Thores-Cross Blurb

Thores-Cross

A haunting novel set in the North Yorkshire Moors about isolation, superstition and persecution. Thores-Cross follows the stories of Emma, a present day writer, and Jennet, an eighteenth century witch.

Emma Moorcroft is still grieving after a late miscarriage and moves to her dream house at Thruscross Reservoir with her husband, Dave. Both Emma and Dave hope that moving into their new home signifies a fresh start, but life is not that simple. Emma has nightmares about the reservoir and the drowned village that lies beneath the water, and is further disturbed by the sound of church bells – from a church that no longer exists.

Jennet is fifteen and lives in the isolated community of Thores-Cross, where life revolves about the sheep on which they depend. Following the sudden loss of both her parents, she is seduced by the local wool merchant, Richard Ramsgill. She becomes pregnant and is shunned not only by Ramsgill, but by the entire village. Lonely and embittered, Jennet's problems escalate, leading to tragic consequences which continue to have an effect through the centuries.

Emma becomes fixated on Jennet, neglecting herself, her beloved dogs and her husband to the point where her marriage may not survive. As Jennet and Emma's lives become further entwined, Emma's obsession deepens and she realises that the curse Jennet inflicted on the Ramsgill family over two hundred years ago is still claiming lives. Emma is the only one who can stop Jennet killing again, but will her efforts be enough?

Thores-Cross Sneaky Peak

Thores-Cross, Sneak Peak 

Emma

3rd September 2012 



 I studied the sky, maybe I shouldn’t have come for such a long walk after all. I wasn’t going to make it back before the storm broke, but I hadn’t written a word worth keeping in days, and I needed to clear my head. I turned to call the dogs, but they were chasing rabbits – they must have run a marathon this afternoon.

‘Damn it.’ A rumble of thunder reverberated round the valley and echoed off the dam wall ahead. I headed towards the trees as the first heavy drops of rain fell and lightning flashed. The bridge across the Washburn and to the path up the valley side was metal – there was no way I would cross it now. I was stuck here with what little shelter I could find until the storm passed. It was only two o’clock in the afternoon, but it seemed like dusk already: dark, heavy clouds had moved in quickly over the moors and another flash of lightning lit up the valley, the thunder that came with it so loud I thought the dam had blown up. But no, it still stood.

I huddled in the tree line, trying to remember if this were safer than being out in the open. I decided that I was less likely to be hit by lightning if there were other, taller, targets nearby. I screamed as another bolt of lightning exploded overhead, suddenly not so sure of my reasoning. The dogs, although used to thunderstorms, went mad; circling and barking, then running up the hill before returning to circle around me again, and I realised they were ignoring the rabbits that streamed about us. Something more than lightning was wrong.

I eyed the dam again. Had it been hit? Surely not, there must be all sorts of precautions against lightning strike. It must have withstood hundreds of storms in the past fifty years. I watched it for a moment longer. The water coming down the overflow seemed to have increased. It couldn't all be rain, not so soon. I glanced again at the rabbits and the odd behaviour of the dogs and jumped to my feet. Suddenly the decision whether to shelter in the trees or not seemed irrelevant. I wanted to be on higher ground – quickly, but realised I had a problem.

I was at the bottom edge of Hanging Wood, which covered the valley side, and it was steep. Almost sheer. I could only climb by using the trees as a ladder; hauling myself round to brace against a trunk then reach for another, but everything was soaked and slippery already; the trunks mossy, the ground a mush of wet pine needles.

I glanced at the dam again; there was definitely more water flowing over it. Too much. I realised that lightning must have struck the water behind it and maybe cracked the overflow.

‘Shit!’ I screamed in terror as I slid backwards, losing the precious few feet in height I’d gained, colliding with trees, striking my elbow and scraping my legs. I looked up at the impossible slope – almost a wooded cliff – and could have cried. There was no way I could get up there. I spotted Cassie, the Irish Setter, barking at me and shouted at her to get on. She did, and I cursed her for leaving me until I realised how she managed the slope. That was it – thank you, Cassie!

