculiarities and dreaded anyone else becoming aware of them now. Owen, however, had just said, ‘Hi, you’ve moved in down there, haven’t you?’ Their friendship had come easily after that, which had surprised Daniel. Why he couldn’t tell Owen about his odd premonitions and feelings he didn’t know. Surely Owen would be deeply interested? Yet still Daniel feared scorn or punishment, and kept silent, repressing the unbidden feelings as much as he could. In private, he could indulge himself and dream strange, new realities, but he had learned at any early age this indulgence was not to be shared.

  The first time Owen had taken him to the High Place, Daniel had been horrified, and had barely kept control of himself, anxious that no-one should notice how much the proceedings affected him. Since then, he had mastered getting drunk and how to act. It came as second nature now. He was aware how different he was from the others, and also how his background and slightly younger age sometimes grated against their own. Occasionally, this manifested as verbal baiting, but he had discovered how to combat that, and to give as good as he got. When he answered back and stood up for himself, Owen seemed pleased. Then he would say something really cruel. Daniel found it harder to answer Owen back than any of the others.

  Owen had set off in the direction of Herman’s Wood, his hands in his pockets, his long stride lazily devouring the lane. ‘Where are the others?’ Daniel asked, hurrying to keep up.

  ‘Meeting us there,’ Owen answered shortly. He seemed to be in a distant mood.

  They walked in silence, until they came to the place where a path, almost hidden by undergrowth, led into the trees. It was almost dark and the woods, on the right of the lane, looked oppressive and dangerous. Owen led the way into the moist shadows, his hands still in his pockets. Daniel hit out at trailing thorns that snagged his clothing. He wanted this part to be over. It was like a trial, a test, the journey through the woods to the sanctuary of the High Place.

  The deciduous trees gave way to pines, and the ground was spongy with fallen needles underfoot. When they approached the High Place, Daniel could see two lights burning up among the trees. The High Place was crowned by a ring of ancient oaks, and there was a hollow in the middle, where the group built fires. A solitary figure, a sentinel, was silhouetted against the light of one of the lamps. Daniel recognised the aggressive stance of Ray Perks, his least favourite of the group. He felt that Bobby and Luke actually liked him most of the time, while Ray just played at it to keep Owen happy. In another situation, Ray would be the one to jump Daniel in a dark street, knock him senseless, take his money, his watch, kick him in resentment for his comfortable life. Ray came from the most shunned of the village families. Apart from Ray, his three sisters and his mother, the rest of the family seemed ancient and senile, including the father. If you walked past their rundown cottage, one of the ancients would invariably shout obscenities at you from the garden, or a window of the house. Bobby and Luke came from farming families, were boisterous and crude, but mostly well-meaning.

  Owen and Daniel climbed the hill. Ray said, ‘All right?’ as Owen passed him.

  ‘Yeah.’ Owen walked directly down to the hollow, where Luke and Bobby were already building a fire. Daniel followed, uncomfortably aware of Ray slouching behind him. Owen took a can of beer from one of the four-packs lying near the fire. ‘Have one, Daniel,’ he said, gesturing. Daniel helped himself. He would need to drink at least three of these before he felt part of the group again.

  For about ten minutes the youths drank beer, while Owen rolled a joint. They bantered awkwardly with one another, casting sidelong glances at their mentor. Owen lit up, and exhaled a perfect plume of silvery smoke up to the treetops. His head was cast back, his eyes alight with some weird inner quirk; he seemed elemental, threatening. He’s not one of us, Daniel thought, but what Owen might actually be, he could not guess.

  The youths had formed a circle, which Owen dominated through his pallor and his presence. He passed the joint languidly to Ray, who noisily inhaled. The sparking end of the joint illumined his face,his features generous and satyr-like in red shadow. Daniel was sitting next to him. The group had fallen silent, as if Owen had willed it. Daniel’s heart was beating fast. He didn’t want to be there, yet lacked the will to leave. He knew that Owen would pick on him tonight; he’d been spared too many times these last few weeks. Ray handed him the joint, and he took careful, measured inhalations. The dope helped; it altered his reality, made the ridiculous seem sane and required. He could feel Bobby’s impatience, waiting for the joint to pass on, yet was reluctant to hand it over. He wanted it all, needed its temporary gift of tranquillity. Eventually, unspoken pressure from the others was too heavy to ignore and Daniel relinquished the joint. Owen was already building another, his pale hair falling forward over his face, hiding his expression, but Daniel knew he was smiling. The thought of that smile made Daniel angry, fuelled a spark of passion, some creature-thing, deep inside him.

  Having lit the second joint, Owen rose to his feet and began to walk around the others. His circling seemed to create a boundary that separated them all from the world beyond the hilltop, round and around. He began to hum softly beneath his breath, a monotonous note. Daniel’s head started to spin slowly. The effects of the drug helped him sense the circle of presence Owen was creating; he could feel it rotating. Something seemed to uncurl and stretch within his body; he wondered if it was the same for the others. Owen’s pace increased and his throat opened to a deep resonant tone. Familiar with this ritual, the rest of the group were all sitting upright, eyes fixed ahead, focusing on a point in the midst of their circle. The air was spinning round them, faster and faster, until all that existed was the small space they occupied. The smell of the forest, the earth itself, seemed to intensify within the circle, hot, humid, fecund. Daniel coul
d feel his throat pulsing with the beat of blood, then his breast, his stomach, his loins. His arms felt hot; his fingers tingled. It was like fainting without losing consciousness.

  Suddenly, Owen uttered a screech and jumped into the centre of the circle to land on all-fours, head thrown back, mouth gaping, eyes starting, throat corded. Then, he shook his head like an animal, his pale hair threshing around his shoulders. He reared up a little to rest his hands on his thighs, his knees cracking. His head turned as he inspected each member of his group. None of them had any doubt that he judged them, found them wanting, but they were all he had. He had begun to hum beneath his breath again, a tuneless melody. Then he fixed his eyes on Daniel, and nodded once. It was a summons.

  Daniel felt the ground beneath him grow hot. It seemed to be steaming, but that might have been the smoke in his eyes. Owen was a crouched, predatory thing in the centre of the circle, his long hands quivering as they hung over his knees, his pale, attenuated face livid along the cheekbones. He did not speak, but Daniel could almost hear Owen’s voice whispering in his head. ‘Come forward, come to me. Do as I tell you.’ Daniel crawled towards the centre of the circle. Were the others relieved they had not been chosen?

  ‘Your sacrifice,’ Owen said aloud, and resumed his place between Luke and Ray at the circle’s edge.

  Sacrifice. Sacrifice to the Earth. She takes from us. We give.

  Daniel unzipped his trousers. He knelt in the dirt beside the smouldering, cracking fire, and scrabbled in the peaty soil with his fingers. His will was not his own; he had no control over this. As he dug into the body of the earth, the hunger came, and the sense of being removed from his own mind. The other youths had started to chant, slap their hands against the ground. Daniel dug in time to their rhythm. By the time their voices had risen to a howl, he was stabbing the earth, stabbing it, letting her take him.