Archive of Our Own ^beta

The map Tim spread out across Jon’s desk was made of four sheets of A4 taped together and thickly marked up in multiple colors of pen. “What,” Jon asked slowly, “am I looking at, exactly?”

“Oh, nothing much,” Tim said with a half-smile. “Just the likely site of the spooky circle from Jason North’s statement.”

Jon immediately set aside the files he’d rescued from beneath the map, his heart rate ticking up a notch. “I thought you said you couldn’t find any sign of it?”

“Not on satellite photography, no,” Tim said. “But then I got to thinking, you know, if his statement didn’t like digital audio, what’s to say the place itself is a fan of digital pictures? So I put in some calls to the Scottish Forestry Commission about fire hazards over the last ten years or so. Then I cross referenced that with smoke patterns that were visible on the satellite images, with the help of a very friendly student meteorologist, and followed that up with a troll through every photo on Instagram and Flickr geotagged in the Wyvis Forest for that time period. Sasha helped with that bit, admittedly.”

After a bit of study, Jon thought he could make sense of the topography lines on the map, even if most of the names meant nothing to him. Ben Wyvis National Preserve was situated in the lower left, Loch Glass to the upper right, with an evergreen plantation along its southern shores. The area Tim had marked off was a good distance from the loch, though, in another plantation north of the preserve. “This seems a bit far from the area specified in the statement.”

“Yeah, but it’s still close,” Tim said. “You could get there from the access road for the loch or the A835. And there was a smoke plume spotted in the area in November 2006, and another in December 2008, but no actual fire or anything that could’ve caused a fire — the ground was covered in snow both times.”

No ordinary fire, Jon wanted to correct, but it sounded excessively melodramatic, even in his head. “Still. I find it hard to credit that an experienced forester could’ve strayed so far from his assigned territory without noticing it.”

“Hey, I’m just showing my work,” Tim said. “Take it or leave it. But if you did want to take it, it’d only take half a day or so for an experienced hiker to get there…”

Jon glanced up at Tim, who wasn’t even trying to mask his eagerness. “And you’d be more than happy to take a long, Institute-funded weekend to investigate this personally, wouldn’t you?”

“It’s important to be thorough,” Tim said, remarkably straight-faced. “And I’ve already got all the gear for hill walking.”

Jon considered it. As dangerous as the circle sounded, getting independent verification of its existence — and its more unusual properties — would be far and away more documentation than most of these statements ever received. It might also help clarify what, if any, connection the ritual had with Gertrude Robinson. And perhaps with the example of Jason North’s statement, they could avoid sharing his fate…

Wait a minute, when had he started thinking of this in plurals? It wasn’t like he could just pop off to Scotland for a weekend, there was far too much to do in the archives. Far too many worms outside of the archives, too, and as much as he was tired of tripping over Martin every other step, the thought of just leaving him here...of not being around when Prentiss finally did whatever she’d been plotting...Jon wasn’t a brave man by any stretch, but he wasn’t just going to...to abandon his post, as it were.

Then again, if the ritual circle was real...and it was only for a few days….

“You said half a day for an experienced hiker,” Jon put forth carefully. “How long for an inexperienced one?”

Tim scoffed. “What, you’re going to send Martin along with me? He doesn’t even leave the building these days.”

“I was referring to myself,” Jon said peevishly.

That earned him an even more incredulous look, which was frankly unfair. “Ah, no offense, boss,” Tim said slowly, “but I sort of thought dimly-lit basement offices were your natural habitat. You know there’s going to be sunlight involved in this, right?”

“Given the usual weather in Scotland, I find that highly unlikely.”

Tim rolled his eyes at that. “Seriously, though. It might not be the Alps, but it’s not beginner stuff, either.”

“Then I’ll be fortunate to have an experienced partner to hand, won’t I?” Jon said, forcing a smile that he hoped looked confident rather than awkward. “Presuming Elias approves funds for the trip, of course.”

Tim’s eyes narrowed slightly. “So you haven’t got time to re-record the statements you goofed up, but you do for a hiking holiday?”  

Jon looked down at the map, and thought about the faded photograph of Gertrude Robinson filed away with Jason North’s statement. “It’s not a holiday, it’s research. That thing we originally joined the Institute to do, yes?”

“Well, it’s obviously not a holiday if you’re coming,” Tim muttered, but he took his map back. “I’ll write up a budget for us, shall I?”

XXX

Elias did approve the funds, with a cryptic comment about stretching your wings that utterly baffled Jon. Tim insisted on handling nearly all the actual planning, which included sending Jon a detailed packing list, a bag of miscellaneous supplies on loan, and multiple emphatic reminders not to bring any more books than he was willing to personally carry up a small mountain and back. Jon thought this was highly unnecessary; after all, they’d be spending more time on the train as they would actually hiking, and he’d need something to pass the time.

They met at King’s Cross on Friday to catch a train north. Tim was easy to spot on the platform, given his height, and Jon knew the moment Tim saw him because he did an exaggerated double-take and clapped a hand to his chest. “My god, he does own jeans,” he cried out melodramatically as soon as Jon was close enough to hear.

“Oh, be quiet,” Jon shrugged off his rucksack— personally selected for him by Tim, it had some sort of rigid internal frame and would likely leave him with a herniated disk by Sunday.

“And trainers! I didn’t think you knew what those were.”

“I am going to abandon you in Inverness,” Jon declared.

“And then you will die in a bog,” Tim said cheerfully. “Seriously, though, did you bring proper boots, too?”

“I doubt there’s an appreciable difference,” Jon said, though he didn’t actually have any idea of whether that was so.  

Tim’s eye roll was probably not exaggerated on purpose. Probably.

Once they were on board, Tim dug out a smaller version of the map he’d first shown Jon, which he’d inserted into a waterproof slipcover. “So, Rosie’s booked us a car — you do know how to drive, right?”

“I have a license, yes,” Jon said.

“And you’ve used it some time this century, I hope?” Without waiting for Jon’s indignant response, Tim carried on, “Anyway. We’ve got a reservation at a B&B in Dingwall, which I swear is a real place. If we leave first thing in the morning, it’s only half an hour to the car park for Ben Wyvis. I reckon the easiest route for us is to follow the existing trail up to An Cabar and then over the ridge to Tom a’ Chòinnich, then head down to the northwest and skirt around the base of Queen’s Cairn. Then it’s straight downhill to the plantation from there.”

