The Spook's Tale: And Other Horrors Read online

  “That’s true enough, boy. But what choice do we have? We might as well get it over with. Follow me!”

  With those words he picked up his bag and staff and set off northwest at a rapid pace while I struggled to keep up. At first we walked in silence, but as we drew nearer to the witch’s cottage, the spook slowed down and dropped back to walk beside me.

  “We’re not going to get there much before dark, boy, so we’ll have to wait until morning to deal with her. It’ll be easier and safer then. But I’m going to explain what we’re up against so that you know the worst.

  “The land around her cottage will no doubt be full of danger, with dark magic spells and snares ready to trap us. But inside her dwelling—well, that doesn’t bear thinking about. I expect the witch will be waiting down in the cellar. That’s what witches often do when at bay. They find an underground lair, a place of darkness, and defend it with every dirty trick that a lifetime of malevolence has taught them. This isn’t going to be easy, boy.”

  As we approached the cottage through the trees, it was already getting dark. We were moving slowly and cautiously in case she’d set any snares. There was a sudden rustle from above, and I shuddered with fear as I saw a pair of large eyes staring down at us from a branch. It was an owl, and it suddenly took off, gliding away almost soundlessly through the trees toward the cottage.

  “If I’m not mistaken, that was the witch’s familiar,” said the spook. “There was an owl about last night when you were safely positioned behind the waterfall—almost certainly the same one—so it must have been watching what we were doing then.

  “A familiar can be something as small as a toad or as large as a big dog. Whatever it is, it’ll be the eyes and ears of the witch. You see, a witch usually uses what we call long-sniffing to see what’s about to happen, especially if danger threatens. But I’m not worried about that. Long-sniffing doesn’t work on seventh sons of seventh sons. So she has to find another way. Bone magic is stronger that blood magic, but more powerful than both put together is familiar magic. And a witch strong enough to control a boggart may also have a familiar doing her bidding. Most likely it’s that owl. If so, the witch will already know what’s happened to her boggart. Just as she’ll know now that we’re very close to her cottage.”

  We settled down in the trees just within sight of the cottage, ready for a long vigil. The spook had told me that we had to stay alert and couldn’t afford to sleep even for a moment. We’d only been there about ten minutes or so when I started to feel unwell. It was as if someone very strong had me in a bear hug and was squeezing my chest. I couldn’t get my breath and started to gasp and choke.

  The spook turned toward me. “You all right, boy?” he asked.

  “I’m finding it hard to breathe,” I told him.

  “Have you ever had problems like this before?” he asked.

  I shook my head. It was getting difficult to speak. But after a few moments the pain went away and I could breathe more easily. My brow was wet with sweat, but I was relieved. It felt so good just to be able to fill my lungs and not fight for air. But my relief was short-lived. Within minutes the pain came back, worse than ever. This time the constriction of my chest was so tight that I couldn’t breathe at all. I lurched to my feet in panic, the world spun about me, and I felt myself falling into darkness.

  CHAPTER V

  The Silver Chain

  THE next thing I knew, I was lying on my back looking up at the moon through the bare branches of a tree.

  The spook helped me to sit up. “It’s the witch,” he told me. “She’s using that lock of your hair to do you harm. I thought you were a goner then. You see, she’s trying to force my hand. She wants me to face her now, while it’s still dark and her powers are in the ascendancy. So I don’t have any choice—the next time she might kill you. You’ll have to come with me; it’s far too dangerous to leave you out here alone. Your best chance is still to stick close to me.”

  He helped me to my feet. I felt weak but stumbled after him as he made directly for the cottage. We hadn’t taken more than a dozen paces when I began to feel ill again. But this time it was different. Rather than feeling breathless, my body was now so heavy and weary I could hardly take another step.

  Then I began to see things beneath the trees—objects that shone white in the moonlight. Beads of sweat formed on my forehead and ran into my eyes. I was about to call out to the spook when he came to a sudden halt and motioned with his staff that I should stop too. When he turned slowly back to face me, the moonlight illuminating his face, I could see he also had sweat on his brow.

