Spook's Curse (3 page)

I said ‘When’ to the rigger who, in turn, nodded to his mate, who tightened his grip upon the short chain. Even before he pulled it there came a sound from the pit. This time it was loud and all three of us heard it. I glanced quickly at my companions and saw their eyes widen and mouths tighten with the fear of what was below us.

The sound we heard was the boggart feeding from the dish. It was like the greedy lapping of some monstrous tongue, combined with the ravenous snuffling and snorting of a big carnivorous animal. We had less than a minute or so before it finished it all. Then it would sense our blood. It was rogue now and we were all on the menu.

The mate began to loosen the chain and the stone came down steadily. I was adjusting one end, the rigger the other. If they’d dug the pit accurately and the stone was exactly the size specified on the sketch, there should be no problem. That’s what I told myself - but I kept thinking of the Spook’s last apprentice, poor Billy Bradley, who’d died trying to bind a boggart like this. The stone had jammed, trapping his fingers under its edge. Before they could lift it free, the boggart had bitten his fingers off and sucked his blood. Later he’d died of shock. I couldn’t get him out of my mind no matter how hard I tried.

The important thing was to get the stone into the pit first time - and, of course, to keep my fingers out of the way.

The rigger was in control, doing the job of the mason. At his signal, the chain halted when the stone was just a fraction of an inch clear. He looked at me then, his face very stern, and raised his right eyebrow. I looked down and moved my end of the stone very slightly so that it seemed to be in perfect position. I checked again just to make sure, then nodded to the rigger, who signalled to his mate.

A few turns of the short chain and the stone eased down into position first time, searing the boggart into the pit. A scream of anger came from the ripper and we all heard it. But it didn’t matter because it was trapped now and there was nothing more to be scared of.

‘Job’s a good ‘un!’ shouted the mate, jumping down from the platform, a grin splitting his face from ear to ear. ‘It’s a perfect fit!’

‘Aye,’ said the rigger, joking drily, ‘It could’ve been made for the job.’

I felt a huge sense of relief, glad that it was all over. Then, as the thunder crashed and the lightning flashed directly overhead to illuminate the stone, I noticed, for the first time, what the mason had carved there and suddenly felt very proud.

The large Greek letter beta, crossed with a diagonal line, was the sign that a boggart had been laid under it. Below it, to the right, the Roman numeral for one meant that it was a dangerous boggart of the first rank. There were ten ranks in all and those from one to four could kill. Then, underneath, was my own name, 
Ward,
 which gave me the credit for what had been done.

I’d just bound my first boggart. And it was a ripper at that!

T
wo days later, back at Chipenden, the Spook made me tell him everything that had happened. When I’d finished, he made me repeat it. That done, he scratched at his beard and gave a great big sigh.

‘What did the doctor say about that daft brother of mine?’ the Spook asked. ‘Does he expect him to recover?’

‘He said he seemed to be over the worst but it was too early to tell.’

The Spook nodded thoughtfully. ‘Well, lad, you’ve done well,’ he said. ‘I can’t think of one thing you could have done better. So you can have the rest of the day off. But don’t let it go to your head.

Tomorrow it’s

Joseph Delaney

business as usual. After all that excitement you need to get back into a steady routine.’

The following day he worked me twice as hard as usual. Lessons began soon after dawn and included what he called ‘practicals’. Even though I’d now bound a boggart for real, that meant practising digging pits.

‘Do I really have to dig another boggart pit?’ I asked wearily.

The Spook gave me a withering look until I dropped my eyes, feeling very uncomfortable.

‘Think you’re above all that now, lad?’ he asked. ‘Well, you’re not, so don’t get complacent! You’ve still a lot to learn. You may have bound your first boggart but you’d good men helping. One day you might have to dig the pit yourself and do it fast in order to save a life.’

After digging the pit and coating it with salt and iron, I had to practise getting the bait-dish down into the pit without spilling a single drop of blood. Of course, because it was only part of my training, we used water rather than blood but the Spook took it very seriously and usually got annoyed if I didn’t manage to do it first time. But on this occasion he didn’t get the chance. I’d managed it at Horshaw and I was just as good in practice, succeeding ten times in a row. Despite that, the Spook didn’t give me one word of praise and I was starting to feel a bit annoyed.