I got to my feet again and followed, this time following a diagonal line, and soon got a rhythm going. I could dig my feet sideways into the mush and brace them against the trees at the same time. That was better; six feet, twelve feet, fifteen, time for a rest. Surely this would be high enough? I steadied myself astride a strong pine to catch my breath and study the dam.

The sky was lightening and I had made no mistake, there was far too much water pouring into the valley. Another horrific crack, but this time not from the sky; masonry fell from the top of the dam and crashed a hundred and twenty feet on to more concrete. As I watched, the new V-shaped split in the centre became a U as cascading water forced the restraining wall out of the way. Water thundered into the valley. I needed to get higher, and started to scramble upwards again.

Another rest. I must be twenty five feet up now and my legs were shaking. I wasn’t sure I could climb any higher. Cassie nosed up to me, whining, and I put my arms round her. She was terrified, poor thing, and I didn’t blame her – I felt the same way, and completely helpless.

Suddenly, another explosion rent the air and I screamed again as a concrete boulder the size of a house fell to the valley floor. Cassie yelped and jumped, and I couldn’t keep hold of her wet fur. I screeched her name as she slid down the wet slope, careening off tree trunks. Despite her efforts to stop, her claws were ineffective in the pine mush. She splashed into water and was gone.

I screamed her name again, but to thin air. I looked around for the two boys, but couldn’t see them in the gloom beneath the trees. I didn’t want to call them in case they tried to come to me and ended up swept away as well. I was on my own, clinging to the wet hillside above a torrent of certain death. Tears poured down my face and I clung on to my tree and watched the destruction unfold in front of me.

Poor Cassie. Where would she end up? She was a good swimmer, but there was so much debris in the water, the valley would be scarred for generations. What would those trees do to Cassie? Would she manage to climb on to one of them or would they drown her? I sobbed at the image in my mind of her fighting for her life.

I gaped downstream after her, and imagined what was happening out of sight. Not just to Cassie, but to everyone in the path of this torrent. The road at Blubberhouses was impassable at every snowfall; this would definitely close it – and for how long? Three million gallons would surely wash it away completely. Then what? There were three more reservoirs downstream, would they hold this water? No way, surely their dams would crumble in its path. I had a brief vision of the Dambusters film, dam after dam falling away.

Then what? Otley and the Wharfe. How much would survive? What about Ilkley, Wetherby? What about York? How many homes, towns, cities would be destroyed before this brown, peaty Dales water reached the sea? How many people would be swept out of their lives?

My initial panic dulled and a horrified dread took its place. How close had I come to being swept away myself?

I don’t know how long I perched on that hillside, watching Thruscross empty into the Washburn Valley – thrusting what was left of the dam out of the way. I’d heard of being speechless, and been afflicted that way many times, but this was the first time I’d been struck thoughtless. I couldn’t grasp the enormity of what I was seeing. This was an inland tidal wave. Except this was much more than a tsunami, because there’d be no trough, no ebbing of the waters, not until the reservoir was empty. And Otley would soon be facing four times what I’d seen.

I checked my phone. I had to ring someone, anyone, to warn the people living in ignorance downstream. Nothing.

I got back to my feet to climb to the top – I couldn’t afford to rest anymore, I had to get to the road at the edge of the dam where I'd have a better chance of getting a signal.

*

I came out on to the rocks above the road, grateful to leave the sheer claustrophobia of Hanging Wood, and was greeted enthusiastically by two big balls of wet fur with even wetter tongues. Delly and Roddy. I hugged the two German Shepherds in tears, thinking of Cassie swept away. Then pushed them off to fumble for my phone. Emergency only – enough. I dialled 112 with shaking fingers, but had no idea which service I wanted. What could the fire brigade or police do?

‘Everyone!’ I shouted at the operator, ‘Thruscross Dam’s burst! You have to warn everyone downstream before it’s too late!’

‘Which service do you require?’

‘Didn’t you hear me? The dam’s burst, water's flooding downstream, get whoever you can to move people out of the way!’

‘Where exactly are you?’

‘I’m at the dam.’

