The Hungry Stones

I stared at the water below as our chartered floatplane descended, my stomach dropping faster than the aircraft. Loch Fionn stretched beneath us, clear and cold-looking, enclosed by Highland hills and dense woodland that seemed capable of swallowing us whole. Somewhere down there was Eilean Dorcha, where I was supposed to spend the next three days of my life.

It was Wednesday, 22 July 2026, and this was the last place I wanted to be.

'Isn't this amazing?' Dad shouted over the engine noise, his face lit up like a child on Christmas morning. 'Look at that water. You can see straight to the bottom.'

I gave him a half-hearted nod, not wanting to encourage him. This whole family-bonding trip had been his idea, not mine. I had made that abundantly clear for weeks, but here we were anyway, about to be deposited in the middle of nowhere with nothing but our camping gear and one another.

Beth sat opposite me with her headphones firmly in place, her gaze fixed on her mobile as she typed what I assumed were farewell messages to her friends. In about twenty minutes, she would lose the signal completely.

I almost felt sorry for her. Almost. At least I had been camping before. Beth had managed to avoid Dad's outdoor adventures until now.

The floatplane struck the loch in a series of jolts that sent spray across the windows. Dad gave a delighted whoop while Beth finally looked up, her expression caught between alarm and irritation.

'Perfect landing, Euan,' Dad called to the pilot.

Euan MacRae nodded, his weathered face showing the faintest smile as he guided the specialist charter plane towards a natural landing place, a broad shelf of rock projecting into the water.

'Loch's calm today,' he said. 'Makes it easier.'

When the engine stopped, the sudden silence felt heavy. I could hear water lapping against the floats and birds calling from the ancient Caledonian pinewood. Beth removed her headphones with obvious reluctance.

'No signal,' she muttered, holding her mobile in different directions as if that might help.

'That's the point,' Dad said, clapping his hands together. 'Three days, just the three of us. No distractions, no work calls, no social media. Just nature and family.'

Beth and I exchanged a look that said everything words could not.

Euan opened the door, letting in the smell of pine, damp moss and loch water.

'Let's get your kit unloaded. I need to be away before the weather changes.'

We climbed on to the float and jumped one by one on to the rocky shore. I helped Euan and Dad unload three rucksacks, a small cool box, Dad's fishing tackle and a larger bag of camping equipment. Euan also passed down a compact emergency VHF radio in a waterproof pouch.

Dad checked it, then stored it in the larger tent bag with the rest of the essential equipment.

The entire time, Beth stood to one side, still holding her mobile like a talisman.

'Remember, I'm due to collect you at 16:00 on Friday, 24 July,' Euan said as he handed Dad the final bag. 'We'll try a radio check each morning. Use the VHF if there's an emergency, though reception can be unreliable among these hills. If I don't hear from you, I'll raise the alarm.'

Dad shook his hand firmly. 'We'll be fine. I've been planning this trip for months.'

I studied Euan's face for any sign that he thought leaving us there was a terrible idea, but he merely nodded with professional calm.

'Forecast looks decent, but watch the cloud coming in from the north. If conditions turn, there's a mapped mountain refuge on the far side of the island. The coordinates are marked for you.'

'Got it,' Dad said, tapping the waterproof case containing the Ordnance Survey map. His handheld GPS receiver hung from a strap on his rucksack.

Euan climbed back into the plane. Within minutes, the engine roared into life. We stood on the shore as he taxied across the loch, turned into the wind and took off. The plane grew smaller until it disappeared beyond the hills.

And just like that, we were alone.

'Well,' Dad said, turning to us with determined cheerfulness. 'Let's get moving. The campsite's roughly one and a half kilometres inland. Perfect little clearing, level ground for the tents and fresh water nearby.'

Beth finally pocketed her mobile. 'One and a half kilometres in this heat?'

'It's about twenty-four degrees,' I said, hoisting my rucksack. 'Could be worse.'

'Thanks for the support, Jamie,' Dad said, clearly mistaking my bare minimum of cooperation for enthusiasm.

We set off with Dad in front, me in the middle and Beth trailing behind. The route could scarcely be called a path. It was only a faint depression through moss and bracken, which Dad followed with the aid of the GPS and frequent checks of the Ordnance Survey map.

'This island has a fascinating history,' he began, slipping into tour-guide mode. 'There's a protected prehistoric stone circle somewhere deeper in the woods. Archaeologists aren't certain who built it or precisely what it was used for, but there are fragments of local Gaelic tradition about an island of the hungry spirit.'

'Fascinating,' Beth muttered behind me.

I adjusted my rucksack straps, already feeling sweat gather across my back. The woodland surrounding us was beautiful in an oppressive way. Ancient Scots pines towered above birch and rowan, while moss and bracken crowded the ground. The greenery seemed to close behind us as we walked, and the air was thick with the scent of damp leaves, earth and pine resin.

'Did you know this is a surviving pocket of Caledonian pinewood?' Dad continued, undeterred by our lack of interest. 'Some of these trees could be two or three hundred years old.'

'Wow,' I said flatly.

Dad stopped and turned to face us.

'Look, I know neither of you wanted to come, but we're here now. We might as well make the best of it. This matters to me.'

His face had that earnest, slightly desperate look that always made me feel guilty. I knew the trip mattered to him. He had talked about it for months, ever since the divorce had been finalised. Quality time, he called it. A chance for us to reconnect as a family while Mum was attending an academic conference in Copenhagen.

'It's fine, Dad,' I said without meeting his eyes. 'Let's just get to the campsite.'

Beth said nothing. She stared at her walking boots.

We continued in silence, accompanied by the soft crush of vegetation beneath our feet and Dad's occasional remarks about plants or local wildlife.

After about forty minutes, the trees thinned and we emerged into a modest clearing.

'Here we are,' Dad announced, letting his rucksack fall with a heavy thump. 'Home for the next three days.'

The clearing was about ten metres across, surrounded by Scots pines, birch and rowan. A small burn trickled along one edge, and the ground was level enough for tents. In another situation, I might have appreciated how suitable it was. Instead, I felt trapped.

'Let's set up before it gets any later,' Dad said, already unpacking the poles. 'Jamie, will you find some stones for the fire pit? Beth, could you filter some water?'

Beth looked ready to object, but she accepted the filter and bottles from his outstretched hand and trudged towards the burn. I searched the edge of the clearing for stones suitable for a fire ring.

As I worked, I kept glancing into the surrounding woods. The light beneath the trees seemed darker and greener than it ought to have been. Shadows appeared to shift even when there was no wind.

I dismissed the thought. It was only a forest. I had camped plenty of times before.

By the time the sun began to sink, we had pitched three small tents in a triangle around a proper fire pit. Dad had insisted we each have our own.

'Privacy is important at your ages,' he had said.

I suspected the real reason was that neither Beth nor I had been willing to share with him. Dad placed the emergency VHF radio, the map case, spare head torch and other essential supplies inside his larger tent, close to the entrance where they could be reached quickly.

He lit a small fire and heated water for our freeze-dried chicken casserole. We sat on logs he had dragged into place, eating in a silence that was not quite comfortable but not openly hostile either.

'School starts again in a few weeks,' Dad said at last. 'S6 for you, Jamie. Any thoughts about your university choices?'

I prodded the reconstituted meal with my fork. 'Not really.'

'You should start thinking about it. Your UCAS application will come round quickly.'

'I know.'

'And Beth, S4. Any clubs or electives you're considering?'

Beth shrugged. 'Maybe photography.'

'That's great. I could get you a proper camera if you're interested. Not just mobile photography, but something real.'

'My mobile camera is fine,' Beth cut in. 'I only chose it because it should be easy.'

Dad's face fell slightly, but he rallied.

'It's still a useful skill. You could take some nature photographs while we're here.'

Beth did not answer. She merely scraped the last of the casserole from the pouch.

As darkness settled around us, the woods came alive with sound: the hoot of an owl, rustling in the bracken and the constant hum of insects. Dad tried several more conversation starters, but eventually abandoned them when our replies remained brief.

'Well,' he said, standing and stretching, 'I think I'll turn in. Big day tomorrow. We could fish in the morning, then walk towards the north shore. The guidebook mentions some unusual rock formations.'

'Sounds great,' I said, making no effort to conceal my lack of enthusiasm.

Dad hesitated, looking from me to Beth and back again. For a moment, I thought he might say something honest about Mum, the divorce or why he had really brought us there. Instead, he sighed.

'Good night, then. Don't stay up too late, and make sure the fire is completely out before you go to sleep.'

After he zipped himself into his tent, Beth and I remained by the fire for several minutes.

'This is awful,' she said at last, barely loud enough to be heard over the crackling wood.

'Yeah.'

'Three days. How are we going to survive three days?'

I shrugged. 'One day at a time, I suppose.'

'Very philosophical.'

She stood and brushed dirt from her trousers.

'I'm going to bed. At least I downloaded some books before we lost the signal.'

After she disappeared into her tent, I sat alone beside the dying fire. The flames dwindled to glowing embers, casting just enough light to make the surrounding darkness seem deeper.

I poured water over them and watched steam rise as the last glow died with a hiss. Without the fire, darkness pressed in from every side. I used my torch to find my tent, zipped myself inside and lay back on my sleeping bag.

Outside, the woodland noises continued, a confusion of unfamiliar sounds that should have been soothing but left me on edge. A branch scraped against something in the breeze. Dad's snoring began in the next tent, a familiar sound that ought to have comforted me. Instead, it reminded me of all those nights after Mum left, when it had been just the two of us in a house that felt far too empty.

The isolation of our situation suddenly struck me with full force. We were miles from anyone, on an island accessible only by boat or specialist floatplane, with unreliable communication. If someone fell ill or was injured, or if the weather changed, we would be on our own until help reached us.

I rolled on to my side and tried to get comfortable on the thin sleeping mat. Tomorrow would bring fishing, walking and more of Dad's forced enthusiasm, more of Beth's sullen silence and more of my own uncomfortable position between them.

