Lily had stopped about fifty yards down the coastal path, where the cliffs curved slightly towards the narrow entrance to the bay. She walked a little way towards the edge of the promontory and waited until the Gorgon emerged from the trees and loped up the slope to join her. Beyond them he could just see the tips of the aerials and radar dishes and mastheads of the ship, silhouetted against a pale, cloud-strewn sky. The Gorgon raised one arm to Lily's face, cradling her jaw gently with its huge, clawed hand, and she pulled her veil back, looked up at the beast's face with her strange dark eyes before she turned her head slightly and bit deep into its exposed wrist. It watched impassively as she tore at its flesh, blood spurting from the wound, until she slackened her mouth and stepped back. It watched the blood running over the meat of its thumb and slicking across its palm, and then it turned and ran up the slope to the promontory, leaped down onto the slick rock slope over the beach, and sprinted down the black stones towards the stern of the ship. It took a huge leap and landed sprawled against the grey hull, its uninjured hand gripping the deck. With a sudden, vigorous movement it hauled itself over the ship's railings and onto the deck, stalked over to the stern gun turret and disappeared from their view. A moment later he saw the turret's rear entrance door flying out to sea, and a person in light blue deck fatigues flew out of the turret, bounced against the deck and slid to a halt. The Gorgon emerged from the turret and stepped to the edge of the deck, giving vent to an enormous roar of rage and hatred, head back and arms held wide. Beyond it the figure on the deck began to twitch and spasm, hauled itself onto all fours and began vomiting blood on the deck. The screech of an alarm pierced the air, and the gunners in their nests on the beach and vehicles below began looking around in terror.
Healey saw Lily standing in the sunlight at the cliff edge, watching the Gorgon. She turned to face him, her veil still cast back, her mouth and jaw slick with the Gorgon's blood. Their eyes met, and she threw her head back and gave voice to a scream of wild joy.
The ravagers charged down from the cover of the bushes at the beach's end, snarling and screaming as they came, moving with a speed and fury he had not seen in them for years. Most were old, emaciated, naked and covered in sores and moss, but a few were newly-quickened in the past few years, still partly clothed and physically more robust. As they ran towards the beach O'Connor stood up and threw his two grenades, quick and professional, one after the other, at the closest stretch of fence. One fell short and exploded harmlessly in the sand, but the other landed near one of the fence posts, blowing a big hole in the sand near its base so that it wobbled and subsided slightly. Then he dropped down again and began shooting at the machine-gunner nestled under the opposite cliff face. He fired single shots, trying to get the soldier's attention. The roar of gunfire shocked Healey and he ducked down, almost fell down the slope, as a fusillade of machine gun bullets sprayed over the cliffs.
As Healey dragged himself back to the position he had been hiding in he saw soldiers emerge from their grey vehicle, fanning out between the two vehicles with weapons pointed at the fence. One, a woman in a mixture of soldier's fatigues and partial leather body armour, sprinted towards the ship carrying the medical case they had seen before – he guessed this was the soldier who had been taking the blood samples. The Gorgon waited until she was within range before it leapt down from the stern of the ship. She had not seen it on the stern – who would expect a monster like that to be lurking on the deck of their own ship? – and, shocked, slipped and skidded to a halt on the sand in front of it. It reached down and hauled her up until she was hanging in front of it with her legs kicking. She pulled a pistol out with her left hand and was still trying to chamber a round without dropping the case of samples when the Gorgon put its free hand on her face, smearing its fresh blood all across her eyes and mouth. As she dropped the pistol in shock it tilted its head slightly, checking that she was properly covered, and then turned and threw her, case and all, onto the deck of the ship. Then it surged forward, sprinting past the grey vehicle and out of their sight below the cliffs. Another volley of heavy fire forced them all down, Gazza dying so suddenly that he did not even grunt as the bullets tore his upper body apart. O'Connor, swearing, resumed his firing position and sent a long burst of bullets into the machine gun nest under the cliff. Beside Healey, Boots sprung into a crouch, fired a hasty crossbow bolt at the machine gun nest on the more distant grey vehicle, and flopped hastily back to her belly. Whispers, grim face splattered with Gazza's blood, threw a rock over the cliff edge. Healey risked a peak and saw the fence was down, the soldiers were falling back, firing wildly, as ravagers pushed the fence over and charged forward. To the rear Healey saw the loading ramp of the boat begin to rise, the water seething and churning as the boat began to move away from the beach. One of the soldiers ran toward it, pursued by a naked, scrawny ravager, but came to a staggering halt in the turbulent mess at the water's edge. As he turned the ravager smashed into him, knocking him backwards and savaging his face even before he hit the waves. The ship's engines hit full power, and in the sudden surge of force as it moved away from the sandbank a wave of water pushed the struggling soldier and his attacker up onto the beach.
