whistle on the Wynd (edit)

‘Are we there yet’
‘No not yet.’
‘Ouch!’
‘Eleanor leave your sister alone!’
'DAAAD! She’s pinching me.
Josh looked turned towards Lyn. She smiled. The kids were making a noise and the traffic was heavy and that  combination always made her nervous. It  led a to a tell.  A slight shake  of her tousled  blonde  hair and that smile, which hid a boiling rage. On days like this he wish he could drive. But years of epileptic seizures had closed a door to that.
‘Kids keep the noise down.’
Giggles laughter, screams.
‘Come on now girls, mummy is trying  to drive.’
They stopped the  car at the  old   priory. It was a pre-arranged  decision  to  stop here  for a picnic;  before  returning  back  home to  Exeter after  the weekend at Steve and Pauline’s place  in Plymouth.    Mainly because it was a handy place to let the kids  remove  some of their energy in  what had been already been an arduous  journey. Josh  wanted to forget the  weekend,  especially  the silent messages passed  between  Lyn and  Steve, which  were  painfully embarrassing after two  glasses of wine.
 It was  a warm sultry  early afternoon.  The  sky had thick  rolling dark clumpy cloud;  that threatened  rain.  The overgrown grass  blew wildly  about   the wooden fences  and the foreground  of the  abbey; whose   dark corners ,  broken arches and tumbledown buildings  (made of ancient grey stone  mixed with the  rich red  rock of Devon.) appear  -at least to him-   alive with an aged and undead malevolence. As he  walked about  taking the scene in with his  Canon  Dsi, clicking here;  pausing to  set a frame there;  Josh felt  a nausea  grow.  He felt it as  strange   stabbing  in the back of his  neck  as if  unseen eyes,   bloated with a  loathing  of  living things  gazed. The nausea increased.  Signs of a seizure. He mediated the feelings  of anxiety down.  This is a ruin.  There is nothing  out  of the ordinary. Its energy is in the stone  and the  stone  is  old. Its battery  is worn out.
‘Look Dad’
It was A.J,  the  youngest  of the three, her  green eyes  shone  with the  delight of pushing boundaries, as she scaled the wall. She had her mother’s  beauty  and his love of excitement.  Still…
‘AJ  get down!’
Giggle. ‘come  and get me!
 ‘Come on girls, its food time.’ called  Lyn.
Two  girls  came  scrambling  out  of the shadows of the  abbey, as the  one  in front of him  clambered down the rough Greystone  wall.
Eleanor  came over to the  blanket
‘Look what  I’ve  found.’
Two tiny hands covered with slimy mud, red clay  and sand  were open,  palms up to  reveal in the clinging clay  a long narrow  tube.
‘What’s  that?’
‘Dunno.’
'Give it to me!’
‘No  its mine!’
‘its  not fair!’
‘Girls please!’
Lyn  rummaged in her handbag for the wet wipes.  Always there  for  the emergencies.
‘You can’t eat with hands like  that. ‘
The muddy tube  was  thrown, discarded  in the long  grass by the fence.  Josh put down the camera on corner of the blanket and then  walked towards where  the muddy tube  had been discarded.  He  picked it up and as he  did, his  curiosity  grew .
The tube was encrusted, but was  about five inches long. It glinted with an azure stain in the rich near burgundy slimy red clay.  Abstractly,  Josh walked back to the blanket  and  picked up the  plastic packet  of wet  wipes already almost empty,  due to three mucky little girls and their  ferocious appetite  for adventure.  Carefully  and very slowly he began  to remove  the  clay.
‘Josh put it dow-‘ sigh
‘-but  it’s actually  quite’ –
‘-Daaaad, it’s probably  got dog poo on it-‘
‘-Errgehh!  Daddy picking up!’
‘Eleanor  touched it ffirst !’
Oh god kids!
It cleaned up well.  It was about five inches in diameter, made  of bronze, or brass,  he couldn’t tell, but then he wasn’t a metallurgist.  He was an unemployed father   of three, with an  unrecognised disability and a degree,  that, if he had the ambition, (which right now, he confessed to himself  he  had little  of.)  into something valuable.
‘The writing’s familiar-’
‘-Darling, just put it down.’  She had that awkward face he recognised. He glanced at her, smiled, slightly  and looked down again.  Trying his hardest not to hear the  tiredness in her voice.  Knowing and fearing  the  distance between them.
‘-It’s  got  some Anglo Saxon  runes  on it.’
