William Meikle

OPERATION: LOCH NESS

- 1 -

The remains — a mélange of blood, guts, shattered bone, and fur — were strewn over a 10-yard circle on the rocks above the diving pool, but it was clear that other parts were noticeable by their absence. The head lay with an astonished expression on its face, looking up from where it was wedged in a rocky hollow, but there was no sign of one foreleg, one rear leg, and many of the internal organs.

“Where’s the rest of it?” Captain John Banks asked.

The man at his side didn’t look up from the carnage, and when he spoke it was dully, as if all emotion had been drained from him.

“What you see is what we found this morning. As for the other half… I have no idea.”

Banks was also at a loss to explain it. Outside of a battle zone, he hadn’t seen such bloody destruction of a body, man nor animal. It wasn’t something you ever expected to come across in a quiet spot in the Scottish Highlands.

“A pack of dogs, maybe?” he said, mostly to himself.

“Give over, Cap,” Wiggins said behind him. “What kind of mad dog could do a thing like that? We’re no’ in Siberia now.”

Banks stood over the torn mess of strewn body parts that was all that remained of a male polar bear, trying not to think of the size, or savagery, of the beast that had killed the poor, zoo-tamed thing. Wiggins was right though, they weren’t in Siberia, although this particular Highland Wildlife Park in Inverness-shire had several animals that wouldn’t have been too far out of place back there in that strange, cursed zoo. The Kincraig facility prided itself on housing a collection of Scottish animals, both those that still roamed the countryside, and those that had in times past.

At least it had had the animals, until the events of the previous night.

* * *

“The local coppers are at a loss, and asked if we could shed any light on a problem they are having,” the colonel had said when he called Banks in that morning back at base in Lossiemouth. “You S-squad chaps are the nearest thing we have to experts in this kind of weird shite. So head on down, have a reccy, and see if anything makes any sense to you. You have no jurisdiction of course, and I don’t expect you to do anything but see what’s what and offer any guidance you think it requires. Just don’t go tooled up, and try to play nice with the locals. This is a PR exercise as much as anything.”

“So what kind of weird shite are we talking about this time, exactly?” Banks had asked.

“The dead and mutilated animal kind,” the colonel had said, “down at Kincraig in the Wildlife Park. Something got in among the exhibits. It’s a bit of a bloody mess by all accounts.”

Banks had had a sinking feeling in his gut even before he left his superior’s office, and it had persisted while he got the team together, and was still troubling him all the way down the road in the SUV.

The four of them, the regular squad of Banks, Hynd, McCally, and Wiggins, had spent the hour-long drive down mostly in silence, it being still early, without a chance of any coffee or breakfast, and none of them yet fully awake. Wiggins had even fallen asleep in the back, his snores louder than the roll of tires on roadway, and he only woke as they turned off the road and into the park.

* * *

They went through a gate that was opened for them by a surly chap with no manners and fewer words, then went up a rough track across some rugged moorland. Even here, it was obvious something was far wrong. Small groups of park workers stood around areas where the boggy grassland, dry and browning this late in the year, was smeared red across large swathes.

The park manager, a wiry middle-aged man who looked as if he might blow away in a strong wind, white-faced and red around the eyes where he’d been crying, met them in the car park and led them north up a rocky track to the main animal enclosures.

“The worst of it is up here,” he said.

Banks looked to their left, where a tall fenced-off area enclosed what had been a lynx cage. The animal itself lay in half a dozen different parts, all strewn across the tall sleeping platform that overlooked the caged area. One whole side of the cage had been torn off and thrown aside, a mangled rectangle of metal, mesh, and cabling, as much destroyed as the animal it had failed to protect. Some of the beast’s guts hung like rows of drying sausages from a branch of a pine tree some 15 feet off the ground.

“Bloody hell,” Wiggins muttered. “If that’s no’ the worst of it, I don’t think I want to see what is.”

“Trust me, you don’t,” the park manager said, and the sinking feeling in Banks’ gut got noticeably worse.

* * *

Now they were here, looking down at the gutted and partially skinned shell of what had been left of the bear, and Banks’ gut was rolling on double time.

This is going to be a bad one.

The park manager, he’d introduced himself as David Lang, had hardly spoken since their arrival, and now seemed close to tears again, having to turn away from the corpse of the bear. Banks went to his side.

“Okay, there’s this, and the lynx that we saw, and whatever else was out on the hill on the way in,” he said. “What was the total damage?”

“We lost the bear, the lynx, eight red deer, three bison, and six caribou,” Lang said dully, as if it was something he had set to memory in the hope of never having to think about it if asked to repeat it.

“Anything else?”

Lang sobbed.

“Is that not enough?”

“What else do you have here?”

“A shitload more deer and bison, some horses, a pair of brown bears, four Siberian tigers, a pack of a dozen wolves, boar, otters, beavers, and a whole load of small animals and birds, waterfowl, and raptors.”

“And they’re all okay?”

“The whole place is as jittery as a groom at a shotgun wedding,” Lang said. “But the ones that didn’t escape are alive. What the fuck happened to these here though?”

“I was hoping you would tell me,” Banks replied. “Did anybody see or hear anything?”

“The night watchman was in his wee hut at the gates. He heard the wolves first, in the early hours, howling and barking, but that’s not unusual when one of them’s in heat. Then he heard the polar bear. He said it sounded like it had got a red-hot poker up its arse — his words, not mine. He took maybe 30 seconds getting his shotgun and loading it, and legged it up here, but by the time he arrived, it was like you see it now. If you look closely among the parts, you’ll see where he lost his supper.”

“He didn’t see anything else? Any intruders?”

“You think people did this? What kind of people could do such a thing?”

Banks didn’t reply. He knew exactly what kind of people would be capable; he’d faced many of them down the barrel of a gun in years gone by. But this didn’t have the feel of fanaticism. This definitely looked like the work of another animal but he didn’t have enough info yet to make a guess as to what.

“Any idea how whatever did it got in?” he asked.

“That’s the easy bit. Come away over here and I’ll show you.”

They followed Lang down a slope. The wolf pen on their left intersected with a taller barrier out into a more open part of the park beyond. A long stretch of the wire-mesh fence was flattened, and several of the iron uprights were bent in bow-shaped curves.

“Bloody hell, Cap,” Wiggins said at Banks’ side. “I don’t want to be messing with whatever did that.”

Bank didn’t reply. He crouched on his haunches, studying the ground, looking for tracks, but the whole area was so wet and churned it was hard to tell what might have destroyed the fence.

Banks waved over the open ground.

“All of this ground in front of us is part of the park?”

“Aye,” Lang said. “Or it was. There’s another fence over to the north with a hole in it as big as this. And all the rest of the bloody deer and bison that were in this enclosure have fucked off and away through it. It’s going to take days to round all the buggers up — if it’s even possible.”

“Did any of your predators escape?”

“Thankfully, no. The last thing the people of Kingussie need is to pop out for a fag and meet a Siberian tiger on their driveway or a pack of wolves at the chippie.”

“Just another Saturday night in town,” Wiggins said, then went quiet when Banks gave him a look to remind him they were on the clock.

“This other hole? How far is it?”

“Almost a mile away across the moor,” Lang said. “There’s nothing to see you haven’t seen here. But if you need to see it, you can get your van along the track, just turn left up the hill outside the car park. It’s usually open for the public to drive ‘round. We’re lucky this happened late in the season; we’re going to be shut for weeks dealing with this shite.”

“Okay, lads,” Banks said. “Back to the van. Let’s see what there is to see over there.”

Lang didn’t want to go with them; Banks saw it in his eyes. He guessed that it would be because there were more dead beasts to be found in the open area, and that guess was proved right five minutes later as Wiggins drove the four of them along the rutted track that circumnavigated the open area of the park.

The hole in the fence to the north was immediately obvious, as were the corpses of more slaughtered beasts scattered around the new opening. They were unidentifiable until Banks got out of the SUV and stepped up close. What had once been deer were identifiable only by antlers or ears and the distinctive red hair. Similarly, a huge hairy head and wide horns told him there had been a bison killed here. But the meat had been stripped, almost surgically, from the bones and there was little left but bloody skeletons and heads.

“Fuck me, Cap,” Hynd said. “Something was hungry. What are we into this time?”

“I don’t know, Sarge,” Banks replied. “But whatever it was, it went this way. Let’s take a wee shufti through the fence and see if there’s anything else to see.”

The colonel had told them not to go out in public tooled up, and Banks had obeyed him that far. But heading across rough ground wasn’t public, and he’d feel a lot safer with a gun in his hand, especially if there was still a hungry beastie in the area.

“Cally, get the boot open and let’s get at the pistols. If we’re going hunting, we need something to shoot with.”

Corporal McCally handed them each a service pistol and two magazines each; regs said that any higher-caliber weaponry needed top-level authorization, and thus far, they didn’t have that on this jaunt. The pistol felt too light in Banks’ hand, not enough if they had to try to take down something capable of so easily bending iron and taking down a polar bear.

It was obvious that the men felt the same way.

“Maybe we should go back to the watchman and get a lend of yon shotgun?” Wiggins said.

“Nope. We’ve spent enough time fannying about already,” Banks replied. “We’re going to have a quick shufti through the gap in the fence, and if we find nowt, then it’s back to the squad room for a pie and a pint.”

“I vote we find nowt,” Wiggins said, then went quiet as Banks led them off the road and across the wet ground to the torn and tumbled remnants of the fence.

* * *

“Can we have a fag, Cap?” Wiggins asked as they walked up to the mangled fencing. “I’m gasping here.”

Technically, they were on the clock, but Banks nodded, and took one when the private shared his pack around. He’d started the habit up again on the Amazon trip, and despite several tries hadn’t managed to shake it off in the intervening months. Now it had him gripped again, as strong as it had ever been, and he gave in to it with barely a regret, lighting up with a Zippo he’d kept in a drawer at his desk. The click-rasp-clack as it opened, fired, and closed was another part of the almost comforting ritual. He sucked a long draw, enjoying the hit on an empty stomach, and only then turned his attention to the damaged perimeter fence.

It was as equally torn asunder as the one up at the main park had been, with bent stanchions and flattened mesh. This time, there was something else besides the streaks of gore on the trampled ground. There were definite tracks, several of them, but Banks was at a loss to explain them. His sergeant crouched down beside him for a look.

“What in Hell’s name have we got here, Cap? Could another big bear have escaped that they’re not telling us about?” Hynd asked.

The tracks certainly looked something like bear, but they were huge, each the size of two large hands outstretched while touching thumb to thumb, and almost circular, a large pad with four distinct toe-marks at the front, with a hint of a fifth. Each toe mark was topped with a sharply delineated line where long claws had dug into the muck.

“Have you ever seen a bear that big?” Banks asked.

“Well,” Wiggins replied at his back, “there was that time when the sarge’s wife had on a bikini.”

Hynd gave Wiggins a two-fingered salute and turned back to Banks.

“Seriously, Cap, what are we looking at here?”

“All we can say for sure right now is that it looks to be a large, a very large, mammal of some sort. It’s got four legs if I’m reading the tracks right, and it’s a predator,” Banks replied.

“Thank fuck for that,” Wiggins said with a grin. “I was worried we were going after a giant fucking kangaroo. They’re bloody lethal.”

One look from Banks was enough to silence the private. Banks led the squad forward, stepping over the wrecked fencing and looking over the rough moorland beyond.

* * *

They stood at a high spot, looking over a mile-wide basin dotted with black peaty pools. Clouds of midges swarmed lazily, but nothing else moved. The tracks they’d seen led down into the basin then were lost again in churned mud at a low wet point. Banks gauged his position from the sun.

“It’s heading almost directly northwest. There’s nowt over there but rough ground until the hills and the Ness.”

“And even after you get through yon bog, there are plenty of copses and areas of thin woodland where a beastie could be hiding,” Hynd replied. “We’re not equipped for a yomp or a hunt, Cap.”

“Don’t fash yourself bout that, Sarge,” Banks replied. “Our orders were just to do a reccy and not upset the locals. Job done on both fronts. We go back, tell the colonel we don’t have a Scooby, and then get that pie and pint I mentioned.”

Banks knew in his heart it wasn’t going to be that easy — in this job it never was — but there was nothing to be gained by tramping over a wet bog in the wrong gear chasing after what might be a dangerous animal.

“Back to the van, lads,” he said. “We’ll check in with the park manager and see if anything’s changed, then head back up the road for our dinner.”

- 2 -

The park manager had nothing new to report, and didn’t even seem to notice them leave. He stood, cigarette burning unnoticed in his fingers, at the door of the deserted visitor’s center, staring blankly out over the car park that lay empty apart from the squad’s van and four other cars. Banks guessed they belonged to the few staff that remained in the facility. Banks couldn’t tell from the distance, but he got the impression that Lang might be crying again.

“Maybe we should stay and see what we can do to help, Cap?” McCally said as Wiggins drove them out of the car park and took the turn downhill to the main road.

“The civil authorities won’t want us sticking our nose in,” Banks replied, “and neither will the colonel. Trust me on that, lad. This is a clusterfuck waiting to happen and somebody’s going to have to take the blame. So it’s heads down and mouths shut time, you know the drill. Just think yourselves lucky that the press hasn’t got wind of it yet. You would have been seeing us on the telly on the six o’clock news, and then the shite really would have hit the fan.”

“Fame at last,” Wiggins said with a grin, then had to pay attention as they exited the narrow entrance onto the main road at the same time as two vans tried to come in. One of the drivers lent heavily on his horn, Wiggins gave him two fingers, called him a wanker, and forced their way past without stopping. The second van trying to enter had to brake hard to avoid hitting the first and then Wiggins was clear and away, leaving more blaring of horns in their wake.

“Fucking amateurs,” Wiggins muttered.

Banks turned to check that they hadn’t left an accident behind. Both vans were, carefully now, negotiating the entrance and were side on to him so that he could see the logos on their flanks. One was from BBC Scotland, the other from the local newspaper.

We got out just in time.

* * *

“Get me a pie and a pint,” Banks said to Hynd when they got back to Lossiemouth and parked up the van. “I’ll be right with you. Just got to report in to the boss, and that’s only going to take a minute.”

It took much longer than he expected. The colonel was on the phone, and Banks had to wait 10 minutes for the call to finish before he was allowed in. His stomach grumbled, reminding him that he hadn’t even had breakfast yet, but he stayed in the chair opposite the colonel’s secretary; if his superior knew that he’d got back and not made a report, it would be his balls rather than mutton that would be in the pie.

Eventually, he was allowed into the colonel’s office. The officer listened without speaking at first, then sucked at his teeth before replying.

“I don’t like it, John.”

“It’s bad for the park, right enough, sir, what with the loss of revenue from having to close even above the loss of the animals themselves,” Banks replied. “But as you told me this morning, it’s not in our jurisdiction. They’ll need animal control people out on the hill to round up the escaped beasts and find out what killed the others, not a bunch of squaddies looking for something to shoot at.”

“If it was just the park, I wouldn’t be so worried,” the colonel said, and Banks felt the sinking in his gut again and knew he wouldn’t be getting to that pie and pint any time soon as his superior continued. “That’s what I’ve been on the blower about before you came in. Things have been hinky around that area for a couple of weeks. The local police and the county council have been trying to keep a lid on it, but the farmers are up in arms, rumors are flying, and now with this thing in the park… ”

He trailed off. Banks had seen the BBC van and guessed the news was out all over town, or would be imminently. He hesitated to ask the next question, guessing it was only going to lead to trouble, but the silence was dragging on, so he filled it.

“Hinky in what way, sir?”

The colonel told him and he went to tell the squad that the drinking would have to wait. They were going back on the clock.

* * *

“Missing sheep? Cattle mutilations?” Wiggins said as they were getting kitted up after a very short briefing. “What the fuck is this now, the bloody Scottish X-Files? Why are we always getting the weird shite?”

“Because the colonel knows you love it so much,” Hynd replied.

“And don’t worry, Wiggo,” McCally added. “If any wee green men turn up, we’ll not let them probe you. Not for long anyway; we all know you’d enjoy it too much.”

“Just let them try it. I’ll kick them in the balls, if they’ve got any, and in the arse if they haven’t.”

“And what if they don’t have an arse?” McCally said, laughing.

“Don’t talk shite, man. Everything’s got an arse. Nothing’s quite as big as the one on the sarge’s missus though.”

Wiggins had to dance aside to avoid a slap from Hynd.

“Apart from yours,” McCally said. “Them aliens could see yon from space and they wouldn’t even need a telescope.”

“Aye, maybe, but they’d need a microscope to see your tadger.”

Banks let them have the banter while they got kitted up; they’d be all too serious soon enough. Given the terrain he expected to be walking, he’d ordered bad weather gear and full rucksacks for camping out; they might be on the hills for a while, and even at this time of the year, there was often snow on the high tops. It was best to be prepared for any eventuality.

“Lugging this lot around in a bog isn’t going to be much fun, is it, Cap?” Wiggins said as he threw his rucksack into the back of the SUV five minutes later. Banks waited until the private had stowed his rifle in the mounted gun rack before replying.

“We don’t pay you to have fun, Wiggo,”

“Strictly speaking, you don’t pay me enough to do fuck all apart from have a couple of pints and a few packs of smokes.”

“And that’s a problem?”

“Well, I was promised all-I-could-manage Colombian marching powder and high-class prozzies when I signed up.”

“That’s only for the posh lads from the public schools,” McCally chimed in. “We get Sweaty Betty the Shettleston bike and a wee dab of sherbet, and that’s if we’re lucky.”

“We’ll stop off in Aviemore on the way back,” Banks said, “and see what we can do about getting Wiggo laid. He’s obviously pining for something.”

“Aye,” Wiggins replied. “The sarge’s wife’s arse mainly.”

This time, Wiggins didn’t dance away fast enough, and got a cuff on the ear from Hynd. He was still rubbing at it when he got into the driver’s seat, started up the SUV, and headed out onto the road south.

“Where are we headed, Cap?” Wiggins asked.

Banks sat up front, with an Ordnance Survey (OS) map open in his lap, working out a route that would see them crisscrossing the bogs and hill country. It was rough terrain in the main, but not mountainous, and as long as the weather held up, he knew the squad could handle it easily, even with their packs; they’d all trained in far worse.

“Stay to the same roads as earlier for now. There’s a turn off a mile before the park that’ll take us up a track to a reservoir,” he said when he was satisfied. “We should be able to park there and get up into the hills on a rough hiker’s track.”

* * *

They drove in silence for a while, with the windows down while they all had a smoke. Banks’ stomach growled; the others had at least managed to fit in a quick lunch while he’d been with the colonel. All Banks had managed was two chocolate bars and a cup of weak, watery coffee from the mess vending machines, and he had a feeling that wasn’t going to be enough to sustain him in the yomp to come. He checked in the glove compartment in front of him, found a packet of chewy toffees left by the last occupants, and ate four for the quick sugar hit before passing them around. Chewing replaced smoking for the next few minutes.

Wiggins, as usual, was the first to speak up. The private had never met a silence he didn’t want to fill. Banks knew that he came from a big, noisy family, where he who talked loudest and fastest got noticed. The habit had followed the lad into first his regiment where he got a reputation as a bit of a loudmouth and now, toned down a tad from the youth he’d been some years before, into the squad. He’d been with them since joining to replace the dead from the Baffin Island affair. He was loyal to a fault to his friends, and a good soldier. That meant Banks was more than happy to cut him some slack, as long as it didn’t descend into insolence.

“Seriously, Cap. What the fuck are we after this time? Any ideas?”

‘Something that eats sheep, cows, deer… and polar bears,” Banks said.

“Well, that narrows it down a bit. Just wait and I’ll check in my Ladybird Book of Big Fucking Monsters.”

“We don’t know it’s a monster,” McCally said from the back. “As we said earlier, it could be an escaped bear, like yon tame Grizzly that was running about on the Hebridean islands years back.”

“I think somebody might have reported a fucking enormous escaped bear,” Banks said dryly, “and whatever it is, it’s got the brass worried. When they get worried, I get worried that the shite is going to get poured downhill.”

“Aye, me too,” Wiggins replied. “And I’m at the bottom of the fucking valley.”

Banks let the men speculate as their ideas got wilder and wilder. They started placing bets, with cigarettes on the line.

“It’s a fucking enormous cat of some kind,” McCally said. “Like yon ‘Beast of Dartmoor’. There’s long been rumors of exotic big cats running loose up here. I bet 20 fags on it.”

“A pussy as big as a house? Now that I’d like to see,” Wiggins replied.

Hynd spoke up quickly, as if he sensed another joke about his wife coming.

“We made a report about yon kerfuffle in Siberia, right? Maybe some mad scientist type has been back over there and fetched back a dire wolf. We all saw that they were hungry big bastards. This is just like that, so I’ll put down three packs of smokes on it being a Russian wolf, or a pack of them.”

“Them tracks weren’t right for a dog though,” Wiggins replied. “So I’ll match your three packs of fags, and put them on the wee green men fucking with us again. Remember, I was inside yon saucer in Antarctica when it nearly had away with me. I ken exactly what they’re capable of.”

“Dinnae talk shite, Wiggo, that was the fucking Nazis that built yon. There’s no such thing as fucking aliens.”

Wiggins lapsed into his infamous bad American accent again.

“Chariots of the Gods, man. They practically own South America.”

* * *

Banks let them speculate but didn’t offer a bet of his own. None of it made any sense to him. All he had to go on were the bloody huge tracks they’d seen at the Wildlife Park. They were terrifying enough on their own, given his estimate of the size of the beast that made them. He went back to studying the map, this time looking, not for a route, but for places where a large predator might be able to hide itself. He marked the spots where those places intersected with his planned route.