  “How are you, boy? You don’t look well to me. Not well at all.”

  “Is it the witch again?” I asked. “I feel really sluggish and heavy.”

  “Yes, she’s the one who’s making you feel like that—that’s certain. She’s not using your lock of hair though, because I can feel it, too. See those bones over there?” he asked, pointing with his staff.

  He indicated one of the white things I’d noticed. Now I could see that it was actually a heap of small bones, those of a rabbit, long since dead. I glanced about and saw other similar mounds. Some were the bones of birds; a particularly large pile in the distance looked like the remains of a deer.

  “We’re right on the edge of a dark magic snare,” said the spook. “It’s what we call a bone yard. Anything that enters the snare’s in trouble right away. Your bones start to get heavy. After a while you can’t move at all and die a slow death of starvation—that’s if you’ve not gone too far in. Later the witch comes to collect the bones she needs for her spells. She can make do with animals, but she’s really waiting for a person to blunder into her yard. Right near the center, victims suffer a speedier death. Their bones become so heavy they’re crushed to powder. Now we need to start walking backward, boy. Do it nice and slowly and take deep breaths—otherwise you might faint, and there’s no way I’d be able to carry you out of this trap.”

  I did as he instructed, breathing evenly and deeply and taking slow backward steps. It was hard, and I began to sweat with the exertion. At one point I almost lost my balance and just managed to recover in time. Falling would be as bad as fainting. Gradually the heaviness of my body eased, and eventually I felt quite comfortable in my skin again.

  “Now follow me. We need to skirt this trap and go the long way round,” the spook told me.

  As we took a roundabout route toward the witch’s lair, a thought struck me. “I was lucky not to stumble into that snare yesterday when I first saw the cottage,” I commented.

  “Luck wasn’t involved, boy. That spider spell the witch spun to lure you to her door would have guaranteed that you got there safely. It tugged you along by the safest path. Anyway, now we come to the dangerous part. I’ve got to go in and find where she’s hiding.”

  We were at the edge of the trees and could now see the front of the cottage. Getting inside would be easy. The door was hanging open as if inviting us to enter, but it was utterly dark within. The spook led us forward but paused at the threshold. He placed his staff on the ground and took the lantern from his bag, lighting it at once. Next he pulled out his silver chain and coiled it around his left wrist before handing the bag to me.

  “You’ll have to carry that for now, boy. Bring my staff, too, and hand it to me if I need it.”

  “How will I know when to hand it to you?”

  He gave me a withering look, then smiled grimly. “Because I’ll shout for it so loud it’ll blow your ears off! Look, just stay alert. As we search the cottage, stay five steps behind me. I need room to work. I’m going to try and bind the witch with my chain. That’s our best hope of dealing with her quickly.”

  So saying, he turned, picked up the lantern with his right hand, and led the way into the witch’s cottage. I followed close behind, carrying his heavy bag and staff, my knees starting to tremble. The lantern was casting strange shadows on the walls and ceiling, and I started to feel very cold. The unn
atural cold that warns that something from the dark is very near.

  The spook advanced slowly and cautiously through the small front room and into the kitchen. The witch could be anywhere and might attack at any moment. He glanced at the heap of bones in the corner and shook his head; then, sighing deeply, he began to climb the stairs. I followed at a distance, my legs trembling with every step. My back was now to the kitchen, and I didn’t know if I was more afraid of what might lie in wait ahead of us or what might lurch out of the darkness behind. I could almost feel the witch’s talons clawing at my ankles as I climbed. I glanced nervously over my shoulder, but the kitchen was empty. We checked each bedroom in turn. Again, nothing. We would have to go down to the cellar. The prospect of that scared me more than anything. I hated cellars. It brought back memories of my recurring nightmare. That, and the time my dad had thrown me into the cellar at home and nailed the door shut.

