I leant against the rough stone wall of Bearnais bothy and stared out at the rain from porch as hefty droplets of rain leapt gleefully down my neck. I am a lover of wild remote places and usually revel in the unpredictability of the weather but today the grey drizzle that saturates the landscape dampens even my enthusiasm.

This is an extract from The Horror of Bearnais.  read the full feature  The Great Outdoors
I haven’t spoken to another human being for three days and have been looking forward to walking out to the little Highland village of Lochcarron to enjoy a renewed contact with my fellow humans. The only things I’ve met over the last three days walking across this high, windswept landscape are sheep and deer and their conversation is limited. The thought of trudging out through the cascades in rain water fills me with dread.

Bearnais Bothy.
I pick through my remaining food. A few bits of pasta, a tin of tuna, a few tea bags, just enough to sustain me through one more night so that I can walk out in the dry the following day. I’m sure the weather forecast is promising for tomorrow. Inside the bothy it is dry at least. But the bothy is also silent and I crave the sound of a human voice then I remember I have an audio book I’ve not listened to so, even though my phone has no signal, it can keep me company.

On the way to Bearnais Bothy.  A wild and lonely place
I’m not normally a fan of the horror genre but the dark tale the narrator unfolded slowly drew me in. It was about a man alone in a cottage who is slowly convinced that there is something else in the cottage with him, something dark and mysterious. I listened, intently, my mind focussed on the headphones shutting out the sound of the rain, as the narrator told of the man’s searching in every room for the source of a strange moaning sound, the cry of a terrified creature.
I heard the narrator’s voice capture the growing tension as the hero grew ever more convinced that he was watched from the shadows. I heard the story of this awful presence coming ever closer. What I did not hear, cocooned in my earbuds, was the bothy door open as a fellow walker entered, saturated from the storm. I didn’t hear his cheerful “hello” from the bothy door or his footsteps as he approached me from behind. I was unaware of his presence completely until he placed a cold wet hand on my should.

My audio book The Last Hillwalker Listen to a sample

In the village of Lochcarron they cannot agree, some say it was the cry of an enraged Golden Eagle, others that it was the call of a stag, there are even those who say it came from the mouth of a beast half man half bear. What they all agree on is that on that day, as the rain cascaded down, they heard the distant moaning cry of a terrified creature.

I don’t listen to horror audio books in bothies anymore, preferring lighter tales, and now I always sit facing the door.