There were far too many of them.

* * *

Wiggins drove them off the main road and onto a rutted track, where they bounced around for half a mile before cresting a rise to look over a small reservoir set in a valley between rolling hills. They parked up next to a sluice gate on a gravel area that looked to have been created for the purpose. There was no sign that anyone else had used it recently, not even a rusted Coke can in the verge, or cigarette butts on the gravel.

Bank was first to retrieve his rucksack, and was kitted up and studying the terrain to the northwest while the others got ready for the walk. It didn’t look too bad from here, but he knew from tough experience that the hills around this area often looked nice from a distance, but became real bastards when it came to climbing them.

“Handguns or rifles, Cap?” Hynd asked from behind him.

“Rifles,” Banks replied, and stepped over to take a weapon from the rack. “And plenty of ammo. We might need it if this thing is as big as we think it is. If we come across any hikers or farmers, don’t shoot them; the colonel wouldn’t be happy. And if anybody asks, we’re on a training exercise.”

He turned back to look across the reservoir. The hiker’s track he’d traced with a finger on the map was clearly delineated in the landscape, a gray scar running away from them across the hillside. Banks knew from the contours that there would be dips and hollows, wet spots that they might have to circumnavigate, but the early part of the walk definitely looked even easier than he might have hoped.

It didn’t stop Wiggins complaining though. The muttering began as soon as he strapped on the rucksack and hefted his rifle.

“Bloody hell, Cap,” he said, “I can barely lift this sodding gear nevermind walk with it up a fucking hill.”

“Tired and worn out after a long hard shag are you, Wiggo?”

“Long hard wank more like,” McCally said, and the laughter seemed to buoy them all up as the four of them walked off the small parking spot and onto the rocky track leading northwest.

“Everybody remember where we parked,” Wiggins said.

* * *

They smoked as they negotiated the track around the edge of the reservoir; Hynd’s high-tar cigarettes did a better job of keeping the midges away than any repellent was able to.

“A trick I learned from my auld granddad when I was 14,” Hynd said. “My grannie gave him hell for starting me smoking, mind. But anything’s preferable to being eaten alive by these wee fuckers.”

Banks was forced to agree, although the smoke was making him light-headed, and he was once more aware of the lack of breakfast.

At least the pack didn’t feel too onerous a burden. The ground at this point of the track made for good walking. A gravel walkway had been laid around the reservoir at some time long past, and although it was overgrown with weed in places and muddy in others, all they had to dodge were a few larger puddles in sunken spots.

Banks kept his gaze on the softer ground to either side, looking for any sign that the big beast they were looking for had passed this way. He saw nothing apart from old, dry, rabbit and sheep droppings and one, stinking, maggot-infested dead jackdaw to indicate the presence of local wildlife.

And when this thing we’re after shites, it’s going to be a bit more noticeable.

Wiggins, as Banks knew he would, kept up a constant litany of complaints at the rear. They were all used to it, and Banks even found it comforting in a way. If Wiggins was complaining, he knew they weren’t currently in trouble, for the private, for all his volubility, always knew when focus was needed and was more than ready to be first into the action.

Hynd had point, and led them off the gravel and away from the reservoir, up the first small hill to the northwest. Banks felt the rucksack tug at his back for the first time, a warning of what was to come. He knew it was going to get tougher, a lot tougher, but pushed the thought away. He might be carrying it for hours yet, and thinking about it now was definitely counter-productive.

Thin drizzle in his face made him look up. The skies had lowered and gone flat gray, typical weather for the time of year, but at least it wasn’t cold and didn’t look like it was going to rain any harder. They’d all tramped in much worse, in much worse places, and at least here they had the bonus that nobody was shooting at them.

* * *

They walked, climbing gently upward, for two hours in the drizzle. His waterproof camo suit and stout boots kept Banks dry apart from the occasional trickle of water down the back of his neck, and he’d got used to the swing of the rucksack, adjusting his stride into the lope he knew he could sustain for several more hours at this speed.

They stopped for a smoke at the crest of a hill with a view down a long high valley, the slopes on either side purple and pink and orange with heather. The track they were following wound down the slope below them toward a small loch a mile or so away. Apart from the tumbled ruin of a farm cottage at the loch side to the south, and old drystone dykes on the hillside above the ruin delineating were small fields had once been there was no sign civilization had ever touched this place. The cottage lay at the edge of a small copse of old conifer woodland, little more than a couple of acres in area. It was one of the spots that Banks had marked on his map as a site of possible danger.

He pointed the copse out to the squad.

“We’ll need to be careful down there, and focussed. Yon’s plenty of woodland for a big beastie to hide in. So heads on tight, and quiet as we go. Let’s see if there’s anything to flush out. If we’re lucky, we’ll find it in the first place we look.”

“Aye,” Wiggins said and smiled, “because that’s always worked so well for us in the past.”

But they were all quiet when they finished their smokes and headed into the valley.

Banks kept a close eye on the sky as they went down the narrow track; the clouds had got lower and darker, and the constant drizzle was now threatening to turn to real rain. Even that didn’t bother him unduly; he’d climbed Snowdon in a full-on blizzard in his training — anything after that was a piece of piss in comparison. But he was aware that time was creeping on. This late in the year, it wouldn’t be too long before the gloom of dusk descended, and despite the fact they’d brought their tents, he didn’t relish being out on the hill and exposed in the dark.

“We’ll check out the copse, make sure nothing’s going to creep up on us, then hunker down in what’s left of the cottage. A fire, a cup of coffee, some grub, and a fag sounds good to me about now.”

“No argument from me, Cap,” Hynd said, and he led them deeper down the valley.

* * *

He’d been right in his assessment; the drizzle turned to steady rain as they reached the valley floor, and nobody complained when the sarge upped the pace, heading at double time for the copse of conifers. They stopped at the edge of the trees, getting some shelter from the overhanging branches, although water was already dripping steadily from the pine needles. Banks put up his hood, the patter of droplets sounding like a manic drummer on the top of his head.

“Wiggo, you’re with me. Sarge and Cally, you head ‘round the far side, double time. Make a quick sweep through and we’ll meet in the middle, see if there’s anything to flush out. Don’t shoot us, we’re the ones with two legs, but if anything bigger makes a move, put it down fast and ask questions later, even if it just turns out to be a deer. Move out.”

He waited until the other two men were out of sight ‘round the corner of the copse, counted slowly to 20, then led Wiggins under the canopy of trees, following an old deer track that hadn’t been used in recent memory. Wiggins had finally fallen quiet, and Banks saw the same tension in the younger man that he felt in himself. No matter how many times you walked into a possible shooting match, it never got all that easier, and the sudden dryness in his mouth reminded him clearly of past fights, both victories and defeats. A red squirrel scampered quickly up a tree trunk a few yards ahead of them and he felt his finger twitch at the trigger, having to force himself to calm as they went in deeper.

They were soon sheltered from the worst of the rain, but the gloom lay deep under the canopy; dusk was approaching fast. Everything under the branches was damp and dark, wet lichens hung just at the right height to slap in their faces, and the ground felt springy, almost boggy, under a bed of dead, brown needles. Another red squirrel looked down at them from a high branch then scurried away, sending a small shower of needles in its wake, but apart from that, nothing else moved until they saw Hynd and McCally appear out of the murk ahead of them.

“All clear, Cap,” Hynd said. “There’s nowt here but us and some squirrels.”

Banks sighed, not sure if it was in relief or disappointment.

“Looks like we’re spending the night out here then, lads,” he said. “Let’s see what shelter we can get in the cottage.”

* * *

The cottage was a simple, three-roomed affair, or at least it had been at one time. Now it was little more than four sandstone walls, none of them in particularly good shape, with even less sturdy red brick partitions in the interior. Both inside and outside were thick with dark green moss and lichen and the floor, paved with heavy stone slabs, was covered in timber and broken slate that had fallen from what remained of the roof. The kitchen and main living area were in the most ruin, with the roof having completely fallen in during some distant winter storm. But what had been a bedroom still had three of its walls, and most of the roof overhead.

McCally was able to jerry-rig one of the tents, flattening it out under the rafters such that it kept them mostly free of the drips. There was enough almost dry wood lying around to allow then to set a fire in a wide stone fireplace. They had to poke a long stick up the chimney to free an old bird’s nest but after they’d done that, the smoke escaped freely and they were able to enjoy some heat while Wiggins got coffee going on the camp stove and Banks made inroads into his field rations. They were as comfortable as they could ever expect to be while out in the field.

Banks hadn’t realized how hungry he’d been until he opened the food pack and the smell of it made him salivate. He wolfed it down quickly and was about to start in on another pouch when he stopped. They could be tramping about in these hills for a while yet, and he might need more sustenance after a longer walk in rougher ground tomorrow. He put the pouch away with regret and took a mug of coffee from Wiggins.

“Stop me if I’m wrong,” Wiggins said as he lit up a smoke, “but haven’t we seen this film? A bunch of squaddies, out in the Scottish Highlands, finding mutilated animals, then taking shelter in a farm cottage while there’s a monster fannying about out in the dark?”

McCally laughed.

“Aye, so that means as Corporal, I’m the good looking one that survives to the end, and you’re the loud-mouthed one that’s destined for dog food. But I thought you were all in for the wee green men theory, Wiggo? Are you changing your mind to ‘huge fucking howling things’?”

“Nah, I’m sticking with the fucking aliens for now. I’m just wondering when the posh bird that talks dirty will turn up. She’d be a comfort to a lad on a cold night, that one.”

* * *

Banks checked his watch; six o’clock.

“I’ll take first watch at the door from now until nine,” he said. “Three-hour stints, Sarge after me, then Cally, and Wiggo gets the shift before breakfast.”

He rose away from the fire and took his coffee with him to go and stand in the doorway, looking over the rubble-strewn main living area beyond and to the open space that had been the main doorway and end wall in the original building. Now it looked out onto the small loch, the surface of the water black as night took its grip in the valley. Within five minutes, he couldn’t see more than a few yards in the darkness beyond the room.

The only sounds were the patter of raindrops all around and the quiet chatter of the squad at the fire as they played hand after hand of three-card-brag for cigarettes. Banks stood in what remained of the bedroom doorway, getting as much shelter as he could, but even then he had to put his hood up to avoid a steady drip down the back of his neck. At seven-thirty, halfway into his shift, he went forward and stood at the main door of the ruin, looking out into the night. There was only blackness, no lights to show that any other human being was around for miles. He thought he caught a glimmer of pink reflecting on the underside of the clouds away to the east, a town’s lights reflecting off low clouds. That was probably Kingussie if he had his bearings right, but even that soft glow was quickly lost in the night as the rain came even heavier, forcing him to retreat back to the doorway.

He smoked another cigarette then fell into that almost fugue state that all people who have to take guard on a regular basis developed, one where his eyes were open, and he knew he would react immediately to any sound or movement, but he was able to drift, almost half asleep. He remembered that he still had some of the toffees in his pocket, and he chewed, almost mechanically, on them, unwrapping a new one as soon as the last was eaten until they were all gone and he felt less hungry, but rather queasy at all the sugar. After the sweets were done, he had another smoke, then fell once again into his watchful meditation.

He was surprised when Hynd tapped him on the shoulder, as he thought only minutes must have passed, although his watch said nine when he checked.

“All clear, Cap?”

“All clear.”

“If you get tempted to play a hand, watch out for Cally tonight,” the sergeant said. “He’s on a hot streak and has already got most of Wiggo’s fags and half of mine. Says it’s his lucky day.”

Banks picked up the coffee mug from his feet, poured out the half-inch of rainwater that had gathered there, and, leaving Hynd at the door, went back to the fire, sitting as close as he dared until he felt some heat reach into his bones. Wiggins handed him another coffee, but didn’t ask if he wanted a game. Banks sat on his haunches, smoking, sipping coffee and staring into the fire until tiredness took him. He got his sleeping bag from his pack, wiggled inside without even taking off his boots and, with his rucksack as a pillow, was asleep in minutes.

McCally shook him awake sometime in the depths of the night.

“Cap?” the corporal whispered. “I think there’s something outside.”

- 3 -

Banks rose quickly, squirmed out of the sleeping bag and rose, his rifle already, instinctively in hand. He went with McCally to the doorway, careful not to kick anything loose that might give away their position. Hynd stirred but didn’t wake, and Wiggins’ snoring didn’t miss a beat. He left them sleeping.

“No sense waking them if it’s a false alarm,” he said quietly and McCally nodded.

“It might just be a stray dog,” the corporal said. “I heard loud barking, twice, the second time closer than the first. But the weird thing is, I think it was coming from out on the loch rather than on land.”

“Fisherman with his dog in the boat maybe? You know some lads like a bit of night fishing?”

“Aye, maybe, but there’s been no other sounds, no light of any kind. It’s got me fair spooked, and I’m not feert to admit it.”

They stepped through the rubble and ventured to the open wall looking out over the loch. The rain had stopped, but there was still cloud cover, so no chance of moonlight or stars to shed any light on the dark waters.

“Barking, you said?” Banks asked.

“Aye, Cap. And just like a dog. Not angry, just curious.”

As McCally spoke, Banks heard it for himself, a sharp but deep-throated bark. Then there was a loud splash, not too far out on the loch. Banks switched on his gun light and panned the beam across the surface, catching an outward roll of large ripples from a point no more than 10 yards away. Whatever had made the disturbance in the water had to have been huge, but there was no sign of anything there now. The ripples lapped against the shore, the first few of them raising small splashes on the bank, then everything fell quiet again.

“What the fuck was that, Cap?” McCally said. “A big seal maybe?”

“We’re a hell of a long way from any access to the sea,” Banks reminded him. “I can’t see a seal getting over the hills, can you?”

“Otter then?”

“It would have to be a bloody big otter to make a splash like yon.”

McCally’s voice went quiet, higher pitched, almost childlike.

“Maybe it was a kelpie.”

Banks looked over at him in the darkness, checking to see if the corporal was kidding, but he appeared to be deadly serious.

“Don’t talk pish, man. That’s just a story to frighten the bairns.”

“You’re not from the Highlands, Cap,” McCally replied. “There’s more things in this land than we know, or care to know. My auld great gran worked a croft on her own out on Lewis after Great Granddad never came back from the war. She had stories to tell that would turn your hair white, of handsome young men by loch-sides who turned into vicious, horse-like monsters if you gave in to their advances, kelpies that were fiercely territorial, and murderous as hell. She said that everybody out on the islands knew about them and avoided dark pools at night. But every so often a bairn would be taken anyway and, man, was I scared that one day I would be one of those bairns, because I saw the truth of her stories in her eyes.”

“I don’t believe in such things.”

“Aye, and I don’t believe in Nazi ice zombies, giant sea lice, snakes the size of trains, or fucking abominable snowmen, but look where that’s got us these past few years.”

“Changing your bet from big cats, are we, Cally?” Banks said, trying to lighten the corporal’s mood, but the big man was clearly rattled. Banks had seen him stand up, not fazed in the slightest, under an attack of hundreds of Afghan mountain bandits. To see him so disconcerted by little more than a splash in the water had Banks confused. He covered his confusion by offering McCally a cigarette, and they smoked in silence for a bit.

“I’m just saying, Cap,” the corporal said, breaking the quiet, “here in the Highlands, we’ve sometimes got other things to worry about than the purely physical. If my auld grannie was still here, she’d say we’d just been given a sign, a portent, and that we shouldn’t dismiss it lightly.”

“Still, fucking kelpies? That’s a stretch even for us, isn’t it, Cally?”

“All I’m saying is we should keep an open mind,” McCally replied. “Until we ken better.”

“And there you have got something we can agree with.”

Banks checked his watch. Two-thirty, and he was now wide awake.

“I’ll take the early shift,” he said. “Let Wiggo snore. Just fetch me a coffee first, then you get your head down for a bit. We’ll see what there is to see in the morning.”

After McCally brought him a coffee and returned to his sleeping bag, Banks stood at the open wall, looking out toward the loch. Once his eyes adjusted properly to the gloom, he was able to see as far as the edge where it lapped against the bank so if anything did come from that direction, he’d see it coming. But the night had fallen completely still now, only Wiggins’ snoring carrying through from the back of the cottage. He sipped his coffee, smoked a cigarette down to the butt, and waited for a recurrence of either the barking or the splashing, but none came.

* * *

By around four, the coffee had worked its way through and he felt the need to go. He walked over to the bank and did his business in the loch, sending ripples back out toward where the splash had been earlier.

Still nothing replied.

“Here I am, pishing in your wee pond,” he said out loud. “Does that not bother you?”

He’d have got a shock if anything replied, and as he turned back, he was thankful for the continued silence.

The night was turning toward dawn when Wiggins finally woke, crawled out of his bag, and headed to do the same thing in the loch that Banks had done earlier. As he came back to join Banks in the doorway, he already had a cigarette in his mouth, puffing away on his first of many for the day.

“All clear, Cap?”

“Just about, Wiggo,” Banks replied. “There was a splash in the loch in the early hours. Cally thinks it’s got a kelpie in it.”

“What’s one of them when it’s at home?”

“A water spirit; a handsome man that turns into a spectral horse after it lures the unwary to their deaths.”

Wiggins laughed.

“Just as well, we’re not partial to handsome men, or are particularly fucking unwary then, isn’t it?”

Banks left the private on watch and went to get a pot of coffee on, then wake the other two. The fire was almost out, but he didn’t bother stoking it; he intended to be out on the hill as soon as the sun was fully up.

Breakfast was a simple one of coffee, dry biscuits, and another smoke, then they quickly packed up their gear and headed out into thin, watery sunshine.

Fifteen yards to the left of the cottage, just on the edge of the loch shore, they found evidence that their visitor in the night had been closer than they had thought.

* * *

“That’s a lot of shite,” Wiggins said as they stood around a medicine ball-sized pile of dark faeces. The thick grass of this flat patch between the loch and the copse of conifers had been flattened down, as if something heavy had lain there for a while.

“The bastard was here watching us, while we were watching for it,” McCally said.

“Sure looks that way,” Hynd said, then bent and retrieved a dead branch from the longer grass, using it to sift through the pile, spreading shit around to examine the content. The rest of them stood back as a vile stench rose up from below and stung at their noses and throats.

“What are you now, Sarge?” Wiggins asked, putting a hand over his nostrils and mouth to try to mask the smell. “The shite whisperer?”

Hynd ignored the private and spoke to Banks.

“There’s crushed bone in here, and it’s definitely a meat-eater. At a guess, I’d say this is what’s left of the rest of yon polar bear.”

“A pretty good guess, I’d reckon. Looks like our big pal is as curious about us as we are about it. Eyes open, lads. This thing might not be too far away.”

* * *

Banks kept a close watch on the loch as they made their way along a narrow animal track that ran along the water’s south side, but nothing stirred, not even a fish after a fly. At least the walking was more comfortable than the day before, with watery sunshine replacing yesterday’s persistent drizzle, but Banks’ thoughts kept turning to the pile of crap, and just how close the beast that left it there had been to the cottage and the squad. He remembered Wiggins’ quip about being unwary.

Maybe we’re not wary enough.

McCally dropped back to Banks’ side as they left the loch behind and started to climb into the hills beyond.

“Sorry about the funk last night, Cap,” the corporal said. “I got spooked like a big daft bairn. Dark water at night has always had that effect on me, since hearing the old woman’s stories. That, and being a Highlander in general means I’m just a moody, superstitious sod sometimes. It’s in my blood, I can’t help it.”

Banks clapped him on the shoulder.

“Chin up, man,” he said. “Did your grannie ever speak of kelpie shite?”

McCally laughed.

“She left that bit out.”

“There you go then. It’s just a big stupid animal that took a shite on our doorstep. Nothing to worry about.”

* * *

They spent the morning wending their way to and fro across hillsides and into valleys, tracing the route Banks had planned from the OS map. Several times they stopped to investigate areas where he’d marked an X on the map, trying to flush something from patches of shrub and woodland, old quarries or wetter, more persistent areas of bog. They scattered a small herd of red deer, one old ram, and several families of rabbits in the course of the morning, but nothing bigger. By noon, they still had no luck, with no trace of the beast, and not even a single track in the muddy ground.

At least there’s been no more of yon toxic shite.

Banks allowed the men some respite, having a rest and coffee stop on the top of a rocky outcrop overlooking a long, narrow valley. From this point, they had their first view of civilization of the day, in the form of a marching line of power pylons that stretched across the valley floor and northward up over the hill to their right. In the misty distance at the far end of the valley, the gray ribbon of a country road crossed north to south, some five miles distant. Banks didn’t intend to go that far; the next quadrant to be swept was up the hill at their back to the north. At some point in the evening, they were going to be high enough, and far enough north, to look down into Loch Ness itself, but there was a lot of climbing and walking to be done between here and then.

“I get a feeling that we’re all by our lonesome out here, Cap,” McCally said. “Whatever was around last night has well and truly buggered off.”

“What, no kelpies?” Wiggins said with a grin, and got a slap on the side of the head for his trouble.

Banks took a long drag of the cigarette he’d lit to accompany the coffee.

“I thought that last night too,” he replied, “right up until it crapped at our door. Let’s not let our guard down just yet.”

They each had a hot pouch of meat stew from their rations and another coffee to wash it down, then they moved out onto the hill for the second half of the day’s walk, their packs only marginally lighter for having had a lunch out of them.

* * *

The going got tougher the higher they climbed. Wet moorland gave way to heather and gorse, with few tracks through it that they could follow for any length of time. It became more of a trudge than a walk, one foot after the other trying not to think of the weight of the pack or the fact that feet seemed to have turned to blocks of stone. The current hill they were on seemed to have gone on forever; every time they crested what they thought might be the top, it was only to see another slope rising above them. McCally had point, and Banks felt a small wash of relief when the corporal called them to a halt.

