Children of the Barrow

This book was inspired by a short story I wrote called Secrets, which you can read in my short stories section.

Chapter 1 The Barrow

 

The Midsummer Day sun scorched their backs as they ran laughing up the grass covered hillside.

“Come on!” Shouted Ryan, in the lead as usual thanks to his longer legs, “I can see the entrance.”

Oliver glanced back to make sure Claire hadn’t been left behind, she hadn’t and was almost level with him, though her face was red with the effort. She grinned and ran on past him.

Ryan was leaning down peering into the barrows dark opening by the time they reached him. It was a single black hole in the otherwise smooth curvature of the grassy hill.

“Let’s check it out.” He said emboldened by their arrival.

They had to crouch to enter the stone portal, but once inside the roof rose and only Ryan had to walk bowed over to avoid hitting his head.

It was blissfully cool inside and very silent. Only the children’s hard breathing and the sound of their footsteps could be heard. It smelt of damp and earth and something else which none of them could identify.

The light of the entrance didn’t penetrate far into the underground chambers. Oliver pulled out a torch and shone it around. It caught on huge slabs of rock and cast pitch black shadows into deep recessed chambers.

“Dad said it was an ancient burial mound.” Claire said.

“I wonder if there are any bones still here.” Ryan said ghoulishly, using his own torch to light up his face in a horrible visage.

“Dad said they had all been taken away to a museum along with the treasures they found here.” Claire said sensibly.

“I’d rather find treasure than bones.” Ryan admitted.

They went from chamber to chamber along the main passage, searching each one carefully in hope of discovering some overlooked artefact. The stone floors were thick with soil washed in by the rain. Here and there were piles of leaves and dried grass, brought in by some animal or other. Once Ryan thought he had found a bone, but on closer inspection it was just an unusually shaped stone.

The final chamber was at the end of the passageway and was much bigger, Ryan was able to stand up straight and he stretched gratefully, his hands touching the carefully mitred roof stones.

“It looks like an igloo made from stone.” Claire said, admiringly.

The main chamber was lit by a single shaft of diffused sunlight which entered through a single tiny aperture high up in the roof. The light fell across a huge vertical stone on the opposite wall, which seemed to act almost like a mirror, reflecting the light and lighting the whole chamber with a dusky sort of twilight.

The children looked around, the chamber was as empty as all the rest, except for the mirror stone, and at its base sat another stone. It was a massive rectangle of granite about the size of a writing desk covered all over with intricate swirling designs carved into the rock itself.

“It looks like an altar,” Ryan said, “maybe this is where they did the human sacrifices.”

Claire punched his arm. “Don’t be so ghastly!” She said.

“They’re beautiful.” Oliver said. He felt almost mesmerised by the designs. He reached out and ran a finger along one of the spiralling grooves. It was cold and rough against his skin yet once he had started, he felt like he didn’t want to stop until he had traced the whole design.

“Yes it’s a very pretty rock,” Ryan said sarcastically, but then he shivered involuntarily, “Come on, it’s freezing in here, and it’s midsummer day out there, I’m going to climb on top of this tomb and bask in the sun!” he declared, and ducked out of the chamber.

“Are you coming?” Claire asked, turning to leave too.

“No, I think I’ll make a rubbing of this rock first. I’ll come up when I’m finished.” Oliver said. He never took his eye off the carved stone the entire time. He heard Claire leave as he shrugged off his back pack to get out his paper and pencil case.

The shaft of sunlight burned hot against the back of Oliver’s head and neck as he leant over the huge stone, carefully tracing the ancient designs onto sheet after sheet of paper from his sketchbook.

Oliver heard Ryan calling down to him from the surface through the gap where the sunlight entered.

“Oliver Finlay, you are trespassing on sacred ground, the bones of the ancient dead will rise up and punish you!” Ryan whispered down to him in a tremulous voice.

Then he heard a thump and laughter as Claire told him off.

The sounds of his siblings faded and became vague in his mind as he focused more and more intently on what he was doing.

Carefully and patiently he rubbed a wax crayon over the paper and watched as the designs from the stone below appeared on the surface like magic. Making the rubbing made them so much clearer and fresher and Oliver felt like they were almost alive.