Sleep remained impossibly distant as I listened to the strange night sounds and felt a growing unease I could not name. It went beyond ordinary teenage resentment or discomfort in the wilderness.

Something seemed to whisper that perhaps we were not as alone on Eilean Dorcha as we believed.

I woke on Thursday morning to something scratching against the side of my tent. It was probably only a branch, but after the restless night I had endured, every noise felt threatening.

Morning light filtered through the orange fabric, making the tent glow like a lantern. I had hardly slept. Between Dad's snoring and the unfamiliar sounds outside, my mind had kept producing increasingly grim scenarios about being stranded there.

'Rise and shine, campers.'

Dad's voice boomed from outside, far too cheerful for the hour. I groaned, rolled over and checked my watch. It was 06:30 during the summer holiday. This was exactly why I had not wanted to come.

I pulled down the zip and let in a rush of cool morning air. Dad was already dressed, crouching beside a small fire and stirring a metal pot.

'Morning, mate. Sleep well?' he asked without looking up.

'Not really,' I muttered as I crawled out and stretched my stiff back.

Sleeping on the ground had been as uncomfortable as expected. Beth's tent remained firmly zipped. Sensible of her.

'I made porridge,' Dad announced, holding up a spoonful of grey paste as if it were a gourmet breakfast. 'We've got a full day ahead. I thought we'd explore the northern part of the island once we've eaten.'

I nodded without pretending to be enthusiastic. There was no point. We were stranded there until Euan returned at 16:00 on Friday. Three days of reconnecting with nature, as Dad kept describing it.

Twenty minutes later, Beth finally emerged, her hair pulled into a messy ponytail and her expression as pleased as mine. She accepted the bowl Dad offered and sat on a fallen log opposite me.

'So,' Dad said, plainly attempting to manufacture some excitement, 'I've been studying the map Euan gave us. There should be interesting terrain towards the north shore. Ancient woodland, rock formations, perhaps some wildlife if we're quiet.'

'Great,' Beth muttered without looking up from her porridge.

'Come on, you two. This is meant to be fun.' Dad's relentless optimism began to crack. 'A little family adventure.'

Guilt pricked at me. He had planned the entire trip and probably spent a great deal on it. The least I could do was try not to look completely miserable.

'Yeah, sounds good,' I offered, though I did not mean it. 'When are we leaving?'

Dad brightened. 'As soon as we've cleared breakfast away. Just take water and a light rucksack. We'll be back by the afternoon.'

An hour later, we were walking in single file along something that could barely be described as a path. Dad led, occasionally consulting the handheld GPS and the Ordnance Survey map in its waterproof case. I followed, and Beth brought up the rear, dividing her attention between her footing and longing glances at her useless mobile.

The woodland was denser than it had appeared from the air. Great Scots pines rose above us, their branches forming a canopy that blocked much of the sunlight. Birch and rowan crowded between them, while moss and tangled bracken repeatedly forced us to push through or find another route.

'Look at these trees,' Dad said, stopping to place one hand against the trunk of a particularly massive pine. 'Some of them must be two or three hundred years old.'

I had to admit it was impressive. The trunk was too wide for Dad to reach around, and the bark resembled plates of armour.

As we continued, I noticed something peculiar. The deeper we went, the quieter the woods became.

When we had left the campsite, there had been birdsong, insects humming and small creatures rustling in the undergrowth. One by one, those sounds faded.

'Is it just me, or has it gone very quiet?' I asked, stopping to listen.

Dad paused and tilted his head. 'Mm. I suppose it is peaceful.'

That was not what I meant. It did not feel peaceful. It felt empty, as if the wildlife knew something we did not.

'Can we stop?' Beth called from behind me. 'My feet hurt.'

'We've only been walking for about forty-five minutes,' I pointed out.

She glared at me. 'These aren't exactly walking boots.'

She gestured towards her trainers which, to be fair, were not designed for the rough ground.

'There's a clearing ahead,' Dad said after checking the GPS. 'We can stop there for a few minutes.'

We forced our way through a particularly dense stretch of bracken and low branches. Then the woods opened abruptly.

It was not an ordinary clearing.

Seven immense stones stood in a precise circle. The clearing was perhaps ten metres across, and each stone rose roughly two and a half metres from the ground. Their surfaces were covered with markings softened by centuries of weather. They reminded me of photographs of prehistoric monuments, only more enclosed and somehow more complete. The grass inside the ring grew shorter than the grass beyond it, as though the ground obeyed different rules there.

The instant I saw the circle, something cold slid down my spine.

There was something wrong with the place. Not merely unusual or unexpected, but wrong in a way I could not explain.

'Whoa,' Dad breathed, moving towards the nearest stone. 'This is extraordinary. It must be the protected prehistoric site mentioned in the records.'

Beth finally looked away from her mobile. 'Weird,' she said, which from her amounted to enthusiasm.

I remained at the edge of the clearing.

'Should we be going near it?' I asked. 'It looks important.'

Dad was already examining one of the stones, though he kept his hands close to his sides. 'We're not disturbing it. We're only looking. Its location is recorded, but access is discouraged and there's no maintained path. That must be why there aren't any signs here.'

'Then perhaps we should leave it alone.'

'This is exactly the sort of thing I hoped we might see.'

Reluctantly, I stepped into the clearing. The air felt different at once. Heavier.

The silence that had deepened during our walk was absolute there. There were no birds, no insects and no rustling leaves. I could hear only our breathing and our footsteps.

'Look at the carvings,' Dad called, beckoning me closer. 'They must be ancient.'

I approached a stone opposite him. Its surface was covered in strange symbols: spirals, lines and shapes that might once have represented animals or people, all eroded by time and weather.

Something compelled me to touch them.

I reached out slowly and traced what looked like a spiral. The stone was cold, far colder than it should have been on a warm July day.

The instant my fingers made contact, I heard voices.

There was no flash or sudden noise. The whispers hovered at the edge of hearing, indistinct and overlapping, like a radio caught between frequencies.

I snatched my hand away, my heart pounding.

'Did you hear that?' I asked, looking wildly around the clearing.

Dad glanced up. 'Hear what?'

'Voices.' I regretted saying it as soon as I saw his expression.

'Probably wind among the trees,' he said with a smile that did not reach his eyes. 'Or your imagination. Ancient places can have that effect on people.'

There was no wind. The air was perfectly still.

Beth had wandered towards the centre of the circle and was taking photographs with her mobile.

'These will look good on Instagram when we're back in civilisation,' she said, apparently unaffected by the atmosphere that made my skin crawl.

Something indistinct lay in the grass near the centre, a pale scrap or small object partly hidden by shadow. Beth paused and aimed her camera towards it.

'What's that?' I asked.

'Don't know.' She peered at it without moving closer. 'Probably rubbish or an old bit of fabric.'

The shape seemed to disappear when I changed position. Beth shrugged and returned to photographing the stones. Whatever she had seen, it had clearly meant nothing to her.

I forced myself to touch the stone again, pressing my palm against its cold surface. Nothing happened this time, but I could not escape the sensation that something beyond the clearing was watching us from among the trees.

'How old do you think they are?' I asked, trying to sound normal.

Dad shrugged. 'It's impossible to say without an archaeologist. Prehistoric, certainly. The available records apparently don't settle on a precise date.'

'And there are no notices or fences?'

'The site is protected, but the island is extremely remote. The official guidance discourages access rather than inviting visitors, and there isn't a maintained route. We only found it because the GPS brought us near the recorded location.'

We spent about twenty minutes exploring the circle. Dad took photographs and notes without touching or marking the stones. Beth lost interest once she had taken her pictures and sat on a fallen trunk at the edge of the clearing, staring at her mobile despite the absence of a signal.

I tried to behave normally, studying the stones and the ground around them, but my feeling of wrongness steadily intensified.

The place did not want us there.

'I think we should go,' I said at last. 'We've still got the rest of the island to explore, haven't we?'

Dad looked up in surprise. 'We've only just arrived. Don't you want a proper look?'

'I've seen enough.' I fought to keep my voice steady. 'And Beth's bored.'

Beth looked up at the mention of her name. 'Yeah. Can we go? There's nothing to do here.'

Dad sighed, plainly disappointed. 'All right. We'll continue the walk. But I'd like to come back with better equipment. Not to touch anything, just to record the carvings properly.'

The thought of returning tightened my stomach, but I nodded because I wanted to get away.

As we left the clearing, I looked back one final time.

Between two of the standing stones, something moved in the shadows. I saw only a flicker of pale colour before it vanished.

It was probably my imagination working too hard. That did nothing to loosen the knot of dread in my chest.

The walk back to the campsite felt far longer than the journey out. Dad kept stopping to point out plants and signs of wildlife, but I could not concentrate. My thoughts returned constantly to the stone circle and the almost-audible whispers.

By the time we reached camp, the sun had begun to sink. Dad suggested fishing from the loch shore before supper, but I claimed the walk had exhausted me. Beth also refused and retreated to her tent with her e-reader.

I sat at the water's edge, skimming stones across the glassy surface and trying to persuade myself that I was overreacting. It was only a prehistoric monument. Its builders were unknown, and fragmentary Gaelic traditions had gathered around it over the centuries. Old places accumulated stories. That did not make those stories true.

Even so, I could not rid myself of the conviction that we had found something we were never meant to find.

That evening, after freeze-dried chicken casserole that tasted like salty cardboard, we sat around the fire. Dad tried again to draw us into conversation, asking about the new school year. I made an effort to answer because I felt guilty about the way the day had gone, but my heart was not in it. Beth hardly spoke.

When the fire dwindled to embers, we returned to our separate tents.

I lay in my sleeping bag, staring at the orange fabric and listening to the nocturnal sounds outside. Despite my exhaustion, sleep remained distant.

When I finally drifted off, I dreamt of the stone circle.

I stood at the edge of the clearing, but the stones were taller and more imposing than before. Their carvings pulsed with a faint green-white light, slow and regular as a heartbeat.

