progress as she blundered into branches and tore through bushes. You wouldn’t think such a dainty little thing could lumber about so clumsily, but she was plainly as terrified as I. That shriek was chilling enough to turn your guts to ice. Unlike her, though, I couldn’t run. I cowered down behind the bush where I was hiding and tried desperately to work out where the hell the cry had come from. I peered into the gloom, trying to get a glimpse of the beast that had uttered such a cry, but the branches and bushes were being whipped back and forth so fiercely by the winds that even if a bear had been rampaging through the forest, I wouldn’t have been able to distinguish it from a tree in that gloom.
The noise of Isabela’s flight had almost faded into the distance now. The evening was growing darker by the minute and I was desperate to get back to the cottage before I lost my way entirely. Spending the night lying in goats’ shit with the great she-whale and pig-boy was beginning to feel strangely enticing compared to a night out here alone in the storm. But I dared not move until I knew what it was that had made that noise.
Then I heard a long-drawn-out scream. I’d heard enough screams like that in my time to be quite certain it was a woman’s cry, a woman in pain, a woman terrified. It was far away, but I knew it was Isabela. Whatever that beast was, it must have caught up with her and seized her in its jaws. I almost started in the direction of the sound, thinking I should do something to help her. But I quickly pulled myself together. If she was hurt, dead even, wasn’t that exactly what I wanted? Besides, who knew what had attacked her? Judging by that unearthly shriek, it was a monster no man alone could hope to tackle.
But the girl had conveniently drawn it away from me, and now was the time to run for it while it was safely occupied devouring its kill. Then a chilling thought occurred to me. If there was one monster out there, might it not also have a mate, even a pack? Although it made my flesh crawl to think of it, it also pushed me into action. I had to move and move now. I certainly didn’t intend spending the night alone in a forest full of slavering beasts. With luck, if there were more of them, they’d be drawn to the corpse by the smell of blood.
I rose cautiously and peered about me, trying to work out which way I’d come. The trouble was, I’d been so intent on following the girl that I hadn’t taken much notice of landmarks, and one tree was beginning to look dismally like another in the dark, not that they didn’t in daylight. I’ve always loathed the countryside, and this evening’s events had certainly done nothing to endear it to me.
I edged out from behind the bush and started off at an ungainly trot back in what I hoped was the direction of the stone byre. The wind swirled among the branches, plunging down through any small gap in the trees, sucking up fallen twigs and dried leaves in stinging spirals. Then the rain began to fall, big fat drops plopping down through the branches. I hurried as fast as I dared, peering around me all the time in case that beast, having tired of the girl, had doubled back and was now stalking me. But after I almost pitched headlong several times over tree roots and crashed painfully into branches, I realized that I was in grave danger of breaking a leg or knocking myself unconscious. And if I did, I’d be at the mercy of any passing predator who fancied an easy meal. So I forced myself to concentrate on getting clear of the trees as quickly as possible.
The rain was pouring down now. Between the darkness and the rain driving into my eyes I could only see my own hand, white as a maggot, moving in front of me as if it had become detached from my body and was its own creature. The leaves were now so wet under foot that several times my feet slipped from under me and I had to grab at branches to steady myself, but finally I burst out from the trees into the scrub. I staggered backwards