“We’ve got something on the hill ahead, Cap. Some kind of animal, but it’s not moving.”

Banks strode up to McCally’s position and followed the line of his pointing finger. A dark, hump-like shape was outlined against the sky on the next ridge above them. It looked too big, too bulky to be a deer or a cow, the biggest things he might have expected to see on this hill.

“Our boy, do you think?” McCally said.

“Maybe,” Banks said, keeping his voice low. “And we’re downwind of him, so if he hasn’t seen us yet, let’s keep it that way. Sarge, you take Wiggo and come round and up on the east flank. Cally and I will go straight up from here. If he comes anywhere near you, take him out and we can worry about what the fuck he is later.”

Hynd and Wiggins moved away to the right and Banks and McCally started climbing toward the humped figure, keeping low. But they didn’t have to go far before they realized they hadn’t found their quarry, only more of its lunch.

What remained of a large male bison lay on the hillside. Like the polar bear before it, it had been almost hollowed out, and most of the meat had been stripped from the bones, leaving only the head, horns, and an empty shell draped with bloody strips of skin. Both back legs were missing, torn roughly from the hipbones that showed white amid the gore.

“I’ll say one thing for the boy,” Wiggins said. “He likes his grub.”

* * *

“Take a smoke break, lads. I’ll call this in,” Banks said.

He put in a call on the sat phone back to base in Lossiemouth. He got as far as explaining about the dead bison when the orderly on the other end interrupted him.

“I’ll let them know at the Wildlife Park and they’ll get someone out to those coordinates,” he said, “but the colonel’s been going spare all morning trying to get you. You need to get yourselves over to Foyers, right bloody quick. There’s tourists dead and torn up, others missing, press and TV all over the shop and top brass shitting themselves.”

“Has this got to do with why we’re out here in the first place?”

“Not a clue,” the orderly said. “All I know is that it’s a bloody mess. Just get your arses over there. The colonel is on site, and he’ll brief you.”

The fact that the colonel had left the safety of his office sent a chill down Banks’ back. The man spent his whole working life behind his desk since redeployment from Northern Ireland and didn’t move barring a disaster. Things had just got a lot worse.

- 4 -

Banks checked the map. If they pushed hard, they’d make it back to their vehicle at the reservoir in six hours from where they were, then it was another hour more to drive back to Foyers. A four, maybe five-hour hike north across the hill would bring them down to Foyers far sooner than that.

“Gear up, lads, we’re moving out hard and fast.”

The squad had relaxed to have a smoke while Banks was on the phone, and now got back into their rucksacks and crowded around him as he traced a route on the map. “We head over the hill to here at Errogie, then we’re off the rough stuff and can make double time down the farm roads to the loch-side. I want us there before it gets dark.”

The squad had only heard his side of the conversation on the phone.

“What’s going down, Cap?” Hynd asked.

“The shite has hit the fan over at Foyers. They didn’t say so, but my guess is that our boy’s been moving faster than we have, and he’s found something else he likes to snack on. The colonel’s waiting on scene for us.”

“The auld man’s out of the office? Things must be bad.”

“Aye, and the shite will be flowing downhill fast again, so let’s try to avoid it and get a move on. Cally, lead us out.”

* * *

Now that they weren’t actively searching for anything, they made good time, although by the time they topped the largest hill on their route two hours later, Banks’ calves were crying out for relief, and the pack felt like he was carrying a large man along with him. They’d managed to follow a deer track for the last few miles, which had made the going slightly easier. It had also allowed them to find two more piles of faeces as big or even bigger than the one that had been left at the cottage.

“Are you not stopping, Sarge?” Wiggins said as they passed the first one. “I thought shite inspection was your thing.”

“Nah, I see enough of that on your underwear in the laundry,” Hynd replied. “Besides, we can guess what’s in this one. More polar bear, and maybe a bit of some of yon deer we saw dead back at the park, and plenty of it. He’s making room for the bison to move through.”

Banks allowed them a quick stop for a smoke at the top of the hill. There wasn’t a view to appreciate, for the clouds had drawn down again, lowering gray overhead, lending a trace of moisture to the breeze and spreading a misty dimness across the landscape. With clouds that low and added mist, dusk was going to come all the sooner, and they had miles to go yet.

They headed out as soon as they finished their smokes.

* * *

Banks’ sense of direction proved up to the task, and they only had to stop twice to check the GPS on the sat phone. They arrived at a gate out onto a tarred farm road at Errogie at a quarter to four, and set off faster, almost jogging, on the downhill tracks that led them out at the side of Loch Ness in the middle of Foyers village just after four-thirty.

Almost immediately, they had to fend off the attentions of reporters and TV crews. Microphones were thrust in their faces and questions were shouted at them that they had no answers to. Banks didn’t even bother with a bland ‘No comment,’ just plowed his way through the crowd until he came to a security barrier. A young corporal from their own base was manning it with two privates, and Banks’ squad got waved through, much to the chagrin of the reporters who were immediately closed off from following.

They found the colonel standing with a senior policeman and another man that Banks only recognized from the TV as the local member of the Scottish Parliament.

“You took your damned time,” the colonel said.

“Sorry, sir,” Banks replied. “We were off the gird. We came as quick as we could.”

“I suppose so,” the colonel said. “And the bloody tourists were already dead before I tried to call you anyway, so there was nothing you could have done. Anything to report?”

The colonel led the squad away from the policeman and the MP, and heard Banks’ report in silence.

“And you’ve still no idea what it is?”

“No, sir, beyond that it’s big, and it likes meat.”

“I knew that much already,” the colonel replied. “It flattened a campsite in the field beside the church here just before dawn this morning. Luckily, it’s late season so it was relatively quiet, but there’s six dead and two missing. One of the missing is a five-year-old child.”

“Any witnesses?”

“Not a one. A local heard a rumpus, but by the time he got to the site, there were only trampled tents and the dead to see.”

“Prints?”

“Same as the ones you reported,” the colonel said and ran a weary hand through his thinning hair. “The government is going to slap a List D notice on the whole thing, so the press will have to keep their mouths shut for the time being. We’re going to seal off the road and start to evacuate everybody on this side of the road from Inverness down to the bottom end until we know it’s safe, but that’s going to take most of the night. I need you and your men to find this bloody thing and take it out before panic spreads any further.”

“Yes, sir,” Banks replied.

“And the first man that mentions Nessie gets a long spell in the brig. Understand?”

“Yes, sir,” Banks said, knowing better than to argue, although he didn’t have a clue where they might make a start.

“We’ll be sealing off all local roads up the hills too, to keep nosy buggers out, and placing men all along the loch banks at strategic points north and south. The police will be scouring the countryside looking for the missing woman and child, and I’ll be setting up a base of operations for the duration at Castle Urquhart. You’ve got a roving brief. Do what you need to do, no questions asked. Just don’t piss off too many people, don’t get dead, and get the job done fast before the story gets too big to contain. Understood?”

“Understood, sir,” Banks replied, and the colonel returned to his conversation with the policeman and the politician, leaving Banks to wonder, yet again, where they might make a start.

* * *

His first move after briefing the squad on the colonel’s orders was to lead them over to the small field by the church for an inspection of the campsite. Tall, trailer-mounted floodlights lit the scene, and the rhythmic thud of a generator echoed ‘round them as they stood over what had once been a family tent. The canvas was torn to ribbons, bloodied in places, and the ground had been heavily gouged, the thin grass now churned and muddy. Two other tents lay in a similar state, circled by crime scene tape, some 10 yards away closer to the church, but it looked like the forensics teams were finished here, as the squad had the area to themselves. Something caught Hynd’s eye and the sergeant bent down for a closer look at a track in a smoother patch of mud.

“Same as before, Sarge?” Banks asked.

“Aye, Cap, and there’s something else.” He traced the outline of the splayed toe marks and drew their attention to a marking that looked to have been made by a fold of skin between each of them. “I’m not surprised you heard something in the loch last night. I think these are webbed feet.”

“So what is it then? A giant fucking duck?” Wiggins said.

“It’s a mammal, it’s a carnivore with a newly acquired taste for long pork, and it’s at least semi-aquatic,” Banks said. “That’s three things we know about it. Let’s hope we find some more answers. The colonel gave us a roving brief, so let’s rove. This bloody generator thumping is giving me a right headache.”

“What’s the plan, Cap?” Hynd asked.

“I’m making this shit up as I go along, Sarge. But we need to start thinking like a hungry predator,” he replied, “and try to second guess where it’ll be next.”

“Somewhere it can get an easy meal,” Hynd said.

“Aye, and given its methods so far, I’m guessing it’s a tad shy and only on the move when it’s dark and quiet, which rules out another attack here, at least while these lights and generators are running and there’s so many folk about at the barriers. Let’s get out of the village where it’s calmer and darker, have a wee walk up the shore, and see what’s what while I’m thinking.”

* * *

The village of Foyers was already falling quiet as they walked out of the small campsite. The sound of departing traffic was all that was left of the squads of reporters and TV crews, and the security barriers were gone and would no doubt be reinstalled farther up and down the loch road. There were no lights in any of the houses, and Banks guessed that the evacuation had already been effected here. Several Army trucks still sat in the main road, and a group of 20 or more soldiers stood around waiting for orders. Banks looked, but didn’t see the colonel.

He led the squad north, and they were out of the small village only a minute or so later, walking in almost darkness with the black waters of the loch on their left and a slope of a rhododendron-covered hillside on the right. McCally had point and used the light on the barrel of his rifle to keep them straight on the road. They stopped at a lay-by for their first smoke for several hours.

“I fancy a cuppa to go with this,” Banks said as he took in a long draw. “Cally, get a pot of coffee made. We’ll stay here for half an hour until they’ve completely stopped fucking about back in the village. Our beastie isn’t coming out until it’s sure of some peace and quiet.”

It was proving to be a damp, chilly night, with mist rolling in waves off the loch, but the coffee, and some more biscuits, five minutes later did a lot to dispel that. Over on the north bank, lights showed among the trees where traffic moved along the main Inverness road. It was the only sign of life they could see, and even that was becoming harder to make out as the mist thickened and swirled.

“We could be in for a long night, lads,” Banks said as they finished the coffee, had another smoke, and got everything stowed away again. “I’m thinking we should find a quiet spot to declare as center of operations and ditch the rucksacks there so we can move hard and fast if we need to. I’ve lugged this crap around on my back as much as I want to for one day.”

Nobody disagreed, so he led them out again, still heading north, but with an eye open for a safe place to call home for the night. *

They saw the sign in the gloom ahead long before they were close enough to read it, a pointer at the roadside to a site of interest for tourists. This one read ‘Boleskine House’ and the words tickled something in Banks’ memory that wouldn’t come fully to mind; all he knew was that he’d heard the name before. McCally filled in the blanks for him.

“I remember this; it’s an old manor house or something. Burnt down in a fire some years back and made a splash on the news at the time. It’s famous; I think it used to be owned by Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin.”

“Aye,” Hynd replied. “And it’s always had a bad rep, even before that. Some big scandal back in the early part of the last century. I read about it in a magazine a while back.”

The sarge didn’t get time to elaborate, for they were all looking up a long driveway that ran off the road, and they all saw the dancing beam of a torch being played around somewhere up the slope.

“Could be one of our lads, or a local cop?” Wiggins said.

“I doubt it,” Banks replied, “but let’s go and see anyway. If we get lucky and chase a reporter off, it will put us back in the colonel’s good books, for a wee while anyway.”

McCally switched off his gun light and, using the torchlight up the slope as a beacon, they went quietly and quickly up the driveway. The roofless ruin of a large house loomed above them, a darker shadow in the night. Whoever was waving the torch about was inside to their left, behind what had been a large bay window. Banks drew the men close and spoke softly, just loud enough for them to hear.

“Cally, Sarge, round the back and cut him off in case he does a runner. Wiggo, you come with me. And for fuck’s sake, don’t shoot anybody.”

Banks and Wiggins made their way quietly to what had been the main door of the old house. The light was still coming from their left, and now that they were closer they heard someone shifting rubble, as if searching for something in the ruins.

They crept forward, keeping to the darkest of the shadows, and made it all the way up to a doorway leading into what had been a large room without giving themselves away. A dark figure was bent over, using the torchlight to study something on the floor.

“Hands up! You’re under arrest,” Wiggins said.

There was a loud thud as the torch fell to the floor. It hit hard, they heard the tinkle as the bulb went, and the room was plunged into darkness.

“Wiggo, you tosser,” McCally said from a far side window, and then the room was dimly lit by the wash of his rifle light. Banks switched on his own light, and they caught the intruder in the crossbeams.

A small, wiry man in a tweed suit and with a mop of red hair and a salt-and-pepper goatee stood up straight and smiled at Banks. He looked to be in his 60s at least, but full of health with it, and even in the dim light his eyes showed, piercing blue, crinkled in wrinkles at the corners as he smiled. If he was at all perturbed at being caught, he didn’t show it.

“Good evening, gentlemen,” he said. “What can I do for Her Majesty’s finest?”

* * *

“You can tell us what you’re doing fucking about here in the dark for starters,” Banks replied.

“That’s rather a long story, I’m afraid,” he said. Banks couldn’t quite place his accent. It was definitely Scottish, but with a hint of a drawl that might be American, and he had a slightly formal, slightly detached manner that reminded the captain of his colonel. “I have a wee boat moored down by the loch that might be more comfortable if we are telling tales. I can’t offer you much in the way of food, but I have coffee, or something stronger if you wish. I even have a heater.”

Banks certainly didn’t fancy quizzing the man here in the dark dust and ruin, and there was no sense in taking him back to the village, which would surely be empty by now. By all rights, they should just see him on his way and get on with looking for the beast, but Banks’ gut was telling him stories again, and he trusted his instinct.

The wee man might know something that we need to know.

He made up his mind quickly.

“We’ll go down to your boat, see what’s what, and then, if your story convinces me, you can be on your way,” Banks replied.

“Oh, I can be very convincing,” the man said. “Lay on, MacDuff, and don’t spare the horses.”

* * *

The wee boat proved to be a 20-footer. Banks recognized the type; tourists could hire them at ports at either end of the Ness for cruising trips, and at high summer the locks of the canal at the southern end were packed tight with their coming and going. This late in the year they were rarer, and seeing one operated by just one man rarer still. It didn’t feel right, and Banks’ gut was still telling him there was more to this wee man than met the eye.

Their captive was right about the coffee though. The squad was soon packed into the small living area cabin of the cruiser, taking advantage of the brew, the heat, and respite from carrying their packs, which they had left lying on the viewing deck at the back of the boat.

“I still haven’t got your name, or what you’re doing here,” Banks said once they were settled.

“Ah, the easy ones to start with,” the older man said, taking out a pipe and stoking it with rough black tobacco. “My name is Alexander Seton; you can call me Sandy. As for what I’m doing here, I’m after the same thing as you I suspect. I’m after Nessie.”

Banks almost laughed. He’d expected Wiggins to be first to be told of the colonel’s threat of the brig. He could hardly use the same threat against their captor.

“I don’t think the monster, if it exists, spends its time rummaging around in the ruins of old burned-out houses,” Banks replied.

Seton’s grin widened as he replied.

“It might… if it was born there.”

- 5 -

Banks’ gut was shouting now and he knew he didn’t really want to hear the man’s story. But ‘roving brief’ meant listening to any intel, however ludicrous. Besides, he had good coffee, and he was warm, two things that didn’t apply out on the road.

“Tell me,” he said.

“It’s a longish tale, and I have a dry throat. Will you lads join me?”

He took a bottle of single malt down from a cupboard and five small glasses.

“We’re on duty, sir,” Hynd said, but Banks waved him down with a smile.

“It wouldn’t be the first time we’ve had a dram when we shouldn’t, and one’s not going to hurt anybody, so hush, Sarge, and let the man pour.”

It was more expensive stuff than Banks was used to, honey and wood smoke in the mouth, and a fire in the gut, and he had to resist the temptation to dive head first into it. He lit a cigarette, raised the glass to their host, and waved for the man to continue.

When the older man spoke, it was in the tone of a man who knew how to tell a story, and had one that needed to be told.

* * *

“The current house, what remains of it, was built in the mid-18th century as a hunting lodge for the Fraser family. Before that, there was a church on the spot dating from the Reformation, with a wee cemetery and a yard where they hanged cattle rustlers and murderers on a gibbet. Before the church was there, the ground had a series of burial mounds going back well before Christianity, before the Romans, into the depths of prehistory, the rumor among the local populace being that all those who were ever buried here were cursed folk, abandoned by God. In all that time, so the stories go, this particular patch of ground has always had a dark reputation.”

“More auld wives tales and fairy stories,” Wiggins said. “Cally will be in his element.”

Seton smiled.

“I’m rather fond of auld wives myself,” he said. “And I’m partial to fairy tales, as there is usually a kernel of truth to be found in even the most unusual of them.”

“Sounds like you’re a bit of a scholar, wee man,” McCally said.

“At one time, I was indeed a scholar, but in science rather than anything less mundane. Today, however, I am, and have been for many years, before all of you were born I’d guess, a student of what you might call the esoteric.”

“Come on now, if this is more of yon occult shite, I’m going out on deck for a fag,” Wiggins said.

“More?” Seton said, and raised an eyebrow.

“You tell your story, and maybe we’ll tell you one of ours,” Banks said. “You were telling us about the house? What were you doing there? And how does a monster fit in?”

“I’ll get to that,” Seton said, pouring himself another drink before continuing.

“You may have heard of Aleister Crowley, the so-called ‘Great Beast’ and ritual magician? Now is not the time to discuss the man’s supposed Satanism or his demerits as a human being. But one thing at least is true of him; he was a great student, indeed master, of the history and practice of the lost magical arts. He bought the house here in 1899, and you can be sure he knew of its history before doing so.”

“I knew it. More occult shite,” Wiggins said.

Seton stopped the private from leaving by the simple expedient of pouring them all another drink. Banks didn’t complain; there wasn’t enough in the bottle for any of them to get drunk and, besides, he was starting to get intrigued by Seton’s story.

“Crowley was interested in all manner of ancient practices,” Seton continued, “not least of which was the alchemical path to perfection and how it might be obtained. It is no surprise that there are reports from the early part of the last century of animals, and household pets, disappearing in this area. I believe the man was using them for his experiments. Again, I will not bore you with the detail of the full range of magical practices that he carried out, but they were many and diverse. Household servants told the folk down in Foyers of a small menagerie being kept in a shed at the rear of the property, and of animals being changed and turned into chimeras, monsters if you like.”

“Pish,” Wiggins said. “A load of auld pish.”

“That’s as maybe,” Seton said. “However, I could show you documentation, letters, sworn statements and journals and such, that go a long way to backing up my assertions. The papers tell that Crowley at least had some control over the beasts when he was present here. But he was often away on business. One night while he was in Edinburgh, at least one of the animals escaped, and the housekeeper, and two small children, were found dead in the doorway in the morning.”

“That’s the story I read,” Hynd said. “It was a big scandal back in the day.”

“That it was,” Seton continued. “But as I said, it is not Crowley’s reputation that concerns us here, but what became of his experiments. For only a few years later, the first modern stories of a monster in the loch started to appear, the first to make the papers being a report in the Inverness Courier on the second of May 1933. One thing to note is that there was no mention of any reptilian features, none of the ‘extinct dinosaur’ theories that emerged later, after the famous, now proven fake ‘Surgeons’ photograph. Indeed, one of the more credible early sightings speaks of a very large otter-like beast rather than anything resembling a dinosaur. It ate a cow in front of some ladies out for a quiet Sunday drive in the 1940s.”

Banks jerked at the mention of the otter, for suddenly pieces were starting to fall into place. To cover it, he spoke up.

“That still doesn’t explain what you were doing up at the house tonight,” he said.

“Doesn’t it?” Seton said. “I thought it did. I was, of course, looking for something, anything, that might tell me by what magical rites Crowley managed to control the beasts. I heard about the attack on the village and thought I might be able to do something to help.”

“We’ve seen firsthand what this thing can do, mister,” Wiggins said. “I don’t think it gives a fuck about your mumbo-jumbo.”

“Nevertheless, what kind of man would I be if I didn’t at least try?”

“You sound like you know a bit about the history of the monster here,” Banks said.

“I know a bit about a great many things,” Seton said, laughing, “But yes, I’ve done a lot of study in the area.”

“So what do you think it is?”

“I think it’s probably as much a result of science gone wrong as of magic, although Crowley definitely used magic to control it. And I think it’s likely to be more like the giant otter I mentioned earlier than anything else, an aquatic predator, mostly hiding in dark places, wary of man but now, somehow, emboldened. And I also believe that the burning of the house might have been a trigger, of sorts. Perhaps it saw the house as a symbol of control, perhaps the house itself contained some magic that kept the creature at bay.

“And now that the house is gone, the beast feels able to feed freely, perhaps for the first time in its life. And it is coming to enjoy it.”

* * *

“That’s quite a theory, Mr. Seton,” Banks said. “Does it go any way to telling us where the beast might be or how to find it?”

“Alas, no. I was pinning my hopes on finding something at the house. Beyond that, I planned to sail the length of the loch tomorrow and attempt some incantations, but I have no idea if they will prove useful or not.”

“Whether your magic works or not is neither here nor there to me,” Banks said. “But we could use the boat. We’ll come out on the water with you tomorrow. At least that way we can cover a much wider area than on foot.”

“And I’ll be glad of the company. What about tonight?”

“Going out on the loch in the dark is asking for trouble we don’t need. And if the beast is, as you say, tied somehow to the house, here is as good a place to search. I’ll set watches, and we’ll sit moored here until dawn. The lads need their kip anyway; we’ve been on our feet all day.”

