I'd been excited for some time about our trip to the North. We were to try and find the graves of our ancestors who had all lived in the Northumberland hills around Haltwhistle and Hexham in little villages with populations of maybe 100 or so at the most. It was somewhere you'd only want to stay for a short holiday, as we were doing, to have the peace and quiet to read and contemplate life while the hustle and bustle of modern life remained at home.

It was on the second day that we finally found something.

We'd driven through the pouring rain up a road that probably had more business being called a track than a road going far above the patches of heather and clusters of trees. My mum and step dad behind me, I went into the graveyard of a church that was very much out of proportion to the size of the village. I doubted the congregation would ever be full from inhabitants solely from the village, but perhaps people would have come from surrounding farms, nestled in the lees of the hills where people would have scraped a living not so far back in the past. It had always fascinated me how religion had held away over lives for so long, which had led me to apply and get in to Durham University, where I'd be going that autumn. Another reason why we'd come up North, then, was to visit the city, since I'd never been there, having been denied the opportunity by the coronavirus pandemic.

Lambley graveyard was rather large, a little overgrown and very muddy, forcing me to watch my step lest I trip and end up covered in the stuff. As we'd agreed, I wound my way carefully down to the bottom end of the graveyard, so that Mum and John could cover the top parts and we'd meet in the middle.

"Ridley… Ridley… Ridley… come on, there's got to be one of you somewhere in here." I said to myself under my breath. The wet grass meant that water had begun to sleep into my walking boots, dampening my socks, bringing an unseasonal chill to me. It was hard to believe it was August.

Then I saw it.

I'd nearly missed it, becoming complacent in my searching after the long walk we'd had this morning by Hadrian's wall.

"I've found it!" I yelled. There was no reply. Mum and John must have been in the other side of the church, my voice carried away by the gale blowing around us. With their hoods up and heads down there'd be even less of a chance that they'd have heard me. I sighed and decided to wait until they came round to this side.

This inscription on the grave was just what we'd wanted to find, if a little worn by the harsh weather typical of these remoter locations:

Here lies Thomas Ridley

B. 1743

Baptised, March 14 1743

Died Aug 27 1789

Over the lashing wind and rain there was another noise. A humming, or maybe a buzing.

I surveyed my immediate syrriundings, expecting to see a weakened bee hovering by my shoulder, or else a wasp angered by my presence. I couldn't see any electrical wires or pylons nearby. It was most confusing. The sound seemed to be coming from the grave, or at least the stone.

Leaning in close to the stone, my suspicions were confirmed: the stone was making a sound.

I reached out my hand to the stone, perhaps a little foolishly, expecting an electric jolt.

The world simply went black.