Which looked all well and good in abstract on the map, of course. “How long do you expect that to take?” Jon asked.

“Four hours, maybe five, all depending on your pace.” He tucked the map back into his backpack. “So if we get a good start, we’ll make it out to the plantation by ten or so, have plenty of time for a nice poke around, and still get back to Dingwall in time for dinner-. Easy-peasy.”

Jon spent several seconds trying to wrap his head around anything being called easy peasy when it involved climbing a mountain twice in one day. “Well, at least you’ll have a splendid time,” he eventually muttered.

“You brought this on yourself,” Tim reminded him sweetly.

“Yes, I am aware of that.”

“There might still be time to throw yourself off the back of the train, you know. We haven’t technically left London yet.”

“Tim,” Jon said, grasping for the last strands of his self-control, “I promise I will suffer enormously when we are actually hiking tomorrow; there’s no need to begin early.”

“Ah, you’re no fun at all,” Tim said with a little pout, but he did leave off the teasing for a while.

XXX

The train took eight hours to traverse the length of the country. Jon paid for the overpriced Wi-Fi so that he could keep in touch with Sasha and Martin regarding work, and the current or expected levels of worms both in and around the Institute. He also tried to look up some of the landmarks on the map, if only because not knowing how to pronounce the Gaelic names was inexplicably irritating to him. Tim spent most of the time either toying with his phone or happily ensconced in a few guidebooks about hill walking in the Highlands. He even volunteered to venture down to the dining car around tea time, though only after confirming they’d be reimbursed for meals and other incidental expenses.

“Find anything interesting?” he asked when he got back, tossing Jon a wrapped sandwich and a packet of crisps.

“ Ben Wyvis is Gaelic for ‘hill of terror,’” Jon informed him. “As if I needed any more omens that this was a horrible idea.”

“Well, you invited yourself,” Tim reminded him. “I could’ve made it on my own, brought you back some pictures, but no, you just had to see for yourself…”

Jon sighed. “Please do try to keep the schadenfreude to reasonable levels, will you?”

He then jumped, as something bounced off his forehead. A balled-up paper napkin. “Lighten up, seriously. Some of us actually enjoy getting to leave the city now and again, you know? Especially with all the recent...you know.” He made a vague waggling gesture with his hand which, if one was being extraordinarily generous, might resemble a worm of some sorts.

“Of course. My apologies.” Jon dared his own sandwich and found it surprisingly palatable, compared to his last long-distance train journey. Then again, that had been for his grandmother’s funeral, so perhaps the circumstances had colored his memory overmuch. “To be honest, I had no idea you were such a keen outdoorsman.”

“Eh, don’t get out as much as I used to since...since I started at the Institute.” He set his sandwich aside and started scrolling absently through his phone. “My stepdad used to take my brother and I out to the country every chance he got. Fishing, hiking, kayaking, everything. He has a cabin in Wales, somewhere I can’t spell, but we went all over. Male bonding sort of thing.”

“Sounds idyllic.” Jon turned to watch the scenery flicker by the windows. “I was mainly an indoor child myself. Perhaps not quite to the degree my grandmother would’ve preferred, admittedly.”

“Jonathan Sims, defying an authority figure?” Tim mimed a shocked face, and Jon huffed at him. “Oh, come on, you were clearly born in a sensible cardigan, with a strong opinion about the Oxford comma. You are a seventy-year-old academic deep in your soul.”

“We’re nearly the same age, you know,” Jon said, trying to sound severe.

Time waved him off. “Well, sure, on the outside you might be, what, thirty-three, thirty-four—”

“Twenty-eight.’

“Bullshit.” Tim carried on as if Jon hadn’t interrupted. “But anyway, I’m talking about your soul. Your cranky old man soul.”

Jon rolled his eyes. “My soul, should it exist, is the same age as the rest of me, which was twenty-eight the last time I looked at my passport.”

Tim studied him for a moment, actually looking thoughtful. Then he ruined the impression by asking, “So you just dress like that to keep up with the rest of the hipsters, or….?”

Jon threw the napkin back at him.

XXX

The scenery outside gradually rolled through a syrupy sunset and into darkness. Jon resisted the urge to check up on Sasha and Martin when the work-related emails finally trickled to a stop. Absence of evidence was not evidence of absence. Absence of contact was not evidence of worms. He didn’t need to hover.

At Inverness they grabbed a quick supper and picked up their rental car; it took nearly forty minutes to drive to Dingwall and locate the bed and breakfast, by which point Tim had finally exhausted his supply of off-color jokes about the name. Checking in at the B&B went normally enough until the woman at the desk asked if they’d be enjoying the complimentary breakfast.

“Oh, no, we’re off with the sun tomorrow,” Tim said brightly before Jon could say anything. “Probably out the door by half-four at the lastest.”

To this, Jon managed to add, flatly, “What.”

“Oh, where are you headed at that hour?” the woman asked, ignoring him completely.

“Hill walking!” Tim thumped Jon on the shoulder. “This one’s bagging his first Munro.”

She beamed at him. “Good luck with that! Should be good weather for it.”

“Thank you?” Jon asked, thoroughly lost and rather indignant about it.

“I’ll be gentle with him,” Tim said, with the sly grin that had half the file clerks and two-thirds of the receptionists in London wrapped around his finger. The manager of the B&B blushed, and shooed them off to bed.

“Were you planning on sharing the complete schedule with me at any point in this journey?” Jon asked as they settled into the (extraordinarily plaid) room. Given how many of his nights lately had been spent in the archives, an entire twin bed to himself seemed unusually luxurious.

“I just like how indignant you get, that’s all,” Tim said. “Now go on, get some rest, I wasn’t kidding about being up with the sun.”

“That is in five hours.”

“Yes, Jon.” Tim dropped his trousers and flopped onto the other bed. “So quit whinging about it and go to sleep.”

Jon was seriously tempted to argue the point, if only for the sake of principle, but he was self-aware enough to realize it would be a pyrrhic victory at best. He set his glasses on the nightstand and took his pajamas into the bathroom to change.

