Something deadly and mysterious stalks the members of an isolated polar expedition in this haunting and spellbinding historical horror novel, perfect for fans of Dan Simmons’ The Terror and Alma Katsu’s The Hunger.
Intrigued? Well read on to discover the synopsis and an excerpt from All The White Spaces by Ally Wilkes, which releases on March 29th 2022!
In the wake of the First World War, Jonathan Morgan stows away on an Antarctic expedition, determined to find his rightful place in the world of men. Aboard the expeditionary ship of his hero, the world-famous explorer James “Australis” Randall, Jonathan may live as his true self—and true gender—and have the adventures he has always been denied. But not all is smooth sailing: the war casts its long shadow over them all, and grief, guilt, and mistrust skulk among the explorers.
When disaster strikes in Antarctica’s frozen Weddell Sea, the men must take to the land and overwinter somewhere which immediately seems both eerie and wrong; a place not marked on any of their part-drawn maps of the vast white continent. Now completely isolated, Randall’s expedition has no ability to contact the outside world. And no one is coming to rescue them.
In the freezing darkness of the Polar night, where the aurora creeps across the sky, something terrible has been waiting to lure them out into its deadly landscape…
As the harsh Antarctic winter descends, this supernatural force will prey on their deepest desires and deepest fears to pick them off one by one. It is up to Jonathan to overcome his own ghosts before he and the expedition are utterly destroyed.
It was a little after eleven o’clock, but the perpetual twilight still shone white and gray. The ship was settling down for the night: galley stove cooling in a series of muffled bangs, lights coming on in the wardroom and glimmering up onto deck. We’d been making good progress through an uncharacteristically calm sea, but freezing mist had rolled in, and all sails had been reefed. The air wrapped me up in a wet cloak; I could barely see from port to starboard. The ship hung suspended in dark water.
The nightwatchman on the bridge was Boyd: big arms, no-nonsense mustache. He was Randall’s first officer, and would gladly have flogged or caned me if Randall had ordered him to do so, regulations be damned. His knotted knuckles popped as he took the steaming mug of coffee.
“Dog deck,” he said, having a gulp then scowling. “Needs a scrub.”
“Yes, sir.” It came out automatically: I never needed to think about saying “yes” to everything. But the dog deck had been scrubbed by Harry that morning. Boyd had been about, barking orders at the seamen, getting in their way—or so it appeared to my untrained eye—and must surely have seen so.
Boyd shrugged, giving me a look that might—just—pass for a smile.
“There’s no use shirking,” he said, mistaking my pause for reluctance. “Clarke’s compliments. The fog will make the bastards sleep, at least.” His language spoke of the Front—it seemed to cling to him. Sugar and condensed milk were in ample supply, but he insisted on taking his coffee black: Good enough in the lines, he said proudly, and good enough here.
I’d tried it a few times; it tasted like mud to me. If I’d thought to appeal to Boyd, I didn’t have the slightest notion how to go about it.
Although the dog deck had a clear line of sight to the bridge, once I went up the steps the fog engulfed him entirely. I recognized that it was the first time I’d been so alone on deck. The Fortitude was small, and I was forever turning a corner headfirst into someone, being barged and shoved as I made my way below. I exhaled a long, deep breath, feeling my chest expanding. It was clearly the first time I’d been trusted: I tried to recall how Clarke had looked, but only came up with the impression of his size, and silence. If this were progress, it hadn’t shown.
I smiled as I turned to work. The dogs seemed to be obeying Boyd in their stillness, and I was glad, thinking of all the scars and torn sleeves I’d seen on Harry. “Brutes,” he’d say, with a rueful sigh. It was true he had no real experience with dogs: with my encouragement, he’d told some absolute rot about hunting, implied he spent weekends in the country, which was good enough for Randall, who’d said jovially, “Well, I suppose you’ll be a dogsbody then, eh?” That lie, and nearly a thousand pounds in funds, had bought Harry his place. We hadn’t been able to believe our luck.
But I’d egged him on only because I’d known he would come good: Harry had a knack for picking things up, and there’d be plenty of time before the dog teams were needed on the ice.
For now, our dogs slept or quarreled in an unpredictable rota, largely housed in a horseshoe of kennels between the dog-deck steps and the prow. The smallest mongrel—Jamieson—made a few groaning whimpers as I knelt outside his hutch, fingers already numb around the scrubbing brush. The night had a bite to it, and the fog settling on my face seemed to beckon from the frozen Weddell Sea.