  We went down to the kitchen again, and the spook strode purposefully toward the cellar steps. I let him go down five before I began my own slow descent. There was a bend in the stair; beyond it, the steps continued down at right angles. When he reached that bend, the spook held the lantern high. I was facing his left-hand side, and from the expression on his face and the way his whole body suddenly straightened, I knew that he could see the witch waiting below.

  I was right! He uncoiled the silver chain with one flick of his wrist and prepared to cast it downward. But no sooner had he done so than the ground seemed to move beneath my feet. That was impossible. How could solid stone steps do that? But whatever I felt, farther down the effect must have been much stronger. Before he could cast the chain, the spook tottered, lost his balance, then fell headlong and was lost to view.

  Instantly I was plunged into darkness. The spook, chain, and lantern were down in the cellar. He was at the mercy of the witch. My heart hammering, I turned to flee. I could do nothing against a witch. How could I help him? I had to get away or she’d take my bones, too.

  But then something stopped me. What it was or why I changed my mind, I can’t explain to this day. Maybe it was self-preservation, because if I abandoned the spook, the witch would still have a lock of my hair. Later, she could release the boggart and send it after me. Or perhaps it was something inside me—the courage that a spook needs in order to face the dark and do his dangerous job.

  Whatever it was, I edged cautiously down the steps and, hardly able to believe what I was doing, my heart pounding in my chest, peered around the corner. Rather than looking down into absolute darkness, I could see almost everything in the cellar. The lantern was lying on its side but hadn’t gone out. The spook was on all fours, head hanging, forehead almost touching the floor. The witch was crouching over him with a knife in her hand. In just moments she’d take his life. But so intent was she upon her evil business that she didn’t look up and see me on the steps. No doubt she’d expected me to be long gone.

  The spook looked up at the witch and gave a groan of fear. “No! No! Not like this!” he pleaded. “Please, God, don’t let it end like this!”

  Without thinking, I put down the bag, lifted the spook’s staff, and ran down the steps, straight toward the witch. At the very last moment she looked up at me, but she was too late. I swung the staff and hit her hard on the forehead. She fell backward with a cry, the knife flying out of her hand, though she was up on her knees again almost at once, face twisted with fury. And for the second time I felt the solid ground move beneath my feet, this time with a violent lurch that brought me down hard onto the cellar floor, jolting the staff from my grasp.

  I was flat on my back and started to sit up, but within seconds the witch was on me, both hands around my throat, trying to choke the life from me. Her face was close to my own, her eyes wild, her open mouth showing sharp teeth. Her foul breath made me heave. It stank like a cat’s or a dog’s, of stale meat with a sweet hint of blood.

  I glanced to my right and saw the spook struggle shakily to his feet and stagger against the cellar wall. He was in no fit state to help me. If I didn’t do something, I’d be dead in moments!

  I gripped the witch by the shoulders and tried to throw her off me, but she was squeezing my throat so hard I couldn’t breathe. I could feel myself weakening, my sight darkening, and I desperately reached out with both hands, trying to find the spook’s staff. It wasn’t there. But then my left hand closed over something else. The silver chain!

  I gripped it and swung it across. It caught her head a glancing blow and she screamed, withdrew her hands from my throat, and pressed them to her face. I whipped the chain back in the opposite direction, this time catching her on the chin. She stood up, then staggered and dropped to her knees. I felt a hand on my shoulder and looked up to see the spook standing over me, breathing hard.

  “Here, boy. You’ve done well. Now give me the chain.”

  I handed it to him, and after quickly coiling it about his wrist, he sent it soaring aloft with a crack, and it dropped over the witch and coiled about her tightly. She rolled over and over, her eyes bulging from their sockets, the chain tight against her teeth and binding her arms to her side.

  “She’s bound good and proper now,” the spook said, smiling grimly. “I owe you a big thanks, boy.”

  With the witch safely bound, we searched the cottage, and the spook made a fire outside and burned the things he found: powders, herbs, and a book of dark magic that he called a grimoire. Eventually he found my lock of hair in a leather pouch that the witch wore on a chain around her neck. He burned that, too. At last I was safe, and I began to feel a lot better.

