Rise of the Huntress, Page 2

  I heard him give a sob. I turned away, embarrassed. Was he crying?

  Alice sniffed quickly three times, then gripped my left arm. “Follow me, Tom,” she whispered.

  She picked her way over a couple of charred beams and entered the house through the jagged hole that had once been the back door. She found her way into the ruin of the library, now little more than charred wood and ashes. Here she halted and pointed down at the floor. Just visible was the spine of another book. I recognized it immediately. It was the Spook’s Bestiary.

  Hardly daring to hope, I reached down and picked it up. Would it be like the other book we’d found—just a shred of the cover remaining? But to my delight I saw that the pages had survived. I flicked through them. They were charred at the edges but intact and readable. With a smile and a nod of thanks to Alice, I carried the Bestiary back to my master.

  “One book has survived,” I said, holding it out to him. “Alice found it.”

  He took it and stared at the cover for a long time, his face devoid of expression. “Just one book out of all those—the rest burned and gone,” he said at last.

  “But your Bestiary is one of the most important books,” I said. “It’s better than nothing!”

  “Let’s give him some time alone,” Alice whispered, taking my arm gently and leading me away.

  I followed her across the grass and in among the trees of the western garden. She shook her head wearily. “Just gets worse and worse,” she said. “Still, he’ll get over it.”

  “I hope so, Alice. I do hope so. That library meant a lot to him. Preserving it and adding to it was a major part of his life’s work. It was a legacy, to be passed on to future generations of spooks.”

  “You’ll be the next spook in these parts, Tom. You’ll be able to manage without those books. Start writing some of your own—that’s what you need to do. Besides, everything ain’t lost. We both know where there’s another library, and we’ll be needing a roof over our heads. Ain’t no use going to Old Gregory’s damp, cold Anglezarke house. It’ll be behind enemy lines, and it’s no place to spend the winter anyway. No books there, either. Poor Bill Arkwright can’t live in the mill anymore, so we should head north for the canal right away. Those soldier boys won’t have got that far.”

  “Perhaps you’re right, Alice. There’s no point in waiting around here. Let’s go and suggest exactly that to Mr. Gregory. Arkwright’s library is much smaller than the Spook’s was, but it’s a start—something to build on.”

  We left the trees and started to cross the lawn again, approaching the Spook from a different direction. He was sitting on the grass looking down at the Bestiary, head in hands and oblivious to our approach. Alice suddenly came to a halt and glanced toward the eastern garden, where the witches were buried. Once again she sniffed loudly three times.

  “What is it, Alice?” I asked, noting the concern on her face.

  “Something’s wrong, Tom. Always been able to sniff Lizzie out when I crossed this part of the lawn before. . . .”

  Bony Lizzie had trained Alice for two years. She was a powerful, malevolent bone witch who was buried alive in a pit, imprisoned there indefinitely by my master. And she certainly deserved it. She’d murdered children and used their bones in her dark magic rituals.

  Leading the way, Alice moved cautiously into the trees of the eastern garden. We passed the graves where the dead witches were buried. Everything seemed all right there, but when we came to the witch pit that confined Lizzie, I got a shock. The bars were bent, and it was empty. Bony Lizzie had escaped.

  “When did she get out, Alice?” I asked nervously, afraid that the witch might be lurking nearby.

  Alice sniffed again. “Two days ago, at least—but don’t worry, she’s long gone by now. Back home to Pendle, no doubt. Good riddance, is what I say.”

  We walked back toward the Spook. “Bony Lizzie’s escaped from her pit,” I told him. “Alice thinks it happened the day after they burned the house.”

  “There were other witches here,” Alice added. “With the boggart gone, they were able to enter the garden and release her.”

  The Spook gave no sign that he’d heard what we said. He was now clutching the Bestiary to his chest and staring into the ashes morosely. It didn’t seem a good time to suggest that we go north to Arkwright’s place. It was getting dark now, and it had been a hard journey west, with bad news at the end of it. I just had to hope that my master would be a bit more like his old self in the morning.

