Chapter 5

Dawn broke with a dull light. It didn't matter. Milo was already awake. He had laid there for what seemed like hours, watching the sky slowly lighten, mind racing. What was going on? He hadn't bought any books with him…not ones about skinless monsters, anyway. Was there a connection between the creature that had chased them last night and this mysterious disease, or was he just clutching at straws?

Kida stirred beside him, and crawled into a sitting position. From the creases beneath her eyes, it had not been an easy night for her, either.

"Are the others awake?" She whispered.

"Not yet. It's getting light outside, though."

Audrey yawned, and began to move.

"I can hear you, y'know. I'm coming. Just give me a moment to find my shoes." She looked up, at the concerned faces of Milo and Kida.

"Audrey, I think you'd better stay here." Said Milo softly.

"What? Because of this?" Audrey glanced down at her hands, which were covered in angry blotches. "No, this is nothing. This isn't the dreaded plague everyone's going on about, it's just…just an allergy or something. I'll be fine."

She shifted, trying to stand, only getting halfway before keeling over again.

"Audrey!"

"I'm fine. I'm fine." She said, through gritted teeth, her breath stuttering into little strangled sobs. "I've just got the disease that's killing everything on this stupid, stinking island! No big deal!"

"Audrey, listen to me." Kida's voice was calm, her hand cool on Audrey's shoulder "We're going to do everything we can to get to the bottom of this. But you have to stay calm. You have to rest."

Audrey nodded, sniffing her tears up with a loud snort.

"Fine. Okay. I'll stay here." She gave a faint, wonky smile. "I guess Vinny needs some company anyway."

Vinny groaned from under the blankets.

"You start a game of eye-spy and I swear I'm taking my chance with the monster."

Kida flashed a small smile back at Audrey.

"I promise you, we'll do everything in our power to fix this."

Milo picked himself up. Two down. Who knew how long the rest of them had?

"Right. We need to get moving. Mole? Are you alright?"

Mole crawled out from under the bed and snapped off a salute.

"I am fine. One does not explore ze sewers of Paris without gaining some immunities. Why, I recall one time, ze pipes ruptured, and-"

"…That's great Mole. Glad to have you with us."

At the highest point of the cliffs, as Mavis had said, stood a battered old cottage, its shape clear against the bright white sky. The sky was piled up with clouds, the whole island smothered under them, thick with fog. The air was still, painfully still. Nothing stirred except them and the flies. Innumerable, swarming flies, the buzzing loud in the still air. Under Milo's feet, the grass crunched. Dry. Dead.

"This has to be the place." He said, as they approached, voice loud in the misty quiet. Sweat prickled on his forehead. The tiny cottage, storm-battered and rickety, was surrounded by a circle of buckets and pots. They formed a ring around it, a mismatched throng of containers, each filled to the brim with still, stagnant water. Mole knelt down next to one, and dipped his tongue in the scummy liquid.

"Ze water is fresh."

Milo picked his way over the ring of pots. The door to the old cottage was rotting, the wood flaking from the rusted hinges. Milo pushed it open, with a wet creak, squinting into the darkness.

"Hello?" Milo noticed a shape, a bony old lady, sitting in a chair by the fire. "We're here about the Murrain family. What do you know about them? What's happening to them?"

From her seat by the fire, the old lady unfolded, with the creaking of stiff joints.

"The Murrain family? What makes you think all this is limited to the Murrain family?" She came shambling forwards, her tattered grey dress swishing across the dusty floor, until she was stood next to Milo, at the doorframe, faded blue eyes glowering into his. She gestured out through the door with a wrinkled hand. "The whole island is sick."

"We can see that." Kida's voice was tense. "What do you know about this sickness? What have you been doing to this island?"

The old lady gave half a bitter chuckle.

"Me? You think all this is my doing? "She looked down at herself, at her skinny arms, her hunched frame, her skin stretched thin over her bones. "Look at me. I can barely lift fresh logs onto the fire. You think I could bring this whole wide island to its knees."

Mole squinted up at her through mist-clouded goggles.

"Looks can be deceiving." He hissed.

The old lady sighed.

"And if was the cause of all this? What would I gain? Petty revenge? That seems a poor reason to let a whole island rot."

"Alright, so this sickness isn't your doing." Milo sighed. "We believe you. But you know more than you're letting on, don't you?"

Another sigh.

"Very well. I'll tell you want you want to know, for all the good it'll bring." She held her skinny arms out. "But humour an old lady, will you? Help me up to the cliffs. Let me look out over the sea again. Then, I swear, I'll tell you all I know."

Milo and Kida took an arm each, and helped the frail old lady out of her cottage, out from the ring of stale water, and up to the crest of the cliffs. She was light, but Milo was relieved to reach the top of the cliffs: he was afraid he'd snap her skinny arms like twigs, or bruise her papery skin. She leant her head back, a few white hairs coming free, and breathed in the fetid air.

"I remember the old times." She said, quietly. "I remember old Stronsay, back when they still knew the old ways." She shuddered. "I remember when the Nuckelavee roamed the land."

"The Nuckelavee?" Milo asked.

"An old Orkney sea-demon. It rises from the water. Below the sea, it is as formless as the waves, but above, it takes terrible shape. Like a monstrous horse and rider, with one great fiery eye, its body stripped of skin…"

"We saw it! It chased us up from the beach. If we hadn't made it across the stream, it would have..." What would it had done?

"The Nuckelavee cannot abide the touch of fresh water." She continued, casting a glance back at her house, at her little circle of buckets. "In the winter, the storms and rain keep it trapped in the sea. It is only in the still summer months that it can ride out."

"But why now? Why is back?"