Next came one practical I really enjoyed - using the Spook’s silver chain. There was a six-foot post set up in the western garden and the idea was to cast the chain over it. The Spook made me stand at various distances from it and practise for over an hour at a time, keeping in mind that at some point it might be a real witch I’d be facing, and if I missed, I wouldn’t get another chance. There was a special way to use the chain. You coiled it over your left hand and cast it with a flick of your wrist so that it spun widdershins, falling in a left-handed spiral to enclose the post and tighten against it. From a distance of eight feet I could now get the chain over the post nine times out of ten but, as usual, the Spook was grudging with his praise.

‘Not bad, I suppose,’ he said. ‘But don’t get smug, lad. A real witch won’t oblige you by standing still while you throw that chain. By the end of the year I’ll expect ten out of ten and nothing less!’

I felt more than a bit annoyed at that. I’d been working hard and had improved a lot. Not only that, I’d just bound my first boggart and done it without any help from the Spook. It made me wonder if he’d done any better during his own apprenticeship!

In the afternoon the Spook allowed me into his library to work by myself, reading and making notes, but he only let me read certain books. He was very strict about that. I was still in my first year, so boggarts were my main area of study. But sometimes, when he was off doing something else, I couldn’t help having a glance at some of his other books too.

So, after reading my fill of boggarts, I went to the three long shelves near the window and chose one of the large leather-bound notebooks from the very top shelf. They were diaries, some of them written by spooks hundreds of years ago. Each one covered a period of about five years.

This time I knew exactly what I was looking for. I chose one of the Spook’s earliest diaries, curious to see how he’d coped with the job as a young man and whether he’d shaped up better than me. Of course, he’d been a priest before training to be a spook so he’d have been really old for an apprentice.

Anyway, I picked a few pages at random and started to read. I recognized his handwriting, of course, but a stranger reading an extract for the first time wouldn’t have guessed the Spook had written it. When he talks, his voice is typical County, down to earth and without a hint of what my dad calls ‘airs and graces’. When he writes it’s different. It’s as if all those books he’s read have altered his voice, whereas I mostly write the way I talk: if my dad were ever to read my notes he’d be proud of me and know I was still his son.

At first what I read didn’t seem any different from the Spook’s more recent writings, apart from the fact that he made more mistakes. As usual he was very honest, and each time explained just how he’d gone wrong. As he was always telling me, it was important to write everything down and so learn from the past.

He described how, one week, he’d spent hours and hours practising with the bait-dish and his master had got angry because he couldn’t manage a better average than eight out of ten! That made me feel a lot better. And then I came to something that lifted my spirits even further. The Spook hadn’t bound his first boggart until he’d been an apprentice for almost eighteen months. What’s more, it had only been a hairy boggart, not a dangerous ripper!

That was the best I could find to cheer me up: clearly the Spook had been a good, hard-working apprentice. A lot of what I found was routine so I skipped through the pages quickly until I reached the point when my master became a spook, working on his own. I’d seen all I really needed to see and was just about to close the book when something caught my eye. I flipped back to the start of the entry just to make sure, and this is what I read. It’s not exactly word for word but I have a good memory and it’s pretty close. And after reading what he’d written, I certainly wasn’t going to forget it.

Late in the autumn, I journeyed far to the north of the County,
 
summoned there to deal with an abhuman, a creature who had Brought
 
terror to the district for far too long. Many families in the locality had
 
suffered at its cruel hands and there had been many deaths and
 
maimings.

I came down into the forest at dusk.. All the leaves had fallen and were
 
rotten and brown on the ground, and the tower was like a black demon
 
finger pointing at the sky. A girl had been seen waving from its solitary
 
window, Beckoning frantically for aid. The creature had seized her for its
 
own and now held her as its plaything, imprisoning her within those dank
 
stone walls.

Firstly I made a fire and sat gazing into its flames while gathering my
 
courage. Taking the whetstone from my bag, I sharpened my blade until
 
my fingers could not touch its edge without yielding blood. Finally, at
 
midnight, I went to the tower and hammered out a challenge upon the
 
door with my staff.

