gives an exasperated look to the sky. ‘Oh, my heart bleeds for you. Can anyone hear those violins?’ She mimes playing the stringed instrument while humming a sad and mournful tune. Joanne turns and walks backwards. ‘Don’t think you’ll get any sympathy from me, you’re the one who wanted to be the sole owner.’ She spins on her heel and jogs ahead to catch up with Zoe.
‘That’s me told,’ says Andrea.
‘She’s still prickly about it all, then,’ I say. It’s more of a statement than a question.
‘You noticed, huh?’
‘Don’t worry about it.’
‘I’m not worried,’ says Andrea. ‘But it pisses me off that we always make allowances for Joanne. She gets to say what she likes and none of us ever stand up to her. Why is that?’
‘It’s just Joanne being Joanne. You know what she’s like. It’s amusing at first, especially when it’s directed at other people, but at some point she always manages to turn it on you. Then you’re like, “How am I now the butt of her barbed comments?” She does it in such a way that no one wants to say anything because, at the end of the day, she does very generous things. Like this weekend.’
‘I know. She can be totally endearing one minute and an absolute bitch the next, and yet we still love her,’ replies Andrea. ‘At the moment, she’s definitely in absolute-bitch mode.’
We walk on in silence for a few more minutes. Ahead of us, Joanne is chatting away to Zoe. She calls to Andrea and me from time to time, chivvying us along.
‘We’re here!’ she announces at last, with a flourish of her hand.
‘Praise the Lord!’ says Andrea.
We step out from the trees into a small clearing which seems almost circular in shape. In the centre is a heavy stone slab on top of four smaller stones, which have been carved to almost identical sizes of roughly three feet in height.
‘It’s an altar,’ says Joanne. ‘Apparently, the Vikings used to make human sacrifices here in honour of their gods. When their chief died, the chief’s female slaves would volunteer themselves as sacrifices to follow him into the afterworld so they could tend to him there. They were bathed, dressed in white linen, given some sort of drug to relax them, and then they walked to the altar, where they’d lie down and have their throat cut.’
‘Lovely,’ I say.
‘You wouldn’t catch me doing that for my boss,’ says Zoe. ‘I’d be bloody dancing on that altar.’
‘Good thing Tris isn’t your boss any more,’ says Andrea.
I’d forgotten Zoe used to work for Tris, back when he was still with the local NHS Trust. Zoe was a secretary in the psychology department where he was one of the senior psychologists. Although, since then, Tris has moved into private practice where the money is more lucrative.
Zoe clasps her hand to her mouth. ‘Oh, sorry, Joanne. I didn’t mean Tris. I only meant I wouldn’t do that for any man.’
Joanne grins. ‘It’s OK. I’m with you on that. I wouldn’t be offering myself up as a sacrifice for Tris either. Do you honestly think I want to go to Valhalla and spend eternity washing his dirty socks and pants?’
‘What are those petals on the altar?’ asks Andrea as we approach the stones.
Now we are closer, I can see a dozen or so red petals have been scattered across the stone. They look like rose petals, but there aren’t any roses in sight.
‘There’s another Norse legend,’ says Joanne. ‘I can’t remember all the details, but Mrs Calloway, the owner of the croft, told me about it once. Apparently, the son of a Viking king fell in love with a local Scottish girl but her mother was against it. She pleaded with the king not to allow the wedding. The king said the gods would be offended, so to atone for angering the gods, the mother would have to sacrifice herself. So she did.’
‘Did it work?’ asks Andrea.
‘I can’t remember. But after that, young people who wanted to get married would come here and spread petals on the altar to receive the gods’ blessing. Something like that, anyway. The petals are supposed to represent the mother’s blood and the sacrifice she made for her child.’
‘What a load of mumbo-jumbo,’ says Andrea.
Joanne shrugs and looks at the petals. ‘I didn’t realise people still did it. I thought it was one of those folk stories. I suppose we should be grateful it’s only rose petals and not a human sacrifice.’
‘Ooh, stop. The thought of people having been killed on this slab is giving me goosebumps,’ says Zoe, rubbing her hands up and down her arms.
Andrea gives a sharp intake of breath and grabs hold of my arm. ‘Did you see that?’
‘What?’ I look in the same direction as Andrea.
‘I thought I saw something behind those trees.’ She moves a step to her left, still holding on to my arm. ‘Through there. I definitely saw something.’
‘You’re getting jumpy,’ says Joanne. ‘There’s nothing out there.’
I watch as Joanne begins to walk towards the outer edge of the clearing. She doesn’t seem in the slightest bit bothered.
‘I can’t see anything out there,’ I say, in a bid to reassure Andrea, not to mention myself.
‘You’re winding us up,’ says Zoe. ‘Trying to spook us.’
‘I’m not. I swear there was something or someone out there,’ says Andrea. ‘Joanne! Don’t go. Stay here.’
‘Honestly, there’s nothing out there,’ says Joanne, continuing to make her way further into the trees. ‘I’ll prove it. Hello!’ she calls out. ‘Hello, Mr Fox or Mr Bogeyman. Are you there?’ Her voice echoes around the trees and bounces back from all sides.
‘What’s that there?’ says Andrea, pointing to the ground.
As I look, I’m met by the sight of a rabbit carcass, which has obviously been picked at and eaten by other forest animals.
‘That’s disgusting,’ says Zoe.
‘Yuk,’ says Andrea, turning away and looking in the direction Joanne went. ‘Where the hell has she gone?’
I scan the clearing and the trees beyond but I can’t see her. ‘Joanne? Joanne! Where are you?’
I let go of Andrea’s arm and head over to where I last saw her.
‘Don’t go off on your own,’ calls Andrea. She comes running over to me, Zoe hot on her heels.
‘She can’t have disappeared,’ says Zoe. ‘You don’t think—’
‘Shut up,’ snaps Andrea. ‘Joanne!’
‘But you said you saw something or someone out there,’ says Zoe.
I