“There’s four berths below,” Seton said. “I hardly sleep, so they’re all empty. You’re welcome to them.”

“I must say, you’re the cheeriest wee burglar I’ve ever met,” Wiggins said, and Seton laughed.

* * *

Banks took first watch again; the other three were heads down and asleep before nine o’clock. He smoked a cigarette as he stepped up onto the wooden dock and walked up to the roadway. He stood there for as long as it took to finish the smoke. No traffic came either way, and the night was quiet, so much so that he heard the honk of a car horn coming from clear across the other side of the loch. He ground the butt of the smoke out, had one last look up and down the road, then went back along the dock to the boat and stood at the rear viewing deck.

Seton came out to join him, bringing a toasted cheese sandwich and a mug of coffee for each of them. They stood in silence for a while as they ate, looking out over the still waters of the loch, what little they could see of it. The mist was thicker now, and colder, so much so that Banks was glad of the fleeced jacket of his camo suit, and the warmth in his belly as the coffee went down. Seton wore only his worn tweed suit, but showed no signs of the cold affecting him.

“It doesn’t bother me much. These old bones are too used to long winters,” he said when Banks asked. “Plus, you’ve got to take into account the general benefits regular consumption of good whisky brings, of course.”

“I look forward to testing that out for myself in years to come,” Banks replied, before turning the conversation around to matters he had been mulling over. “Do you really believe that stuff you were spouting earlier? You think your theory about the monster being of Crowley’s doing is valid?”

“I do,” Seton said. “And so do you, I think. I saw it in the eyes of you and your men. I know from bitter experience that not many people would have heard me out so readily with so few questions. You’re obviously not run-of-the-mill soldiers. You’ve all encountered something like this before, haven’t you?”

“Not exactly like this,” Banks said and without realizing he was going to do it, launched into the story of their encounter with the saucer and the occult experiments of the Nazis in their base in Antarctica. It took a while in the telling, and he needed another smoke during it as the memory of the icy tomb brought a fresh chill to his bones. He spoke of the secret experiments of Carnacki and Churchill, and how they almost led, inadvertently, to giving Nazi Germany a decisive weapon, almost 30 years later. Then he related how the S-Squad had gone in, over 60 more years more on, to clean it up, and at what cost. He wished the older man had brought scotch rather than coffee, for he had lost men on that mission, and the memory was still raw.

Seton listened, and if he was at all incredulous, he did not show it.

“That is quite a tale, Captain,” he said. “And not one I expected to hear when I set out on this jaunt. I know Carnacki’s work, of course. A fine fellow and everybody in the field is indebted to him. I did not know he had got involved with Churchill before WW1 though; everybody played that one close to their chests, and there’s not a hint of it in the literature.”

“How about you? How did you get into all this esoteric stuff?” Banks asked, looking to change the subject and stop the surge of memories that threatened to throw everything else out of his mind.

Seton laughed.

“It’s a family tradition, just like my name. No, really, there was an ancestor of mine, Alexander Seton, an alchemist, at Robert the Bruce’s bedside, healing him when no other physician could help. He wrote a book about his process that’s rare as hen’s teeth now, worth a small fortune, and purports to be a true telling of a successful experiment on the path to enlightenment. It is known as ‘The Twelve Concordances of the Red Serpent’ and it is said that Crowley had one of the few copies still known to exist.

“A couple of hundred years after that original Sandy, an Alexander Seton was getting into trouble making gold for Dutch shipping magnates; that one got a castle, and eventually a town, named after him down the coast from Edinburgh. There are rumors he was the same man, ageless and wise, as had been at Bruce’s bedside, and there are other rumors that he’s still running around somewhere to this day, although if he is, he’s not one for checking in with family. There has been other Alexander Setons, with Queen Mary of Scotland at Fotheringhay, on the Highland side in both Jacobite rebellions, and another at Trafalgar with Nelson. All were purported to be ‘advisors’ to the powerful, on matters arcane and dark. As for the name itself, I was lucky to get Alexander. There’s another scion of the family tree that gets named Augustus, but they went to the dark side centuries ago, the first one selling his soul for a shiny sword to a strange wee man in a Dundee bar. We don’t talk about them.”

Banks laughed, then saw the man was serious.

“As with you, that’s a story I wasn’t expecting when I set out on this mission. But I understand. Soldiering is my family way,” he replied, “so I know only too well how history and family bonds affects a man when he’s growing up. It just seeps in, doesn’t it?”

Seton nodded.

“That it does. And on hearing your story, I see now why you heard me out; you are open to these kinds of possibilities. That might prove to our advantage, should we find the beast.”

Banks laughed.

“If it comes to that, I’ll be relying on my family way. It’s what saved us in Antarctica… a fuckload of bullets and blind luck.”

* * *

Seton left Banks alone and went to sit in the cabin, writing in a journal. Banks stood at the rear of the boat, unable to find the calm, trace-state he’d fallen into so easily the night before. Thinking of Antarctica had dredged up too many memories and they flitted to and fro in his head, refusing to be banished, fleeting images of dead men, and some who should have been dead but weren’t. He tried to concentrate on the task at hand, smoking a succession of cigarettes as he pondered Seton’s story and its implications.

He still couldn’t come to any conclusions, and the long day walking in the hills was taking its toll. He felt tired down to his bones, and was almost dead on his feet by the time Hynd came to relieve him. He was lost to sleep seconds after his head hit the pillow, the soft roll of the boat at the dock acting to rock him away and down into blessed oblivion.

He woke to thin, watery sunshine coming in through the small porthole above him, and the smell of cooking bacon and coffee wafting down from the cabin above. He had a remarkably warm shower in the cramped washroom, then quickly dressed and went up onto the cabin to find Hynd and McCally tucking in to a fried breakfast.

“Make yourselves at home, lads, why don’t you?” he said. The other two grinned back at him.

“Nowt happened all night except Wiggo’s snoring. And now a full breakfast? Cushiest job in ages, Cap,” McCally said. “Can we live here?”

“Don’t get too comfortable, Cally. We’re still on the clock,” he replied. “Everybody get kitted up and on deck in five. Sun’s up and we need to get going.”

Seton had already thought of that, and had made all the preparations for departure. The engine kicked in just as Banks walked out onto the rear viewing deck, and Wiggins stepped down off the quay after dropping the mooring ropes back aboard.

“All ashore who’s going ashore,” Seton shouted, then put the boat in gear and they pulled away from the bank.

Banks went back inside and grabbed a bacon sandwich and a mug of coffee from the cabin, taking them both out onto the deck to join the men. The sun was up, the mist had cleared away, and they’d divested the fleece overcoats, but each had his rifle in hand.

“Cally, up front, Sarge and Wiggo, rear deck,” he said. “I’ll be up top at the wheel with Seton. Shout if you see anything.”

There was no chitchat now; they all knew when they were needed to be paying attention. Banks waited until he was sure they were all in position, then went up the six-step ladder to the top deck, where Seton sat at the upper pilot’s wheel station, the best driving position to get a view, if the weather permitted it.

“A fine day for it,” Seton said, and Banks could only nod, his mouth full of bacon and bread. He washed it down with coffee, made sure that Seton seemed to know what he was about in piloting the boat up the loch, and put in his first report of the day to the colonel.

* * *

It took longer than normal to get connected, a byproduct of the fact that he wasn’t calling Lossiemouth, but a field base down the far end of the loch. He heard scramblers engage; given the colonel’s obvious feelings for the press, they were being extra careful to avoid any eavesdroppers.

“Any news of the missing kid, sir?” he asked first.

“Nothing yet,” the colonel said, and Banks heard the weariness in his superior’s voice. “And no reported sightings of either them or your beast. We can’t issue a general alert for the public to keep an eye out because of the damned List D notice. The press will be making shit up anyway, of course. That’s what they do. I’ve asked for more men to be sent up from Leuchars, but it’ll be a couple of hours yet before they get here. Anything at your end?”

“Nothing here either, sir, although we have procured a boat and will make a tour of the loch throughout the day, taking our time to get a good look around. We should be down your end at the castle by around 1600 hours.”

“Very well, check in with me here then if you’re still drawing a blank, and I’ll be in touch to let you know if anything happens here apart from me kicking every single damned reporter up the arse.”

Seton saw Banks’ grim smile as he switched off the phone and put it away.

“Any news?” the older man asked.

Banks shook his head.

“Nothing yet,” he replied, and heard the same weariness in his voice he’d heard from the colonel. He knew that the longer the search went on, the less chance there was of finding anyone alive, let alone a child. He changed the subject.

“I’ve had a wee think about your theory, Mr. Seton,” he said.

“Are you convinced?”

“Partially. But don’t stories exist about monsters in the loch far older than the newspaper report you cited as the first?”

“Indeed there are many, myths, legends, snippets of song, oral history, and even some scrambled fragments of history in journals and manuscripts,” Seton replied. “They date from Columba’s supposed encounter in the 7th century all the way up to the time of the Jacobite rebellions. But you’d struggle to find any large body of dark water on the planet that hasn’t been rumored to host one kind of beast or another; Nessie’s hardly unique in that area.

“Can I read you something? I happen to have one such piece of ‘evidence’ on me. It’s a fragment only, one I translated from the Latin, a document that was found in Urquhart Castle years ago, detailing a failed Viking raid in the 12th century. It might amuse you, if nothing else, as you’ll see you’re not the first warriors to venture onto the loch unaware of what might be there, nor are you even the first captain. You’ll have to take the wheel as I read though. Wouldn’t want me causing an accident.”

Banks swapped positions so that he was in control of the wheel, then waved him on. Seton took two thin sheets of paper from his pocket and read, in the singsong voice of a storyteller.

“It starts, and ends, in the middle of a story. I’m afraid this is all that has survived down the long years.”

* * *

“A serpentine shape took form, a huge body that looked to be the length of the longboat itself, and nearly as wide. A long, swan-like neck rose up, and a head like a great axe wedge turned. Deep blue eyes looked straight at Tor as it solidified and strengthened.

“The serpent fell the short distance out of the air into the loch, the resulting splash sending the longboat careening from side to side, almost capsizing before righting itself. Fully solid now, the beast aimed its gaze at the longboat, and came forward, straight at them. The great neck rose, the wedge head came down and its mouth gaped impossibly wide, a black maw some four feet across. The guard next to Tor raised a sword but the beast was too fast. It plucked the Viking from the deck so neatly that he had no time to scream. Tor heard bones crunch, and felt the spatter of blood on his face.

“The huge head of the serpent rose high above the boat then made a new lunge forward toward the stern of the longboat. The Viking — Orthus Klinnsman — who stood directly beneath the open jaws was awake to the danger. He stepped back sharply, cutting a swipe with his sword at the beast’s exposed snout, only to curse when his blade hit flesh and immediately broke in two, as if he’d just struck a hefty blow at obdurate rock. The beast lunged again, and knocked Klinnsman off balance then caught him between its jaws and bit his torso into two bloody pieces, as easily as a man might bite into a soft fruit. The sound as the body was chewed and broken between the serpent’s twin rows of teeth echoed loudly all along the longboat.

“Tor stepped forward, sword raised as the serpent’s head rose up high above the longboat, preparing for another strike. Terror and fear raged through him, but as captain to these men, he was determined that no more of them would die. The deep blue eyes of the serpent fixed on him as he stepped forward, and seemed to pierce into his inner depths. Once again, Tor heard the rhythmic beat in his bones and in his gut, felt the call of the dance, offering him peace, an eternity to be spent swimming in the darkness of Niflheim. And even above the roars and shouts of Vikings now scrambling for weapons, he heard the invisible choir’s song rise in the wind again, their hymn to the Dreaming God.

He sleeps in the deep, with the fish far below,

He sings as he sleeps in the dark.

“Tor felt more than saw Skald step up to his side, but he could not afford to take his eyes off the writhing serpent that was even now propelling the bulk of its body closer and closer to the longboat. As Tor stood tall on the stern, he saw for the first time the full extent of the thing. The skin was gray, almost black in mottled areas, and seemed oily, with a shimmering to it like the air above a hot skillet. The head and neck were definitely serpentine, but the body resembled more that of a large seal or walrus, barrel-shaped and complete with two massive triangular flippers which propelled it through the water with great rapidity. Behind the bulk of the body, it tapered away into a tail at least as long again as the swan neck. In total length, it was almost twice the size of the longboat, and it was coming ahead so fast now that its intent was clear. It meant to swamp the Viking vessel completely.

“The wedge-shaped head finally swooped down in another attack, but Tor had been waiting for it. He stepped nimbly aside and brought his sword down in a cut that would have cleaved a man in half. The blade rang as it struck but it was as if he’d hit a wall. The weapon bounced back, the impact and vibration so severe it sent Tor staggering backward. The blade did not break, but it thrummed for several seconds in his hand, sending shaking vibration and tingling all up his sword arm. It momentarily weakened him, and he was too off balance to prevent another Viking from being swept up from the deck and into the great maw. He only saw the man’s legs kicking even as he was swallowed whole with a single gulp.

“The attack seemed to have been going on forever, but Tor realized it had only been a matter of seconds. The rest of the crew were only now rousing from their oars and joining in the fray. Several spears struck at the serpent’s head, but they had as little impact as Tor’s sword. One of the men stepped over Tor and struck at the beast’s left eye, but yet again, despite being aimed directly in the center of the iris, the point of the weapon met only with a surface as hard as any stone. The beast was unscathed and scooped the attacker up, biting off his head with a sickening crunch and spray of blood.

“Tor managed to steady his stance his sword raised again, but he had no deal how to fight such a seemingly indestructible foe. And Skald was no help; he stood at the stern, his gaze blank, his eyes fluttering, lost in the Wyrd even as his crewmates fought and died around him.

“And then there was no more time to even fend the thing off. The serpent surged high out of the water and a full half of its considerable bulk fell right onto the stern of the longboat. The back end went down, the prow went up, and everything aboard — Vikings, oars, weapons, and pillaged loot — was tossed into the water like strewn pebbles.

“Tor landed in the black waters of the loch with a splash that momentarily knocked the wind from him, but he had enough presence of mind to hold onto his weapon; it might well be the only thing between him and death in the next few seconds.

“To shore. To the north shore,” he shouted. He knew from the splashing and cursing that there were men in the water all around him, but how many there were was something he could not know. He could only hope that the remaining crew had heard him and were able to do something about it. He swam forward, kicking with his legs and paddling with his spare arm. His hand hit a timber the length of a man, a piece of the longboat which he guessed was now mostly at the bottom of the loch. Using the timber as a float, he hung on tight and kicked with his feet with all his strength, heading toward where he thought, hoped, the northern shore might be.”

* * *

“Is that it?” Banks asked, as the story ended far too abruptly.

“That’s all there was. But you see, there was a monster, if not an otter of any kind, here all that time ago, if this is to believed. I think the occult influences around the area of Boleskine house predate Crowley by centuries. But as I said before, it was only after 1933 that the reports around here started to get more frequent, and more specific, only after Crowley’s great experiment.”

“And do any of them since the Viking’s ‘walrus’ mention your proposed giant otter?”

“In fact, there are several over the years that are remarkably similar. And many more reports of three humps moving as one. Have you seen an otter swim when it is traveling with purpose, Captain? There’s a small hump for the head, a large one for the body, and a third where the tail is curved and upraised acting as a rudimentary rudder. Even for a normal-sized otter, it’s the classic ‘lake monster’ profile. I suspect many of the purported photographs of Nessie are simply of an otter with nothing else in the picture to give a sense of scale.”

“What about those scientific investigations a few years back? The ones Peter Scott was involved with. Didn’t they photograph what looked like a plesiosaur flipper? That might have been more akin to your admittedly outlandish Viking story?”

“They said they did, certainly,” Seton replied. “But those photographs were inconclusive at best, and a hoax at worst. I am far more inclined to believe in an overly large modern mammal than in a 200 million-year-old dinosaur miraculously surviving into the modern era without ever being seen properly by anyone.”

“But if it is a giant otter as you say, how did it get so bloody huge? And how has it survived for a hundred years?”

Seton smiled.

“I don’t know, but as I said last night, I suspect it might be some form of alchemical experiment of Crowley’s gone wrong. Alchemy’s history is replete with tales of homunculi and chimeras being raised to gigantic proportions, and of them being unnaturally long-lived, almost immortal.”

“This alchemy, though? It’s all just chemistry experiments when it comes down to it, isn’t it?”

“No. Just as there was in the tale I just told of the vikings, there’s a large element of mysticism and the occult in the mix too. If I’m right, the beast is as much formed by magic as it is by natural forces. That’s why I’m hoping my area of expertise will come in useful if we come across it out here.”

“I still can’t say that I’m convinced. But I’ll take any help I can get right about now,” Banks replied.

* * *

He had just lit the second cigarette of the morning, and was studying the water between the boat and the bank to his right through Seton’s binoculars when McCally shouted from up front.

“Some fog ahead, Cap.”

He looked forward. It looked like a gray wall stretched across the deep valley from shore to shore and up over the hills on either side.

“How far to the head of the loch?” he asked.

“Another 10 miles or so,” Seton replied. “I can navigate just fine in fog though, so don’t worry about that. Still want to go all the way up?”

Banks nodded.

“A full sweep is what I told the colonel, so that’s what he’ll get. I’m not sure we’ll see much of anything in there though.”

“Morning fog rolling down from the firth past Inverness,” Seton replied. “It might burn off quickly if we’re lucky.”

Seton studied the fog through the binoculars. It looked thick, almost solid from this distance, not like anything that was going burn off fast.

“Let’s hope we’re lucky.”

Seton took them into the fog two minutes later.

- 6 -

Banks’ descended from the top deck and went to join Hynd at the rear of the boat. Visibility was down to 10 yards, and the only sound was the low thrum of the boat’s engine; Seton had cut speed, and they were now moving at little more than a brisk walking pace. That suited Banks just fine, as he knew there were large rocks breaking the surface in the shallows near the shore, and he didn’t fancy hitting anything at speed.

He took a smoke when Hynd offered.

“Do you buy any of the wee man’s story, Cap?” the sergeant said as they lit up.

“Not that alchemy bullshit and mumbo-jumbo, no. Well, not really. But the bit about it being a fucking huge otter rings true given what we’ve seen so far. Plus, having a lend of his boat for the day is handy, so I’m not about to argue too much with him just yet.”

“I’ve been thinking, Cap. He seems like he’s a smart man. Maybe it wasn’t a total coincidence that we found him last night.”

“Aye, the thought had crossed my mind too. Maybe he found us. But either way, we’re out on the water where we want to be, and so is he, so nobody’s losing out of the deal. Keep an eye on him though. I’ve got a feeling things might turn hinky. Antarctica-type hinky.”

“I thought you weren’t buying his spiel?”

“I’m not. But my gut is.”

“Bugger,” Hynd said with a smile. “Your gut’s right more often than not.”

“Tell me about it.”

* * *

They motored slowly through the fog for 10 minutes, and Banks developed a stress headache from trying to peer into the shifting gray wash of dampness. The engine cut off and he heard a clank of chain then a splash as they dropped anchor. He went to go back up top and had to stop on the ladder as Seton made his way down.

“Coffee and smoke break?” Seton said with a smile. “Then I want to try something, if it’s okay by you?”

The squad kept their positions while Seton clattered about in the cramped kitchen in the cabin and returned a few minutes later with a tray of five coffee mugs and a packet of chocolate digestive biscuits.

The coffee was dark, strong, bitter and obviously expensive, and the biscuits filled a hole Banks hadn’t known was there. Seton kept up a constant chat of information about the loch itself as they drank; details of its depth, volume of water, and some of the more comical aspects of its history. The small man was a born storyteller, and he had all of the squad smiling by the time that the coffee and a smoke to go with it were finished.

“Now that I’ve got on your good side,” Seton said, “I’ve got something I want to try.”

“Some of your mumbo-jumbo, wee man?” Wiggins asked.

“If you like to call it that, yes,” Seton replied. “It’s an incantation, an ancient chant. And if I’m right, it’s one that Crowley could well have used to control his beasts during his experiments. It’s certainly clearly copied down in his journals.”

“Chanting? Give over,” Wiggins replied. “How’s that going to work on a murdering beastie?”

“A lullaby can send a child to sleep, can it not?” Seton said calmly and reasonably. “Why should something similar not work with another mammal? After all, we are quite close in kind, evolutionary speaking. We share 99 % of our DNA after all.”

“Speak for yourself,” Wiggins said. “The only time I share my DNA is with the sarge’s missus.”

Seton ignored that, and walked around the cabin and up to the bow. He stood right at the point and raised his hands.

“What is he now, Kate bloody Winslet?” Wiggins muttered.

Seton sang in a fine high tenor that belied his age. To Banks’ ear, it sounded like Gaelic, but he had no understanding of the words.

“Ri linn cothrom na meidhe, Ri linn sgathadh na h-anal.

“Ri linn tabhar na breithe Biodh a shith air do theannal fein.

“That’s a Highland prayer,” McCally said. “I remember it from when I was a lad. My auld grannie sung it to keep the kelpies at bay.”

“What’s it about then?” Wiggins asked.

“It’s a call for peace and calm.”

Seton kept singing, kept repeating the same two lines. The fog continued to swirl and roll around them but the water itself was flat and still, almost as if a mirror lay just below the shimmering surface.

“Ri linn cothrom na meidhe, Ri linn sgathadh na h-anal.

“Ri linn tabhar na breithe Biodh a shith air do theannal fein.

Seton continued in this vein for two minutes longer, then stopped. The fog deadened all sound, and the water was so still there was no sense of rocking or bobbing. They lay dead calm in the middle of a circle of gray and it was as if the world held its breath.