XXX

For a rare treat, Jon slept deeply and dreamed little. Four-fifteen in the morning saw him shuffling vaguely around the room, attempting to make himself presentable, while Tim packed and re-packed both their rucksacks and attempted to tell him all about it. Jon nodded wherever it seemed appropriate and promptly forgot everything in favor of dozing off in the car.

They actually arrived at the nature preserve by five o’clock, and the combination of early-morning chill and low-angle sunlight glaring through the trees finally dragged Jon fully awake. It was very still, though even at this hour there were birds calling to one another and flickering in trees and brush that lined the road.

Tim perched a pair of sunglasses on his forehead, managing to look like the cover of a sporting magazine despite getting no more sleep than Jon had. “Midge spray first,” he announced. “Then off to find the exploding cult circle!”

“Perhaps we shouldn’t be announcing that bit,” Jon muttered, though they were the only people in the car park. He hoisted his own bag out of the boot of the car and started investigating its various pockets. “Have I got midge spray?”

“I am in charge of midge spray.” Tim declared. “Also sun cream, maps, and the GPS.”

“What am I in charge of?”

“Too many books, and a Polaroid camera.” Tim finished spraying down himself and gestured for Jon to hold his arms out. “Where did you even find that thing, by the way?”

Jon flinched away from sharp smell of the spray. “Martin found it in the documents storage. I thought it best to take custody before he got...artistic.”

“You’re a gentleman and a scholar.” Tim popped the cap back on the midge spray and it disappeared back into his bag. “All right. Any last words, boss?”

“Please stop implying I’m about to die.” Jon wiped a bit of midge spray off his glasses with the hem of his shirt. “Unless you’ve secretly been angling for a promotion…?”

“Yes, Jon. I’m going to push you into a bog and take over the archives.” Tim elbowed him as he locked up the car. “You’ve sussed out my devious plot.”

A pair of markers at one of the of the car park indicated the start of the trail, with information posted in English and Gaelic; the trail itself swiftly wound off into stands of broadleaf trees and brilliant purple heather that hid the car park from sight, following alongside a small, rocky stream. The air was cool but not really cold, and Jon warmed up quickly at the pace Tim set — not that he was going especially fast, but his stride was quite a bit longer than Jon’s even accounting for the difference in height. Still, it wasn’t like Jon had to jog to keep up. The trail was wide and well maintained, and the sky was clear.

As they came around a curve, the long, looming mass of Ben Wyvis came into view, rising up from the grass and peat. Still, Jon thought, it wasn’t like they were scaling the Alps here. In fact, if the weather held up, this whole excursion might actually be fairly pleasant. A rather literal walk in the park...

XXX

By the time Jon dragged himself, gasping, to the cairn that marked the first peak, his lungs were burning and his legs could barely hold his weight. He’d stripped down to his t-shirt, which did little for the sweat that was pooling where his rucksack lay against his back. If he hadn’t had a climbing pole for support he might not have been able to remain vertical.

Tim was sat on the ground next to the cairn and aiming his phone. “Say cheese!” he called cheerfully.

“You,” Jon panted, leaning on his borrowed climbing pole, “have never smoked a cigarette in your life.”

“That is correct, yes.” Tim’s phone beeped, and his smile widened. “Sasha says, quote, ell-oh-ell poor Jonathan, unquote. What should I say back?”

Jon gave him a two-fingered suggestion, and groped for his water bottle.

“Aw, don’t be like that, boss, Sasha’s nice,” Tim said reproachfully. “And look on the bright side, you’re a thousand meters above sea level! That’s an achievement! We should be celebrating!”

“I hate you,” Jon croaked between gulps of water.

Tim snapped another picture. “What’s this about smoking, anyway? Some other shameful secret from your rebellious youth?”

“Will you stop taking pictures if I tell you?” Jon snapped back.

“Probably not, no,” Tim said with a shrug. But he did let Jon stop and catch his breath, without trying to talk to him further.

XXX

The long, high ridge between An Cabar and Tom a’ Chòinnich provided a panoramic view of the peaks and glacial valleys to the east and west, vivid green fields occasionally smudged with tree cover. There was a smear of brightness that was probably Loch Glass itself, with gaunt white windmills clustered at one end. If Jon squinted — or, more constructively, nicked Tim’s binoculars from the front pouch of his rucksack — he could even distinguish the semi-orderly rows of the evergreen plantations from the natural copses of mixed species that filled in the low spots. And, back in the directions they’d come from, a few more hikers dotting the trail, having arrived at a more reasonable hour and taken a more leisurely pace.

“Quit taking things out of my bag,” Tim called from up ahead. “Looks like the weather’s turning.”

That, too, was visible from a long way off: a sweep of high, gray clouds spilling over the sky like a slow-motion oil slick. Jon had been praying for clouds since halfway to An Cabar, to be honest, and day had only grown warmer since then, but there was something about this spreading gloom that he didn’t like.

“Any idea how far off it is?” he asked, in case that was the sort of things outdoorsy people just knew.

Tim shook his head, though. “We’ve got gear for a bit of rain. Well, I have, at least. And it doesn’t look like a proper storm, there’s no wall cloud.”

“Still.” Jon gave Tim his binoculars back, adjusted the straps on his own rucksack, and made a moderate effort to pick up his pace. The ridge had begun a gentle downhill slope at the last cairn, at least, and he no longer felt like his ribs were going to dislocate if he inhaled too deeply. The hat Tim had nagged him into wearing helped keep the sun off his neck, too, even if Jon suspected he looked ridiculous.

“You know,” Tim said, apropos of nothing, “I think this is the most relaxed I’ve seen you since you got promoted.”

“That’s...concerning,” Jon said. “Seeing as I don’t feel particularly relaxed.”

Tim chuckled softly. “Maybe relaxed was the wrong word. You know some of the researchers have a betting pool going on whether you or Martin is going to be the first to have a screaming breakdown?”

Jon stumbled on a rounded lump of granite and nearly turned his ankle. “ Do they now?”