Soldiers were running around the beach now, some screaming with rage and others yelling to each other for help. The gunfire aimed at Healey's team on the cliffs came to a stop as the remaining machine gunners abandoned their posts to run along the cliffs or escape inland. One made it to the edge of the trees at the top of the beach, only to be dragged down by a shambling, scrawny, impossibly weak ravager that had been hiding amongst the ruins of the old beachside café. He was one of the lucky ones – in its extreme hunger the ravager did not pause after its first bite, as the healthier ones usually did, but greedily feasted on the gore at his neck so fast that he died before he could quicken. The rest of the soldiers, however, were chased to the edges of the beach and, though they fought desperately, were quickened one by one. Behind these gruesome battles the Gorgon went to work on the vehicles, tearing off access doors and hurling them across the beach into the sea. It dragged the remaining two prisoners out of their cell and threw them to its gang, grabbed a soldier as he emerged from the other vehicle, bit him once and threw him straight back inside. No one else emerged, though the soldier itself came out after a few minutes, smeared head to foot in someone else's gore.
It had been a long, long time since Healey witnessed such an orgy of ravager violence, and it was the first time he had ever been able to experience it second hand. He watched the whole horrible tableau with a conflicting sense of grim satisfaction and pity, until eventually the last soldier had succumbed, the surviving ravagers converging on her at the edge of the surf to eat her alive as the waves washed away her blood. When it was done the Gorgon stood in the middle of the beach, staring up at the place where Healey and his team hid, obviously waiting, its gang of ravagers prowling the sands restlessly behind it.
"Healey," he turned to face Lily, standing the prescribed distance back from him, on the cliff edge where the Gorgon could see them both. She had returned the veil to its prescribed position, sparing him the sight of her blood-splattered face. "It's done. The Gorgon and its ravagers will leave now." Healey opened his mouth to speak, but she raised her hand to stop him. "I am going with it," she told him.
He stared at her, momentarily speechless. Behind him O'Connor and Whispers were fussing with Gazza's broken body, Whispers crying and babbling nonsense while O'Connor tried to calm him. From the beach he could hear the familiar snarling of rage and hunger. The rest of his team stood in a loose half-circle between Gazza's body and the old coastal path, watching them in silence. "What?" He said finally. "You can't!"
"I must."
"But Lily, it's –" he gestured down to the beach. "Look at it! You can't go with that!" He struggled on, trying to find a more sensible objection. Lily obviously knew what the Gorgon was, better than any of them. "We need you with us." And finally, "I need you with us. With me."
She stepped forward, looked briefly at her gloved hand to check for blood, broke the prescribed distance and the prescribed rules. He felt her hand on his arm, saw the outline of her face behind the veil as she stepped to within a normal human distance. "I'm sorry Healey, but you know there's nothing for me here. I'll always be like this." She shrugged, a small self-deprecating gesture. Look at this monster. "I can never love or be loved. I'll always be an outcast. But maybe, if I go with it…" She paused. "Healey," she leaned closer, her dark eyes faintly visible and her voice rising in intensity. "If I have a child with it, maybe it can be a bridge. We know I'm unsafe, but maybe a child of mine will have my … my usefulness … but won't be dangerous. To you. Then you won't have to be afraid of my death."