A figure moved between them, pale and slender. It drifted from one monolith to the next, never becoming clear enough for me to distinguish more than a white shape against the darkness. Then it stopped and appeared to look directly at me.

I could not see its face, but I knew it was watching.

A voice travelled through air that did not move.

'Jamie.'

It was neither male nor female, neither young nor old. It spoke my name as though calling from an immense distance.

'Jamie.'

I tried to step backwards, but my feet would not move. The figure began to approach, gliding across the grass without taking a single visible step.

'Jamie.'

I woke already standing upright outside my tent.

For several seconds, I remained trapped in the dream, confused by the darkness and the cold air against my skin. My heart hammered. Pins and needles prickled through both legs.

I had no memory of unzipping the tent or crawling out.

The torch was clenched in my hand. I switched it on and swept the beam across the campsite. The fire was completely dead, without even a glowing ember. Dad's and Beth's tents were zipped shut. The trees stood as black shapes against the marginally lighter sky.

I was barefoot on damp ground, wearing only the T-shirt and shorts in which I had gone to sleep.

Had I been sleepwalking? I had never done it before. Not once in my life.

A twig snapped beyond the campsite.

I swung the torch towards the sound, but its beam found only trunks, bracken and tangled undergrowth. Nothing moved.

I backed towards my tent, suddenly desperate to be inside it. As I bent for the zip, the torchlight caught marks in the damp soil.

They were footprints. My own bare footprints led from the tent towards the edge of camp, in the direction of the stone circle.

I could not sleep after that. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw the seven stones pulsing with green-white light.

I sat inside the tent with my back against my rucksack and my knees drawn to my chest. The torch remained switched on, throwing distorted shadows across the orange walls. I was not going outside again that night.

My watch showed almost 03:00 when I finally dozed, slumped awkwardly against the rucksack. My sleep was shallow and restless, full of half-formed dreams about being lost among the trees.

A voice pulled me awake.

'Jamie.'

My eyes opened. The tent was completely dark. My torch battery had failed. I found it beside me and pressed the switch several times, but nothing happened.

'Jamie.'

The voice came again, clearer now. It sounded as if it were directly outside the tent. Female, soft and almost a whisper.

'Come to me, my child.'

I froze. Those last words turned my blood to ice.

My first thought was that Beth was playing some stupid prank. She knew the circle had disturbed me, and frightening me would be exactly her idea of entertainment.

'Beth, stop it,' I hissed, trying not to wake Dad.

There was no reply, only the faint movement of air through the pines.

I wriggled free of my sleeping bag and crawled towards the entrance. My hands shook as I reached for the zip. The fabric rustled while I opened it just far enough to look outside.

Moonlight filtered through the branches, washing the campsite in a pale glow. The fire had been dead for hours, leaving only cold ash. Dad's tent was dark and still. So was Beth's.

'Beth,' I whispered, louder this time.

'Jamie.'

The voice came from the trees behind me.

I spun round, my heart pounding. I saw nothing except darkness between the trunks.

'Who's there?' I called, my voice cracking.

No one answered.

I looked towards Beth's tent. If this was her joke, she was taking it too far. I picked up the useless torch, which might at least serve as a weapon, and crawled outside.

The ground was cold beneath my bare feet as I crept to Beth's tent.

'Beth,' I whispered, tapping the nylon. 'Beth, wake up.'

There was no response. I unzipped the entrance enough to peer inside. In the weak moonlight, I could make out her shape inside the sleeping bag, her back towards me. Her hair lay across the pillow, and her breathing was deep and regular.

'Beth,' I said more loudly.

She stirred and rolled over. 'What?'

Her voice was thick with sleep.

'Did you call my name?'

'What? No. Go away.'

She rolled back and pulled the sleeping bag over her shoulder. She was not pretending. She had been sound asleep.

'Jamie.'

The whisper came once more from the woods.

Beth did not react.

'Did you hear that?' I asked.

'Hear what? Go back to sleep.'

She did not even turn round.

My mouth went dry. If it was not Beth, who or what was calling me?

I closed her tent and stood in the centre of the campsite, searching the tree line. Moonlight formed strange shadows that seemed to shift whenever I tried to focus on them.

'Jamie.'

'Come to me, my child.'

The voice was clearer now, coming from the route leading towards the stone circle.

I took a step towards Dad's tent, intending to wake him, then stopped. He would tell me it was the wind or my imagination, just as he had in the clearing.

I retreated to my own tent and zipped it tightly behind me. I climbed into my sleeping bag fully dressed and pulled it to my chin, although I was not cold.

For what seemed like hours, I listened to something moving around the campsite. Soft footsteps circled my tent and occasionally paused.

Once, something pressed against the fabric close to my head.

I held my breath, too frightened to move.

The voice called my name several more times, always followed by the same words.

'Come to me, my child.'

Each time, it came from a different direction, as though whatever spoke was circling the camp.

I did not sleep again. I lay rigid in the darkness until the first grey light of Friday dawn filtered through the fabric. Only then did the footsteps and the voice cease.

When I was certain morning had come, I unzipped the tent and crawled outside.

The woods looked ordinary in the early light. Birds sang, dew covered the grass and mist lifted from the distant loch. If not for the dark circles beneath my eyes and the knot in my stomach, I might have convinced myself that the entire night had been a dream.

I stood and stretched my aching muscles. Then I saw it.

A small pouch lay directly outside the entrance, positioned so carefully that I had almost stepped on it. It was no larger than my palm, made from coarse, faded wool and tied with waxed linen thread.

I picked it up cautiously. It was light, but something shifted inside.

With trembling fingers, I untied the thread and opened it.

Bones.

Tiny animal bones, bleached white. Most looked as though they belonged to a bird or small rodent. Among them was a tooth too large to have come from the same creature.

My stomach lurched.

The pouch had not been there the previous evening. Someone or something had left it while I was inside the tent.

'Morning.'

Dad's voice made me jump. He emerged from his tent, stretching his arms over his head.

'Sleep well?'

I turned and held out the pouch. 'Dad, look at this. It was right outside my tent.'

He took it and peered inside, his brow creasing.

'Hm. Animal bones.'

'It wasn't there last night. And I heard something outside. A voice calling my name.'

Dad examined the contents without touching them. 'Perhaps a predator left the bones.'

'Dad, they're in a pouch. Foxes and owls don't make pouches.'

He frowned at the coarse wool and waxed thread. 'No, they don't.'

'It kept saying, "Come to me, my child." It circled my tent all night.'

Dad handed the pouch back. 'There may be a rational explanation. It could be something associated with wildlife research, though we'd have to ask the rangers whether any work has been carried out here.'

'That doesn't explain the voice.'

'Jamie, we're miles from anywhere. As far as we know, nobody else is on this island. You might have heard wind in the trees. Or you could have been dreaming and believed you were awake.'

'I wasn't dreaming,' I said, frustration building. 'I was wide awake.'

'The mind can play tricks in an unfamiliar place. New sounds, darkness, lack of sleep. It's easy to misinterpret things.'

I wanted to argue, but his expression told me it was pointless. He had already decided there must be an ordinary explanation.

'Fine,' I said, putting the pouch into my pocket. 'Whatever.'

Dad clapped a hand on my shoulder. 'Let's make breakfast. Pancakes might cheer you up.'

He walked towards the fire pit as if nothing had happened.

I remained where I was, the pouch of bones heavy in my pocket, feeling completely alone despite having my family beside me.

Beth emerged a little later, her hair tangled and her eyes puffy with sleep. She sat on the log opposite me while Dad cooked pancakes on the camping stove.

'You look awful,' she said.

'Thanks.'

'Seriously, did you sleep at all?'

I glanced towards Dad, who was humming as he cooked.

'Not really. Didn't you hear anything last night?'

Beth shook her head. 'I slept like the dead.'

It was a poor choice of words.

I nearly showed her the pouch, but decided against it. She would probably side with Dad and accuse me of being dramatic.

The morning dragged. Dad wanted to return to the stone circle to record the carvings more carefully, but I refused outright. After an argument, he agreed that we would remain closer to camp.

Beth withdrew to her tent with her e-reader, and Dad went down to fish from the rocks beside the loch. I spent the hours in a haze of exhaustion and anxiety, constantly glancing over my shoulder and starting at every sound from the woods.

I could not shake the sensation that something was watching us.

The forest felt different. The birds that had been noisy when we arrived were mostly silent. Even the insects seemed subdued. The trees appeared to lean towards the campsite, closing around it.

Beth scarcely spoke. When she did leave her tent, she seemed remote and distracted. Once, I caught her staring into the woods along the route towards the circle.

'What are you looking at?' I asked.

She shrugged. 'Nothing.'

Then she went back inside.

As the day wore on, my dread of the coming night intensified. Cloud was gathering over the northern hills, and shadows lengthened across the clearing. Dad built the fire larger than before, which gave me a little comfort.

'Beautiful evening,' he said, gazing at the orange and pink sky through gaps in the trees. 'This is what camping is all about.'

I nodded absently, my attention fixed on the darkening woodland.

In a few hours, the sun would be gone, and whatever had visited me might return.

Dad handed me a plate of baked beans and campfire sausages. I had no appetite, but I forced myself to eat.

I needed to remain alert that night.

'You're very quiet today,' Dad said.

'Still upset about that pouch of bones?'

'I'm fine,' I lied. 'Just tired.'

He studied me for a moment.

'You know, when I was your age, I went camping with my dad in the Cairngorms. On the first night, I was convinced I could hear something dangerous outside the tent. Turned out I'd mistaken a red deer in the trees and a fox getting into our rubbish for some sort of monster.'

'This wasn't a fox, Dad.'

He sighed.

'I'm only saying that the woods play tricks on you, especially at night. Don't let your imagination run away with you.'

The sun sank below the treeline. Darkness crept in around us, held at bay only by the campfire.

Beth retreated to her tent early, muttering something about finishing her book. Dad stayed beside the fire with me, telling stories about earlier camping trips that I scarcely heard. My eyes kept straying towards the pinewood, searching the darkness between the trees. The night seemed to press closer, shrinking our circle of firelight.