“Mmm. Full disclosure, I’ve got five quid riding on you, but that’s only because I’ve seen how you get about file formatting.” Tim paused long enough for Jon to catch up to him, so the conversation didn’t have to be conducted at a shout. “I assume it’s just the two of you because everyone knows Sasha’s too level headed for that sort of thing, and I’ll quit first.”

“So you’re not worried about Prentiss?” Jon challenged him.

Tim scowled at him. “Of course I am. I’ve seen the bloody crawly things everywhere, too, you know. But we’ve got the extinguishers now, and if those blokes in hard hats weren’t actually installing the new fire system then I’m not sure why we put up with them drilling holes in the ceiling all last week. And … I mean … she can’t possibly live like that much longer, from what Martin’s said.”

Can’t she? Jon wanted to ask. “I hope you’re right about that,” is what he managed to mumble.

“Anyway,” Tim said after a bit. “ Relaxed was definitely the wrong word. It’s more like … ever since you got the head archivist job, you’ve been running on a motor or something. I’m pretty sure you didn’t used to sleep in the office so much when we were in research.”

Jon wanted to point out that Martin was currently using the archives’ only bed, but he recognized that as a tactical error: they all likely had a good idea of how many times Jon had simply fallen asleep at his desk in the last few weeks, or worked so late there seemed nothing to do except keep on working through till morning. “I have more responsibilities now,” Jon muttered defensely, even though he knew it sounded pathetic. “I never expected to get promoted this fast, I need to demonstrate that I can handle it. I need to…”

To understand, he wanted to say, but understand what, he still couldn’t quite articulate even in his own head. Which was a large part of what drove him, like it or not. There was some pattern, some logic behind the statements and the artefacts, and if he could just put a name to it he might finally be able to sleep at night.

“I’m pretty sure most people cope with imposter syndrome with, you know, therapy,” Tim said, bone dry, interrupting Jon’s spiraling thoughts. “Or maybe day drinking? That would certainly brighten things up around the archive.”

Jon rolled his eyes. “Amazing how so many of your helpful suggestions boil down to alcohol and fornication.”

“And hiking, sometimes!” Tim protested. “Not that we couldn’t also incorporate alcohol and fornication into this, of course, but I don’t think Elias would reimburse me for condoms or booze.”

Laughing felt odd; Jon couldn’t remember the last time he’d laughed without a tinge of dread or hysteria to it. Perhaps Tim was right that a break from London was a good thing. “I’m not sure I can respond to that without violating some kind of harassment policy.”

“Heavy hangs the head, I know,” Tim said. “Guess we’ll just have to keep the alcohol and fornication to ourselves.”

“Tim,” Jon groaned.

“All right, I know, eyes forward.” Tim gave him one last cheeky smile, and they continued towards the third cairn of the trail in comfortable silence.

XXX

The sky was fully overcast by the time they reached the evergreen plantation, and Tim began stopping more frequently to confer with the map and the GPS. Jon spent these pauses looking at the rows of precisely spaced trees, tall and silent, their orderly progression just short of uncanny. He caught the occasional glimpse of a squirrel in the brush, and once a slightly larger, darker shape that he couldn’t identify. (A pine marten? North’s description of them hadn’t been particularly helpful.) Part of him was surprised the lumber company hadn’t harvested the area yet, though he supposed it must take decades before this particular crop came ripe.

“Christ, Jon, stop picking at your pack like that,” Tim snapped without actually looking up.

Jon realized he’d been letting out the shoulder straps of his rucksack again. “What do you want me to do? It’s uncomfortable.”

“You just have bad posture.” He peered down an aisle of pines. “Origin of the smoke plume should be this way.”

They both walked more cautiously now, and not just because the underbrush between the trees was denser. Jon searched for any sign of a break in the pattern, of iron nails or stone altars, not sure whether he was more afraid of finding the damn place or of coming all this way and then not finding it. Just because they couldn’t find it, after all, didn’t mean it wasn’t there...

They broke through the trees near the bank of a shallowish river — the Abhainn Beinn na Eun, if Jon was remembering the map (and his quick Gaelic lesson on the train) correctly. A rutted track cut through the peaty ground between the bank and the tree line, hardly substantial enough to be called a road. Tim frowned at it. “That’s...we shouldn’t be this far north yet. That path’ll lead all the way back to Loch Glass, I think.”

“So it was probably the route North originally took, rather than going through the reserve.” Jon peered as far as he could down the track in both directions. “If we could retrace his steps—”

A low, slow growl of thunder interrupted him. It went on for slightly longer than thunder seemed like it ought to. Tim frowned at that, too. “The weather report definitely didn’t mention storms today.”

“Should we...head back?” Jon asked. He found himself resenting the idea of turning back when they were so close, when he felt they were on the verge of really finding something worth climbing a small mountain over.

“Hell, if we turn back now there’s a good chance we’ll end up exposed on the ridge when the rain hits,” Tim said. He looked back at the map, the GPS, the map again. “C’mon. Let’s try one more thing.”

Back into the plantation, angling across the rows of trees now instead of down the orderly aisles. Jon found himself scanning to the left or right for any break in the pattern, any glimpse of a stone altar, while still keeping Tim in sight in front of him. He hadn’t bothered to put his outer layers back on, even as the sky darkened, and for now he wasn’t at all chilled without them. He wasn’t sure if it was nerves or the suddenly increased pace or—

—something shimmering in his peripheral vision, like a heat mirage—

Jon froze, and then ever so slowly turned.

Perhaps fifty feet ahead of him, the rows of the plantation didn’t so much stop as distort: the trees suddenly grew larger and shaggier as they spiraled into a rough circle. The rough-cut stone in the center was a blue-black color utterly unlike the lumps of pale granite that had poked through the turf elsewhere along their route. Despite the threatening the sky, there was no wind, and the plantation was completely still — no animals, just as Jason North had observed, and none of the swarming midges that had plagued them on and off all morning. As Jon approached the clearing he could feel the air around him warming, heat radiating outward from the block of stone.

He was fifty feet away, close enough to see the glinting glass of bottles still hanging from their iron nails. Close enough to spot the small, roasted carcasses in the brittle grass, looking just as fresh and just as dead as they’d been in February 2009. It felt oddly dream-like, perhaps because this had only ever happened in his nightmares: to finally come to the scene of a statement, to see all the details without the distancing filter of someone else’s words. Jon took one more step toward the boundary of the circle, close enough that the heat of the place was a palpable pressure against his face, but could not make himself go any farther. Because that, somehow, would make the whole thing too real. That would make everything real.