“Aye, very nice I’m sure, pal,” Wiggins said. “But if you’re done with the opera, do you have any more chocolate biscuits?”

He was answered by a loud bark from somewhere deep in the fog.

* * *

Seton sang again, the same two lines.

“Ri linn cothrom na meidhe, Ri linn sgathadh na h-anal.

“Ri linn tabhar na breithe Biodh a shith air do theannal fein.

Another bark punctuated the last note of the chant.

“Fucking hell, the wee man’s onto something,” McCally said.

“Maybe aye, maybe no,” Banks replied. “But we’d best be ready for anything. Back to your positions, lads, and keep your eyes peeled.”

Once again, everything fell deathly quiet and still. The fog swirled, and Banks thought he saw a darker shadow move, just at the edge of his visibility, but by the time he’d raised his weapon, there was only fog again, although a slight swell made the boat rock, twice, underfoot. There was another bark. Louder this time, then three dark humps broke the surface right at the edge of their visibility, parallel to the boat at first then heading northwest away from them at speed, back into the fog. The middle hump, the otter’s body if Seton was right, rose a good three feet above the surface, more than 12 feet long and five feet wide and covered in slick black hair. From the tip of the front hump to the end of the rearmost one spanned a distance several yards longer than the craft they stood in.

The humps had already moved off into the fog before anybody reacted; they’d all been struck dumb and immobile by the sheer size of the thing as it passed. The boat rocked under them again in the beast’s wake.

“Fucking hell,” Wiggins said, loudly enough for them all to hear. “We’re going to need a bigger boat.” *

“After it,” Banks shouted.

Seton was already on the move and heading back up the ladder to the top pilot deck. The chain rattled again as the anchor was drawn up and the calm was broken further by the thrum of engines as the boat started up and was quickly put in high gear.

They plowed quickly through the fog, casting caution aside, and Banks went up front, weapon raised, hoping for a clear shot at their quarry. But even at full speed, they didn’t catch it. He only got a short glimpse of it and saw a tail splash as the beast, some 20 yards ahead, dived. By the time they reached the spot, the water had stilled again.

Seton cut the engine and let them bob slightly in a small swell.

“I don’t suppose anybody took a photie?” Wiggins said from up front. “We could make a mint in the tabloids.”

Seton shouted down from the top deck.

“I could try singing again?”

“No, it’s off and away for now. Heading for the north bank is my guess,” Banks said. “We’ll follow that way for a bit, and hope this bloody fog lifts and we can get a clear shot at it.”

Seton looked as if he might argue, then thought better of it, and went back to the wheel. The engines started up again, and they headed north into the fog, all of them more alert than they had been previously.

* * *

The fog started to lift five minutes later, and minutes after that, they were motoring in clear water, a hundred yards from the north bank. Banks climbed up the ladder to the top deck and swept a 360-degree turn, looking for any sign of the beast, but there was only the receding fog, and the, now slightly choppy, surface of the lake. A wind was getting up, and the rougher water wasn’t going to help their search, for the humps and hollows of the waves in the wind looked all too similar to the outline the beast had made earlier. On impulse, he checked the near shoreline, panning from the bank up the slope to where trucks sped by on the northern road between Inverness and Urquhart Castle, their drivers oblivious to the hunt going on in the loch below. All he saw was thick scrub and rhododendron bushes; even a beast as large as the one they’d seen might be hiding in that dense undergrowth, and they’d never spot it.

“What now, Captain?” Seton asked.

Banks checked to the northeast where the loch narrowed before the stretch of canal that led into Inverness. The fog had almost completely lifted, and he saw the taller buildings of the city in the far distance.

“I told the colonel a full sweep, so I’d better do it. All the way up to the top end, then we’ll crisscross the loch on the way back and make for Urquhart Castle if we don’t get lucky.”

“Or unlucky, as the case may be. I do believe yon beastie could swamp this boat with one flick of that tail. I wonder why it didn’t attack?”

“Maybe it was your singing,” Banks said.

“Maybe,” Seton replied. “Or maybe it just wasn’t hungry.” The older man looked over at Banks. “I’d like to try again, up at the north end. It’s a common spot for sightings, and we know now it responds to the song. And I have a request of you.”

“Ask away.”

“If it comes back, I’d like to try to calm the beast. To control it if you like. It may be that we can avoid both further bloodshed, and the death of a monster, the death of a legend.”

“And then what?” Banks said softly. “I have some sympathy; I’m a Scot, and Nessie is iconic. I don’t want to be the man who goes down in history as having killed the myth, but it’s not as if we’ve got a handy fucking big cage, and even if we had, I can’t see the brass allowing such a thing to be left alive.”

“Let me try? Please? Call it payment for your passage on my boat if you like, but I have to try.”

Banks saw the naked need in the man’s face, and couldn’t bring himself to say no.

“As long as nobody gets put in harm’s way in the effort, you get first dibs. That’s a promise. But if yon beastie gets frisky, I’ll order the lads to put it down”

Seton smiled and shook Banks’ hand.

“I accept your terms of surrender.”

* * *

When they reached the top end of the loch, they cut the engines and anchored offshore just before the shallow waters around the canal inlet. On a normal summer day, there would be boats lined up here to head into Inverness, but today they had the loch to themselves.

“More coffee, gentlemen?” Seton asked. “I need to wet my throat if I’m going to be singing again?”

“Only if there’s more chocolate digestives,” Wiggins said from the bow.

“Oh, there’s always time for chocolate digestives,” Seton replied with a laugh.

Banks took the relative peace and quiet as an opportunity to check in with the colonel in Urquhart Castle, relating the details of their sighting.

“A giant otter? Really?” Banks heard the incredulity in his superior’s question.

“Yes, sir,” Banks replied, “or as near to one as makes no difference. We all got a good look at it as it passed us. Nearly 30 feet nose to tail at a guess.”

“Is it still in your area?”

“Hard to tell, sir. We’re working on something. I’ll get back to you if we’re successful.”

“Make it fast, Captain. We found what little was left of the wee girl floating by the shore on the south side an hour ago. The press, blast them, have got wind of something. That List D notice won’t hold for long if they know there’s a dead child involved in the story.”

“Understood, sir. I’ll check in when I get to you, if not before.”

“Make it before.”

He closed the call just as Seton arrived with the coffee and biscuits, and they drank, ate, and smoked in silence this time; he guessed Seton was saving his voice for the singing to come.

* * *

“Ri linn cothrom na meidhe, Ri linn sgathadh na h-anal.

“Ri linn tabhar na breithe Biodh a shith air do theannal fein.”

Seton’s high tenor rang across the waters of the loch as he repeated the same two lines for several minutes. Banks went up onto the top deck and scanned the loch surface with the binoculars, but with the wind still getting up, the water was even choppier now, and if the beast did appear, they might not see it until it was almost upon them.

“Heads up, lads,” he shouted, “and take positions. This might go south on us fast.”

Seton raised his voice higher, putting everything into one last repetition.

“Ri linn cothrom na meidhe, Ri linn sgathadh na h-anal.

“Ri linn tabhar na breithe Biodh a shith air do theannal fein.”

There was no warning, no sign of its presence. The beast surfaced 20 yards off their port side and came toward them with a surging rush of spray.

- 7 -

From straight in front, the huge, slightly flattened head looked almost dog-like, although it was five feet and more in width, with a mouthful of teeth in a smile that creased from ear to ear. McCally was closest, and he raised his rifle, taking aim.

“Don’t shoot,” Seton pleaded. “Captain, tell them not to shoot.”

The creature was almost on them, and would surely swamp the boat in seconds, but before Banks could reply, Seton shouted, two ringing words that sounded like a command.

“Dhumna Ort!”

The beast’s forward motion stopped and its head went down so that only the eyes and snout showed above the surface, the long body swaying from side to side in the water to maintain its position. Its ears perked up, listening. The boat rocked alarmingly below them from the waves caused by the beast’s surging attack and it was several seconds before they were on an even keel.

“Cap, do we put this fucker down or what?” Wiggins shouted.

“Don’t shoot!” Banks replied, and Seton added his own two words immediately afterward.

“Dhumna Ort! Dhumna Ort!”

The beast raised its head just long enough to emit two loud barks in reply, excited, like a dog expecting a treat. The loch fell quiet. The beast lay still in the water, never taking its gaze from the boat, its eyes just inches above the choppy surface. Every few seconds, a small whoof of thin steam showed at its nostrils as it breathed, but that was the only indication it was actually alive. Even the tail was still, lying straight out behind it.

“Now what?” Banks heard Hynd say.

“It’s our move,” Seton replied. “Let’s hope we have the best hand to play.”

* * *

The older man moved around to the port side so that he was standing directly in front of the beast’s gaze. He sang again, softly this time, like a mother to a small child, the same words and tune as before.

“Ri linn cothrom na meidhe, Ri linn sgathadh na h-anal.

“Ri linn tabhar na breithe Biodh a shith air do theannal fein.”

The beast let out a huffing snort that would have been almost comical in other circumstances, but every nerve in Banks’ body was tingling now, and he had an itchy trigger finger. He knew the other men would be feeling the same way.

Come on, wee man. Whatever you’re going to do, do it now.

He was going down the ladder to Seton’s side to try to speed matters up when a new sound broke the silence on the loch. He recognized it immediately as the chop and whop of an approaching helicopter.

It’s not one of ours. The colonel would have told me anything was incoming. So much for the fucking List D notice.

The noise got louder quickly, and Banks kept one eye on the beast; if it got agitated now, it was too close to the boat for them to take it out before it got them. For a few seconds, the chopper seemed as if it was going to pass straight over them and keep going. But the pilot or passenger obviously spotted the beast lying just of their port side, and quickly circled around and came back overhead, descending, intending to hover in position above it. A side door slid open, and a figure leaned out precariously, aiming a camera at the beast below.

“Fuck off, you stupid bastards,” Wiggins shouted, as all of the squad struggled to keep standing, buffeted by the downdraft from the rotor blades. The new wind set the boat rocking and rolling as if in a heavy swell.

When Banks caught his balance, he looked up again, and now he clearly saw the BBC logo on the chopper’s flank.

The fucking idiots are going to get us killed.

The cameraman turned toward the pilot and motioned that they should descend to get even closer. But the beast had other ideas. As the chopper came down to within 20 feet of the boat, the creature surged up and out of the water, showing Banks and the squad its belly of paler fur. Its tail thrust it in a lunge that took it up, and up. Its mouth opened, baring its teeth. Banks saw that the head looked less like that of an otter in profile, and more like a huge, enraged, horse, nostrils flaring, lips pulled back and with a rough mane of hair down across its shoulders. The front legs reached up and taloned paws grabbed the chopper on either side. Metal shrieked as huge claws pierced the chopper’s body and tore.

The cameraman dropped his camera, which bounced off the beast’s snout and fell between it and the boat with a loud splash, then he squealed, just once, as he lost his seating and tumbled out of the door. He wasn’t as lucky as the camera; the creature had its mouth open, waiting for him, and he fell into the maw as if he’d been aiming for it. One bite was all it took. Banks felt blood spatter down on his face as he watched the thing swallow, once, twice and the cameraman was gone.

The chopper still had power, and the engine wailed with a high whine as the pilot tried to turn aside, but he was far too late. The beast’s jaws clamped down on the cockpit. Glass shattered, metal bent and tore, and the chopper fell out of the air, trailing dark smoke as the creature dragged it back into the sea with a splash that rocked the boat, almost tipping it over.

When the beast fell, it twisted and turned. As it gripped the frame of the chopper tighter and dived down into the water with the crumpled fuselage, its tail swung round, thicker than a tall tree and just as solid. It struck Seton in the upper torso, throwing him all the way back along the boat to land in a crumpled heap against the bow rail.

It had all happened so fast that yet again no one in the squad had had time to raise their weapon, let alone fire a shot. Banks looked over the side. Two large air bubbles rose up from the depths and burst at the surface. And as quickly as that it was over, leaving only silence, a scum of oil and floating fragments of seating material on the surface to show where the chopper had been.

I wonder if they were going out live? If so, that’s definitely the end of yon List D notice.

* * *

Seton, almost miraculously, was still alive when Banks reached him, and even trying to stand, although there were flecks of blood at his lips and he was in obvious pain.

“The bugger stove my ribs in,” he said, wheezing. “I’ll live. But there’ll be no more singing or chanting for a while.”

Barns checked for other broken bones, but found nothing. When he examined the ribcage, Seton gave out a whelp of pain.

“I reckon you’ve got two, maybe three broken ribs there, Sandy.”

“Aye, that’s what I thought too. Get me back to the cabin. There’s bandages in the first-aid kit.”

“It’s a doctor you need,” Banks replied.

“Aye, but do you see one here? You lads have had field medic training, right? Patch me up. I’m seeing this out for the duration.”

“Only until we get to Caste Urquhart,” Banks replied. “There’ll be a proper medic there with the colonel’s team.”

“Sounds like a plan to me,” Seton said. “Now all I need is something for the pain. Lead me to the whisky, there’s a good chap.”

Banks gave Seton a shoulder to hang on to before turning to the squad.

“Cally, you’re with me,” he said. “Let’s get the auld boy here patched up. Sarge, Wiggo, keep your eyes peeled, and if the big bugger comes back, don’t bother singing to it. Put a volley down its gullet and don’t wait for an order.”

* * *

While McCally wrapped bandages around Seton’s thin, and soon to be a multi-colored hue of bruises, torso, Seton called the incident in to the colonel.

“Best tell the BBC that their crew is down,” he said after relating the basics.

“Aye, we heard already. They started to send a streaming video back to their van here. I got a good look down your monster’s gullet before the picture went. What were they thinking? Stupid, stupid, bastards. They were told to keep well away.”

“Aye, I’m sure they were, sir. Has it caused a stushie?”

“Luckily, they weren’t live on air,” the colonel replied. “If they had been, I wouldn’t be talking to you now, I’d be getting my arse reamed by the brass. But it’s just another thing to deal with here, and the press boys are straining against an increasingly short leash. We need a big win, Captain, and we need it fast.”

“As I said, sir, we’re working on something, or we were before that fucking chopper tuned up and screwed it up.”

Banks told the colonel about the singing, and how it had calmed the beast.

“You should have put the fucker down right there and then,” the colonel said. “That’s what I sent you out to do, not to sing to the bloody thing.”

“Aye, maybe I should have at that, sir,” Banks said dryly. “I hope to get another chance at it on the way back down the loch.”

He signed off before adding anything he’d regret later.

Or then I’d be the one getting his arse reamed.

“Let me guess,” McCally said as Banks turned back, “the boss isn’t a happy man.”

“No, he isn’t,” Banks replied. “And that makes two of us. Getting civilians killed on my watch wasn’t in the script.”

“Nor mine, Captain,” Seton said. He had a whisky bottle in one hand and he wasn’t bothering with a glass, necking it down in gulps that would have floored Banks if he tried it. “This is my fault.”

“No, it’s mine,” Banks said. “Mine for indulging a dangerous magic trick with a violent beast. I’m sorry, wee man, but I’m writing that one off as a failure.”

“But it was working,” Seton said. His attempt at raising his voice brought him a flare of pain that needed more whisky to quell it.

“Right up until it wasn’t,” Banks replied. “I’m not about to let any of my lads end up as otter food for the sake of another experiment. You’re in no fit state for any more of your hocus-pocus anyway. We’ll do this the hard way.”

“I could teach somebody the chant? I heard Corporal McCally say he recognized it. It wouldn’t be hard for a highlander to master.”

“There can be only one,” Wiggins said with a grin until Banks stopped him with a stare.

“There’s no time,” Banks replied to Seton. “You need some rest. Try not to move and maybe you won’t pierce a lung. We’ll head for Castle Urquhart, going across the loch a few times on the way down, but if you need us to speed up and go straight there, just shout. And pray we get lucky and come across it again before it kills anybody else. My conscience is going to be in a bad enough state as it is without adding any more weight to it.”

* * *

Banks motioned for McCally to follow and left Seton in the cabin with the whisky. Banks knew the pain of broken ribs of old; the liquor, then sleep was probably the most comfortable outcome the old man could hope for until they got him proper treatment.

And that’ll have to wait. I’ve got a monster to find.

“The auld fella’s right though,” McCally said. “I nearly ken that chant already. It wouldn’t take but a few minutes to get it down pat.”

“We don’t have minutes to spare, Cally. And I’m not about to use you as bait for the fucker.”

“I’m too important, is that it, Cap?” McCally said with a grin.

“Aye. You’re the only that makes a decent cup of coffee. So do me a favor and don’t get eaten, big man.”

He sent McCally back to his port side post, then climbed up to the top deck to take the wheel. The controls were simple enough to get to grips with, and a minute later he had the anchor raised and the engines running, his gaze set down the vessel and over the bow to the whole length of the loch.

“Wiggo,” he shouted. “It looks quiet at the moment. See if you can rustle us up a sandwich and a mug of tea… or even just more of those chocolate biscuits. And smoke them if you’ve got them, lads. It could be a long afternoon.”

As it turned out, a cheese sandwich, a cup of weak coffee, courtesy of Wiggins rather than McCally, and a smoke proved to be the highlights of the next few hours. They slowly crisscrossed the north end of the loch with nothing to see but the wind on the water and a nasty-looking front of dark, looming cloud slowly advancing from the southwest. A cold breeze blew up ahead of the front, making the water even choppier and biting through Banks’ clothing.

After a while, the wind came even colder, driving straight into his face. He abandoned the top pilot deck and went below to the safety of the cabin and the interior wheelhouse at the front of the living space. The view over the loch wasn’t nearly as good, but the relative warmth more than made up for that.

He allowed the squad to come in, one at a time, to fetch their waterproof fleeces, but kept them out on deck; he needed as many eyes on the water as they could muster, and Seton wasn’t going to be of any help. The older man had taken to the whisky with gusto, and was now lost in what looked to be a mercifully painless sleep, flat out across the bench beside the kitchen table.

* * *

They had another coffee and smoke break in the early afternoon, just past the midway point of their trip down the loch. There had been no sign of the monster.

“Probably still chewing away at that fucking chopper,” Wiggins said as they all converged on the rear viewing deck for a smoke. “I don’t want to know what’s in its shite the next time it goes.”

“Stupid bloody reporters who should have kent better,” Hynd said.

Banks didn’t admonish the men for their tastelessness. Gallows humor was a survival tactic for men who had to face danger on a routine basis, an ‘if it’s happening to somebody else, it’s not happening to us’ mentality that allowed them a buffer against harsh reality.

Besides, the BBC men really should have bloody known better.

By the time they finished their coffee and smokes, the line of the dark front was almost directly overhead. The wind got up, disturbing the water even more, and rain splattered in heavy drops. By the time Banks got back to the wheel, the window in front of him was awash. The whole sky had gone dark, slate gray, and the rudimentary wiper blades he had at his disposal did little to clear the view from rain that was being blown almost horizontal in the face of the window.

He had to drop his speed to half of what he’d been doing earlier. There was little chance of maintaining their crisscross searching pattern, for turning side on into the wind caused them to rock and roll alarmingly, threatening to tumble the men outside off and over the rail.

Bugger this for a game of soldiers.

He set the boat’s nose directly into the wind, ran up the engine as far as he dared, and headed, he hoped, in the general direction of Castle Urquhart.

- 8 -

Over the next half an hour, the weather deteriorated until he could only see a few yards ahead of the nose of the boat. Hynd came in from the rear deck. Although he wore the waterproof fleece with its hood pulled over his face, rain dripped from his nose, his cheeks looked as if they’d been sandblasted, and he gave every impression of being seriously fed up with life.

“Can I bring the lads in, Cap? It’s not fit for man nor beast out here.”

“It’s the beast I’m worried about,” Banks replied. “But you’re right, there’s fuck all to see anyway apart from rain. Bring them in and get a brew going to warm you up. I’ll keep an eye out up front, and one of you three watch out the back door. But if it decides to attack us in this weather, we’re fucked anyway; we’ll never see it coming.”

“Let’s hope chewing on yon chopper gives it the shits, keeps it busy, and far away.”

“We’re supposed to be hunting it,” Banks said with a thin smile.

“Aye, because that’s been working out well so far,” Hynd replied, and left to fetch McCally and Wiggins.

* * *

Seton woke up as the others were coming inside and sat up to make room at the table, his face pale and a mask of pain after the effort.

“What did I miss?” he asked, his voice little more than a croak.

“A fuckload of wind, a shitload of rain, and fuck all of anything else,” Wiggins replied.

Banks turned to Seton.

“Yep, that about sums it up. As far as I can tell, we’re headed directly for Castle Urquhart. Shouldn’t be too long, as long as I don’t run us ashore in the meantime.”

Seton insisted on getting up to join Banks at the wheel, although the effort clearly pained him enough that he needed another slug of whisky before he was able to speak. He looked at the map of the loch that was pinned above their heads, checked the compass and GPS, and nodded.

“You’re a tad off. Bring her to port, ten degrees or so, and you’re heading straight there. Remember to stop before you hit the castle.”

Wiggins came over and passed them each a coffee. Seton put a slug of whisky in his, but Banks refused when offered.

“You can buy me and the lads a drink when this is all over, and we’ll listen to your stories all night, but best we all stay sharp right now. The weather might be just the cover this thing needs; we know fuck all about its attack patterns.”

“At least we know it disnae like helicopters,” Wiggins said.

Banks’ tension headache from peering through the window ratcheted up again, and he ceded the wheel to Hynd for a spell before going to stand guard at the open rear door to have a smoke. At first, he was looking almost northeast while he stood in the relative cover of the doorway, but when he turned to flick the butt of the smoke away when he was done, he looked northwest, in line with the rear of the boat.