Every snapped twig and rustle of bracken sent a jolt through me. Eventually, Dad yawned and stretched.

'Think I'll turn in. Don't stay up too late, all right? And make sure you put the fire out properly.'

I nodded, not trusting my voice. He squeezed my shoulder before heading to the larger tent.

Then I was alone.

The fire popped and crackled. Beyond its light, the ancient pines, birches and rowans waited. I put another log on the flames and watched the sparks rise towards the stars, countless pinpricks in the vast darkness above Eilean Dorcha.

I did not want to return to my tent. I did not want to lie in the dark and wait for that voice to call my name again. But I could not remain beside the fire all night either. My eyes burned with exhaustion.

I needed sleep. More than that, I needed to know what was out there among the trees. What had left the pouch of bones? What had called my name in that soft, chilling voice?

As the fire began to sink, I made my decision. I would go back to my tent, but I would not sleep. I would wait, and if it returned, I would be ready.

I doused the fire carefully with water from my bottle, watching the flames hiss and die. Darkness swallowed the campsite. I switched on the spare head torch, fitted with fresh batteries from my rucksack, and made my way to my tent.

Inside, I sat with my back against the rucksack, facing the entrance. My main torch lay beside me, its beam trained on the zip. I held my open pocketknife in my lap, although I had no idea what good it would do against whatever was out there.

The pinewood grew quieter as the night deepened. My eyelids felt weighted, but every time they began to close, I forced them open. The knife grew heavier in my hand, and my eyes stung from staring at the entrance for so long.

At midnight I checked my watch. This was when it had begun the previous night.

The woods had fallen completely silent. No insects. No night birds. Not even leaves stirring in the wind. Only a dead, waiting quiet.

I shifted, trying to ease the cramp in my legs after hours of sitting cross-legged. Dad's dismissal of the pouch still bothered me. How could he fail to see that something strange was happening? Beth was no better, behaving as though I had invented the whole thing. The pouch sat heavily in my pocket, tangible proof that I was not losing my mind.

A twig snapped outside.

I froze, gripping the torch. Another snapped, closer this time. Something was walking towards my tent.

'Hello?' I whispered, immediately wishing I had made no sound at all.

The footsteps stopped.

Then came a noise that made my skin crawl: a slow, deliberate scratching against the outside of the tent, like fingernails dragging over the fabric. I aimed the torch at the wall. Its beam revealed only the shadow of something moving beyond the nylon.

The scratching continued, circling towards the entrance.

Then I heard the voice. It was not like the whisper from the night before. This voice was deeper and coarse, as though it came through a throat packed with earth.

'My child,' it rasped. 'Come to me, my child.'

I could not breathe. The voice was no longer everywhere at once. It was directly outside.

The zip began to move, lifting by itself.

I scrambled backwards until I struck the far wall. The entrance opened just far enough for me to see the campsite.

At its edge stood a figure.

It was a girl, or something that had once been one. A decayed pale linen shift hung in filthy strips from her skeletal body, fastened at the throat by a tarnished brooch. Her skin was grey and cracked, peeling in patches to expose darker flesh beneath. Her hair dangled in clotted strands, matted with dirt and what looked like dried blood.

Her face was worst of all.

Where her eyes should have been, there were only empty sockets, black and hollow. Yet I felt them fixed upon me.

'My child,' she said again.

Her mouth scarcely moved. Her jaw hung slightly askew.

'Come to me.'

I could not scream or move. I only stared, the knife forgotten in my lap and the torch beam juddering in my trembling hand.

She stepped forwards, one bare foot dragging behind the other.

Then the smell reached me: meat left rotting in summer heat.

'Dad!' I finally managed to shout, my voice breaking. 'Dad!'

I blinked and she was gone. Not retreating, not fading. Gone. The place where she had stood was empty.

The flap of Dad's tent opened and his head appeared, his hair disordered from sleep.

'What? What is it?' he asked, groggy and irritated.

'There was...' I pointed towards the edge of the campsite. 'There was a girl standing there. She was wearing a pale shift. She wasn't alive, Dad.'

He sighed, climbed out and pulled on his walking boots.

'Jamie, we've been through this. There is nobody else on this island.'

'I'm not making it up.' My voice came out louder than I intended. 'She was right there. She said, "Come to me, my child." It was the same thing I heard last night.'

Dad walked over to the spot and swept his torch across the ground.

'There's nothing here, Jamie. No footprints except ours.'

I crawled to the entrance and examined the soil. He was right. There was no sign that the girl had ever been there.

'But I saw her,' I insisted. 'She had no eyes, Dad. Just empty sockets. And she smelt like something dead.'

Beth's tent rustled and she poked her head out.

'What's going on?'

'Your brother had another nightmare,' Dad said.

'It wasn't a nightmare. I was awake the whole time.'

Beth rolled her eyes. 'Can you two keep it down? Some of us are trying to sleep.'

'Go back to sleep, Beth,' Dad said.

He turned to me. He looked more worried than angry now.

'Jamie, listen. I think you're overtired. You barely slept last night, and now your mind is playing tricks on you.'

'I know what I saw,' I said, but my voice had diminished.

Dad rubbed his face.

'Look, there is nothing out there. We're alone on Eilean Dorcha. If it makes you feel any better, I'll stay awake for a while and keep watch.'

'You don't believe me.'

'I believe that you think you saw something,' he said carefully. 'But when we're frightened and exhausted, our brains can fill in the blanks with the worst things imaginable.'

I wanted to argue, but there was no point. He would not believe me unless he saw her himself, and I knew somehow that he never would. She was allowing only me to see her.

The isolation crushed me. I was completely alone with whatever this thing was.

'Fine,' I said, retreating into my tent and closing the zip.

I sat in the dark and listened to Dad moving about outside. After a few minutes, he returned to his tent. Beth had already fallen quiet.

I was alone again.

Despite my fear, I must have dozed off, because I jerked awake to the same gravelly voice just beyond the nylon.

'My child. I am waiting.'

I fumbled for the torch and knife, my heart hammering. The smell reached me before I could switch on the light, that putrid reek seeping through the tent walls.

When the torch came on, her silhouette showed against the fabric. She was closer now, almost touching it. Long skeletal fingers pressed into the nylon, making small indentations that moved slowly across the wall.

I could not remain there. I could not be alone with her any longer.

With shaking hands, I opened the tent and burst outside, running straight for Dad's without looking back.

'Dad!' I tore open his tent. 'Dad, she's back!'

He sat up abruptly, disorientated. 'What? Jamie, what are you-'

'She's outside my tent.' I was shaking uncontrollably. 'Please. You have to believe me.'

Dad seized his torch and climbed out, with me close behind. He swept the beam around the campsite, lingering on my undisturbed tent.

'There's nothing there, Jamie.'

'She was there. You must have seen her, or smelt her at least. She smells like death.'

Dad put both hands on my shoulders.

'Jamie, listen to me. There is nobody here but us.'

'Then what's happening to me?' My voice broke. 'Am I going mad? Why am I seeing her?'

His face softened.

'You're not going mad. You're stressed and badly sleep-deprived. This trip, being cut off from everything familiar, it can affect your head.'

'What about the bones?'

'They could have come from anywhere. Perhaps wildlife researchers used pouches like that for samples and one was lost. It's only a possibility, but there may be a perfectly ordinary explanation.'

I pulled away from him. 'Stop making excuses. Something is happening here and you won't even consider it.'

Beth's head appeared from her tent again.

'Seriously? Again?'

'Go back to sleep, Beth,' Dad said firmly.

She muttered and disappeared inside. Dad watched me for a long moment.

'Do you want to sleep in my tent tonight?'

The offer surprised me. It was the sort of thing he might have suggested when I was eight, not seventeen. At that moment I did not care how childish it seemed.

'Yes,' I admitted.

He nodded. 'All right. Fetch your sleeping bag.'

I hesitated, unwilling to return to my tent. Dad understood. He retrieved it for me while I stood in the middle of the campsite, turning in slow circles and scanning the darkness beyond the reach of my torch.

Inside his tent, I laid out my sleeping bag as far from the entrance as possible, pressing myself against the rear wall. Dad climbed into his own without saying much beyond a gruff, 'Try to get some sleep.' The emergency VHF radio he had stowed there when we unloaded our equipment sat beside the Ordnance Survey map in its waterproof case.

I lay awake and listened as his breathing gradually slowed into sleep.

The larger tent felt safer, but I could not escape the sense that she remained outside, waiting. Every few minutes I heard subtle movement: the soft pressure of feet on earth, the brush of fabric against bracken. Occasionally the rotten smell slipped through the tent walls, making me gag in silence.

I pressed myself harder against the nylon, as if I might somehow vanish through it if she came inside.

My thoughts raced through every possibility. Was I hallucinating? Was I suffering some kind of breakdown? Or was the dead girl real?

If she was, why could no one else see her? Why had she chosen me?

The questions circled as I lay rigid in my sleeping bag, the knife clutched in one hand, listening to soft scratching move around the tent for the rest of the night.

I woke with a start, my neck stiff from sleeping propped against the tent wall. Daylight filtered through the nylon, bathing everything in a pale yellow glow. I must finally have dozed off shortly before dawn, after the longest night of my life.

'Dad?' I called, my voice rough with exhaustion.

There was no answer.

I blinked hard, trying to clear my head. His sleeping bag lay empty beside me, neatly zipped. He must have risen early to make breakfast.

The thought brought a flicker of relief. Perhaps daylight and food would make the night's horrors seem less real.

I opened the tent and crawled out, wincing as my stiff muscles protested.

'Dad?' I called again, louder.

The campsite was empty. The fire pit held only cold ash. Beth's tent remained closed. My watch showed 07:30 on Friday, 24 July 2026.

Dad was always awake by 06:00 and usually had the fire lit by now. I walked towards Loch Fionn, thinking he might be filling water bottles or trying some early fishing. There was nothing but still water beneath a cloudy sky.