A child of mine. "You don't mean to …"
She nodded. "If I live, I'll come back to you. In a year or two. If it's safe."
So matter of fact. He wondered how long she had been thinking about this. Had the idea come to her when the Gorgon first brought its child? He remembered that gentle moment between them at the quarantine pits and the way it touched her on the cliff edge, almost passionate, her lustful bite. "Lily," he said, softly, his voice pleading.
"Look for me from the Wall of Silence, Healey." She stepped back, her hand lingering on his arm briefly. "Don't forget me. I'll return, I hope with the future of our community." Then she was walking down to the coastal path, the rest of the team separating before her. As she reached the old, broken road the Gorgon appeared in the forest at its end, barely visible in the deep shadows the trees carved out of the fading daylight. "You will be safe here until the morning, Healey. Stay well."
With that she turned her back on them and walked away, towards the monster in the forest.
#
Once they were sure the ravagers were gone they picked their way down to the beach to comb through the wreckage in the last of the daylight. While his team scavenged Healey stared out at the sea, watching the retreating ship through O'Connor's binoculars. It had moved fast away from the beach but when it reached the open channel it did not turn to face the waves. Hit side-on by waves rolling up the coast, it slowed down and began to roll and heave. Figures emerged on the deck, and he watched as they chased each other around, only one or two of them armed with modern weapons. He thought he recognized the woman who had been carrying the case from her distinctive half-leather clothes that had offered no protection against the Gorgon's cunning. He watched her chase someone to the bow and corner them, finally managing to drag them down. At the stern two other crew members tried to fend off one of their own, obviously a losing battle in open space with no barricades and nowhere to run. He watched as two other crew members jumped overboard, wondered idly if they would make landfall. If they did it would be far down the coast from here, and if they did manage to reach Tintagel he resolved to bring them back here as sacrifices to the Gorgon. A feeling of pure rage and vengeance gripped him, the first and only time in 28 years that he had felt any of his actions could be guided by a morality other than the crude calculus of survival against the odds. Perhaps the first time in his life.
Finally, satisfied that the pitching and rolling ship would not return, he lowered the binoculars and returned to the beach. They had resolved to bury Gazza in the sand here, but not until it was too dark to search the encampment. His team had gathered all the weapons and loose equipment they could find and were piling it up on the rocks far from the water's edge, along with any loose medical equipment they could find in the vehicles. Whispers was up above, unscrewing the mechanism for the machine guns. Someone had dragged out a lighting kit, and Boots and another team member were talking about how to set it up. Seeing him return from the water's edge, O'Connor dragged himself out of the conversation and ambled over to join him. "I think I can set up that light," he told Healey. "If I do we can work all night getting as much as we can carry. A shame they didn't leave a motor boat." He gestured at the horizon, where the distant ship swayed and floundered in the gold-flecked twilit waves. He pulled a small patch from his pocket, a flash of blue and white from a national flag Healey barely recognized after decades of isolation. "I found this on the body they left behind." He slipped it back into his pocket. "So I guess we know who did this." Seeing Healey's confusion, he added, "Like I said, the world hasn't got any better since you were cut out of it. Lots of people out there have people they want to exterminate, this lot in particular. I guess temptation got the better of them."
They stood side by side at the edge of the beach, listening to the quiet slap of the waves and the muted chatter of the team picking over the camp behind them, and watched the distant drifting ship. "I'm never going home," O'Connor said finally. "I guess me and Manot have to learn to live here."
Healey grunted. What to say? O'Connor's introduction to the isolation of this island had been much quicker, much less violent, and much less distressing than Healey's. "You've been a big help so far," he said finally. "We'll all welcome you."
"I've got a lot to learn haven't I?"
Healey smiled, thought of Lily walking through the dark cathedral of the deep forest with the Gorgon at her side. He took O'Connor's elbow, turned him gently away from the ship. "I reckon so," he agreed. "But at least here you know who the monsters are."