  Now that they were in no danger from the boggart, I whistled to summon the dogs into the garden. Since our return from Greece, Claw and her fully grown pups, Blood and Bone, had been staying with a retired shepherd who lived beyond the Long Ridge. Unfortunately, they’d become too much for him, so we’d collected them and were on our way back to Chipenden when we’d seen the smoke over Caster. The three had been used by their dead master, Bill Arkwright, to capture or kill water witches.

  I made a small fire on the lawn while Alice went hunting rabbits. She caught three, and soon they were cooking nicely, making my mouth water. When they were ready, I went across and invited the Spook to join us for the meal by the fire. Once again he didn’t so much as acknowledge me. I might as well have been talking to a stone.

  Just before we settled down for the night, my eyes were drawn to the west. There was a light up on Beacon Fell. As I watched, it grew steadily brighter.

  “They’ve lit the beacon to summon more troops, Alice,” I said. “Looks like a big battle’s about to begin.”

  Right across the County from north to south, a chain of fires, like a flame leaping from hill to hill, would be summoning the last of the reserves.

  Although Alice and I lay close to the embers of the fire, there was a chill in the air and I found it difficult to get to sleep, especially as Claw kept lying across my feet. At last I dozed, only to wake suddenly just as dawn was breaking. There were loud noises—rumbling booms and crashes. Was it thunder? I wondered, still befuddled with sleep.

  “Listen to those big guns, Tom!” Alice cried. “Don’t sound too far away, do they?”

  The battle had begun somewhere to the south. Defeat would mean the County being overrun by the enemy. We needed to head north quickly, while we still could. Together we went over to confront the Spook. He was still sitting in the same position, head down, clutching the book.

  “Mr. Gregory,” I began, “Bill Arkwright’s mill has a small library. It’s a start. Something we can build on. Why don’t we head north and live there for now? It’ll be safer, too. Even if the enemy wins, they may not venture any farther north than Caster.”

  They might send out foraging patrols, but they would probably just occupy Caster, which was the most northerly large town in the County. They might not even spot the mill, which was hidden from the canal by trees.

  The Spook still didn’t raise his head.

  “If we wait any longer, we might not be able to get through. We can’t just stay here.”

  Once again, my master didn’t reply. I heard Alice grind her teeth in anger.

  “Please, Mr. Gregory,” I begged. “Don’t give up. . . .”

  He finally looked up at me and shook his head sadly. “I don’t think you fully understand what’s been lost here. This library didn’t belong to me, lad. I was just its guardian. It was my task to extend and preserve it for the future. Now I’ve failed. I’m weary—weary of it all,” he replied. “My old bones are too tired to go on. I’ve seen too much, lived too long.”

  “Listen, Old Gregory,” Alice snarled. “Get on your feet! Ain’t no use just sitting there till you rot!”

  The Spook jumped up, his eyes flashing with anger. “Old Gregory” was the name Alice called him in private. She’d never before dared to use it to his face. He was gripping the Bestiary in his right hand, his staff in his left—which he lifted as if about to bring it down upon her head.

  However, without even flinching, Alice carried on with her tirade. “T
here are things still left to do: the dark to fight, replacement books to write. You ain’t dead yet, and while you can move those old bones of yours, it’s your duty to carry on. It’s your duty to keep Tom safe and train him. It’s your duty to the County!”

  Slowly he lowered his staff. The last sentence Alice uttered had changed the expression in his eyes. “Duty above all” was what he believed in. His duty to the County had guided and shaped his path through a long, arduous, and dangerous life.

  Without another word he put the charred Bestiary in his bag and set off, heading north. Alice and I followed with the dogs as best we could. It looked like he’d decided to head for the mill after all.

  CHAPTER III

  The Old Man

  We never reached the mill. Perhaps it simply wasn’t meant to be. The journey over the fells went without a hitch, but as we approached Caster, we saw that the houses to the south were burning, the dark smoke obscuring the setting sun. Even if the main invading force had been victorious, they couldn’t have gotten this far north yet; it was probably a raiding party from the sea.