Something was wrong. The air felt thick and difficult to breathe.

I hurried back to Dad's tent, thinking I must have overlooked something. His walking boots were gone, but his rucksack, map, VHF radio and outdoor supplies were still there. He might have gone for a short walk, but he had left with nothing except what he was wearing.

Then I saw it.

A second small pouch lay exactly where his head had rested. It was identical to the one left outside my tent: coarse, faded wool bound with waxed linen thread.

My stomach dropped. I picked it up with trembling fingers, already knowing what it contained.

Inside were more tiny animal bones, bleached white.

'No,' I whispered. 'No. No, no.'

I stumbled outside with the pouch clenched in my fist.

This could not be happening. Dad had to be nearby. He had to be.

'Dad!'

My scream echoed across the loch. Birds burst from the nearest trees.

'Dad, where are you?'

Beth opened her tent and stuck out her head, her hair tangled from sleep and her eyes narrowed.

'What are you shouting for? Some of us are trying to sleep.'

'Dad's gone,' I said, my voice shaking. 'He's not here.'

She rolled her eyes. 'He's probably gone fishing or something. You know what he's like.'

'No.' I held up the pouch. 'I found this where he was sleeping. It's like the one I found yesterday. He's gone, Beth.'

Her irritation became confusion.

'What is that?'

'It's what I've been trying to tell you about. The same sort of pouch was left outside my tent yesterday. Now Dad is gone and this was left in his place.'

Beth crawled out and pulled her hoodie tightly around herself.

'That doesn't make sense. Did you check by the loch?'

'Yes. He's not there. His boots are gone, but his rucksack and everything else are still here.'

I tried to keep my voice steady, but panic rose in my throat like bile. Beth stood, finally understanding that this was serious.

'Maybe he went to that stone circle you found. You said he wanted to go back.'

'Without telling us? Without taking his rucksack, the map or any supplies?' I shook my head. 'Something's wrong. Really wrong.'

Beth pulled on her trainers. 'Let's look for him. He can't have gone far.'

For the next hour we searched the area around the campsite, calling Dad's name until our throats hurt. We checked the lochside, the surrounding pinewood and the little clearing we had found on Wednesday. There was no sign of him.

'We need to check the stone circle,' I said at last. I dreaded returning there, but we had no choice. 'He might have gone back.'

Beth nodded, her face pale. 'All right. Let me get my water bottle.'

We followed Thursday's route, with me leading and Beth close behind. The pinewood seemed different that morning, quieter and watchful. Pines, birches and rowans shut out most of the grey light, leaving a perpetual dusk beneath their branches.

'Dad!' I called every few minutes. 'Dad, can you hear us?'

Each time, my voice died in the dense air, swallowed by moss, bracken and ancient trees.

'This is so strange,' Beth said after about twenty minutes. 'He wouldn't leave without telling us.'

'I know.'

I did not tell her about the eyeless girl or the voice that had called to me for two nights. I did not want to frighten her further, but the dread in my stomach deepened with every step.

'What if he fell and hurt himself?' she asked, her voice smaller now. 'What if he can't call back?'

'Then we'll find him,' I said with more confidence than I felt. 'That's why we're looking.'

We reached the dense undergrowth that concealed the approach to the circle. No maintained path led there, and there were no signs in the clearing. Its position might have been recorded as a protected prehistoric site, but access was clearly discouraged.

I hesitated, remembering the pale movement between the stones and the whispers I had heard when I touched the carvings.

'It's through here,' I said, pushing branches aside for Beth.

We emerged into the clearing. Seven stones, each roughly 2.5 metres high, stood in their perfect ring within a space about ten metres across. The grass inside looked shorter than it had the day before, almost as though many feet had trampled it.

'Dad!' Beth called.

Her voice echoed strangely between the stones. Only the wind replied.

I searched for a footprint, a scrap of clothing, anything that might tell us he had been there. Nothing obvious stood out. I circled the perimeter, examining the ground.

Beth stared towards the centre. 'There's something there,' she said.

I followed her gaze, but all I could make out was an indistinct dark shape among the uneven grass. Neither of us crossed the boundary. When I moved sideways for a clearer view, the shape seemed to merge with the shadows between the stones.

'He's not here,' Beth said. 'Where else could he have gone?'

'I don't know, but we have to keep looking.'

We returned to camp and spent the next several hours searching in widening circles. We followed every faint track we could find, checked every clearing and eventually forced our way to the north shore of Eilean Dorcha, where Dad had wanted to take us. We found nothing.

By mid-afternoon we were back at the campsite, exhausted and increasingly frightened. Beth sat on a log beside the cold fire pit, her face drawn.

'What do we do now?'

I paced in front of her, trying to think. Euan MacRae was supposed to collect us by chartered floatplane at 16:00 that afternoon. He had also arranged a morning radio check, but we had missed it while searching. He might already be trying to reach us, although the VHF reception among the island's hills was unreliable.

'Euan is due at 16:00,' I said. 'When he gets here, we'll tell him Dad is missing.'

'But what about until then? What if Dad doesn't come back before dark?'

The thought of another night on the island, especially without Dad, made my skin crawl. Yet low cloud was already gathering above Loch Fionn, and I knew the floatplane might not be able to land.

'We'll stay in the same tent if we have to,' I decided. 'We'll keep a fire going. Dad will see it if he's lost and trying to find his way back.'

Beth nodded, relieved at the thought of not sleeping alone.

'I'm scared, Jamie,' she admitted, barely audibly.

I sat beside her and put an arm around her shoulders.

'Me too. But we're going to be all right. Dad's clever. He knows the island better than we do.'

She leaned into me. For a moment we were children again, comforting each other as we had when thunder shook the house.

'What if something bad happened to him?' she whispered.

I thought of the two pouches, the girl in the decayed linen shift and the voice that had called to me. I thought of Dad dismissing everything I had said, insisting it was my imagination.

'I don't know,' I answered honestly. 'But we'll work it out.'

As the afternoon wore on, we gathered firewood and tried the radio repeatedly, but received only bursts of static. We built a fire and heated water for two freeze-dried chicken casseroles. Neither of us wanted food, but we needed to keep our strength up.

We ate in silence, Dad's absence hanging over us like a physical weight. The sky darkened far too early as worsening cloud smothered what little sunlight had reached the island.

At 16:00 there was no engine over the loch. Euan did not come. We did not know that the missed morning radio check had already prompted him to raise the alarm, or that the cloud which kept him from landing was delaying the Police Scotland response and the search teams assembling on the mainland.

I kept looking towards the trees, expecting Dad to emerge with a perfectly reasonable explanation. He never did.

As darkness closed around us, I built the fire higher with logs thick enough to burn for hours. Beth sat near the flames, her knees drawn to her chest.

'I keep thinking about what Dad would do if one of us were missing,' she said.

'He'd tear the island apart looking for us.'

'Which is what we did today.'

'Yes.' She prodded the fire with a stick. 'He wouldn't give up.'

'Neither will we.'

Even as I said it, I could not escape the feeling that our search had been futile from the beginning. Whatever had taken Dad, whether it was the eyeless girl or something else, was not going to let him be found easily.

Night fell completely, bringing the heavy silence with it. No insects chirred. No frogs called from the loch. There was only the crackle of the fire and an occasional sigh of wind through the pine needles.

'We should try to sleep,' I said eventually, although I doubted either of us could. 'We'll start searching again at first light.'

Beth nodded, her face ghostly in the firelight. 'All right.'

I helped her move her sleeping bag into Dad's larger tent. We left the fire burning brightly in the hope that it might guide him home. Inside, we lay side by side and stared at the nylon roof.

Neither of us spoke for a long time.

'Jamie?' Beth whispered at last.

'Yes?'

'You know something, don't you? Something about what happened to Dad.'

I swallowed. 'What do you mean?'

'You've been strange ever since we arrived, as if you're seeing things the rest of us can't. Now Dad is missing, you've found another pouch of bones, and you don't even seem surprised. It's as though you expected this.'

I turned towards her. I could barely distinguish her features in the dark.

'I tried to tell you. I tried to tell Dad, but neither of you listened.'

'Tell us what?'

I drew a deep breath.

'There's something on this island. Something unnatural. I've seen it and heard it for the past two nights.'

Beth shifted to face me. 'What are you talking about?'

'A girl, or something that looks like one. She's been coming to my tent at night and calling to me.' Once I began, the words tumbled out. 'She looks dead, Beth. Grey skin, hair matted with dried blood, and no eyes. Only empty sockets. She keeps saying, "Come to me, my child." Over and over.'

Beth was silent for so long that I wondered whether she had fallen asleep.

Then she whispered, 'That isn't funny, Jamie.'

'I'm not joking. I showed Dad the first pouch yesterday morning. He said an animal might have carried it there, but animals don't sew pouches from wool and tie them with waxed thread. Then she came back last night. I saw her clearly. Dad thought I was dreaming or hallucinating because I was stressed.'

I took the second pouch from my pocket.

'Now he's gone, and this was lying where he had been sleeping.'

Beth sat up and switched on her torch. Its harsh light fell across the pouch in my hand.

'You think this dead girl took Dad?'

'I don't know. Maybe.' I sat up as well and ran a hand through my hair. 'I know how it sounds, but I am not inventing this. I'm not mad.'

She stared at the faded wool, her face unreadable.

'If what you're saying is true, why would it take Dad instead of you? It was calling for you, wasn't it?'

The question struck like a blow. Why had it taken him instead? Was it my fault? Had Dad been taken because of me?

'I don't know,' I admitted as guilt flooded through me. 'Maybe because I ran to his tent when she came back. Perhaps she followed me there.'

Beth switched off the torch, plunging us into darkness.

'This is insane, Jamie. Dead girls don't take people.'

'I know what I saw. And Dad is gone. They must be connected.'

We fell silent again. Outside, the fire crackled and threw shifting shadows across the tent walls. Every noise from the pinewood made me tense.