The old woman sighed, and gazed down at the sea. The water itself had turned slimy: the silvery bodies of fish floated, bloated, on the surface, battering against the craggy rocks below.

"They're burning the kelp again. I tried to tell them. They didn't listen. They didn't know better. It's the smoke that angers the Nuckleavee. It awakens, and rages over the land, spreading the sickness. They call it the Mortasheen. It is a terrible fate, to catch the Mortasheen, to rot from the inside. It takes the people, then the animals, and with every life claimed, the Nuckleavee grows in power. The beast won't stop until the whole island is dead."

She was quiet for a moment. Then Kida spoke.

"But you say that this has happened before? What did you do then? How did you stop the creature?"

"Ah, my dear. That was in the old days. Back then, when the Nuckelavee came, we would call on the Mither 'O the Deep, a spirit of clean water, honoured on this island in the old times. We would go down to the old sea-caves, and make an offering of fire and water, and if she listened, she would drive the beast back into the sea. She would cure the afflicted…those of them left alive. We learned to stop burning the kelp soon enough. Ever since, the beast has slumbered." She sagged. "But that was long ago. They stopped coming. They forgot. The cave is stopped up with rocks now, and I dare say that that spirit has left the island for good."

Mole peered up through the fog.

"But it is not blocked! I have cleared a way through ze rubble!"

"And if you are wise, you'll leave that cave to rot. The island is dead. Go. Go, while you still can. Find a boat. Swim, if you must. Just get off this cursed island, before the sickness takes you."

"We're not leaving!" Milo protested. "We're going to sort this out."

The old woman laughed.

"Don't waste your time. There's no saving this island now. Escape. Escape any way you can. I know I've found my way."

She stared down at the ocean for one more moment. Then, with a sudden effort, before anyone could stop or reach for her, she leapt forwards, her hair flying out behind her as she fell through the mist. The fog obscured her landing, but it could do nothing to stop the sound of crunching bone, or the hide fact that the next wave foamed pink. Milo stood on the empty cliff, staring down.

"N-no…"

There was nothing much more to say. Kida wrapped her arms around him, and held him close. Mole rested a grubby hand on his arm. He sniffed, and drew himself up, taking a deep breath of stinking air.

"Alright. Alright. We know what we need to do. Mole, can you take us to that cave?"

"Nothing could be easier. Follow me. I will guide you zhere."

He stumped off along the path. Milo followed, but not before casting one last glance back at the tiny, empty shack on the cliff. How long, he wondered, had she lived there alone?

Mole led them down from the cliffs, down towards the beach. Sometimes he sniffed the air, or peered down at the soil beneath his feet. Sometimes, Milo wondered what went on inside his head. Most of the time, he was content not knowing.

Mole came to a stop, breathing heavily. He frowned, and rubbed his forehead.

"Please excuse me." He said. "I seem to have lost my bearings." He blinked, and squinted through the fog, rubbing his forehead with a grubby finger.

"Mole? Not you too!" Milo knelt down beside him, face etched with worry.

"Just a little dizzy. I will be fine in a moment." Mole said, faintly. Then his eyes crossed slightly behind his goggles, and he leant forwards, splattering his stomach contents onto Milo's boots with a loud retching.

"Alright. I lied. I am not fine." He choked, spitting out a fragment of willow-patterned pottery. Then, very slowly, he pitched forwards, landing face-first in the gravel with a dull crunch.

Together, Kida and Milo managed to half-carry, half-drag Mole back to the farmhouse. Mercifully, they had stopped quite close: for such a short little man, Mole was disproportionately heavy. Together, they managed to man-handle him through the house, and set him down in the spare room. Milo's heart raced a little as he looked around the room: Vinny and Audrey were asleep, or unconscious, the room filled with their erractic wheezing. Both were pale as death, their skin shining with sweat. Milo peered closer, his stomach lurching slightly. The blotches that had once covered their skin were suppurating, the skin beginning to decay, to soften and fall off. A trace of pinkish foam had collected at the corner of Vinny's mouth.

Beyond them, he could see the bulk of Doctor Sweet. He was also asleep, although not quite so bad. He must only recently have succumbed, Milo reasoned. He gulped down the bile rising in his throat, and turned back to Kida: she was easing off Mole's goggles and headgear, releasing the sharp, salty smell of unwashed scalp.

"I don't want to die!" He whimpered. "Zhere are so many more holes to dig!"

Milo gingerly squeezed his hand.

"Nobody's going to die. It's going to be alright. Now. Can you tell us how to find that cave?"

Mole looked up with beady, crusted eyes.

"Oh, zhat is easy. It is ze one next to the Aeolian sandstone features, with clear water erosion damage, and obvious stratification of sediment. " Milo's expression was blank. "…Ze big one with water coming out of it."

"Right! Let's go!"

"Wait! You will need equipment! Go to my luggage. Zhere are spare torches in zhere."

"Right. Equipment. Of course."

Milo stumbled over to the pile of luggage, unceremoniously ripping open Mole's bag, and letting the contents spill out, a tangle of equipment, chunks of rock, and a notable lack of clean underwear. He grabbed two head-torches and a pair of folding pickaxes out of the clutter.

"An offering of fire and water..." He mumbled to himself. He ripped open Vinny's case too, adding a distressing amount of explosives to the pile on the bed. There it was, amid the flares and pebbles: Vinny's beloved waterproof match case. Milo grabbed it, and put it in his pocket, along with a few sticks of dynamite. Just in case.

"Sorry Mole. Sorry Vinny. I'll help you pack up later." He turned to Kida, handing her a torch and axe. "Ready to go?"

"Yes. Let's hurry." Her voice was quiet. Firm.

Together, they left the little bedroom, closing the door on the creeping scent of decay.