The soft sweet smelling wipes finally removed the wet clay in a smear across the tube. Through the mud,  tiny  indentations could be seen. There  were runes and they were  Anglo Saxon.  He was certain of it.  He recalled during the Dane law,  that began  around   638 CE, many practices  were  exchanged, the  writing  of runes was one of them.  The Anglo Saxon  Runic  alphabet,  differed from the Viking  in many respects. Some of this was due to accent and  dialect differences between locations; making the runic system exchangeable  to a point. 
The letters stood out  C..al  e..n..de  h..ae w…ill c…y..me. …Cal ende hae will cyme…  call  and he  will come… Fascinating.
There were also  three tiny holes near the bottom  of the  tube.   Taking his pen knife from his pocket he began to  slowly  remove  the wet soil from within the tube.   Muddy water  spilled out  onto  the blanket.
‘Josh  look what you’re doing dear.’ That sigh again.
With a little  difficulty  he  removed the rest  of  mud clearing it completely.
‘Darling, please put that thing down. ‘ she  sounded as if she was talking  to a child. She always  did.
‘It’s a, a whistle  I think.’
‘-Or some  old tat  some other tourist  dropped while climbing the walls. Darling, you dig something up, Eleanor  copies you. ‘
‘-She  has a love  of historical  finds.’
Lyn gave her stare to Josh. The stare that Josh new  too well.  The stare that said   don’t  be an arse  and be realistic.
‘-Have  you seen any jobs lately?’
‘-Nothing.’
‘-You’re not  looking  hard enough.  Seven years you  have been working  towards that bloody degree. Now you have  it, start making some money.’
Josh looked down and away from the kids.  Lyn had said that in front of them deliberately. 
 ‘-Why  don’t   you look for  work.’
‘-We’ve been there  Josh. For  Christs  sake  don’t be an arse.’
‘What’s an arse Daddy?’ AJ looked up innocently.
Josh walked away. He found Eleanor  at his side a moment later.
‘I love  you daddy.’
‘I love  you  too p-.’  He was going to say pumpkin, but changed his mind, as  she was high on  the spectrum  disorder for  SSD.  Ergo she  would not understand a metaphor.  He grinned and looked at this their  eldest  daughter with love. 
‘Tell me,  where  did  you  find it?’
 Eleanor smiled and led Josh  to the western wall.
Just  down there Dad.’  She said quietly.
‘Dad, why is Mummy like that?’
Mummy is worried that there isn’t enough money to keep us in our home.  Mummy hates daddy.  Mummy has met   Steve  and  thinks he’ s  better fuck.  It happens.Josh’s  eyes became  strained.  Hiding  the  anxiety that was building.
‘It’s nothing  to worry about  darling.’
The  words  sounded empty  in his voice Josh  knew  that Eleanor  was smart enough  to pick  up on it.
‘So where exactly  did  you find it?’
She pointed down at the base of the wall.
Both of them looked at the hole recently uncovered by the weekend  rain.  Feeling a little nervous,  and not knowing why,  Josh  put his  hand into the earth and felt something hard and narrow. He pulled at it.  With a soft plop the earth released its secret. It was the topper most part of a human skeletal finger.
‘That settles it, put it back. It’s some piece of history that belonged to that old dead body.  Leave it alone. Her words were even more shocking by the ferocity of the sound.   Jess , the middle  of the  three  girls and the most  inquisitive looked at the  whistle.
‘Mummy’s right.  We should leave it here. ‘
‘I think we should take it t  the  museum in Exeter.’ Josh tried to  persuade.
Lyn  gave  Josh a  hard stare.
Here  we go again.  No dammit he thought before replying.
‘I am taking this back home,   I am going to  properly clean it  and  when we get home  I am  going to take it  to Exeter museum.  That’s  that!'
Lyn looked at Josh. Her now mirthless eyes glittered  with  contempt.
‘Fair  enough.’ came her terse  reply.
‘Can I  see  daddy? AJ  asked.
Josh passed her the  little  whistle.
AJ  thought about it, playing with the little whistle in her tiny fingers. Then she put her mouth to one  end and blew. The sound it made  was ethereal .  A whisper on the wind, Josh thought  absently. The sound was captivating and yet distant; and in its  sound something seemed to wake.  Josh  shook his  head.
Lyn stared  at AJ  and then at  Josh  with anger.
‘That’s so fucking you isn’t it!  Christ you let them do anything!  How do you know that this whistle, or whatever it is, doesn’t have  some some, weird shit on it-‘
‘-You  can’t keep them  bottled  up forever.’
' -or something!  The germs are everywhere! ‘
‘-what  the  hell is  wrong with you?’
‘-It was next to a fucking  corpse!’
-Jesus  Lyn! Im sorry!’
‘-Be a  fucking  parent  Josh  for  Chist’s   sake!’