'We need to sleep,' Beth said at last. 'We can't help Dad if we're exhausted.'

'You sleep. I'll keep watch.'

'Jamie-'

'I'm not taking any chances. Not after what happened to Dad.'

She did not argue. She curled into her sleeping bag with her back to me. Within twenty minutes, her breathing had become deep and even.

I sat against my rucksack, my torch in one hand and the pocketknife in the other, watching the entrance.

Hours passed. The fire outside slowly dimmed as the largest logs burnt down. The pinewood remained unnaturally silent. No owls, no nocturnal animals moving through the bracken. Nothing.

My thoughts returned ceaselessly to Dad. Where was he? Was he alive? Had the girl taken him to the stone circle?

The questions gnawed at me, along with the conviction that I had brought the thing to our campsite. If it had taken Dad because of me, then I had to put it right.

Shortly after midnight, my decision became clear.

I would return to the stone circle alone. Beth would be safer at camp, and I could not risk bringing whatever had taken Dad near her again. Everything had begun at the stones: the whispers, the carvings and the first certainty that something was wrong with Eilean Dorcha. If answers existed, they would be there.

I looked at Beth, sleeping heavily from exhaustion. I could not wake her. She would never allow me to go alone, and I would not place her in danger.

I slipped carefully from my sleeping bag and tore a page from Dad's waterproof notebook.

Gone to look for Dad. Stay here. I'll be back. Jamie.

I left the note where she would see it, then gathered what I needed: my torch, pocketknife, water bottle, the second bone pouch and the emergency VHF radio. The first pouch remained among my belongings at camp. I did not know why I took the second, but some instinct insisted it mattered.

I opened the tent as quietly as I could and closed it behind me.

The fire had collapsed into glowing embers, giving just enough light to reveal the nearest equipment. Beyond it, the world was smothered in darkness.

I switched on my torch and drew a deep breath. Its beam seemed feeble against the black wall around the campsite. Every instinct urged me to return to the tent, wait for daylight and hope the rescuers came.

But Dad might not have that long. I knew it with a certainty I could not explain.

The route to the circle was harder to follow at night. My torchlight leapt across trunks, moss and bracken, casting disorientating shadows that seemed to move whenever I looked away. The pinewood felt alive around me, watching and waiting.

'I'm coming, Dad,' I whispered, partly for the comfort of hearing a human voice. 'Just hold on.'

The deeper I walked, the colder it became. My breath misted before me despite the summer night. Silence pressed against my ears, broken only by my footsteps and ragged breathing.

At the thicket concealing the circle, I stopped.

What exactly did I mean to do? Confront a supernatural thing that had already taken my father? It was absurd. Suicidal.

But I could not turn back. Dad would never have abandoned us. If there was any chance he remained alive, I had to try.

I forced my way through. Branches scratched my face and arms. When I emerged, the seven monoliths stood black against the night sky.

Something had changed.

The air within the ring shimmered like heat above a road, although the clearing was bitterly cold.

'Dad?' My voice sounded thin beneath the oppressive silence. 'Are you here?'

There was no answer.

I moved closer, sweeping the torch over each stone. The carvings appeared deeper and more sharply defined than before. When the light touched them, their lines seemed to shift as if something moved beneath the rock.

'I know you're here,' I said, louder now, no longer addressing Dad. 'I know you took my father. Bring him back.'

Wind rose without warning, whispering through the surrounding trees. Within it I heard the layered voices that had spoken when I first touched the carvings.

'Come to me, my child.'

I spun, but the clearing was empty. The voice came from everywhere and nowhere.

'Where is my dad?' I demanded, anger breaking through my fear. 'What have you done to him?'

The wind died at once. My torch flickered twice, then steadied. Sweat made its casing slippery in my hand.

I stopped at the boundary. Under the beam, the short grass within the ring looked blue-white with frost, impossible in July.

'Dad!' I called again, desperation entering my voice. 'Dad, if you can hear me, answer.'

Silence replied.

I stood before the threshold between the ordinary world and whatever waited among those stones. Dad was on the other side. I felt certain of it.

Whatever had taken him wanted me as well. I should have run back to Beth and the relative safety of the campsite. But I could not abandon him. He would never have abandoned either of us.

I raised the bone pouch.

'You want me? Here I am. But I want my father back.'

The air rippled more violently. My torch beam bent as it passed across the circle's edge, distorting the stones beyond.

Beth was at camp. Euan had already failed to arrive, but the missed radio check would bring help eventually. If I did not return, the note would direct rescuers towards the circle. They would find her and take her away from Eilean Dorcha.

Holding the VHF radio tightly, I stepped across the boundary once.

The cold swallowed me.

The darkness inside seemed to gather around my body. For a moment, I could see nothing beyond the warped beam of my torch. Then the light found a crumpled jacket near the centre.

Dad's jacket.

A trail of small white bones led away from it across the frost-coloured grass.

I moved farther inside, following them. The beam glanced off the carvings surrounding me. Their cut lines now pulsed with a faint green-white light.

No insect called. No leaf stirred. There was no wind. Only my breathing and the soft crunch beneath my walking boots.

'I know you're here,' I said, my voice small within the ring. 'I know you took my dad.'

No answer came, but the air grew heavier, like the instant before a storm breaks.

I swept the torch around. There were only the weathered stones, Dad's abandoned jacket, scattered bones and the darkness between the monoliths.

'What do you want?' I called, clutching the emergency radio. 'Why are you doing this?'

A soft noise came from behind me. It was not quite a footstep. It sounded like fabric dragging over earth.

I spun. The torch beam flailed across the clearing before settling on the gap between two stones. The air there rippled.

Then she appeared.

She did not step from behind the monolith or emerge from the trees. One moment the space was empty. The next, she stood within it.

Up close, I saw that what I had mistaken for peeling grey skin was dried mud caked across her body, cracked in places to reveal pale flesh underneath. Her decayed linen shift hung in ragged strips, its tarnished brooch catching a pinprick of green-white light. Her hair fell in matted clumps, dark with what looked like old blood.

Her empty sockets faced me.

My throat closed. I wanted to run or scream, to do anything except stand there, but my legs would not obey. The torch trembled, its beam shaking across her ruined form.

'My child,' she said in the gravelly whisper I had heard outside my tent.

Her mouth hardly moved. Her jaw hung at an unnatural angle.

'Come to me, my child.'

She advanced, dragging one foot as though it were injured. The stink of long-decayed flesh thickened around her.

'Where's my dad?' I managed, my voice cracking. 'What did you do to him?'

She took another dragging step.

'Come to me.'

I retreated until a monolith stopped me, its frozen surface hard against my back. She continued towards me, every movement jerky and wrong, like a puppet controlled by tangled strings.

'Stay away from me.' I held the torch up as if its light could protect me. 'Tell me where my dad is.'

She stopped and tilted her head at an impossible angle. Then she lifted one arm and pointed towards Dad's jacket near the centre of the ring.

'Did you hurt him?' I whispered.

'My child,' she said again, but the words had changed. They sounded almost sorrowful. 'Come to me, my child.'

She began to move once more, closing the space between us.

I pressed myself against the monolith. The rough carvings dug through my clothes and into my back. The VHF radio slipped from my sweating hand and landed softly at my feet.

When she was only a few feet away, her expression altered. The menace I had seen in her ruined face gave way to something else.

Something almost mournful.

Her head tilted to the other side, and a sound came from her that was not speech, but a soft, keening moan. I could not move, could not breathe, could not look away as she reached towards me with one hand. Her fingers were thin as bones, the nails long and cracked, caked with dirt or blood or both.

'Please,' I whispered, without even knowing what I was begging for.

Her cold hand touched my cheek, and the world exploded into fragments.

Images flashed through my mind too quickly to understand at first. The island seen from above. The stone circle new and unmarked. People in clothes from lost centuries walking through the ancient pinewood. Then the images slowed, and I saw children.

A boy dressed in clothes from the late 1940s. A girl in a dress that might have been a hundred years old. Others in clothing from periods I could not place. All of them walking into the stone circle.

All of them vanishing.

I saw the pale girl as she might once have been: alive, with dark eyes and clean hair, wearing the pale linen shift when it was new, the brooch at its neck still bright. I felt her fear, her confusion and her anger.

She was trying to tell me something important about Eilean Dorcha, about the stones and about herself. The stones were more than they appeared. They were both prison and doorway.

And she was both prisoner and gaoler, victim and predator, trapped in an endless cycle of hunger and loneliness.

The visions became more chaotic. Graham walking into the circle at night. The girl approaching him. His fear. His struggle.

Then darkness.

I felt sick and dizzy, as though I were falling even while I stood still. Through the confusion, one thought came through clearly. She was showing me what she was. What the island was.

Something I needed to understand.

Her cold hand left my cheek and I collapsed to my knees, gasping for breath. My sight cleared for a moment, and I looked up to find her standing over me, those empty sockets fixed upon my face.

Behind her, illuminated by my fallen torch, lay Dad's jacket. Bones were scattered around it, far too large to belong to a bird or rodent.

My stomach lurched.

'Dad...'

Were those his bones? Had that been what she was showing me?

Darkness rushed in from every side. I felt myself falling backwards. The last thing I saw before consciousness left me was the pale girl reaching towards me again, her mouth open in what might have been a scream or a plea.

No sound reached me as the world went black.

I woke to a hand on my shoulder and someone calling my name.

It was not the rasping whisper from the circle, but a man's voice.

'Jamie? Jamie, can you hear me?'

My eyelids felt glued shut. When I forced them open, morning sunlight stabbed through the branches above me. I was still inside the stone circle, lying flat on my back on the cold ground. My head throbbed as if someone had struck it with a hammer.

'He's conscious,' the man called. 'I've got a response.'

I tried to sit up and immediately regretted it. The clearing tipped sideways and my stomach heaved. A man in countryside-ranger green crouched beside me. Behind him stood Euan MacRae, the floatplane pilot who had brought us to Eilean Dorcha.