The beast was there, right behind them.

Although visibility was low, he saw the length of the creature clearly, the three dark, almost shadowy humps swimming along in their wake, keeping pace with the boat some 20 yards behind.

He unslung his rifle, taking aim, but didn’t shoot. With a beast this big, he’d need to get it in the eye or straight down the gullet to put it down fast; one or two bullets were only likely to enrage it. The chances of a decent shot were slim to nil. All he could see were the humps, and with the boat rocking and bouncing, and the gloom gathering, he wasn’t even sure of hitting it in the first place.

He turned back to the cabin and called inside.

“Sarge, stay at the wheel, keep us on the straight and narrow. The rest of you; grab your guns and get out here. We’ve got a visitor.”

* * *

“Stay put, auld man,” Banks said to Seton. “The excitement won’t do you any good.”

“At my age, any kind of excitement is better than none at all,” Seton replied.

The older man pulled an oilskin rain jacket over his shoulders and came out with McCally and Wiggins. They all stood at the rear deck looking at the beast while rain lashed against their backs. If the weather bothered the creature, it showed no sign of it, maintaining the same steady pace in their wake.

“Well, we found it,” McCally said. “Now what do we do?”

“We’ve got our orders. We take it down. It’s got to raise its head some time,” Banks said. “We all hit it at once when it does.”

“Otters can swim with their noses just clearing the surface every few minutes,” Seton said. “This might not be an otter, exactly, but it swims like one. I wouldn’t count on getting a clear shot. Besides, Captain, I thought you did not want to be the man who killed Nessie?”

“I don’t. But nobody will ever know in any case; the colonel will see to that. And I’m in his bad books enough already without letting a kiddie-killer rampage about the countryside just because I’m a sentimental old fart.”

“It’s a fine club to be in,” Seton replied. “I’m a long-standing member.”

“I get one of those when I visit the sarge’s wife,” Wiggins said, but his heart wasn’t in the banter; they were all too fixated on the loch monster that cruised just 20 yards away.

“What do we know about it that’ll help here?” Banks asked.

“We know it reacts when it gets annoyed,” McCally said.

“What do you want to do? Poke it with a big stick?” Wiggins replied.

“Something like that, aye, Wiggo,” Banks said. “Sandy, are you up to taking the wheel for a bit? We’ll need the sarge and his gun.”

Seton again looked like he wanted to argue, but he must have seen Banks’ determination in his eyes, for he went back into the cabin and, after a short conversation that Banks couldn’t hear for the wind, Sergeant Hynd, with his rifle unslung, came out to join them. Banks had them line up along the rear rail just above the churning propellers.

He raised his rifle and took aim at the larger target that was the middle of the three humps.

“Get ready, lads. This might go down fast.”

* * *

“Wait.” a shout came from the cabin. “I’ve got an idea.”

Banks stepped back so that he was at the cabin doorway and could speak to Seton.

“Is it less risky?”

Seton smiled. “I don’t know about that, but it might give you a better chance of hitting it.”

Banks studied Seton’s face, looking for signs of any devious intent, but saw only a plan, open smile.

“Okay, let’s have it then, and be quick. It might get bored with following us any time.”

Seton pointed to the map above his head.

“We’re near the northwest shore, about five minutes if we head straight for it. We can float easily enough in only six feet of water. But the beast is too big to swim properly in that depth. It would have to raise itself up… ”

“… and give us a clearer headshot. Good thinking, man,” Banks said. “Make it so.”

He went back out to the squad and quickly relayed the plan. The boat turned slightly against the wind so that they had to steady themselves against the rail.

The beast turned, right on cue, behind them and kept following.

* * *

After several minutes, it became obvious that Seton’s plan might have merit. The beast’s swimming action became less smooth, punctuated by several seconds where either the tail thrashed more violently in the water, or the head came up, briefly, only to drop back down again before they could get a clear shot.

“Steady, lads,” Banks said. “Wait until we’re sure of putting it down. I don’t want to see this lad when he’s really angry.”

Rain and wind continued to lash at them, coming slightly side-on now that they had turned their nose, enough to make their shots even trickier. Banks checked his watch. It was four minutes since he’d left the cabin doorway.

“Any time now,” he shouted.

The wash behind them was getting whiter as they churned up shallower water, and that too seemed to cause the beast trouble in its swimming.

“I think it’s pissed off,” Wiggins said.

“I know how it feels,” Banks replied, and then there was no time for talk as the beast came forward fast, a powerful thrust of its tail propelling it, torpedo-like, straight at them. Its head hadn’t come up at all yet, although the main body was noticeable higher out of the water. In a matter of seconds, they were going to get rammed.

Banks put three quick shots into the largest hump, hitting it just above the waterline, but the beast didn’t slow.

“Brace yourself,” Banks shouted, and grabbed tight onto the rear deck handrail.

* * *

Banks heard three more shots; McCally had taken a chance and fired instead of bracing himself. He didn’t see if the shots hit. The boat bucked and shuddered as the beast slammed into them — the only similar feeling Banks had felt before was back in Afghanistan when their SUV had been hit side on by a tank. This was worse.

He lost his grip on the rail and was turned around, thrown across the deck and fell hard against the doorjamb of the rear door. He saw Seton lying, slumped across the wheel, and had no idea whether the man was alive or dead. Through the big front window, he also saw that the shoreline was coming up fast as the beast pushed them along. They were headed, at speed, straight for the rocky bank.

“Seton, get out of there.”

His shout went unheard. The boat bucked again, and Banks got thrown through the doorway to smash hard into the kitchen tabletop. He managed to steady himself with his free hand and gripped the rifle tight in the other and a new sound rent the air, the crunch and tear of the boat dragging along a rocky bottom. The engine squealed twice and cut out with a bang. Smoke came up through the hatchway that led below.

Two more shots came from outside.

“Fuck you,” Wiggins shouted loudly, then there was no more shooting, no more shouting, just the lurch and rock of the boat and the ever-louder crunching of the bottom against rock.

Banks staggered upright and stepped over to Seton, lifting him and turning him around to check for life. The older man’s eyes fluttered, and there was more blood at his lips.

But he’s alive.

The boat rose at the back end, six feet or more. The big front window gave way and fell in on itself in a crash of glass. But it gave Banks a chance he had not been expecting. He heaved Seton up, slid him out the window, and leapt after him as the boat came apart in flying bits of timber and plastic, metal, and glass. He caught hold of Seton around the waist and they slid, feet first, across the sloping front deck, stopping only for a second when they reached the railing. Banks was able to get his feet underneath him and, gun in one hand, the other arm around Seton’s waist, leapt into the cold waters of the loch.

He was relieved to hit solid ground underfoot and stood up, thigh deep. The shore was only a few yards away, and he pushed himself quickly through the water toward it, almost slipping on sharper rocks twice, but managing to stay upright, although Seton was completely limp, a dead weight in his arm.

He struggled ashore and put Seton down on a small pebbled beach before turning back to look for the rest of the squad.

Hynd and Wiggins were right behind him, wading out of the water with their rifles held high overhead. There was no sign of Corporal McCally.

- 9 -

The beast wasn’t paying them any attention. It had already destroyed the boat and was now in the process of tearing the wreckage apart. It had stood up, the waterline just at the top of its short, squat legs, its front paws up on what was left of the rear deck of the boat. The huge head once again reminded Banks of that of a large horse in its general shape and demeanor, eyes wide, ears pricked, nostrils flaring and hairy mane flying in the wind. But no horse ever showed rows of teeth like this one; twin canines showing most prominently, gleaming white in the gloom.

Banks raised his weapon, ready to take a shot, but the beast’s head went down to the deck before he could aim, and when the head came back up again, it had McCally in its mouth. It was impossible to tell whether the corporal was alive, although he lay limp across the lower law, and he wasn’t holding a weapon.

Banks saw that Hynd and Wiggins had also turned and raised their rifles.

“Aim for the fucker’s body,” he shouted.

The beast bit down, a burst of red filled its maw, and it was already turning away, starting to chew, McCally clearly dead between its jaws, as the squad fired, three shots each, all aiming for the bulk of its body.

Banks knew at least two of his had hit, he’d seen the impact clearly enough, but the beast surged away and was into the deeper water and moving off at speed in a matter of seconds. If the shots had wounded it in any way, it didn’t show it.

* * *

“Get back here, you fucker,” Wiggins wailed, and sent more shots off after the beast until it was lost from sight on the rain and haze, and Hynd put a hand on his shoulder.

“He’s gone, lad. Cally’s gone.”

“Aye,” Banks said bitterly. “And auld Sandy will be soon if we don’t get him to a doctor.”

Banks knew that the loss of a man, one he’d considered a friend these past few years, was going to hit him hard when he stopped to think about it. The trick, the only one he’d found over the years that worked, for a while, was not to stop and think about it. Sarge and Wiggins needed him now, and at this point, any order was better than no order at all.

He looked over to where the wreckage of all that remained of the boat lay. What could float was already spreading out in a widening circle, the water had a covering film of oil and grease, and there was no sign that anything, such as their kit bags, was going to be salvageable.

Besides, I don’t have time for that.

“Sarge, you take point. There’s a road a hundred yards or so away up the slope to the north if my bearings are right. Wiggo, you and I have got the auld man here. We need to get him to a doctor at Castle Urquhart, and we need to do it right now. Move out.”

Wiggins was on the verge of tears, and Banks thought he might join him if it came to that.

Get them moving. Think — and drink — later.

He stepped over to Seton. The older man was still out, although his breathing seemed to be coming slow and steady.

“One on each side of him, and up the hill we go. Are you with me, Wiggo?”

The private was still looking out over the water, as if expecting McCally to wade out to join them.

“Wiggo, get your arse over here right now. That’s an order, private.”

The voice of authority cut through Wiggins’ grief and got him moving, for now, and he came over to help heave Seton up from the stones of the small beach. They carried him between them, with their rifles in their free hands and their ears pricked, ready to turn and fire at the slightest indication that the beast was making a reappearance.

* * *

Luckily, the slope wasn’t severe, and, following a deer track, they were able to carry Seton without too much effort, for the old man was small and slight, and was less of a burden than carrying their packs would have been. They got to the top of the slope, clambered over a guardrail, and found that the sarge had already flagged them down a ride, a large black sedan with the driver, an elderly woman, the only occupant. There was plenty of room for Banks, Wiggins and Seton in the back, and Hynd up front.

The woman took one look at Seton and caught the urgency of the situation immediately. The road was quiet due to the weather, and she drove as fast as was safe in the conditions, lights blazing, hazard lights flashing and horn deployed to move aside anyone who dared to try to slow her down.

“This is about that stushie on the other side of the loch, isn’t it?” she said.

“Aye,” Banks replied. “But we can’t talk about I’m afraid.”

“That’s okay,” she said. “I’m just happy to do my bit.”

What she thought her ‘bit’ was in the cause of, Banks never found out. When they got to Castle Urquhart, they found six large tents and a portable office truck set up in the castle grounds. They bundled Seton off to a medic straight away, and by the time Banks thought to look for the driver and thank her, she’d already gone.

* * *

The doctor pronounced Seton alive and not in any danger of dying. By the time Banks was able to arrange a meeting with the colonel, the older man was awake and talking, although still in some degree of pain.

He looked around, smiled when he saw the three of them at the bedside, then frowned.

“Where’s the big man?” he said, looked at Banks, then went quiet. The answer must have been plain on the captain’s face.

Seton tried to get out of bed, and a medic pushed him, none too gently, back down.

“We’ve got enough morphine in you to kill the pain,” the medic said. “It’s going to knock you out any minute now, but at least it’ll make sure you get some rest.”

Banks took the squad outside, and left a morose Hynd and Wiggo having a smoke outside a makeshift mess tent, then went to have the talk he’d been dreading all the way down the road in the woman’s car.

It went about as badly as he expected.

“So what you’re telling me is that you gave in to an old hippie weirdy-beardy, tried to stop the beast using bloody witchcraft or some such rubbish, and you lost a man? And the beast is still out there on the loch?”

“Not exactly, sir, and—”

“I don’t give a shit about ‘exactly,’ Captain. And neither will poor McCally’s family. You had the perfect chance to take the thing out, and you screwed up, that’s the long and short of it.”

“Yes, sir, but it’s injured now, the lads will want a chance to get some payback for Cally and—”

“If there’s payback, it won’t be from you or your men. You’re suspended, pending a full investigation. Now get your arse out of here before I decide the brig would be a better place for you.”

* * *

Hynd and Wiggins didn’t take it well. He met them inside the mess tent and joined them in a plate of fried chicken and chips, the first decent meal he’d had since this shitstorm started.

“Suspended? He’s got to be fucking kidding. Cally deserves better than that,” Wiggins said.

“Unless you’re planning on going A.W.O.L and stealing a boat, I don’t see that we’ve got much option,” Banks said.

“Actually, that might not be a bad idea, Cap,” Wiggins started. Banks waved him to silence.

“We’re soldiers, son, still subject to military justice. Our superior officer has given us an order. Ours is not to reason why and all that happy shite. Be thankful we’re still out in the free air.”

“Aye, well sometimes it fucking sucks,”

“So what else is new?” Banks said. He patted his rifle. “Just be glad we’re not completely busted. If the colonel was really pissed off, he’d have taken our guns too.”

They finished their meals in silence and went back outside for a smoke. Night was falling, a dark gloom settling over the loch that matched their mood.

One of the medics they’d left Seton with walked toward the tent. Banks stopped him at the opening.

“How’s the wee man?”

“Constitution of an ox,” the medic said. “But he’s got three broken ribs, and possibly a concussion. He’ll definitely be out for a couple of hours, and there’s an ambulance coming down from Inverness for him. When he gets his back braced, he’ll be sore, but walking, by tomorrow. Oh, and he asked me to give you this.”

The medic took a thumb drive from his chest pocket and passed it to Banks.

“He was doing something on our laptop, and wouldn’t go down and under until it was done. He says C is for the chant, and D is for the command. I don’t have a clue what that means.”

“I think I might. Thanks,” Banks said. He passed the drive to Wiggins.

“This’ll give you something to do, lad. Find us a laptop, and see what’s on this. If it’s what I think it is, it might come in handy.”

He thanked the medic again, and left Hynd and Wiggins by the mess tent.

He needed to clear his head.

* * *

Banks felt at a loose end, his nerves frayed and buzzing. The vision of the beast chewing down as it carried McCally away remained big in his mind. He walked past the other tents, along the side of the truck carrying the temporary office, up a narrow gravel track, and onto a mound overlooking the castle. The rain had eased back to thin drizzle, although with the wind it still felt harsh against his cheeks. He turned his back on it, and lit a cigarette in cupped hands.

The tumbled ruin of the castle was still lit up for visitors, although Banks had the place to himself. It was normally a tourist trap. In high summer, there would be rows of coaches in the area the colonel had chosen for his H.Q., and scores, even hundreds, of people would be milling around the grounds and gift shop. Banks wondered what they’d think, them with their wee plush Nessie toys, their porcelain ornaments, tea towels and postcards all showing the now traditional, serpentine, cute, and often green monster. What would they make of the raging dark beast that had so easily overcome the boat, had so casually taken the life of his corporal?

And there I am already, back worrying at it again.

The colonel was right; from his perspective, Banks had been negligent in not taking the shot when Seton had the beast calmed.

But I promised the wee man I wouldn’t. And the day my promise means nothing is the day I quit.

But there was still the direct line that ran from letting the beast lie there as if asleep, and the later events that led to McCally’s death. Part of him wanted to lay the blame at the door of the BBC reporters in the chopper, but they too were dead. Anyway, he knew that in the long nights when sleep wouldn’t come, McCally would be there with him, in line with the other men he’d lost over the years, all ready to ask why.

Because we chose the life.

That was the real answer, one that all soldiers, if they were honest to themselves, knew. But that didn’t stop them lining up at three in the morning to admonish him. And it didn’t stop the guilt.

He smoked two cigarettes while standing on the mound in the rain, face turned toward the castle but not really seeing it, lost in thought, of times spent with McCally in the field, in bars, and just hanging out around the pool table in the mess.

Christ, I’ll miss him.

He ground the butt of his second smoke out on the gravel and finally turned back into the wind and rain, heading for the tents to find out what Wiggins made of the thumb drive. They might be suspended, but that didn’t mean they had to just sit quietly on their arses.

* * *

He found Hynd and Wiggins in the mess tent again. They sat side by side at a laptop. As Banks approached, he noticed that the thumb drive was installed on its right-hand side.

“The colonel’s secretary has gone home for the night,” Hynd said, “so we helped ourselves to a wee lend of her machine. Would you believe her password is ‘password12’?

“And what about the drive? Anything on it?”

Wiggins turned the laptop so Banks could see. There was a small blue window in the center of the screen, with just two round red buttons, one labeled ‘C’ and one labeled ‘D’.

“It’s a wee simple JavaScript routine, attached to two.mp3 files,” Wiggins said. “A piece of piss for a programmer, but not something I expected the wee auld man to be capable of.”

“I think wee Sandy kens a lot more than he’s let on,” Banks replied. “But does it work?”

“Aye, well, it’s him singing that Gaelic stuff right enough, and shouting the two words. I heard it in the headphones earlier, but it’ll work just fine through the speakers. Here, I’ll show you.”

Wiggins clicked the mouse before Banks could stop him. The sound of the Gaelic chant, slightly tinny, and hoarser than they’d heard it previously, came clearly through the speakers.

“Ri linn cothrom na meidhe, Ri linn sgathadh na h-anal.

“Ri linn tabhar na breithe Biodh a shith air do theannal fein.”

A loud bark echoed from out on the loch in reply.

- 10 -

“Oh, fuck,” Wiggins said. “What do we do, Cap? Leave it on or switch it off?”

The two lines looped ‘round again.

“Ri linn cothrom na meidhe, Ri linn sgathadh na h-anal.

“Ri linn tabhar na breithe Biodh a shith air do theannal fein.”

And again a loud bark came in reply. They were not the only ones to hear it. People came out of tents to gather in the open area, bemused by the sheer volume of the beast’s call.

“Leave it on, Wiggo,” Banks said. “This might be the only chance we get.”

“Has that fucker been following us or what? And how the fuck can it hear it? It’s hardly loud enough to carry outside the tent,” Hynd said.

“Maybe it’s fucking Supernessie,” Wiggins said.

“Stow it, lads. Let’s take the laptop down to the shore, see if we can bring this fucker to us. If it comes, we’ll put it down hard this time.”

“What about the colonel?” Hynd asked.

“We’re doing this for Cally,” Banks said. “Fuck the colonel.”

“You’ll have to get in line for that,” a voice said in the tent opening. Banks looked up to see his superior officer glaring in at them.

The two lines of the chant looped ‘round again.

“Ri linn cothrom na meidhe, Ri linn sgathadh na h-anal.

“Ri linn tabhar na breithe Biodh a shith air do theannal fein.”

The bark came in on the last syllable. It sounded closer now.

“This is your doing?” the colonel said.

“It’s just something the man Seton left for us,” Banks said. “I had no idea it would bring the thing here, with all these people about.”

“Aye, well, it looks like you might have done something right after all, and saved us a night on the loch in the dark looking for it. Did I hear you say you were going to the shore?”

The bark came again in response to the next looped chant. It was definitely closer now.

“Yes, sir. And I think we’d better do it soon, before we have a bloody big angry visitor.”

“I’ll get you some backup,” the colonel said, and turned away from the door.

“You heard the boss,” Banks said. “To the shore it is, double time, lads. Let’s nail the fucker once and for all.”

* * *

Wiggins held the laptop open in his left hand. The chant kept looping, and the barking got ever closer. Several people had already moved down to the stony beach, staring out over the dark loch.

“Get the fuck back, you idiots,” Hynd shouted. “Either that or get a weapon. This thing’s not a fucking cuddly toy.”

Nobody paid him any notice, and by then it was too late anyway. Somebody, Banks guessed it to be at the colonel’s order, swung one of the floodlights around so that it lit up the shore and the surface of the loch beyond. The beast lay in the deeper water some 20 yards offshore, the now telltale three humps all that could be seen of it, its head toward shore, tail end swaying slowly from side to side as it maintained its position. The sound of the chanting from the laptop was almost obscured by the click of photographs being taken, and yells of what sounded more like awe than fear. As the chant reached the end of another loop, the huge head came up, just for long enough to give out an answering bark before lowering again.

“Wiggo,” Banks said. “I’m going to give it a poke. If it starts to come forward, try that other button and see if it stops. If not, you have my permission to shoot the fucker. Let’s do Cally proud.”

Banks raised his rifle and took aim. He waited for the last syllable of the looped chant to come ‘round, anticipated the head coming up, and fired three quick shots that echoed and rang across the water.

As before, the reaction was immediate; the beast came forward, as solid and implacable as an oncoming steam train, nostrils flaring, mouth agape, the mane flying behind the huge head.

Banks tried to take aim right down its throat, but the gawpers on the shore had suddenly realized their peril, and in their flight ran right in front of him. To make matters worse, Wiggins got knocked by a flailing arm, and the laptop went flying, landing with an ominous crack on the rocks at their feet. Hynd at least got three shots in, but if they hit the beast, it didn’t show it.

They were out of time; the thing was almost on them. Banks threw his body to the ground and tried to take aim in the same motion. Hynd and Wiggins both leapt and rolled aside as the beast reached them. Banks tried to get his weapon up, hoping at least to do some damage before he got flattened, but the beast raised its head, barked — more like a roar of defiance — and kept on going. Banks had to roll away fast as a foot that would have caved in his chest stamped down where he had just been, then had to roll away farther when the tree-trunk thick tail whipped just in front of his eyes. He smelled it as it passed over him, musky and thick, and felt its heat as if he stood near a roaring fire.