‘-What  the-‘
‘-I’m sick of being the  grown up  around here  Josh!  Sick of it!’
She looked away.
Silence  settled around the picnic blanket, as  Josh held back the  tears.
The drive home was in silence, as was the rest of the night,  where only Lyn  could be heard  giggling into  her phone.
when bed came  it was full of wild dark horses.
 Josh heard a scream.  He arose and walked  to the communal bedroom that  the  three  girls  shared.  AJ was kneeling on her bed . Her hands  were over her eyes, screaming  in  hysterical  wails. He walked  towards  her  cabin bed and tried  to hold her, but she  wrestled  in his arms  and fought him off. He took a step back.
‘She’s still in the dream.’
Then she pulled her tiny hands  away  from her face  with forceful movements , as if someone or something unseen  was stopping her.
Then she stared towards him.
'Why did  you let me  touch it  Dad? ‘ Her voice  was low dark  and malevolent.  Her eyes were lost  black  sockets.
Josh awoke screaming.
That morning,  AJ  came  into  bed with  them.
‘I had a baad dream  daddy.’
‘Darling  what  happened?’ he  waited  for  the reply 
‘ At the broken place there  was  something there a dark thing it chased me and I  couldn’t  get away.’ Her  voice  came in  soft sobs.
Lyn moaned low.
‘come on let’s  get up.’  He whispered.
An hour later over a summery breakfast, Josh  spoke to  Lyn.
‘You’re right. I’m  I’m   going to  the  museum  today  to see if I  can  get my name on the work list.  Lyn  smiled  warmly  at him.
‘I can be a bitch  sometimes.’
He  could hear  the  sadness in her  voice, but   the  sincerity  was not there; and he  knew  that would never  come back. Trust had been  broken.
Josh waited patiently for one  of the museum  staff  to meet him.  In his pocket he played with the tiny whistle. When he finally met with the  staff,  he decided  to avoid  the issue  of work and show the  find instead.
‘Fascinating, fascinating and and where   did  you find it?'  asked the plump sweaty little man behind the desk.  His voice plum weighted.
‘ well   your  right about the  markings, a fascinating find, and close  to where a body  was found you say. ‘ There was a long pause. ‘You do know the  story…about the   Priory?
‘No.’
‘Well I am surprised… I thought that everyone knew.’
Josh held back  his sense  of  mirthless derision.  This  man was  flogging  his  qualification at him.
'The  priory  was once run by an abbot  of , let’s  say,  a  questionable  faith.  His  practices…they were…err…  frowned  upon.  It’s  said that he …’
Josh  nodded in the right places, but on the  whole found the man  vacuous  and full of his own words: in fact  a complete bore.
‘...incidentally You  were  right about  the  runic  alphabet.  It is Anglo  Saxon  not Viking… the  fact that it was found at  the abbey  infers  that it might be part of an older treasure.  I’m  not sure what the  words  themselves mean. “Cal ende  hae wille cyme.”   Sounds  very,  MR James.  Of course  the  word  Cyme  also refers   to a  claim  so the owner is owned  by the action of calling on  “Hae”   whomever ,  or whatever  “Hea” might be.   Urrm  I wonder Can  we have  it? His  puffy  face  was flushed with excitement.
‘ I’ll  think  about it.’ Josh replied.
Nods  followed  farewells as Josh  left.
That night  both Josh  and Lyn were  about  to go to bed themselves when  screams  filled  with  terror were  heard  coming from  the  girls  bedroom.
Both Lyn and Josh ran up the  stairs . They reached the door and Josh tried  to open it.  But it was solid.
‘Open the  door.’ Ordered  Lyn
‘I can’t’  it’s  not moving.’ 
'JOSH!'
MUMMY! DADDY !  HELP! DADDY! MUMMY!
Josh  slammed into  the  door. Once.  Nothing happened. Twice. Again nothing.  The third and the  fourth time nothing. The  screams  were  getting  louder  and louder.  They could hear things smashing loudly around the room.
With a final viscous kick, Josh   smashed the door open  and they  both fell into the  room.  Three  duvets begin to wrap  about  the  girls necks.  the  room  howled and screamed with unseen violence; as they  fought  against the  duvet’s  that were themselves  forming into hideous  faces. He fought and grappled  AJ free  and pushed her out of the  room. Then he grabbed  Jess  and Lyn pulled Eleanor who was barely breathing. 
 They drove to the priory on dark open roads carrying out  a step of blind faith.  when they  arrived   Josh  replaced  the  whistle where  he found it;in the hoope that if he  did  so, then Eleaanor would  wake.  With trepidation he walked back to the car and towards a ruddy sunrise.