(Something in him very much wanted to go farther.)

“Jon, don’t—”

Tim’s hard grip on his arm broke Jon out of whatever trance he’d fallen into; he yelped and started so badly he almost fell. He half-expected Tim to crack a joke about that. (He wanted Tim to crack a joke, to tease him about wandering off or something similar.) But Tim was looking in the same direction, clearly recognizing the same clues, and he looked as though laughter was the last thing on his mind.

“Good work,” Jon said, throat gone dry for reasons that had nothing to do with the rising heat. “This certainly appears to be the place.’

“Yeah.” Tim let Jon’s arm go, and they both stood there in awkward silence for a moment. “How...er. How close do you reckon we can get?”

“He said he wasn’t burned until he crossed the edge of the circle.” Jon wondered if Tim felt the same mix of apprehension and allure he did. The urge to walk away and ignore—but no, nothing had ever been gained by ignoring a thing like this. Knowledge was always better than ignorance. If he could just work out what was happening, find the rational explanation—

Tim dropped his rucksack to the ground and dug into it for a moment. “I’ve got a thermometer in here somewhere,” he said. “We should—log the temperature, yeah? As we get closer to the site?”

“Right.” Jon also took the time to get the Polaroid out of his bag, and figure out where Tim had hidden the extra packets of film for it. That was the whole reason they’d come, wasn’t it? Documenting this thing?

(Wasn’t that just another filter put over the experience, to keep the terror of it at arm’s length a while longer?)

They approached slowly, with their instruments out like talismans. Jon noted all the details that North had omitted, or perhaps merely not noticed at the time. How the grass inside the circle remained dead and dry even with the rest of the plantation flourishing. The patterns in the altar stone that suggested it had been hand-worked, not cut by a machine, despite its geometric precision. The acrid smell, not quite like petrol, that quickly overwhelmed everything else, until his eyes were nearly watering from it.

The boundary was clear between the living grass and the dead, and both of them gave it wide berth as Jon tried his best to snap pictures of the bottles (fetishes? charms?) that were still hanging from the trees. More than one lay broken on the ground now, and he wondered what else (or who else) had carelessly knocked them down since 2009, whether they had suffered a series of perfectly explicable disasters since then. He had to take his pictures at odd angles to avoid getting too close to the clearing’s edge, but it was better than risking — well. Better than attempting to experimentally validate Jason North’s statement.

Tim paused in his temperature logging to take a swig from his water bottle — it must’ve been a good forty degrees this close to the circle. Inside, of course, the milk bottles were boiling. “So, you reckon it’s voodoo?” he asked quietly.

“The jar spell is used throughout the African diaspora,” Jon said, just as softly. “Put an image or proxy of your target in a jar or bottle, add some symbolic material — honey for love, vinegar for sickness, and so on — then seal and sanctify it. This kind of … display, however, more closely resembles modern Wiccan or eclectic neo-Pagan practices, to the extent those can even be considered unified and cohesive traditions.”

Tim nodded, and then squinted a bit at the nearest bottle. “So who’s the target?”

Jon looked at the pictures developing in his hands, scanning each of them to see if Gertrude’s image was visible. The lie came easily. “No idea.”

“Whoever it is,” Tim said, “I really hope whatever they did to piss someone off this bad was worth it.”

Jon nodded. “God, I hope so, too.”

XXX

They moved away from the circle eventually, to eat something for lunch something outside its oppressive presence. Tim insisted on leaving a trail of bent branches and bits of orange ribbon behind them in case the circle disappeared again, despite the fact he’d logged its exact coordinates with the GPS. He also insisted they could refill their water bottles in the little river across the road, and proceeded to do so over Jon’s emphatic objections to drinking water off the ground.

Jon ate his share of the energy bars and dried fruit while he looked through his books for some sort of jar spell that resembled the ritual circle. The standard lists were sometimes close, but deeply unhelpful. It was only when he started looking at the more modern surveys, ironically, that he came across a reference to Joseph Glanvill’s Saducismus Triumphatus, and remembered another folk magic tradition of a similar sort: the English witch bottle, constructed not to hurt the target but to protect them, by attracting curses and other supernatural harm to itself.

Gertrude Robinson was just an archivist, though. She couldn’t possibly have attracted enough harm to herself that she needed to deflect it all the way to Scotland . Could she?

(She couldn’t possibly have angered something so powerful that its wrath still boiled water years later…)

“Found anything?” Tim asked; away from the awful heat and stillness, he was speaking at normal volume again, and Jon jumped hard enough to nearly drop his book. “Sorry! Sorry. Didn’t realize you were in the zone.”

“Something. Perhaps.” Jon carefully marked the page and stuffed the books (all of them) as deep into his pack as they’d go, next to his half of what Tim kept calling the emergency kit . It mostly looked like miscellaneous, violently orange plastic pouches to Jon, so he wasn’t sure why he was responsible for any of it. “I’m almost out of film for the Polaroid; is there anything else you wanted to check?”

“I mean, I brought a spade,” Tim said. “I don’t expect it would like me taking a soil sample, though.”

“I don’t expect you’d enjoy the process much, either.” Jon tucked the pictures into one of the dry bags Tim had loaned him, alongside his spare socks, and then sealed the bag again tightly. “I’d like to take one more look around, if you don’t mind.”

To Jon’s surprise, Tim stood up and gathered his things together. “Sure. Still plenty of time to get back before dinner.”

“You don’t have to tag along if you… that is, I’m just taking some written notes.” Jon hoisted his backpack up again, wincing a little as the straps settled into place, over what certainly felt like developing bruises.

Tim shrugged without meeting Jon’s eyes. “Always been a big believer in the buddy system. You don’t want to end up separated if anything….if you end up needing help.”