  Normally we’d have rested on the lower slopes, but we felt a sense of urgency and pressed on through the darkness, passing even farther to the east of Caster than usual. As soon as we reached the canal, it became clear that it would be impossible to travel farther north to the mill. Both towpaths were thronged with refugees heading south.

  It was some time before we could persuade anybody to tell us what had happened. They kept on pushing past, eyes filled with fear. At last we found an old man leaning against a gate, trying to get his breath back, his knees trembling with exertion.

  “How bad is it farther north?” the Spook asked, his voice at its most kindly.

  The man shook his head, and it was some time before he was sufficiently recovered to answer. “A large force of soldiers landed northeast of the bay,” he gasped. “They took us all by surprise. Kendal village is theirs already—what’s left of it after the burning—and now they’re moving this way. It’s over. My home’s gone. Lived there all my life, I have. I’m too old to start again.”

  “Wars don’t last forever,” the Spook said, patting him on the shoulder. “I’ve lost my house, too. But we have to go on. We’ll both go home one day and rebuild.”

  The old man nodded and shuffled across to join the line of refugees. He didn’t seem convinced by the Spook’s words, and judging by his own expression, my master didn’t believe them either. He turned to me, his face grim and haggard.

  “As I see it, my first duty is to keep you safe, lad. But nowhere in the County is secure any longer,” he said. “For now, we can do nothing here. We’ll come back one day, but we’re off to sea again.”

  “Where are we going—Sunderland Point?” I asked, assuming we were going to try and reach the County port and get passage on a ship.

  “If it isn’t already in enemy hands, it’ll be full with refugees,” the Spook said with a shake of his head. “No, I’m going to collect what’s owed me.”

  That said, he led us quickly westward.

  Only very rarely did the Spook get paid promptly, and sometimes not at all. So he called in a debt. Years earlier he’d driven a sea wraith from a fisherman’s cottage. Now, rather than coin, the payment he demanded was a bed for the night followed by a safe passage to Mona, the large island that lay out in the Irish Sea, northwest of the County.

  Reluctantly the fisherman agreed to take us. He didn’t want to do it, but he was scared of the man with the fierce, glittering eyes who confronted him—who now seemed filled with new determination.

  I thought I’d gained my sea legs on the voyage to Greece in the summer. How wrong I was. A small fishing boat was a very different proposition than the three-masted Celeste. Even before we were clear of the bay and out in the open sea, it started pitching and rolling alarmingly, and the dogs were soon whining nervously. Instead of watching the County recede into the distance, I spent the larger part of the voyage with my head over the side of the boat, being violently sick.

  “Feeling better, lad?” asked the Spook when I finally stopped vomiting.

  “A bit,” I answered, looking toward Mona, which was now a smudge of green on the horizon. “Have you ever visited the island before?”

  My master shook his head. “Never had any call to. I’ve had more than enough work to keep me busy in the County. But the islanders have their fair share of troubles with the dark. There are at least half a dozen bugganes there.”

  “What’s a buggane?” I asked. I vaguely remembered seeing the word in the Spook’s Bestiary, but I couldn’t remember anything about them. I knew we didn’t have them in the County now.

  “Well, lad, why don’t you look it up and find out?” said the Spook, pulling the Bestiary from his bag and handing it to me. “It’s a type of demon.”

  I opened the Bestiary, flicked through to the section on demons, and quickly found the heading BUGGANES.

  “Read it aloud, Tom!” Alice insisted. “I’d like to know what’s what, too.”

  My master frowned at her, probably thinking it was spook’s business and nothing to do with her. But I began to read aloud as she’d asked.

  “The buggane is a category of demon that frequents ruins and usually materializes as a black bull or a hairy man, although other forms are chosen if they suit its purpose. In marshy ground, bugganes have been known to shape-shift into wormes.