I worked silently and diligently, determined not to shirk: if Boyd came up to check, he would find me hard at it. Shuffling on my knees down the deck, the rest of the ship became invisible. The fog simply cut it off at the steps, where I could have walked down into nothingness. The angular crosses of the foremast yards, naked of sail, loomed at the very limits of sight. The sun—bobbing low along the horizon—had been taken up, and the world was white.
I started to hum; fell silent after the first few notes, telling myself I didn’t want to wake the dogs. When one turned over in its sleep—tail thumping against the kennel—the sound sent a shiver right through me. I paused, listening hard.
Muffled by the fog: Boyd ringing the ship’s bell. It sounded like it had come from the dark water outside, a drowned city still ringing its church bells. I straightened up, rolling my aching shoulders back, telling myself it was nothing.
I didn’t look around until the deck was fresh and glistening, prevented from freezing over by the faint warmth of the galley below. My lantern was a small pool of light, ending at the railings, the barriers between the ship and the vastness of the sea around us. The foremast was gone.
The fog was advancing on me.
I sat on my heels, listening again for the sounds of the ship. Timber creaked. The long steady breathing of the dogs was absurdly comforting. I tugged my hat down lower, jammed my hands under my armpits.
Jamieson made that whining sound again, high-pitched and mournful. It made all the hairs lift on the back of my neck. The visible world around me was small, and I had a sudden dread of leaving the dog deck, fumbling down the steps into the unknown. I stayed silent. I told myself not to be afraid: this was simply the first in a succession of even stranger nights to come.
A slow scraping noise just below me. The dogs stirred. One growled, drawn-out and watchful.
Boyd couldn’t possibly have left the bridge; we were the only ones on deck. My heart hammered, and I crept forward on hands and knees, still clutching my brush.
The steps were solid in all that nothingness. True visibility ended at the third step down. A lantern glimmered below me, Jamieson continuing to make small warning sounds. In the half-light I could see my breaths, small and erratic, blending with the fog.
Then, on the deck beneath me, almost floating in the whiteness: a tall red-haired figure, wearing a long coat, hands thrust deep into his pockets.
My throat closed up. The figure seemed in the act of dissolving, and I dropped the brush. Opened my mouth to speak to him. He’d come back. He’d returned to me.
Francis.
He was floating, like the uniforms my mother had hung up in the hallway, looming over the sour-smelling cut flowers. They’d come back to us in linen drawstring bags, neatly pressed: my brothers’ personal effects. Little nicks and holes, ragged sleeves, and one horrible area of tearing on each tunic, as though savaged by a wild animal. I’d dared to put my fingers into the holes, reaching through to absence.
The scraping noise came again; I saw the shallow door of the foredeck locker open. A broad shadow came out, moving with confidence on the slippery deck, and walked away swiftly, footsteps muffled.
The ghostly figure that remained suddenly became Tarlington, standing in the fog, his greatcoat undone despite the night’s chill. He didn’t turn around. I ducked behind the railings, pressing my hands to my chest, feeling dizzy.
When I could breathe again, I retrieved my bucket. It clanked and jangled as I hauled it down the steps, but the spell—whatever it was—had been broken. The water from the pump was like pure burning fire on my fingertips, and I flexed them hastily to restore circulation. “Again,” Boyd said, coming up to cast a jaundiced eye over my handiwork, when I’d thought I was more than done. He didn’t give the slightest sign that I’d impressed him.
I had the rest of the watch, surrounded by the quiet warm sounds of dogs in sleep, to wonder what two people would want in the foredeck locker, when the rest of the crew was below. All was in order: I’d held my breath as I opened the locker door, almost expecting—something—to come out. But it was low-ceilinged and unremarkable, filled with coiled ropes and washy with rainwater. No dredging nets, no part-dissected seabirds, nothing at all to do with science. It was after midnight, the foggy sky starting to reveal a gray morning, and Tarlington had no possible business there.
Tarlington was described as our biologist, but I’d picked up how very young he was: barely older than Harry, he could have no experience, couldn’t even have finished his undergraduate degree. If Randall needed a bone to toss to the old men of the Royal Geographical Society, for funding or forbearance, Tarlington was surely the skinniest bone he could find—an interested amateur at best. But he was still entitled to order the men around, and had the run of the ship. Which, now I thought of it, had extended to my own hiding place, the darkness of the storage locker.
I shivered, closing the door with a muffled bang.
When Harry came to relieve me, yawning and waking the dogs with his clumsy footing on the steps, I didn’t mention any of it. I resented the way my childish heart had pounded, the fact that my imagination had made Francis from thin air. The fog and isolation had spooked me.
They’re dead and gone, you’ll not see them again.