More thunder rolled overhead as they returned, a bit louder now. Jon borrowed Tim’s binoculars and walked the whole perimeter of the ritual circle, looking at each bottle as closely as he could and noting down the details: which were filled with what, the level, the spacing. The longer they stayed in the presence of the thing, the more habituated he got to the dread of it. The more habituated he got, the greater the urge to enter the circle for a closer look, even knowing what was likely to happen if he tried it. Maybe just putting one foot over the threshold, though. Maybe just reaching one arm. His hands were itching with curiosity—

(I itch, Jane Prentiss had written, and the association inexplicably made Jon shudder.)

“That’s everything,” he said out loud as he came back around the circle to Tim.

“Well, everything we can do,” Tim agreed softly.

“For now, at least. Hopefully it’s enough to persuade Elias to fund a proper research team for it.” Jon stuffed his notebook deep into his bag and then made to shoulder the hateful thing again. “Right, now how long is it going to—”

Maybe the turf didn’t really shift under him. Maybe he just slipped, or over-balanced as he juggled his rucksack. Maybe the dead grass reached out to grasp him, or maybe his old trainers just didn’t have enough grip.

It wasn’t like he wobbled much, even. Just enough to unthinkingly throw out a hand towards the first thing he could use to brace himself.

“Jon—” Tim blurted, eyes widening.

He registered the pain before he registered the rough bark of the tree under his palm. His hand had landed just barely inside the perimeter of the circle, and instantly he could feel his skin prickle and sting, like he’d stuck his arm into a hot oven. Jerking backwards, Jon almost tumbled over in the other direction. Probably would have done, if Tim hadn’t stepped in to catch him.

“Are you okay?” Tim demanded, grabbing at Jon’s wrist.

“I’m — I think it’s fine. Just — just burnt.” Like a bad sunburn, or a splash of scalding water, though when he looked closer he could see that all the fine hairs on the back of his hand had been singed away. He tried to force a laugh. “Perhaps I should take a Polaroid—”

Something cracked, behind them.

Afterwards, Jon would say it was probably lightening. There was no reason it couldn’t have been lightening. The fact that neither of them saw the flash, well, they weren’t really looking for it, were they? They’d heard thunder. Storms in the area. It was a reasonable explanation.

What he did see, in the split second after he looked up, was a deep crack in the altar stone that divided it down the center. A column of fire. (Lightening, one part of his mind still tried to insist. Lightless flame, insisted…something else.) An expanding column of fire that swept outwards towards them at incomprehensible speed, devouring the altar, and then the grass, and then—

Tim grabbed him by the strap of the rucksack, breaking his horrified trance, and Jon ran.

He wasn’t sure he had the strength to run for long, not after going up and down Ben Wyvis in a single day, but adrenaline and the threat of a fiery death could apparently do wonders for muscle aches. The heat behind him surged past uncomfortable to oven-like, to a sting that beat against their backs in waves, as embers overtook them and floated out ahead. There was a roar building up, too, louder and louder, some combination of cracking wood and displaced air and an angry, animal growl.

Tim could’ve outpaced him, and honestly should’ve: he was fitter, his stride was longer, he should’ve bolted to safety when he had the chance. Instead he kept one hand locked on Jon’s rucksack and kept glancing back with firelight reflected in his eyes. They fled blindly through the trees — no. Not blindly, Jon realized as he spotted one of the bits of orange ribbon curling in the heat. Down the path Tim had marked, which lead directly to the edge of the plantation, and beyond that—

They broke the trees and kept running, bounded over the rutted path, and straight into the river. The riverbed was studded with irregular stones, and Jon fell almost immediately, dragging Tim down with him into a pool as deep as his arms were long. For a moment he flailed, caught between the dead weight of his rucksack and the slippery rocks, unable to right himself Finally, though, he managed to find somewhere solid to put his feet. He twisted, turned around and looked back the way they’d come.

Some of the pines were fully engulfed in the flames, right up to the treeline. A cloud of dark smoke rose above, shimmering and hard to look at through the rippling heat. There were smoldering, smoking patches of ground that made him think even the peat was starting to catch. But yards of open ground lay between the flames and them, and even if the fire could’ve crossed it, well, they had the dubious protection of the wide, shallow river. .  

Just as Jon thought that, the towering flames flickered, all at once, and went out like a faulty light bulb.

… Well, then.

Tim, who’d made it all the way back to his feet at this point, choked out a noise that might’ve been mistaken for a laugh from a great distance. He bent over and braced his hands on his thighs, still panting for breath. Eventually he managed to say, “Okay, boss?”

“Intact, at least,” Jon said when he’d found his own voice. “You?”

“Well, you know, I’ve been better.”

With extraordinary care, Jon managed to stand and navigate the few steps to the water’s edge. Some of the trees were still smoking fitfully, but the green wood refused to really catch. They were blackened, though, from root to tip. It was as though whatever was really fueling the flames had abruptly switched off … or perhaps run out. There was still a plume of smoke rising from somewhere deeper in the forest, though at this point the thought of going back under tree cover — no. No, he didn’t think he’d be taking any more nature walks for a while after this.

Overheard, more thunder rumbled, and a slow rain began to fall over the whole horrific scene. Yes, after this Jon might just stay indoors forever.

XXX

They followed the tracks west, at one point coming across some sort of small garage or storage building. It wasn’t much shelter, but enough for them to sit down properly and assess the damages.

Jon’s rucksack was a bit scorched, and some of the plastic bits on the outside had actually started to melt, but the zippers still all worked. The dry bags had performed their intended function, protecting everything inside despite the dunking Jon had given them.. The books, however, had not been in dry bags, nor the Polaroid, which emitted a faint mechanical squawk when he tried to switch it on. At least the pictures themselves were intact, and his notebook had only taken partial damage.

Tim’s rucksack was in better shape, but he’d had his phone in an outside pocket, and the screen was a starburst of cracks where it must’ve dashed against a rock; it didn’t even make a sound as it refused to switch on. They were both a bit bruised and scratched from their headlong dive into the Abhainn Beinn na Eun, liberally splattered with mud, and the hand where Jon had first touched the ritual tree (had started the whole chain reaction, it seemed) was a deep pink on both sides, like a bad sunburn. “No blisters, at least.” Tim said, as if trying to sound encouraging. “Though I bet you’ll be peel something awful in a few days.”

“Rather be alive and peeling than the alternative,” Jon said firmly. “What about you, are you hurt?”