  “The buggane makes two distinctive sounds—either bellowing like an enraged bull to warn off those who venture near its domain, or whispering to its victims in a sinister human voice. It tells the afflicted that it is sapping their life force, and their terror lends the demon even greater strength. Covering one’s ears is no protection—the voice of the buggane is heard right inside the head. Even the profoundly deaf have been known to fall victim to that insidious sound. Those who hear the whisper die within days, unless they kill the buggane first. It stores the life force of each person it slays in a labyrinth, which it constructs far underground.

  “Bugganes are immune to salt and iron, which makes them hard both to kill and to confine. The only thing they are vulnerable to is a blade made from silver alloy, which must be driven into the heart of the buggane when it has fully materialized.”

  “Sounds really scary,” said Alice.

  “Aye, there’s good reason to be both afraid and wary where a buggane is concerned,” said the Spook. “It’s said they have no spooks on Mona, but from what I’ve heard they could certainly do with some. That’s why bugganes flourish there—there’s nobody to keep them in check.”

  It suddenly began to drizzle, and my master quickly seized the Bestiary from me, closed it, and put it in his bag, out of harm’s way. It was his last book, and he didn’t want it damaged any further.

  “What are the islanders like?” I asked.

  “They’re a proud, stubborn people. They’re warlike, too, with a strong force of paid conscripts called yeomen. But a small island like that would have no chance if the enemy looked beyond the County and chose to invade.”

  “The islanders ain’t going to welcome us, are they?” Alice said.

  The Spook nodded thoughtfully. “You could be right, girl. Refugees are rarely welcome anywhere. It just means extra mouths to feed. And a lot of folks will have fled the County and headed for Mona. There’s Ireland further to the west, but it’s a much longer journey, and I’d prefer to stay as close to home as possible. If things are difficult, we could always head west later.”

  As we approached the island, the waves became less choppy, but the drizzle was heavier now, and blowing straight into our faces. The weather and the green rolling hills ahead reminded me of the County. It was almost like coming home.

  The fisherman put us ashore on the southeast of the island, tying his boat briefly to a wooden jetty that jutted out over a rocky shore. The three dogs leaped off the boat in turn, happy to be back on dry land, but we followed more slowly, our joints stiff after being conf
ined in the boat for so long. It was just minutes before the fisherman put out to sea again. Silent and grim on the voyage across, now he was almost smiling. His debt to the Spook was paid, and he was glad to see the back of us.

  At the end of the jetty, we saw four local fishermen sitting under a wooden shelter mending their nets; they watched us draw near with narrowed, hostile eyes. My master was in the lead, his hood up against the rain, and he nodded in their direction. He got just one response: three of the men kept their eyes averted and continued with their work; the fourth spat onto the shingle.

  “Right, wasn’t I? We ain’t welcome here, Tom,” Alice said. “Should have sailed farther west to Ireland!”

  “Well, we’re here now, Alice, and we’ll just have to make the best of it,” I told her.

  We advanced up the beach until we came to a narrow, muddy path, which ran uphill between a dozen small thatched cottages, then disappeared into a wood. As we passed the last doorway, a man came down out of the trees and barred our path. He was carrying a stout wooden cudgel. Claw bounded forward and growled at the stranger threateningly, her black fur bristling.

  “Call the dog back, lad. I’ll deal with this!” the Spook shouted over his shoulder.

  “Claw! Here—good girl!” I called, and reluctantly she came back to my side. I knew that even by herself, she was well able to deal with a man carrying only a club for a weapon.

  The stranger had a tanned, weatherbeaten face and, despite the chilly damp, had his sleeves rolled up above his elbows. He was thickset and muscular, with an edge of authority about him, and I didn’t think he was a fisherman. And then I saw that he was actually wearing a military uniform, a tight brown leather jerkin with a symbol on the shoulder—three running legs in a circle. Legs that wore armor. Under it was a Latin inscription: quocunque jeceris sabit. I suspected that he was one of the island’s yeomen.

  “You’re not welcome here!” he told the Spook with a hostile glare, raising his club threateningly. “You should have stayed in your own land. We’ve enough mouths of our own to feed!”