S Bolton: Sacrifice

I think I even got as far as opening my mouth, forming the first words, but I never got the chance to utter them. Because Gair's eyes left mine and searched along the cabin floor until he spotted the gun. His weight shifted as he raised himself up and reached out. Then he leaned back over me, pushed the humane killer against my left thigh and looked into my eyes. He smiled as he pulled the trigger and my world exploded in a mass of white-hot pain.

I COULDN'T SEE, COULDN'T HEAR, COULDN'T BREATHE. THE BOAT swerved again.

'… the hell are you doing?' I heard Richard calling out from some great distance away. 'She'll bleed to death before we can get her back.'

'Then fix it, Doctor. I'll drive the boat.'

Marginally, the pain was receding, leaving my head, my chest, my abdomen, and concentrating in one spot, the fleshy part of my upper thigh. The blackness in my head faded a little and I could see again. And hear again: a terrifying noise filled the cabin and I realized it was me – screaming. Richard pushed his hands under my shoulders and dragged me across the floor, into the starboard cabin. With a strength I'd never have believed he possessed, he picked me up and lay me on the bunk, beside the still form of a woman. Freya. Even through the pain I recognized her. Then he took hold of both my hands and pressed them against the wound.

'Push hard,' he instructed. 'Stem the bleeding. You know what will happen if you don't.'

Only too well. Crimson fluid was pumping from my leg. Gair had most likely hit an artery and I was in big trouble. I pressed hard but I could feel the strength draining from me. I felt like I do when I'm falling asleep, when keeping the mind focused on even the simplest thing becomes impossible. Except I could not sleep. I had to stay conscious. I could hear Gair on the radio and the crackle of someone responding to him.

Richard was back. He pushed my hands away and started wrapping something around my leg. He pulled tight, then tighter. I looked down – the white of the bandages was already soaked scarlet. I can never see fresh blood without admiring it. Such an amazing substance, rich and strong and vibrant; such a beautiful colour; so sad to see it leaking away, dripping down through the floorboards, into the bilges and out, to disappear without trace, amidst the cold salt waters of the North Sea.

Gair was giving the coordinates of our position. Reinforcements were on their way. I had lost. I was going back to Tronal, to spend the next eight months chained and drugged, while a new life grew inside me. A life I had planned for, longed for, prayed for. And now that it was here, it was to be my death. I wondered what they'd do with Duncan, whether he would be allowed to live, be given one last chance to come back to the fold. Or whether he was already dead.

Richard twisted me so that my head rested on Freya's shoulder and then propped my left leg against the wall, allowing gravity to do its job.

Then he leaned forward, put his hands on my shoulders and looked into my eyes. The room seemed to darken around him.

'Relax now,' he said. 'The pain will go.'

I struggled hard and forced my eyes shut. 'You're hypnotizing me?'

'No.' He stroked my forehead and my eyes opened. 'Just calming you, helping you with the pain.'

He continued stroking my forehead and, remarkably, the pain did seem to ease. But with it went what was left of my focus; I was starting to drift. Didn't want that to happen.

I reached out and caught his hand.

'Why?' I managed. 'Why do you kill us? Why do you hate your mothers so much?'

He held my hand in both of his. 'We have no choice,' he said. 'It's what makes us who we are.' He leaned closer. 'But never think we hate the women who bear our children. We don't. We mourn our mothers, honour their memories, miss them all our lives. We are not a religious people, but if we were, our mothers would be our saints. They made the ultimate sacrifice for their sons.'

'Their lives,' I whispered.

'Their hearts,' he said.

I tore my eyes away from his, back to the poppy-stained bandages around my leg. And knew what he was about to tell me.

Oh God, please God, no.

Richard sat down on the bunk beside me. He was still holding my hand. 'When I was nine days old,' he said, 'I drank the blood of my mother's heart.'

He paused, giving me a moment to understand what he was saying. I couldn't speak, I could only stare at him.

'It was given to me in a bottle,' he went on, 'along with the last of her milk.'

Bile rose in my throat. 'Stop. I don't want…'

He hushed me, stroking a finger gently across my cheek. I swallowed hard; concentrated on taking deep breaths.

'Of course, I knew nothing about it at the time; it was much later, on my sixteenth birthday, that I learned of… shall we say… my extraordinary heritage?'

Breathe in, breathe out. It was all I could think of. I heard his words but I don't think I was really registering them. Not then, not till much later.

'You can imagine the shock. I'd grown up with my father and his wife, a woman I loved very much. I had no idea she wasn't my biological parent. And the horror of what they were telling me, of what had been done to the woman who… I think it was just about the darkest day of my life.'

A derisory phrase sprang into my head, was on the tip of my tongue: my heart bleeds, I nearly said. Jesus, who on earth came up with that one?

'But at the same time, it was the start of my life, of understanding who I really was. I already knew I was special, brighter by far than any other child in the class. I was a gifted musician and I could speak four languages, two of which I'd taught myself. I was stronger, faster and more able in just about everything I did. Every sport I attempted I mastered. And I was never ill. Not once in all my sixteen years had I ever had a day off school because of sickness. When I was twelve, I broke my ankle playing soccer. It healed in two weeks.'

I found my voice. 'You were just lucky; a fortunate combination of genes. It had nothing to do with…'

'And I had other powers too, stranger powers. I'd discovered I could make people do what I wanted, just by suggestion.'

'Hypnosis.'

'Yes, that's what some of the younger ones like to call it.'

I shook my head. I wasn't buying it, but I couldn't find words to argue.

'I was introduced to two other boys who'd already turned sixteen. One was from the main island, the other from Bressay. They were just like me, just as strong, just as clever. I was told about four others, a few months younger, who were the rest of my peer group. And I met six older boys who had just turned nineteen. They knew what we were going through, had been through it themselves three years previously.'

'Every three years,' I said. He nodded.

'Every three years, between five and eight boys are born. We have just one son, in our lifetimes, one son who will become one of us.'

'Trows?' I wanted to scoff, tried to scoff, but it was hard.

He frowned. 'Kunal Trows,' he corrected. Then he relaxed, even half smiled. 'So many stories, so much nonsense: little grey men who live in caves and fear iron. Yet tucked away inside all legends, a kernel of truth can be found.'

All those women. All those deaths. How do you do it?'

He smiled again. I think he was even starting to show off.

'The practicalities are remarkably simple. The key is having people in the right places. Once a woman has been identified, we watch her very closely. We may stage an accident, or her GP might discover an illness. Not all GPs on the islands are with us, of course, so it depends. Once she's in hospital it becomes very straightforward, although obviously every case has to be handled differently. Typically, a high dosage of something like Midazolam is given to slow the metabolism right down so the life-support machines automatically sound the alarm. If relatives are present, the medical team make a great show of trying to save the patient, but fail. The unconscious woman is taken to the morgue, where our people are on standby to take her to Tronal. The pathologist produces a report and a weighted coffin is either buried or incinerated. Naturally, we encourage cremation.'