“Eh, probably?” He tried to bend his left hand at the wrist and grimaced. “That’s a yeah, actually. Must’ve sprained it when I fell.”

Jon helped him wrap it in an elastic bandage, while they considered their options. “I’d like to get out of here as quickly as we can, under the circumstances.”

“I don’t think falling in a stream is grounds for calling in the mountain rescue, unfortunately,” Tim said. “And about the rest...well, Jesus, Jon, would you believe us, if you were them?”

Of course not. Jon wasn’t sure he even believed it now that it had happened. Or perhaps he just didn’t want to believe it, even here, so far from the archives and the feeling of being watched. “So we’re going to have to climb the mountain again,” he sighed.

“Well, or at least make our way around the base of it.” Tim grabbed a paper packet of ibuprofen out of the little first-aid kit, tore it open with his teeth, and swallowed them dry. “Wish my phone had survived. If this rain is sticking around, we might as well try to find a way to dry off a bit.

“It’s not like we’re getting any wetter,” Jon grumbled. “Can’t we just go on through?”

Tim shrugged. “Maybe, but it’ll be freezing, and wet jeans aren’t the best thing to spend five hours hiking in, you know?”

He had not known, at the time, but had ample chance to learn. Jon’s phone, while unbroken, didn’t have any signal close to the river. They had to find their way back to Ben Wyvis, and the cold, clinging weight of wet denim was almost as obnoxious as the squelching of his trainers with every step. He looked enviously at Tim’s trousers, which were some kind of synthetic material, and were already noticeably drier despite the downpour around them. Or perhaps he just hadn’t gotten as thoroughly soaked in the first place.

Eventually, in the saddle between two steep hills, they found a stand of birch that gave a bit more cover from the rain. A tarpaulin and some ropes from Tim’s bag, rigged up over a branch, made a decently dry spot to sit. While Tim took off up the hill with Jon’s phone, Jon changed into what dry clothes he still had — socks, a long-sleeved shirt, the jacket he’d abandoned on the first ascent towards An Cabar — and then sat with some kind of silvery astronaut blanket in his lap while he tried to dry his jeans and shoes by sheer force of will.

(Tried not to think of a column of fire, of lightning, of lightless flame—why did he keep thinking of it like that, anyway? There had been plenty of light with the entire forest threatening to go up around them. Why did his mind keep coming back to the phrase, which didn’t even mean anything anyway and yet nagged at him like an itch ...)

When Tim came back down, he squeezed under the tarpaulin and started stripping off his own wet clothes. “Rain should mostly pass in about an hour, that’s the good news. Bad news is I managed to get a picture of the fire from the top of Queen’s Cairn.”

Jon took his phone back when Tim offered it. The photos were a bit blurry, especially with the rain, but it was hard to mistake the dark outlines of the plantation. The burst of fire had eaten an irregular black circle into it that had to be nearly a quarter-mile across at the widest point. “Good lord,” Jon murmured.. If they hadn’t got clear of the trees when they had… if Tim hadn’t marked the shortest path to the river, hadn’t physically dragged him the right direction…

“Yeah. Don’t think Elias will be sending anyone else out here, budget or not.” Tim’s head popped through the neck hole of his dry sweater. “If there’s even anything left of the circle to look at.”

“We’ve got the photos, though,” Jon said, more to reassure himself than anything. “And most of my notes are still legible. That’s...that’s not nothing.”

“Assuming we don’t get burnt to bits like Jason North did,” Tim added darkly.

Jon peered down the slope, toward the pond — or did it count as a loch? — cupped between two peaks of the mountain. “Technically he burned himself,” he pointed out.

“Whatever.” Tim spent a long time picking at the laces of his boots, and then said quietly and briskly. “Not keen on my friends and loved ones getting eaten by some kind of fire...curse...thingy.”

“Of course not.” Jon entertained himself briefly with morbid thoughts of who or what such a curse might target in his life. He had no family, few enough friends outside of work...then again, the archives themselves were very, very flammable. “Though technically neither of us destroyed anything in the circle, so even if there truly was a curse in effect on North, there’s no reason to assume we’ve invoked anything similar.”

“You invoked it, you mean,” Tim said. “You’re the one that pissed it off.”

Jon bristled despite himself. “It’s a ritual circle, Tim, not a person. It can’t be ‘pissed off’ because it’s not alive.”

“Well, not anymore, it’s not,” Tim said.

“Fine,” Jon said with a sigh. “I’ve annoyed the ritual circle. But that means you have to drive us back to Dingwall, so the hypothetical fire curse doesn’t decide to blow up our engine on the way.”

Tim turned to glare at him. “Are you using a hypothetical fire curse to get out of your share of the driving?”

“I’m just pointing out the risks.”

“And I’m pointing out I could just leave you here, hypothetical fire curse and all,” Tim grumbled, with hardly any real malice in it.

The rain was loud on the tarp above their heads, streaming off one side in a gushing spout. “You could’ve left me behind in the forest as well,” Jon pointed out, not even sure himself why he was bringing it up.

Tim’s head snapped up; his eyes had gone wide. “You really think I — Jesus, Jon, I’m just venting, okay? I’m not actually going to abandon you anywhere.”

“I didn’t say you would,” Jon said quickly. “But I still … I’m grateful. Thank you, is what I’m trying to say.”

“It’s...it’s okay.” Tim turned to stare at the loch down the slope. “Buddy system, right? That’s why you’re not supposed to go alone.”

He didn’t offer any other conversation. They settled into their own separate thoughts, while the rain came down around them.

XXX

When they did eventually set off back towards the car, the rain hadn’t stopped entirely, but it had at least downgraded from a steady downpour to an intermittent mist that filmed Jon’s glasse whether he wore his hat or not. The temperature had dropped significantly, especially on the higher elevations: they had to choose between being exposed on all sides along the trail, or blundering through soggy peat and bracken and god-only-knew-what lower down the slopes.. On the way out the view from the ridge had gone on for miles: now they seemed to be in an island in a sea of gray nothing, which might’ve been fog or (Jon realized with a start) might’ve simply been clouds gathered below their current elevation.

At least the cold and fatigue kept Jon from dwelling overmuch on fire, curses, Gertrude and/or worms. Not entirely, because he was very good at multitasking, but enough.