  We sat by the fire for a while, both of us locked into our own thoughts, until a question came into my mind and I broke the silence.

  “What was it on the steps that made you fall?” I asked. “I felt the ground tremble beneath my feet. Later, in the cellar, it gave another lurch and I fell, too.”

  “One of the snares she’d set to defend herself, boy,” the spook said, throwing another handful of the witch’s possessions into the flickering flames of the bonfire. “It’s called slither, a spell that causes the victim to feel unsteady on his feet, lose his balance, slide, and fall. It nearly did for me, all right. Even if you anticipate it, little can be done. As I said, I owe you a big thanks, and I’d like to make you an offer. How would you like to train as a spook? As it happens, I’m looking for an apprentice to replace the one I’ve just lost. Would you be interested? I need a brave lad for my line of work.”

  “Thanks for the offer, but I’m going to be a priest,” I told him. “It’s something I’ve wanted to do for a long time.”

  “It’s your choice, boy. I won’t say anything against the priesthood, because some of them are good men who mean well—”

  “Father Ainsworth works hard to help the poor,” I interrupted. “He’s spent his whole life helping people. I want to be like him.”

  “Well, good luck to you then, young John. But if you ever change your mind, you can find my house near Chipenden village, west of the Long Ridge. Just ask any of the locals. My name’s Henry Horrocks. They’ll point you in the right direction.”

  With that we parted. Carrying the witch over his shoulder, the spook set off toward Chipenden, where he’d bind her in a pit. I watched him walk away and supposed that would be the last I’d ever see of him.

  I continued my journey to Houghton and began to train for the priesthood. I did become a priest, but not for long—though that’s another story. But as a young man of twenty, I eventually went to Chipenden and asked Henry Horrocks if he would train me as a spook.

  He took awhile to make up his mind. Could you blame him? After all, it had taken me a long time to change mine! I was far older than the boys he usually trained. But he remembered what I’d done back in that dark cottage when we’d faced the dangerous witch. That finally decided him.

  I became his apprentice. His last one. Finally, after his death, I inherited his house at Chipenden and began working as a spook from there
. Now, after all these years, I’m training Tom Ward. He’ll be my last apprentice. The house will belong to him, and he’ll be the new spook. Our work will go on. Someone has to fight the dark.

  John Gregory

  ALICE’S TALE

  TOM Ward’s friend Alice Deane has the potential to travel two different paths in her life. She has the opportunity to become an agent of the light, combining her powers with those of Tom Ward to bind or destroy their deadly enemy, the Fiend. Or she could become the most powerful and dangerous malevolent witch who ever existed. But, always, Alice walks a narrow, crooked path meandering between the forces of light and dark that tug first one way, then another.

  Mouldheels and Maggots

  BORN into the Pendle witch clans, I was—my mother a Malkin, my father a Deane. But though I was raised there, the last place in the world I’d ever want to visit is Pendle. The clans fight one another, and I’ve a lot of enemies there, mostly Mouldheels. Lots of spite, there is. Lots of hatred. Vendettas that’ve lasted centuries. Fall into the hands of enemies there, and they’ll take your bones and drink your blood. Even so, I went back. I went back alone. I did it for Tom Ward. Did it all for him.

  Because Tom’s the only person in this whole world I really care about—he’s my best friend. Ain’t like me, Tom. He belongs to the light, and he’s apprenticed to a spook named John Gregory.

  We’d traveled from Chipenden to visit the farm where Tom was born and grew up. He wanted to see inside the boxes that his mam had left him. Must say I wanted to see inside them, too. Curious, I was. Very curious and just dying to know all their secrets. But when we got there, the boxes were gone. Stolen. The barn had been burned to the ground, the farmhouse ransacked, and Tom’s family kidnapped. Didn’t take me long to sniff out that witches had done it. That they’d taken Tom’s brother Jack, his wife, Ellie, and their little child, Mary. The trail led toward Pendle, and Tom was desperate to set off after them then and there. But I talked him out of it.