'Easy,' the ranger said, pressing one hand lightly against my chest. 'You've been out here all night, by the look of you.'

'My dad,' I mumbled. My mouth felt full of sand. 'Did you find my dad?'

The ranger and Euan exchanged a look I could not read.

'We're still looking,' the ranger said. 'I'm Calum Fraser, the senior countryside ranger for this area. Euan raised the alarm yesterday morning when your family missed the agreed VHF check. He came in early and found your sister at the campsite. Police Scotland have been coordinating the search ever since, but the cloud delayed the aircraft and made parts of the ground search difficult. You're lucky we reached you when we did.'

I struggled to understand him. Then the memories of the night rushed back: the pale girl, the visions, Dad's jacket and the bones.

I pushed myself upright more slowly.

'The girl,' I said, my voice cracking. 'Did you see her? The girl in the pale shift?'

Something shifted in Calum's expression.

'Let's get you back to camp. There's a paramedic waiting to examine you.'

Euan helped me to my feet. My legs felt like rubber and my head spun. I searched the circle for some trace of what had happened: the trail of bones, Dad's jacket, my torch and the VHF radio I had carried from camp.

My torch and the radio were there, lying near the base of one stone. Everything else was gone. In the morning light, the clearing looked ordinary, almost peaceful. Seven ancient stones stood among moss and bracken, nothing more.

'Where's my dad's jacket?' I asked. 'It was there. And the bones. There were bones everywhere.'

'We need to get you back,' Calum said firmly, taking my arm. 'Beth is worried sick.'

The walk to the campsite passed in a blur. I kept trying to explain what had happened, but my thoughts were tangled and neither man could pause for long to listen. When I stumbled, they supported me between them, guiding me through the pinewood along a route that seemed far shorter in daylight.

The campsite had been transformed. Countryside rangers and Police Scotland officers moved methodically between the tents, photographing and recording everything. Mountain rescue volunteers were preparing equipment beside the cold fire pit. A woman in a Scottish Ambulance Service uniform knelt beside Beth, who sat wrapped in a blanket on a fallen trunk.

When Beth saw me, she sprang up and ran over, throwing her arms around me.

'You idiot,' she said into my shoulder. Her voice was muffled. 'You promised you'd come back.'

'I'm sorry.' I patted her back awkwardly. 'I found Dad's jacket, and then I saw-'

'Let's get you checked first,' the paramedic interrupted, approaching with a medical bag. She was in her early thirties, with black hair pulled into a tight bun and rectangular glasses. 'I'm Aisha Rahman. Can you sit down for me, Jamie?'

She led me to the trunk Beth had vacated. Aisha checked my pupils with a pen torch, took my pulse and fastened a blood-pressure cuff around my arm. I tried to concentrate, but my attention kept drifting towards the officers conferring near Dad's tent.

'Your observations are stable, but you're dehydrated,' Aisha said, handing me a water bottle. 'Drink slowly. How is your head? Any dizziness or nausea?'

I nodded, then winced at the movement.

'Both. And my head hurts.'

'You may have a mild concussion.' She made a note. 'Do you remember hitting your head?'

'No. I...'

I tried to reconstruct what had happened after the girl touched me.

'I think I collapsed after the visions.'

Aisha's pen paused.

'Visions?'

Before I could answer, Calum approached and crouched in front of me. His weathered face was grave, his blue eyes sharp beneath thick eyebrows.

'Jamie, I need to ask you some questions about your father. When did you last see him?'

I sipped the water and tried to organise my thoughts.

'Thursday night. I went into his tent because I was frightened, and I fell asleep there. When I woke on Friday morning, he was gone. His walking boots were gone as well, but he hadn't taken his rucksack, the GPS receiver, the Ordnance Survey map, the VHF radio or any outdoor supplies.'

I reached into my pocket and pulled out the second pouch.

'I found this where he'd been sleeping.'

I held out the coarse, faded wool pouch tied with waxed linen thread. Calum accepted it carefully, opened it and examined the small white bones inside. His face remained neutral.

'You're certain this wasn't there before you fell asleep?'

'Yes. There was another pouch like it outside my tent the previous morning, but this one was new. It had replaced Dad on his sleeping bag.'

Calum sealed the pouch inside a clear evidence bag.

'And after you realised he was missing, what did you and Beth do?'

I explained how we had searched throughout Friday, eventually returning to the stone circle. Beth had come with me and had seen something indistinct lying near the centre, but neither of us had crossed the boundary then. We had gone back to camp together. After midnight, I had left the note signed with my name, taken the VHF radio and returned alone.

Beth sat beside me, staring at her hands.

'You crossed into the circle after you came back alone?' Calum asked.

'Yes. I thought whatever had taken Dad was there. And I was right.' I leaned forwards, desperate to make him understand. 'There's a girl, or something that looks like one. She's been coming to the campsite at night. She has no eyes, only empty sockets. Her skin is grey and peeling. She wears a decayed pale linen shift fastened with an old brooch, and she smells like death.'

Calum's face remained impassive, but I saw the glance he exchanged with Aisha.

'And you believe this girl took your father?'

'I know she did. When she touched me, I saw Dad in the circle with her. I felt his fear, and then there was darkness.' I swallowed. 'And the bones. I think they might have been his.'

Beth made a small, distressed sound.

Calum placed a hand on my shoulder.

'Jamie, I understand that you've been through something terrible. Police Scotland, the mountain rescue teams, the countryside staff and the Coastguard search crews are doing everything possible to find your father. The search has been running since yesterday, and more people are joining it this morning.'

'But I'm telling you what happened,' I insisted, my voice rising. 'She isn't human. She's something else. She's been stalking us since we arrived.'

'Beth says you haven't slept properly,' Aisha said gently. 'She says you've had nightmares and believed you saw things at night.'

I turned to Beth. She would not meet my eyes.

'You know I wasn't inventing it. I showed you the first pouch. You heard me talking to Dad about her.'

'I know you've been frightened,' Beth said quietly. 'And you barely slept for two nights.'

'Did you tell them about the jacket? About the bones in the circle?'

Beth shook her head.

'There was nothing there when I went back with the search team yesterday. Only bare ground.'

It felt as if someone had punched me in the stomach.

'That's impossible. I saw them. You saw the jacket as well.'

'I saw something on the ground,' Beth admitted. 'It was getting dark. I couldn't tell what it was.'

More search personnel arrived through the morning. Highland mountain rescue volunteers and countryside rangers deployed into the pinewood with specialist victim-recovery dogs. Police drones rose above the trees where the low cloud permitted, while Coastguard teams worked the shores of Loch Fionn. Officers used thermal cameras where the terrain allowed. A forensic examiner photographed and catalogued our campsite.

Calum continued questioning me. His manner remained professional, but his scepticism became harder to hide each time I repeated what I had seen.

'Let's talk about the stone circle,' he said, consulting his notes. 'Your father mentioned it to Euan before the trip. It is a protected prehistoric site, and its recorded location is known to the authorities, although access is discouraged and no maintained path leads to the clearing. Archaeologists are uncertain about its original purpose. There are also fragmentary local Gaelic traditions connected with the island.'

'There's something wrong with it,' I said. 'Something unnatural.'

'Ancient and isolated places can produce strong feelings in visitors, particularly when people know they are associated with stories of ritual or disappearance.'

'This wasn't a feeling. The carvings pulsed with a green-white light in my dream, and the girl-'

'We should consider your physical condition as well,' Aisha said, checking my blood pressure again. 'Did you eat anything you found on the island? Any berries, mushrooms or other plants?'

I shook my head.

'Only the food we brought.'

'Was the fire ever burning inside a tent or another enclosed space?'

'No. It was outside, and Dad knew how to build a safe fire.'

'What about your water source? Some algal toxins can cause neurological symptoms.'

With every question, I felt my story being dismantled and rebuilt as something rational: stress-induced hallucinations, sleep deprivation, environmental toxins, a trauma response.

By midday, the latest teams had returned from their assigned areas without finding any sign of Dad. There were no clear footprints, fibres or broken undergrowth showing where he had gone. The dogs had found no useful trail.

'We're widening the search again,' Calum told us. 'But I need to be honest with both of you. Eilean Dorcha is not large. If your father were simply lost or injured on the surface, we would expect to have found some trace by now.'

'Because he isn't lost,' I said hollowly. 'I told you what happened.'

Calum sighed.

'Jamie, I understand that you believe what you're saying, but an investigation has to proceed from evidence. At present, the evidence suggests your father left the tent on foot for an unknown reason. People can act unpredictably in remote places, especially if they become confused or disorientated.'

'He wasn't confused. He was taken.'

'By an entity only you have clearly seen,' Calum said, his patience beginning to fray. 'The wool pouches are physical evidence, and both will be examined. One initial possibility is that they came from wildlife research or predator-monitoring work, but we will check the records rather than assume that. At present, however, they appear to contain small animal bones.'

'What about Dad's jacket? What about the human bones I saw?'

'No jacket or human remains were found in the circle, and we have found no evidence of violence or a struggle anywhere on the island. What we have found is a seventeen-year-old who has barely slept for several nights, who is severely distressed and who was discovered unconscious at an ancient site after spending a night exposed to the cold.'

I wanted to scream. Instead, I buried my face in my hands and fought back tears of fear and frustration. Beth rested a tentative hand on my back.

'They're going to keep looking,' she said softly. 'They'll find him.'

But I knew they would not. Not alive, at least.

By late afternoon, Police Scotland requested that an HM Coastguard helicopter evacuate Beth and me to the mainland for medical assessment. The search would continue without us, with additional officers, mountain rescue volunteers and Coastguard personnel conducting a more comprehensive sweep of the island.

As we walked towards the open ground where the helicopter waited, I turned to Calum.

'The pouch I gave you. You still have it, don't you? That's proof.'

'It has been retained as evidence,' he said. 'The first pouch your family found was also documented and collected at the campsite. Preliminary examination suggests both contain small animal bones, probably from rodents or birds. We are checking whether any authorised researchers have used similar pouches in the Loch Fionn area.'