They started to pass more people as well — mostly hard-core hikers, judging by their gear, and the fact that they were out in the wet at all. Many of them had stern looks for Jon’s muddy jeans and less-than-waterproof jacket, but most didn’t offer more than a casual nod or brief greeting, and Tim managed to deflect any small talk attempts.

They limped — well, Jon limped, a little — the last few yards to the car, and unceremoniously dumped their gear into the boot. “Should we put down a towel or something?” Jon asked dully, looking at the mud caked onto his trainers. .

“The institute can afford the cleaning fee,” Tim said, and threw himself unceremoniously into the driver’s seat. If he hesitated a bit before turning the key — well, Jon wasn’t going to say anything.

(If Jon held his breath for a moment after the engine turned over, Tim either didn’t notice, or didn’t say.)

As they pulled out onto the A835, Jon inspected his burnt hand again. He could make a fist, though not without discomfort, but a bit of discomfort was far better than the alternatives. “Next time I’m bringing better protective gear,” he declared. “Even if I have to hire a Sherpa to help carry it all.”

Tim snorted. “And when will that be, d’you think? Not a lot of mountains in Greater London, after all.”

“Hmm. True. Sorry to spoil your only chance at a free hiking holiday.”

The wipers set a rhythm against the windscreen as the gleaming wet tarmac rolled away beneath them. “‘Salright,” Tim said. “Haven’t really gone out much in a while anyway. It’s … it was something I did with my brother, mostly.”

Jon didn’t miss the conspicuous past tense, but for once in his life fatigue beat out his natural curiosity. They were both already exhausted and wet; no point in dredging up family drama or bad memories that would likely make them both uncomfortable. He toyed with the center console instead, trying to work out how to turn up the heat so they could dispel the chill and the damp. Tim didn’t say anything further.

XXX

There were no mysterious fires on the way back to Dingwall, nor in the bed and breakfast as they unpacked their bags and spread out all the things that needed drying on the beds and counters and floors. Nothing untoward happened in the pub where they got a late dinner, unless one counted Jon’s embarrassing groans when he tried to get up after sitting for too long and eating too much.

“You sound like an eighty year old,” Tim said, mood clearly recovering now that he was full of grease and carbohydrates.

“I climbed a mountain today,” Jon protested. “Twice.”

“So did I, and I’m not making old man getting-up noises,” Tim said. “Are you sure you’re only twenty-eight?”

“Twenty-nine in a month. Why do people always assume—”

“Do you really want a list?” Tim asked in mock urgency. “Do you? Because we’ve got another eight hours on the train tomorrow, and I can make a list.”

Jon sighed. “Please don’t.”

Tim claimed first shower, so Jon stretched out on his bed and opened his laptop. He emailed Sasha and Martin to let them know that they had returned in one piece, though he didn’t feel up to recounting the full details of the trip just yet. He considered asking Martin to check the archives for any potential sources of ignition...then again, they were already surrounding themselves with fire extinguishers for the worms. Perhaps they’d get both terrifying birds with one stone, as it were….

He jolted out of a half-remembered dream to find the room dark, and Tim snoring away in the other bed. His laptop had been closed and moved to the nightstand, along with his glasses. Jon rubbed his eyes, then began the excruciating process of standing, so that he didn’t have to sleep in his clothes.

XXX

The next morning, as they waited for the train back to London, Tim quietly said, “You know, we could just...not go back.”

Jon, who was still half-asleep, blinked at him. “You mean, tell Elias we missed the train…?”

“I mean just…” Tim made an indecipherable gesture with the cup of coffee in his right hand. “Play hooky for a few days. Enjoy ourselves. Not have to worry about worms and curses and stuff?”

“Leave the worms to Sasha and Martin, you mean,” Jon said. Or leave them to the worms….

“I didn’t say that,” Tim said quickly. “I just...don’t you ever want a break , Jon? We could all use a proper break.”

A small, selfish part of Jon did want a break, of course he did. He wanted to never have taken Elias’s promotion, flattering though it was, so he could just bury himself in his research like he used to do, instead of worrying about worms and curses and bottles and secrets—

Except that wasn’t quite true, was it? He’d certainly wished those things away so he wouldn’t have to deal with him, but he’d wished that they’d never happened. Not that he could just live in ignorance while some other poor bastard had to put up with the problem. If there were going to be worms, Jon damn well wanted to know where they were coming from, instead of toiling in oblivious detachment upstairs in the research offices. No matter how unpleasant the answer turned out to be.

“I’ll talk to Elias,” he found himself saying, despite the direction of his thoughts. “See about getting you three some sort of … bonus leave or something.”

“Hazard pay?” Tim asked.

“That might be pushing it.”

Tim chuckled softly. “Worth a shot. What about you, though?”

Jon scratched at a cluster of midge bites on the back of his neck. “I believe you’re right about a basement office being my natural habitat. And … if something’s coming, I’d rather face it head-on, so to speak. Even if it means more late nights than I’d like.”

Tim didn’t answer him immediately, and Jon glanced up to find him giving him a strange look. “‘Something’s coming?’” he echoed. “You know something the rest of us don’t, boss?”

Maybe. He hoped not. He feared so. “It’s a figure of speech, Tim.”

“Right,” Tim said, sounding deeply skeptical.

The train pulled in, and they shuffled aboard. Mentally Jon was back in London already, planning out his next steps, and how he was going to fit them in among their existing workload. He unpacked his laptop and started opening his browser before he remembered he had to pay for the wi-fi. Not that anyone would be in the institute today… except Martin, of course, but Jon tried to avoid taking advantage of that fact considering the reason behind it. At the very least he could do some cursory fact-checking on some of the current statements, and perhaps dig into that article linked to case 0131103, so that when he got back to the institute Monday morning he could spare some time for the library…

“And I’ve lost you,” Tim said, and Jon only then realized he’d been speaking for several seconds before that. He didn’t look annoyed, merely resigned.

“Sorry, just looking at work things,” Jon said. “You were, er, asking about…?”

Tim just shook his head. “Never mind. It’s nothing important.” He leaned back in his own seat and shut his eyes.

Jon turned back to his laptop, feeling only a touch guilty, and got back to work.