Then they were left on the shore as the creature headed directly for the tents of the camp, scattering people ahead of it. One poor sod was too slow, and the beast, barely slowing, barreled directly over him, leaving only a trampled, broken sack of flesh behind it.

“It’s heading for the lights,” Hynd shouted.

Banks rolled to his feet. Wiggins had bent to the laptop but left it on the ground, taking only the thumb drive from its socket and stowing it in his flak jacket.

“It’s buggered, Cap.”

“And so are we all if we don’t take that thing down right now,” Banks replied. “With me, lads.”

He set off at a run, heading back toward the camp.

* * *

The creature had already trampled or torn down most of the tents, and was in the process of biting down hard on the largest of the floodlight gantries. The light itself wobbled then fell to the ground with a crash that could be heard all over the camp. The power to the other lights shorted out with a crack and flash of blue sparks. The beast immediately turned its attention to the portable office, perhaps thinking it to be an enemy, for it was little more than a long, squat, shadow in the darkness. Banks saw the tail swing ‘round, as effective a weapon as a swung iron bar, caving in the whole of one side of the trailer and sending the vehicle rolling and tumbling across the car-park in a screech of tearing, buckling, metal.

The squad was too far away to get a clear shot now that the camp was in almost total darkness. The only light came from the road beyond and the assembled news crews. Banks waved forward six other armed men who looked to be seeking an order, any order.

“With me,” he shouted. “Try to distract it from the civilians.”

But that option was already gone; the car park lit up in a cluster of flashes as the massed ranks of press tried to get a picture. The beast reacted as if it had been shot again, and launched itself out of the car park and straight at the press corps.

* * *

The carnage started with the demolition of a BBC van that lasted even less time than the helicopter had earlier; when the beast moved on, there was only a flattened and torn pile of bloodied scrap left behind. The reporters had packed themselves so tightly across the narrow roadway that they had nowhere to go, nowhere to run. The beast rampaged through them, tossing vehicles and bodies aside, tearing flesh and bone apart with teeth and claws, and feeding as it tore a bloody swath 20 yards long along the road.

Banks fired three shots toward the beast even as he ran toward the carnage, aiming high so as not to hit anybody.

“Hey, come on, you fucker,” Wiggins shouted. “I’m tastier than any of those wankers. Come and get a bite out of me.” He too fired high, but the beast seemed too intent on feeding to take any note.

“If you don’t get back here, I’m going to put a round up yer arse,” Wiggins shouted, and fired again, but the beast did not turn. It continued to rend and tear in frenzy, its excited barks even louder than the terrible wails and screams from what remained of the press corps.

It was Hynd who surprised them all by shouting out, not a curse, but the Gaelic command they’d heard Seton use earlier.

“Dhumna Ort!” Dhumna Ort!”

Everything fell quiet save for wails and weeping from the dying and injured. The beast stopped feeding and turned slowly. It looked straight at the armed soldiers. Banks motioned that they should form a line across the road, cutting off the thing’s path back to the loch.

The beast, wary now, backed away slowly. In the gloom of the night, and at still 30 yards away, it was a looming, black shadow, although the glint of its eyes as it stared at them could be clearly seen.

* * *

“Okay, Sarge, you’re in charge,” Banks said.

Hynd turned to face him.

“I don’t have a fucking Scooby what to do now, Cap,” the sergeant said. “I just remembered what the wee man shouted earlier.”

“Aye, well, it seems to be working. Try it again.”

“Dhumna Ort!” Hynd shouted, and the beast barked back, twice, as loud as the earlier gunshots.

Banks had them all take a step forward.

The beast took a step back, staying in the dark shadows.

They appeared to be at an impasse. It was broken by a shout from behind them.

“What are you bloody waiting for? Shoot the buggering thing,”

Banks knew the colonel’s voice well enough that he didn’t have to turn. And he knew better than to disobey a direct order, even when he also knew it was too far, too dark, and the beast was too big, too fast for them.

“Fire,” Banks shouted.

The noise was deafening. At first, the beast stood in the face of the volley, and even made a move as if intending to come for them. They were close enough to it for Banks to see a red mist across the thing’s face as blood sprayed; they were wounding it.

“Again!” he shouted, and another volley rang out from nine rifles.

The beast gave out one last bark of defiance, then turned and fled, off and away south down the roadway, as fast as any delivery truck in a hurry.

It was lost in darkness in seconds.

- 11 -

Wiggins turned to the colonel, his face full of fury.

“Cally deserved better than that,” he said. “We had it under control.”

“Stow it, Private,” Banks said, stopping Wiggins before he got himself a spell in the brig, or worse.

The colonel had hardly noticed in any case. His gaze was fixed on the carnage in the road. Bodies, and body parts, lay strewn everywhere they looked. Only quiet moans and weeping in the darkness showed that anyone was still alive.

“Get this cleaned up,” the superior officer said. “And not a fucking word of this gets out tonight. If it does, we’re all going to jail for a very long time.”

If any of the crews had been going out live, that was going to become a moot point very quickly, but Banks kept his mouth shut. The colonel must be under enormous political pressure on this one, and it just got a lot worse.

* * *

The rest of the night was a blur of medics and ambulances, blood and gore and body bags. The final count was 30 dead and 20 more wounded, four of those critical. Banks organized getting the tents back up where it was possible. Two of them became makeshift field hospitals, the colonel purloined another small one for his own use, and they were able, after a time, to get power to the portable kitchen in the mess and at least get hot tea and coffee distributed. He’d been in disaster zones or the aftermath of battles before, and this had the same feel of living on fumes and the strung-out after-effects of an adrenaline rush.

Coffee and a smoke helped, but he was still on edge, expecting the beast to return to try to finish them at any moment. He’d posted as many guards as he could afford all around the site, watching both the road and the loch.

Closing the door after the horse has bolted.

The colonel was in his tent on a radio to the top brass for more than an hour, and when he finally emerged, he looked older and more tired than Banks had ever seen him.

“Do you have a cigarette, Cap?” were his first words, ones that Banks would have bet long odds against, but he handed over a smoke, had one for himself, and had to light the colonel’s for him, for the officer’s hands trembled too much to use the lighter.

“Well, John,” his superior said. “This is a clusterfuck and a half. I think I’m going to be relieved of duty as soon as they can get somebody up from Edinburgh, probably before dawn. So I have one last order for you.”

“Anything you say, sir.”

“Purloin whatever you think you’ll need, get the fuck out of here, and find and kill that fucking thing. Like your private said, your corporal deserves better. So, fuck off before somebody gets here that won’t let you off the leash. And that’s an order.”

* * *

Banks went in search of Hynd and Wiggins. He found them, not in the mess tent as he’d expected, but on the exit to the north road, standing at the back of an ambulance, having a smoke with the little ginger-haired Seton.

“We were on our way to Inverness, and I’d just woken up when the emergency call came through,” the older man said, “so I made them turn right ‘round and come back so as not to waste any time.”

“How are the ribs?”

Seton showed them the stiff back brace he wore around his torso.

“This keeps everything from sliding about, and the morphine hasn’t completely worn off yet. I’m up and shuffling and I can still enjoy a smoke. At my age, that’s all a man can expect anyway.”

“Sorry we fucked up your boat, wee man,” Wiggins said.

“It wasn’t mine, and it was insured. And I’m sorry about your friend,” Seton said. “When we get a chance, I’ll swing for some good scotch for us all to send him off properly.”

“First things first,” Banks said. He quickly relayed what the colonel had told him, then sent Hynd and Wiggins off on a scavenger hunt to see what could be found that would be of use.

“As for you, auld man,” he said turning back to Seton, “you had better get in the back of this ambulance and get up to road to Inverness.”

“Nope,” Seton replied. “I’m staying right here. And if you’re going after the monster again, I’m coming with you.”

“Aye,” Banks said, failing to keep the sarcasm out of his reply, “because that worked out so well for all of us the last time. We don’t need you, no offence, but Wiggo has got your wee USB drive for the chant, and the sarge has the command part down pat.”

“Ah, but there’s more to it than that. And I know something you don’t.”

“Okay, I’ll bite, tell me.”

Seton smiled broadly.

“It’ll have gone to ground to lick its wounds. And I think I know where to find it.”

* * *

Short of beating it out of him, Banks knew there was no way Seton was going to divulge the information unless he got a guarantee to be taken along.

“Just promise I’ll be going with you, and I’ll tell you,” Seton said, still smiling.

“All I have to do is go down to the shore and play your chant through a laptop,” Banks said. “It’ll come.”

“That depends how bad it’s wounded,” Seton replied, then mimicked Banks’ sarcasm, “And besides, that worked out so well for you earlier.”

“You got me there, I’ll admit it,” Banks said. “But if I agree, there will be rules. Strict ones, such as no voodoo bullshit, no surprises, and no fucking stupid heroics. Got it?”

“Oh yes,” Seton said. “Besides, fucking stupid heroics is your department. Thanks for saving me back there when the boat got taken down. I don’t remember any of it, but your sergeant brought me up to speed.”

“I figured we needed somebody to blame,” Banks replied, and smiled thinly. *

“So, spill it, wee man,” Wiggins said. “Where are we going?”

Wiggins sat behind the wheel of a black SUV, with Banks in the passenger seat and Hynd and Seton in the back. The storage space at the back of the vehicle was full of three rucksacks, and the purpose-built gun racks had rifles, handguns, and stun grenades stowed. Wiggo had even managed to procure four sets of night-vision goggles and headsets, although by the time they were getting ready to depart, it was only an hour or so shy of dawn, and they’d had to make breakfast a hasty one before setting off.

Seton took his time replying.

“Come on, you old fart,” Wiggins said, “you’re enjoying this too much.”

“You’re right,” Seton replied. “I realized when I woke up in the ambulance how good it is just to be alive. But if you insist, we need to go back around the loch — I assume you will be waved through the barriers. We need to go back to Crowley’s house.”

“There was nowt there but a burnt-out ruin,” Hynd said.

Banks was looking in the rear mirror and saw Seton’s wry smile.

“You auld bastard, you were up to something out there when we found you, weren’t you?”

Seton nodded.

“I already told you, I was looking for some clues. What I didn’t tell you was that I’d already found some, years ago when I first started to get interested.”

“Tell us on the way,” Banks said, seeing three Army trucks and a car coming the other way down the road. “If I’m not mistaken, that’s the colonel’s replacement, and I’ve already been told to fuck off once tonight. Wiggo, take us out.”

* * *

“I got interested in the beast in the late ‘60s,” Seton started. “I was just a young research student, and I was called up to these parts from Edinburgh by my Professor, who was working in the area. I met him in the bar at Foyers

“In the course of an alcohol-fueled evening, I discovered several things; my professor, normally of sound mind and judgement, was chasing a legend of a beast in the loch and needed my help in the matter. So here I was, investigating. Or rather, here I was, enjoying the finest hospitality Scotland could offer that evening, it being already too dark to venture out on the water. And I’m afraid I enjoyed it rather too much.

“I woke in the morning with a hangover befitting the amount of Scotch I had consumed the night before. Even a hearty breakfast failed to put me back on an even keel, and I was seriously considering returning to bed. So I was not best pleased when the prof, full of good humor and looking none the worse for wear, bellowed across the dining room.

“‘Come on, Seton. Don’t hang around. The boat’s ready,’ he said.

“The boat turned out to be a small two-man affair, with no motor, just a pair of oars. I had one look at it, then turned away.

“‘In that case, I shall row,’ he said, and all but manhandled me into the boat. He dropped a bag into the bottom beside me. It clinked, glass against glass as he cast off, climbed down into the boat and within seconds was taking us away from the jetty out onto the loch. Luckily for my somewhat delicate disposition, the water proved to be almost flat calm, and after several minutes, I even felt bold enough to light up a smoke. The prof downed oars and joined me. We sat still in quiet water a hundred yards off the shore.

“After we had finished our smokes, the prof reached for the bag in the bottom of the boat. Once again, glass clinked. He smiled and drew out some sampling jars, each with a long stretch of attached fishing line.

“He showed me the trick to operating the jars, giving them a quick tug when at the required depth to close the cunningly constructed valve at the top.

“He stood up. The small boat rocked alarmingly, but he merely laughed, and set to work, dropping the bottles over the side and letting them sink to their required depths. He sang, his voice carrying high and clear across the water.

“Fifteen men on a dead man’s chest—

“Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!

“Out on the loch, something answered. A loud splash behind me dashed nearly caused me to jump out of the boat. By the time I looked ‘round, there was only a large expanding circle of ripples, some 20 yards away.

“The prof pulled his bottles in without taking any samples, dropped them unceremoniously in the bottom of the boat, and took to the oars like a man possessed, turning us in a circle until the prow pointed straight at where the splash had been.

“In only a handful of pulls on the oars, he brought us directly over the spot. The loch was once again flat calm all around us, but he had been taken by the thrill of the hunt and was not ready to give up on his quarry just yet.

“He sang again.

“Drink and the devil had done for the rest—

“Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!

“But this time there was no answer, just a gentle lapping of wavelets on the side of the boat. We sat there for long minutes. Nothing moved on the water. Eventually, he started to deploy the sample jars again. He sang as he did so, sea shanties, nonsense songs, music-hall favorites, all at the top of his voice. Nothing answered.

“He sat down and lit up another cheroot.

“‘It was right here,’ he said. ‘We almost saw it.’

“We spent the best part of the morning out on the boat. At some point, I realized that my hangover had finally passed, and I felt able to help him out with the sampling. We pulled up almost a score of bottles filled with, what looked to my eyes, muddy water, but the prof pronounced himself pleased with the results.

“‘I shall have these sent to Edinburgh,’ he said. ‘There’s a chap waiting for them who’ll have the results back to us in two to three days.’

“‘Results? What are you expecting to find?’

“‘Something. Anything.’

“He took to the oars and started heading back to the hotel’s jetty. Almost as soon he had the boat turned around, there was another loud splash behind me. I saw the prof’s gaze switch to a point over my shoulder, and watched the color drain from his face. But by the time I turned, all I saw was another spreading circle of ripples.

He took to the oars again, rowing for the shore as fast as he was able.

“‘We should have brought the whisky,’ was all he said as I helped him tie up at the jetty.”

* * *

“So there you have the start of it all,” Seton said. “Can I have a smoke before the next part?”

Banks passed his smokes around and opened his window to let the fug out as they all lit up.

“Okay, auld man, I get that you had your own wee close encounter, but how is it relevant?”

“The relevance is in where I was when I heard those splashes. We were offshore, directly in front of Crowley’s old house. I didn’t know its history then, but it didn’t take me long to find out. The fact that the beast seemed to respond to singing, and that the prof had seen something so monstrous to him that he never talked about again, were enough data points for me to start what would turn into a 50-year investigation.”

“Okay, I get that,” Banks said. “But just because you saw, or rather heard, it near the house doesn’t mean it lives there. We’ve been seeing it all up and down the bloody loch. What makes the house different?”

“Geology,” Seton replied, then went quiet as he puffed at his smoke before continuing. “I spent the longest time wondering where a beast as big as that being reported might hide itself, and I stumbled upon the answer by accident while speaking to a visiting geologist in an Inverness bar.

“The rocks around here are riddled with caves and passageways. There’s even talk that the beast comes and goes through a long tunnel that leads all the way out into the Moray Firth, and that’s why it’s not often seen, because it only comes here for a special purpose.”

“And what might that be?” Banks asked.

“Damned if I know,” Seton replied. “But after hearing about the geology, I paid a small fortune for a set of sonar readings, not of the loch like every other Nessie researcher has ever done, but of the surrounding countryside. There’s a huge cavernous space no more than 30 yards below the manor house. That’s where it’ll be. It will go home to lick its wounds, I’m sure of it.”

“So you don’t actually ken anything at all,” Wiggins said. “This is all just another bullshit theory?”

“It’s a theory, yes, but one based on observed evidence and facts, not bullshit,” Seton said. “And there’s one other thing.”

“What’s that?” Banks said.

“Before you found me at the house, I had the dubious pleasure of stumbling around in a field on the far side of the property, and stepping in several very large mounds of fresh dung.”

Banks didn’t think a great deal of the older man’s theory.

But we’ve got little else to go on.

“Okay, Wiggo,” he said. “Keep heading for the house, we’ll have a shufti around there.”

They got through a checkpoint south of Foyers when Banks pulled rank on the young corporal at the barrier, and 10 minutes later pulled up at the foot of Boleskine House driveway just as the sun was coming up.

- 12 -

“Okay, you got us here, Sandy, now what?”

The squad got kitted up at the rear of the SUV — flak jackets, night vision headsets, rifles and handguns, each with extra magazines of ammo in their jacket pockets, and Hynd and Wiggins carrying two stun grenades each. They were now having a smoke before setting off.

“We’re looking for an entrance,” Seton said.

“That will no’ be difficult,” Wiggins said. “A huge beastie-like yon thing would need a fucking big hole to get through.”

“You’d think so,” Seton replied. “But in that case, somebody would have stumbled on it long before now. I’m pretty sure the beast’s entry to the lair must be under the water line somewhere.”

“Well, that’s fucking useful. Could you no’ have told me that when I was scavenging for supplies? Scuba gear wasn’t on my wee list.”

Seton laughed.

“I doubt it would help. I snorkeled around this area for a whole summer in the ‘70s without finding anything resembling cave or tunnel anywhere close by. No, by entrance I mean we need to find Crowley’s entrance to the cavern.”

“What makes you think he had one?” Banks asked.

“He talks in his journals about finding a literal gateway to Hell in this place. He was a great one for playing with words, but I’d take him at face value on this. I think he found a way down, to a place that he considered magical, a place where he conducted his experiments and rituals. And I doubt he traveled far to reach it. I think it must be under the house somewhere.”

“And that’s what you were looking for when we found you?”

“Exactly. I’d been inside for an hour or so, and I’d covered maybe half the floor area before you stopped me. I found nothing but rubble and ruined carpets. The search of the remainder of the house will go faster in daylight with more of us looking, and without the need for stealth.”

“And at least we’ll see any shite before we stand in it,” Wiggins said as they left the SUV by the roadside and walked up the slope of the driveway toward the burnt-out ruins.

* * *

When they reached the main doorway, Seton pointed to the left to what looked to have been the main living areas in the past.

“I went through all of that side of the house,” he said. “As I said, nothing but rubble and rotted carpets. There’s an old library, but the books were obviously mostly lost in the fire, which is a damned shame. So we go right. If I remember the floor plans correctly, there’s a kitchen through the back, and the rest is servant’s quarters in the main, with a laundry room and a couple of small bedrooms for the staff. It shouldn’t take us too long.”

“And it will go even faster if we move in pairs,” Hynd said as they moved through a long hallway. He saw what must be the kitchen at the far end.

“Sarge, you and Wiggo check all the rooms along this hall here, and Sandy and I will take the kitchen and whatever else might be though there. We’ll meet at the far end in five; shout if you find anything before then.”

He walked down the hall, then turned when he realized Seton was lagging behind. The older man looked gray around the face and wore deep black shadows under both eyes, but he waved away Banks’ concern.

“I’ve been after this thing for 50 years, Captain,” he said. “I can manage a couple of hours of pain now that we’re closing in.”

“Are we? Closing in, I mean? It feels like it’s the one that’s been dictating tactics so far. All we’ve been doing is reacting.”

“I know it seems like that to you, Captain,” Seton replied. “But trust me, I can feel it in my bones.”

“That might just be your broken ribs giving you gip,” Banks said with a smile, and pushed fully aside a heavy oak door that partially blocked the entrance to the room at the end of the hallway. He held Seton back with his free hand as he leaned inside, weapon raised, but the room was quiet and empty. He’d been right, it was a large country kitchen, or rather it had been at one time; the ravages of fire had removed any charm it might have had. There was no roof left, although the remnants of burned timber and slates lay scattered everywhere across the floor. There were marks on the tiled floor where a large range had once sat, and another that had probably been the spot for a fridge, but somebody had salvaged the appliances, possibly for scrap, some years past. Now there was only ruin and bare, tumbledown walls.

Seton kicked rubble aside with his feet in an effort to check the flooring below for a cellar hatchway, while Banks made a circle of the room, checking inside the old walk-in larders for any partially hidden traps or doors.

“It’s a hundred years since your man Crowley was here,” Banks said after five minutes of fruitless searching, tapping on walls and stamping on the floor. “We might as well be looking for one of Jimmy Page’s guitar picks… in fact, I’m pretty sure we’d have more luck in that department.”

“Nil desperandum, Captain. There’s an entrance here on the grounds somewhere, there has to be. The journals were most clear on that point.”

Banks didn’t point out that many people were known to exaggerate in their memoirs or that although he knew little of The Great Beast, what he had read of rituals and magick and Thelema had not convinced him of its veracity. He stopped looking around while Seton banged on walls he’d already banged on several minutes earlier.

Hynd and Wiggins came in a minute or so later, and a shake of the sarge’s head told Banks all he needed to know.

“Light them if you’ve got them, lads,” Banks said. “It looks like we’re up a blind alley.”

“At least it’s not shite creek,” Wiggins said as the private passed out cigarettes.

“Shite, that’s what I’ve forgotten,” Seton said after he’d had his first puff.

“You need a shite, wee man?” Wiggins said laughing. “I’ve heard that tobacco can do that to auld plumbing.”

“No, I forgot about the house’s sewage. There was an outhouse here once upon a time before modern indoor plumbing came to the Highlands. Crowley used some of the foundations and built his shed over the same spot, at least that’s what his journals say.”

“The shed where he did his experiments?”

“Exactly, and where there was an outhouse, there would have been at least a hole in the ground, maybe even a drain or a sewer. It might be a way down in any case.”