‘Where is the dam?’

‘Thruscross!’ I shouted, ‘Blubberhouses! Oh my God there’s a car! Get people up here quickly!’ I dropped my phone and scrambled down the rocks to stop the car before it drove off the end of the road. Luckily the sight of a mud-covered, raving woman half falling towards them was enough to make the driver hit his brakes.

‘Stop, stop, stop – the dam! Stop!’

‘Are you alright? What’s happened to you?’

‘The dam!’ I waved wildly. ‘The dam’s gone!’

‘Oh my God.’ The driver had got out of the car and was staring, horror-stricken. ‘I wouldn’t have been able to stop in time. There's nothing there! We’d have gone over the edge!’

‘Steve, look! Bloody hell!’ The woman passenger had jumped out and pointed at a car coming from the opposite direction. But there was nothing we could do to warn them.

There was a sharp bend just before the dam, they wouldn’t have seen the gap until they were on the dam itself. We watched helplessly as the car slewed across the road, aquaplaning on the wet tarmac, then it hit the wall and scraped along the concrete towards the drop.

There was a moment at the very edge when I thought the car had caught, but its momentum was too much. I blinked as the headlights blinded me for an instant, then it plunged into the abyss.

The driver, Steve, rang 112 again. There was nothing else we could do. We couldn’t get over there to warn traffic. Neither of us had enough signal to ring anybody to get down to the road before anyone else drove over the edge, even if I had known any numbers to ring. I hoped no one else would appear around that corner. At least it was afternoon mid-week and the road should be fairly quiet.

I walked out a little way on to the remains of the dam and peered over the wall at what was left of the reservoir. There was plenty of water at this end, but further up where the floor of the valley rose, mud-shrouded lumps had emerged. The village was rising again.

It was an eerie sight – tumbledown houses and bridges resurfacing after fifty years underwater. I realised with a jolt that Jennet would be there somewhere. The bodies from the cemetery had been moved, but she wouldn’t have been buried in consecrated ground. Nobody in the 1960s would have known the site of her grave. Her waterlogged bones would be drying out, somewhere in all that mud.

I knew I had to write her story.

*

I sat up with a jolt. It was pitch black and I was completely disorientated. I remembered needing to see the village, wanting a closer look at the water-worn stone, but why was it so dark? Then I realised, and got out of bed fighting a panic attack. Gasping for breath, I stumbled to the window and pulled the curtains. The reservoir appeared peaceful and beautiful in the moonlight. I grasped the windowsill and stepped back, then bent over with a sob. What was happening to me? It had been so real.

‘Another one?’ I’d woken Dave and he rubbed my arms. I turned and sank against him, sobbing hard.

‘It was so real Dave! It was her – Jennet! I feel like I’m losing my mind, I don’t know which reality is the true one, I don’t know if Jennet is real.’ I sobbed.

He held me and stroked my hair. ‘You know, I don’t know which is more frightening: the thought of you having a breakdown or being befriended by an eighteenth century witch,’ he said in a misguided effort to cheer me up.

‘Nor me,’ I whispered. I wasn’t cheered. There was nothing remotely amusing about this.

Dave kissed the top of my head. 'They're only dreams, Emma, she's not real, she can't be.'

'Hmm.' Logically, I accepted he was right, but it didn't help. My heart still beat madly in my chest, and I was convinced something was very wrong. 'Go back to sleep,' I told Dave. 'No point in us both being awake.'

'You sure?'

'Yes.'

'Well, come here then, snuggle up.' He patted my pillow.

'Maybe later.' I got out of bed. I knew I wouldn’t be able to get back to sleep and was afraid it would worry Dave even more if he could feel me shaking next to him in bed. I stroked his arm to reassure him and went to the office to put the kettle on. I left the lights off and sat on the sofa, staring out at the moonlight reflected on the water. I knew exactly what was underneath that mirror-like surface. I could picture all the muddy humps and bumps, and had a clear picture of the village as it had been in my mind.

I didn’t hear the kettle boil. I was already writing.

Thores-Cross Reviews

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