Of course there was an explanation. There was an explanation for everything.

The helicopter was mercifully loud, making conversation impossible. I stared through the window as we rose above the ancient Caledonian pinewood, seeing Eilean Dorcha in full for the first time. It looked so small and ordinary: pine, birch and rowan surrounded by the dark blue water of Loch Fionn.

As we banked towards the mainland, I caught sight of the north shore and the woodland where the circle lay hidden. For a moment, I saw a pale figure standing in what had to be the centre of the stones, looking up at the helicopter.

Even from that height, I knew it was her.

She lifted one white arm as if in greeting or warning. I pressed my face to the glass, but a bank of cloud swept between us and the island. When it cleared a few seconds later, there was nothing below but trees.

I sank back into my seat, exhausted beyond words.

No one would believe me. Perhaps I no longer believed myself. Yet I knew what I had seen, both in the circle and from the air. She was real, and Dad was gone.

As Eilean Dorcha receded behind us and became a dark speck in Loch Fionn, I closed my eyes. The image of the scattered bones remained burnt into my mind, along with the certainty that whatever had happened on the island was not over.

Not for me.

Beth and I were discharged after two days of observation at an NHS district general hospital in Inverness. Those forty-eight hours brought fluorescent lights, blood tests, psychological assessments and endless questions. The doctors found nothing physically wrong with me beyond mild dehydration, exhaustion and a possible minor concussion. Dr Shah described it as an acute stress reaction with possible hallucinatory episodes and recommended rest, fluids and follow-up therapy.

Mum collected us from the hospital, her face rigid with grief and confusion. Claire Mercer had flown back from her academic conference in Copenhagen as soon as she heard Dad was missing.

The drive home to our commuter town outside Edinburgh passed in near silence. Beth stared through the window. Mum gripped the steering wheel until her knuckles whitened. I watched towns, fields and dual carriageways slide past and wondered how the world could look so normal when everything had changed.

'They'll find him,' Mum said as we pulled into the drive.

None of us believed it.

The house felt wrong without Dad. His coffee mug was still on the kitchen worktop where he had left it before the trip. Another jacket hung by the door. His laptop sat closed on the desk in his study.

The search teams continued combing Eilean Dorcha. After a week without any trace of him beyond our accounts, even the most optimistic people involved admitted that his chances of being found alive were slight.

I could not sleep on my first night home. Whenever I closed my eyes, I saw the pale girl reaching for me. I felt her cold fingers on my cheek and smelt that foul, rotting odour. I kept the light on until dawn.

The next morning, I found Beth in the kitchen making toast and behaving as if nothing had happened.

'How can you carry on as though everything's normal?' I asked.

She shrugged without looking at me.

'What else am I meant to do? Talk about it all day? Say that what you think happened really happened? Dad got lost or injured somehow. The rest was your imagination running wild because you were frightened and exhausted.'

'You saw the first pouch too.'

'It was probably connected with some wildlife study, like they suggested.' She picked up her plate and pushed past me. 'I'm not doing this, Jamie.'

That conversation established the pattern for the weeks that followed. Beth retreated into denial. Mum threw herself into dealing with Police Scotland and the search authorities. I became obsessed with finding answers.

I researched the history of Eilean Dorcha, spending hours online and in our council library. Most of what I found was mundane: geological surveys, bird migration records, conservation reports and archaeological notes describing the seven-stone circle without offering any firm conclusion about its purpose.

But buried in old newspaper archives and obscure historical journals were fragments that made my skin crawl.

An account from 1887 described three forestry surveyors who disappeared after landing on an island in Loch Fionn. Their equipment was found undisturbed at their camp.

A report dated 14 August 1932 concerned a crofting family who vanished during a stay near the loch. Only their youngest child was found, wandering the loch shore three days later, unable or unwilling to say what had happened.

The oldest reference I discovered was an antiquarian's 1836 transcription of a local Gaelic oral account. It referred to Eilean an Spioraid Acrach, the island of the hungry spirit, where those who remained too long were taken beyond the stones. The antiquarian had dismissed the account as superstition, but preserved it among his notes.

None of the documents identified Eilean Dorcha beyond dispute, yet the geographical descriptions matched.

I printed every extract and made a wall chart in my bedroom, connecting dates, names and locations with black thread like a conspiracy theorist. Mum saw it once and left without comment. Beth refused even to look.

Thirty days after Dad disappeared, the active search was scaled back. A Police Scotland family liaison officer explained that all reasonable search options had been exhausted. Police drones, specialist victim-recovery dogs, thermal cameras, mountain rescue ground teams and Coastguard aircraft had found nothing.

Graham Mercer remained officially classified as a missing person.

'One possibility is that he entered the loch during the night,' the officer said. 'Loch Fionn is exceptionally deep and cold in places. If that happened, his body might not surface.'

I wanted to shout that they were wrong, that I knew what had happened. But what could I tell them that I had not said already? That an eyeless girl had taken him? That I had seen what might have been his bones scattered inside a stone circle which was empty when the searchers arrived? That her touch had forced fragments of the island's history into my mind?

The nightmares began about a month after we returned home. They were always the same. I would find myself back inside the circle at night. The pale girl would approach, reaching for me with her cold, filthy fingers.

Sometimes Dad was there too, but only as a heap of bones. They would assemble themselves into a skeleton that lifted one arm and pointed accusingly at me.

I would wake gasping and drenched in sweat.

The truly terrifying part came afterwards. Three times, I switched on my bedside lamp and found small animal bones arranged across my bedside table or the floor. Tiny femurs and ribs formed precise spirals.

The first time, I screamed and Mum came running. By the time she reached my room, the bones had vanished. She thought I had been half asleep and had confused the nightmare with reality.

The second time, I photographed them with my mobile before they disappeared. When I examined the pictures the following morning, every image showed an empty bedside table.

The third time, I did not call for help or try to take another photograph. I simply watched the spiral until it faded like smoke.

Two months after the island, Mum suggested therapy again. I agreed, not because I expected it to help, but because I needed to speak to someone who would not immediately silence me.

Dr Shah listened without judgement as I told her everything: the pale girl, the visions and the bones that appeared and disappeared.

'I don't think you're mad, Jamie,' she said when I finished. 'You experienced something deeply traumatic, and your mind is trying to process it.'

'So you think I imagined all of it?'

'I think you experienced something real: your father's disappearance in frightening and unexplained circumstances. The way your mind interprets and processes that experience is particular to you.'

It was not the validation I wanted, but it was not outright dismissal either.

I continued attending weekly sessions, though after the third incident I stopped mentioning the bones. Beth and I barely spoke. She threw herself into school activities and spent as little time at home as possible. When our paths crossed, the silence between us felt like a wall.

I missed my sister almost as much as I missed Dad.

One night, I overheard her speaking to Mum in the kitchen.

'I'm worried about him,' Beth said. 'He isn't getting better. He's getting worse.'

'Dr Shah says it will take time,' Mum replied. 'Grief affects everyone differently.'

'It isn't just grief. It's as if he wants to believe something took Dad. As if he can't accept that Dad made a mistake or had an accident.'

'And you?' Mum asked. 'How are you dealing with it?'

A long silence followed.

'I just want to move on,' Beth said at last, her voice breaking. 'I can't keep thinking about it. I can't.'

I slipped back to my room without letting them know I had heard.

Perhaps Beth was right. Perhaps I clung to a supernatural explanation because the alternative was too ordinary, too random and too meaningless: Dad had become lost, fallen into the loch or made one simple mistake that cost him his life.

But then why did the bones appear beside my bed? Why did the nightmares feel more like visitations? Why could I still feel the cold pressure of the pale girl's fingers months later?

The subsequent fatal-accident inquiry recorded a presumed accidental death, despite the absence of a recovered body. Dad remained a missing person in the official records.

Two months after he vanished, Mum arranged for a memorial plot and headstone in a quiet municipal cemetery outside Edinburgh. There was no body beneath it. It was simply somewhere for us to go.

Six months after Dad's disappearance, on Sunday, 24 January 2027, Mum was away at another conference. She had begun travelling for work again, though I knew she felt guilty whenever she left. Beth had gone to stay with a friend for the weekend.

I visited the memorial alone.

The cemetery was quiet that winter morning. The inscription read:

Graham Mercer Beloved husband and father His birth date Missing 24 July 2026

I stood with my hands in my pockets against the January cold. Bare branches scratched at a flat grey sky. Dad would have named the trees and explained how each survived the winter. He had loved teaching us things like that, even when we pretended not to care.

'I'm sorry I couldn't save you,' I said aloud. 'I'm sorry I didn't understand what was happening until it was too late.'

A chill breeze stirred the dead leaves gathered along the path. For a moment, I thought I heard a whisper within it.

I turned and searched the empty cemetery, but saw no one.

Then it came again, clearer this time, right beside my ear.

'My child.'

It was not the pale girl's gravelly whisper. It was Dad's voice, warm and familiar, yet distant, as though calling from impossibly far away.

I spun round, my heart pounding. There was nothing behind me, only dead leaves skittering across the path.

I waited, scarcely breathing, for the voice to return. The cemetery remained silent apart from the wind in the branches.

I do not know how long I stood there. Eventually, I placed the small bunch of heather and rowan leaves against the headstone and turned to leave.

As I walked away, I could not shake the feeling that I was being watched. There was no malice in it, only longing.

Had the thing from Eilean Dorcha followed me home? Was that why I found bones beside my bed and still dreamt of the circle? Or was it something else?

Some part of Dad, caught between worlds, reaching across whatever boundary separated us?

I had no answers. Only questions I suspected would haunt me for the rest of my life.

All I knew for certain was that something had happened on Eilean Dorcha, something beyond any explanation I could accept. Whether anyone else believed me or not, I would never forget the pale girl with the empty eyes, the cold touch that showed me those visions, or the whisper of my father's voice calling me his child from somewhere I could not reach.