“So, we’re looking for a shithouse now, are we?” Wiggins said. “This day keeps getting better and better.”

* * *

Banks allowed Seton to take the lead as they went out through a hole in the rear wall of the house to what had obviously once been an extensive garden.

“I’ll ask again,” Wiggins said. “What are we looking for?”

“Shite, and plenty of it,” Hynd said. He pointed out over what had once been lawn. “And look, we’ve found it.”

“Bloody hell, Sarge,” Wiggins said. “When I called you the shite whisperer, I didn’t mean you to take it literally”

The 20 or so mounds of dung in the garden looked superficially like molehills but, like the pile they’d found previously at their night stop in the cottage, these were basketball sized and bigger. Banks wondered if bits of Corporal McCally might not be strewn around on the grass inside the piles, and pushed the thought away, angry just for thinking it.

Seton had gone quiet studying the area.

“There’s more over to the left here than anywhere else,” he said, and marched quickly away from them, picking his way among the piles.

“I never thought I’d see a grown man so excited about shite,” Wiggins said.

If Seton heard him, he didn’t show it, and the older man now stood amid a concentrated area of dung, looking down at his feet and kicking grass and dirt, and dung, aside.

“Found something,” he shouted a minute later. “It looks like foundations. Get over here. This might be what we’re looking for.”

They walked to where Seton stood in the longer grass, having to step carefully to avoid more tumbled timber. The wood was older and much more rotted than that in the kitchen and it lay surrounded by old dry brickwork at ground level that had been laid in a rough rectangle some 15 feet by 10 feet in shape.

“It’s the shed, it’s Crowley’s shed. It has to be,” Seton said, and the auld man looked 10 years younger, his excitement masking any pain he was still feeling. “If the entrance is anywhere, it’s right here, right under our feet.”

* * *

It only took them 10 minutes to find the entrance but they were tough minutes of shifting rock, wood, and matted grass aside to try to find the old floor. Hynd finally found a palm-sized iron ring in what remained of the flooring. A strong tug brought up a hatch, and also sent a hefty portion of rotted wood down into the hole below with a tumbling rustle and thud that told them they were above an entrance to some greater depths below.

Initially, Banks was worried that they might not get any farther; if there were wooden stairs, they were going to be as rotted as the crumbling timbers of the floor and far too dangerous. But when he switched on his rifle light and waved it down the hole, the beam shone on stone and a set of worn gray steps leading down into the blackness. Banks took a deep breath through his nose, checking for signs of corruption or noxious gases, but the air seemed clear enough, and even smelled better than the stink of dung that surrounded them up above.

“A gateway to hell you said?” Banks asked Seton.

“Not my words, but Crowley’s,” Seton replied with a grin. “But as you said yourself, that was a hundred years and more ago — maybe it’s frozen over? Now are we going to stand around here chatting, or are we going down to find the beast?”

As before, Seton refused to consider staying up top to wait.

“If this is Crowley’s pit, then you might need my expertise, or at least my opinion. It’s my ribs that hurt, not my legs. I’ll manage stairs just fine.”

Wiggins passed Seton a pair of night vision goggles, helped him put them on and quickly explained their operation, then Banks had Hynd lead the way, with Wiggins following.

“Ladies first,” he said to Seton and ushered him forward, waiting until the old man’s head was below the level of the floor before taking his first step down into the dark.

* * *

The night goggles gave everything a greenish cast, and Hynd’s gun light showed almost brilliant white some 10 yards below. They descended in a narrow passage, hardly any wider than the width of their shoulders, the steps steep enough to make them move cautiously, for although the stone was dry and not slippery, none of them wanted to tumble way and down into an unknown darkness.

Hynd came on the headset after a few minutes.

“Something on the wall the auld man should see, Cap. It’s about 20 steps below your position. We’ll hold here until he gets to it. Follow Wiggo’s light. Nothing ahead yet but more steps.”

By the time Banks reached the other men’s position, Seton was already studying the wall on the left. It appeared to have been daubed with crude paintings in red and creamy-white, of both men wielding spears and animals running, mostly deer by the look of it.

“Your man Crowley’s work?” Banks asked.

Seton took long seconds to reply.

“No, Captain. These are thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of years old. It is a major archaeological find all in its own right. Done by members of an ancient hunting cult if I’m not mistaken.”

“But hunting what?” Wiggins asked. “There’s nae deer down here.”

“Maybe they were holding their initiation rituals, down here in the dark. Caves are often seen as liminal places, where the border between natural and supernatural is thin. The Greeks, for example—”

“Maybe later, Sandy, eh?” Banks said, tapping at the wall. “Interesting as this may be, we’re after bigger prey.”

Wiggins turned his light away from the wall, and that was the signal for the descent to begin again.

* * *

As they went deeper, the air got thicker, and Banks now smelled a definite odor of animal, and, strangely, tasted salt at his lips and tongue. At the same time, Hynd came back on the con. He was almost whispering.

“It’s opening out ahead, Cap, and there’s dim light ahead. Thirty steps down from you. I’ll provide cover for all of you, but probably best to keep things quiet on the way down.”

Banks moved forward to tap Seton on the shoulder, and, with a finger to his lips, caution the man to silence when he turned. They continued down, slowly. They could no longer see the brilliant white of the sarge’s gun light below, but the opening they were making for glowed dimly, a wavering green aurora like the faintest of Northern Lights.

They found the source of the light show when they stepped out of the stairwell, and onto a wide rocky ledge overlooking a shimmering underground lake.

- 13 -

The lake itself was the source of the luminescence, either by some quality of the rock, or by a biological agent, Banks couldn’t tell. He only knew it was strangely beautiful and was held rapt by sight of the wide, cavernous area, the size of two football fields at least. The water was 10 feet or so below his feet. The rocky roof of the cavern hung 10 yards above them, reflecting some of the lake’s shimmer back on itself. Pale and ghostly thread-like stalactites dropped down over the water like some rough upended pincushion. Banks was so enamored of the scene he almost didn’t spot that Seton had moved along the ledge to their left to study a tall stone cross that had been erected on the edge above the water.

“This isn’t thousands of years old,” Banks said as he stepped over for a look. “Is this one Crowley’s doing do you think?”

Seton had a close look at the carvings that ran the full height.

“No, this is Pictish. And it’s not thousands, but probably at least one thousand years old, maybe a tad older. We’re not the first to be dazzled by the beauty of this place. As I said, many cultures revere caves and caverns, and to them, this must have appeared a truly magical place.”

“They weren’t the last ones here before us either,” Hynd said from behind and to their left. “Have a look at this.”

A secondary, small cave, not natural but hewn out of the rock by metal tools judging by the strike marks, sat, almost hidden in shadows, where the ledge met the main cavern wall. There was nothing in it but two slightly rusted iron cages, each of them the size that might contain a large dog. The floor, both in and outside the cages, was strewn with the bones and skulls of small animals. Banks was no expert, but it looked like they might be rabbits and sheep, and possibly a few dogs and cats.

“This, on the other hand, is most probably Crowley’s doing,” Seton said. “Remember I told you that the locals were reporting missing pets?”

“What the fuck was he doing keeping animals way down here in the dark?” Wiggins asked.

“I told you that before too,” the older man said. “Alchemical experimentation, with the required result being a chimera, of some kind, and the end result being immortality for Crowley himself.”

“I’m guessing that didn’t work out too fucking well for him? He’s been dead a while now, hasn’t he? I’m glad the fucker didn’t succeed. Cruel wanker.”

* * *

They had been speaking in whispers since arriving on the ledge, but Banks’ wasn’t sure it was necessary. When he went back to look over the lake, he could see that nothing disturbed the water, not even a ripple; it looked like a sheet of smoky green glass with only a thin film of liquid on top. The sides of the cavern ran smooth and sheer into the water around the edges, and there was no sign of any other ledge, or any cave entrances that he could see.

“It’s here, somewhere,” Seton said at his side, still whispering. “Can’t you smell it?”

“Aye. I smelled the stench most of the way down yon steps. That, and salt water. I’m guessing there might be something to yon theory about an underground channel to the sea?”

“I think it’s more than likely the passage in and out to the firth is here somewhere,” Seton replied. “But as I said, it hasn’t taken flight, maybe because you injured it in the fight at the castle. Whatever the case, it’s still here. And if we can smell it so clearly, it’s close and hiding, suddenly cautious. I doubt it has ever encountered a gun before.”

“Aye, about that,” Banks said. “Do you have any idea why our shots to the body had so little effect?”

“Fat, probably,” Seton replied. “Otters, and indeed most aquatic mammals, have a very thick fatty layer. It would be like firing into a big lump of solid lard trying to get to the actual meat, bone, and sinew on the other side of it.”

That made sense of what Banks had seen at the castle site. A direct shot to the head had been the only thing to give the beast pause. He turned to Wiggins.

“Here that, Wiggo? Headshots only.”

“Aye, Cap. Either that or a couple up the jacksie should get the job done.”

Banks looked around for Hynd.

The sergeant was at the far end of the ledge from the tall Pictish cross, looking down over the edge toward the lake surface.

“We’ve got more steps here, Cap,” he said. He had spoken softly but his voice echoed and carried clearly in the cavern. Banks looked up, wondering if they might dislodge some roosting bats, but there didn’t appear to be any life apart from the four men in the whole glimmering cavern. Banks went over to join Hynd and looked down into the lake.

A set of similarly worn stone steps ran down from his feet to the waters’ edge and continued beyond the loch’s surface, deep into the shimmering green depths. Seton spoke at his shoulder.

“A site for ritual, a baptism of some sort I shouldn’t wonder,” he said. “Another thing Christianity has in common with older, more esoteric ways.”

It took Wiggins to get to the heart of the matter at hand.

“Aye, this is all very nice I’m sure,” he said. “But where’s that fucking monster got to? I’m done with chasing it up and down this bloody loch. It killed my pal, and it’s payback time.”

* * *

Seton turned to Banks. The old man was looking tired and wan again. The green cast of the luminescence emphasized the shadows under his eyes and the hollows in his cheeks. But his voice was strong enough.

“Let me try. My voice is all I’ll need,” Seton said. “Let me stand at the cross and try the call again. You’ve all seen it work, you know that even wounded, it should respond, here in the place where it was trained. Let me bring it here.”

“And then we shoot the fucker’s head off?” Wiggins said.

Seton looked pained at the thought.

“I was hoping to try to calm it,” he said.

“Aye, that didn’t do Cally any good, did it? And even if I did let you try to keep it under control, and even if you managed it, then what do we do? We can’t exactly get a fucking huge cage down here to cart it off to Edinburgh Zoo, can we?” Banks replied.

“Surely with the Army’s resources at your disposal… ”

Banks stopped him with a laugh that echoed across the lake and whispered around them on its return trip.

“We’re on suspension, our superior officer is at this exact moment getting his arse kicked from one end of Edinburgh to the other, and the only resources we have are what we’ve got with us down here.”

Wiggins interrupted.

“So, does that mean we shoot the fucker’s head off? Because I want to shoot the fucker’s head off.”

Banks smiled thinly.

“Sounds like a plan to me, Wiggo.”

* * *

Seton stood by the tall Pictish cross, put a hand on the stone as if trying to leech energy from it, and began the chant. His voice was thin and wheezy at first, but the echoing reverberation in the chamber appeared to amplify each syllable, and also give energy back to the older man, for his voice grew stronger with each repetition.

“Ri linn cothrom na meidhe, Ri linn sgathadh na h-anal.

“Ri linn tabhar na breithe Biodh a shith air do theannal fein.

A series of ripples ran across the water’s surface, emanating from the far end from where they stood. Banks was looking directly at it when, over a hundred yards away, the beast’s head came up out of the water, and it let out a bark that rang like a gunshot around the cavern.

- 14 -

Seton continued to chant. The beast moved forward, not straight toward them, but showing all three humps side on, cruising in a zigzag fashion that was bringing it, slowly and cautiously, across the lake. It raised its head only to bark at the last syllable of each repetition of the chant.

Banks saw the strain show on Seton’s face, pain etched in hard lines at the side of his eyes and at his mouth, but the older man kept up the chant in perfect time, and the beast continued to move ever closer, its bark now sounding almost excited. The sheer bulk of it as it swam caused the whole surface of the lake to ripple and sway, sending green and black shadows dancing in the stalactites in time with its languid movements.

Banks turned to the others just before the beast came into range.

“Right, lads, this is it. No hesitation, no fucking about, we take this bastard down fast then we can bugger off home to the mess for that pie and a pint I missed at the start of this shitstorm. Plugs in.”

The three of them shoved the soft plugs that protected their hearing deep into their ears.

“For Cally,” Wiggins shouted, and both Banks and Hynd nodded.

“For Cally.”

* * *

Seton’s voice faltered and failed at the last, fresh spittle of blood showing at his lips. But he’d done his job, and the beast had cruised forward so that it was almost directly below them. Banks smelled it strongly now, musk and blood and heat. It looked up, directly at him, and barked, twice, not so much excited now as angry.

“Aim for the head, and fire,” Seton shouted.

Remembering the thing’s reaction to the floodlight at the castle, Banks turned on his gun light and shone it direct at the beast’s eyes. It yelled, a high-pitched squeal, and was still squealing as all three of the squad pumped three rounds each into its head.

Even then it didn’t go down, but using its back legs and tail, launched up toward them, sending a splash of cold water across them from the knees down. It scrambled frantically, tearing chunks of rock from the edge. Banks stepped back and succeeded in putting another two shots above its eyes, but still it came, finally grabbing hold of the ledge with its front feet and hauling its whole length up to loom over them.

“Say goodbye to your bollocks, you wanker,” Wiggins shouted, and shot it three times in the heavy sack that hung, silhouetted and framed against the shimmering of the lake beyond. Banks and Hynd concentrated on the head, even as the maw of its mouth opened, showing the white, six-inch canines. Blood ran from numerous wounds in its face, and its left eye had popped, gore running down its cheek.

It looked straight at Banks, gave out a bark that was more a shriek of anger and pain, and lunged forward, mouth open, thick pink tongue lolling on the left side, dripping bloody saliva. Banks stood still long enough to put three shots down its throat then rolled away, clearing Hynd’s view enough that the sarge was able to put two in its good eye.

The whole cavern, still ringing and echoing with the impact of the shooting, rang again, even louder as the beast gave out one final, piercing shriek, its back legs scrambling for hold on the ledge as its weight shifted.

The three men stood in a line and all put three more shots into the huge head, splattering what was left of the eyes in a spray of fluid and blood. The beast’s head went up, it overbalanced, and finally tumbled backward and into the water with a splash that sent ripples the length of the lake and shadows skittering and running across the walls and roof of the chamber.

Wiggins stepped forward to the edge and sent three more rounds into the beast as it started to sink.

“That’s for Cally, fucker.”

* * *

The whole chamber fell quiet as the echoes faded and the ripples on the surface slowly stilled until the dead beast lay, just below the surface, in a once again flat, calm lake. The three men stood, weapons still aimed, looking down until they were sure the beast wasn’t going to make a final resurgent attack. The water was slowly tingeing red all around the body, and after a few minutes, it was obvious the creature was truly dead.

Banks took out his plugs. His ears rang, and they would for a while yet, but he wasn’t deaf, and heard Wiggins clearly enough.

“Fuck me, we’ve killed Nessie,” the private said. “That calls for a fag.”

Banks took two smokes when offered, lit one for himself, and took the other to where Seton sat, slumped at the base of the Pictish cross.

“Job’s done. It’s dead,” he said as he handed the smoke over and lit it for the older man when Seton put it to his bloodied lips. “How are you doing, wee man?”

“Bruised, battered, and bewildered,” Seton said out of the corner of his mouth. “But I guess I’ll live a bit longer yet. It’s a damned shame we had to kill the beast though.”

“It had to be done,” Banks replied, “after what went down back at the castle. And after those BBC men in the chopper, and Cally, and the wee lassie and the other missing woman and those campers from Foyers and that poor bloody polar bear in Kincraig and… ”

Seton put up a hand to stop him.

“I understand. I really do. But it was unique, a legend, a one of a kind thing we’ll never see the likes of again.”

“Don’t be too sure of that, wee man,” Wiggins shouted from along the ledge. “We’ve got incoming, Cap.”

* * *

They came from the far end of the loch, swimming fast and each leaving a v-shaped wake behind it. There were six of them, smaller than the one they’d just killed, but Banks gauged that each was at least 15 feet nose to tail, and they all showed the same distinctive three humps in the water. They formed a rough arrow-wedge as they swam, pointed directly at the ledge where the squad stood.

“Juveniles,” Seton said, with a degree of awe noticeable in his voice.

Banks saved asking how that was possible for later.

“We’re too exposed here to hold off an attack. Back to the stairwell, lads. We can control the terms of engagement from there. Seton, get behind us and up the steps a ways.”

The smaller beasts reached their dead kin just as Banks began to back away from the ledge. They swam around the corpse, as if confused, then, as if a silent command had gone through them, raised their heads as one and stared straight at him. He saw the same look in their eyes he’d seen in the big one minutes earlier; anger more than fear, and more than a little hunger.

At his back, Seton shouted out the old Gaelic command.

“Dhumna Ort! Dhumna Ort!”

The beasts ignored him and leapt forward and upward, throwing themselves out of the water and scrambling up the sheer rock face. Banks put three bullets in the left eye of the closest one, sending it back down to splash on top of its mother, then had to retreat fast, herding Seton ahead to where Hynd and Wiggins were covering them in the doorway of the stairwell.

“Get up those fucking steps when you’re told, auld man. These buggers aren’t listening to you. I don’t think the kids have had any schooling.”

He got Seton into the doorway and turned, just in time to see the beasts clamber over the ledge and come at them. He shoved his earplugs in deep again and raised his weapon as the beasts barked excitedly in unison.

- 15 -

“Remember, go for the headshots,” Banks shouted. “Center and sides.”

They all knew what the command meant; they each had a sector to defend with Wiggins on the left, Banks in the center, and Hynd on the right. The beasts gave them enough time for three hurried shots each. Wiggins put one of them down hard, Hynd wounded one in the shoulder, and Banks laid two bloody furrows along the back of a third, but the beasts had momentum on their side, and the squad had to retreat completely into the narrow doorway. Wiggins knelt down, Hynd crouched just above him, and Banks went up one step so that he could fire over Hynd’s head.

Wiggins put the closest beast down by putting three bullets down its throat when it tried to bite him. It fell at his feet, effectively making a barrier that the others had to clamber across. Banks helped Hynd put another down on top of that, blowing half its head away with six closely placed shots. That only left two, barking and howling out on the ledge behind the dead.

“Fire in the hole,” Wiggins shouted and pulled the pin on a stun grenade, lobbing it out over the dead beasts onto the ledge. The three men turned their backs and closed their eyes as the grenade went off with a blinding flash.

Wiggins was first to turn back. He jumped over the nearest dead things and Banks stepped down into the doorway just in time to see him finish off the two others where they lay, concussed and bleeding from eyes, nose, and ears on the rock shelf.

* * *

Seton came back down the steps to join them.

“You don’t need to come down if you don’t want to,” Banks said, taking out his earplugs for what he hoped would be the last time. “It’s a hell of a mess down here.”

The ledge was slick with blood, shards of skull and brain tissue that felt sticky underfoot, and the stench of piss, shit, and blood was almost overwhelming.

Wiggins and Hynd rolled all of the bodies off the shelf to splash down alongside their mother below and they all stood, watching the surface of the lake return to its previous flat calm.

“Are there any more of these buggers?” Wiggins asked Seton. “And where the fuck did they come from?”

Seton had picked his way through the gore to stand beside them.

“Whether there are more, I have no idea,” he said. “But I think the big one must have given birth when it came to full maturity, and did it fairly recently at that.”

“Bollocks,” Hynd said. “How could it get pregnant? There was only one of the fuckers.”

“Self-fertilization is my guess at that,” Seton replied. “One of the results of the alchemical quest is the perfect, immortal hermaphrodite. I think Crowley got closer than anyone ever imagined, at least for one of his experiments. And we also have a reason for the large one to have become so emboldened in recent times; it was hunting to feed its offspring. Otherwise, it would have stayed nocturnal and reclusive and we might never have known it was here.”

“And the young? They’d be hermaphrodite too?” Banks asked.

“In theory, yes.”

“And what if there are more? What do I tell my superiors about this bloody mess?”

Seton laughed.

“Tell them the loch will once again have its monsters, but they will be elusive as ever, staying mostly nocturnal and quiet, feeding on fish or maybe the odd seal. They won’t reach full size or maturity for a hundred years or more. It’ll be somebody else’s problem by then.”

They made the climb back up into the light in silence, each man lost in his own thoughts.

- 15 -

The real end to the affair came a week later.

Banks’ superior officer had survived the fiasco at the castle after Banks made a full report on their return to Lossiemouth. The incident in the car park was reported as a domestic terrorist incident, which kept the politicians happy as they had somebody concrete apart from themselves to take the blame. A team went down into the chamber under the house, found the dead beasts where Banks said they were, and then sealed the place up by pouring, in Wiggins’ words, a shitload of rock and concrete down any hole they found in the area.

Banks got a letter on Saturday morning, and took it along to the mess to show the sarge and Wiggins. He got a round in, a pie and a pint for each of them, then took out a photograph to show them. On the back, it had a date: time stamp of early morning of the day before, and a handwritten message.

“She’s back. Love, Sandy Seton.”

Banks turned it over to show them the other side. It was a photograph of the loch, under a heavy gray sky. The photograph looked grainy, slightly out of focus, and there was no sense of scale.

But the three dark humps were clearly visible.

The End

Content

William Meikle
OPERATION: LOCH NESS

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