The sun continued to burn a line between his shoulder blades as the sun edged ever closer to midday. Oliver’s back ached from leaning over but he didn’t stop to rest or stretch.

He didn’t realise that he was under a spell now and could not stop, that the design had control of him now and would not release him until it was complete.

But the design was not complete.

Oliver sat back on his heels at last. The patchwork of paper was almost covered entirely with concentric circles, spirals, twists and swirls, but at the very centre of the design, at the centre of the stone, the design was blank. Oliver couldn’t take his eyes from the spot. He peeled back the paper to look at the rock, and found the surface was rough and the design ended abruptly. It seemed as if the rock had been defaced, the final central strokes of the design chiselled away to nothing. The damage looked old, as old as the carving itself.

Oliver, who was normally a calm and patient boy, felt burning hatred and anger surge through his whole being at the destruction. Never in his life had he felt such strong emotion, it was almost like someone else was feeling it, and he was standing distant, only watching. Like his body and mind and emotions were not really under his own control anymore. Behind the anger he felt afraid. But there was nothing he could do.

He watched from the distance as his body leaned forward once more and raised the crayon to the paper. The sun burned and he felt as if the light burned straight through his body, through the centre of his heart and straight into the centre of the design, which he found his hand now drawing as if it had known all along how the final twists and turns must go.

As the midsummer sun reached its apex the last stroke of the design was completed. Oliver felt the controlling presence leave him. At the same instant, a huge cracking sound like a thunderclap rent the air and the rock before him rent in two.

All light was extinguished, and Oliver who had been sweating with effort now felt chilled right to the bone. Black shapes flowed out of the broken stone, blacker than the blackness. Shapes that could have been bats or birds, but were more formless, yet they had form. Oliver felt their cold slick wings flapping past him as they filled the chamber. He felt as if he were drowning in a flurry of wet black leaves. He felt sick with terror and shut his eyes against the horror that had been unleashed.

Then the final sound of leathery flapping passed him and everything fell silent and the bitter cold of the chamber seemed to ease.

“Ollie!... Oliver!” The sound of his sister’s voice finally roused him and he cracked open an eye. “It’s time for lunch, are you coming?” She was calling him from the entrance to the barrow, she sounded impatient.

Oliver let out a huge breath and shaking a little stood up.

Had he imagined it, he wondered. Maybe the sun on his neck had given him sunstroke and he had fainted.

But then he looked at the carved rock before the mirror stone and saw with horror that, along with all his carefully traced papers, the carvings had vanished. And, the rock was cracked in two.

He started and stared at the rock.

Claire pushed her way through the narrow entrance into the chamber.

“There you are! I’ve been calling for ages! Come on its lunchtime, Ryan will have eaten all the sausage rolls if we don’t hurry!” She saw him staring.

“What’s wrong?” She asked, all her impatience disappearing.

“The rock, its split and the carvings have disappeared.” Oliver managed to say.

Claire approached the rock and looked at it carefully.

“What carvings? I don’t remember it having any carvings.” She said looking at him oddly, “And it’s always been split, look, it must have happened hundreds of years ago, the surface is all covered with lichens.”

Oliver went over and looked. She was right, instead of the fresh broken stone he had expected; the split was as worn and weathered as the rest of the stone. He let out a great sigh. He must have dreamt it; they always did say he was the dreamer of the family.

“I think I was out in the sun too long.” He said to Claire. She grinned at him.

“Been having flights of fancy again?” She asked and Oliver nodded. “Well you’ll have to use it to imagine us up some sausage rolls cos I bet Ryan has scoffed the lot by now. Hurry up and get your things or there won’t be any cake left either!” Claire hurried out of the tomb and Oliver began to gather up his sketchbook and pencil case. He was almost done when he saw the blue crayon lying at the base of the rock. He picked it up and froze. The crayon had been worn down to a sliver.

 

 

Buy the book at: http://www.lulu.com/shop/shiro/children-of-the-barrow/paperback/product-21624690.html;jsessionid=A2978363D84B7F14A70904BC22BCE423