The creature came forth brandishing a great club and roared out in
 
anger. It was a foul thing dressed in the skins of animals, reeking of
 
blood and animal fat, and it attacked me with terrible fury.

At first I retreated, waiting my chance, but the next time it hurled itself at
 
me I released the blade from its recess in my staff and, using all my
 
strength, drove it deep into its head. It fell stone-dead at my feet but I
 
had no regrets at taking its life, for it would have killed again and again
 
and would never have been sated.

It was then that the girl called out to me, her siren voice lurinq me up the
 
stone steps, There, in the topmost room of the tower, I found her upon a
 
bed of straw, bounds fast with a long silver chain. With skin like milk.

and long fair hair, she was by far the prettiest woman that my eyes had
 
ever seen., Her name was Meg and she pleaded to be released from the
 
chain and her voice was so persuasive that my reason fled and the world
 
spun about me.

No sooner had I unbound her from the coils of the chain than she
 
fastened her lips hard upon mine own. And so sweet were her kisses that I
 
almost swooned away in her arms.

I awoke with sunlightt streaming through the window and saw her clearly
 
for the first time. She was one of the Lamia witches, and the mark of the
 
snake was upon her. Fair of face though she was, her spine was covered
 
with green and yellow scales.

Full of anger at her deceit, I bound her again with the chain, and carried
 
her at fast to the pit at Chipenden. When I released her, she struggled so
 
hard that I barely overcame her and was forced to pull her by her long
 
hair through the trees, while she ranted and screamed fit to wake the
 
dead. It was raining hard and she slipped on the wet grass but I carried
 
on dragging her along the ground, though her bare arms and legs were
 
scratched by brambles. It was cruel but it had to be done.

But when I started to tip her over the edge into the pit, she clutched at my
 
kniees and began to sob pitifully. I stood there for a long time, full of
 
anguish, about to topple over the edge myself, until at last I made a
 
decision that I may come to regret. I helped her to her feet and wrapped
 
my arms about her and we both wept. How could I put her into the pit,
 
when I realized that I loved her better than my own soul? I begged her
 
forgiveness and then we turned together and, hand in hand, walked away
 
from, the pit.

From this encounter I have gained a silver chain, an expensive tool
 
which otherwise would have taken many long months of hard work to
 
acquire. What I have lost, or might yet lose, I dare not think about.

Beauty is a terrible thing; it binds a man tighter than a silver chain about
 
a witch.

I couldn’t believe what I’d just read! The Spook had warned me about pretty women more than once, but here he’d broken his own rule! Meg was a witch and yet he hadn’t put her into the pit!

I quickly leafed through the rest of the notebook, expecting to find another reference to her, but there was nothing - nothing at all! It was as if she’d ceased to exist.

I knew quite a bit about witches, but had never heard of a Lamia witch before so I put the notebook back and searched the next shelf down, where the books were arranged in alphabetical order. I opened the book labelled 
Witches
 but there was no reference to a Meg. Why hadn’t the Spook written about her? What had happened to her? Was she still alive? Still out there, somewhere in the County?

I was really curious and I had another idea; I pulled a big book out from the lowest shelf. This was entitled 
The Bestiary
 and was an alphabetical listing of all sorts of creatures, witches included. At last I found the entry I wanted: 
Lamia witches.

It seemed that lamia witches weren’t native to the County but came from lands across the sea. They shunned sunlight, but at night they preyed upon men and drank their blood. They were shape-shifters and belonged to two different categories: the feral and the domestic.

The feral were lamia witches in their natural state, dangerous and unpredictable and with little physical resemblance to humans. All had scales rather than skin and claws rather than fingernails. Some scuttled across the ground on all fours, while others had wings and feathers on their upper bodies and could fly short distances.

But a feral lamia could become a domestic lamia by closely associating with humans. Very gradually, it took a woman’s form and looked human but for a narrow line of green and yellow scales that could still be found on its back, running the length of its spine. Domestic lamias had even been known to grow to share human beliefs. Often they ceased to be malevolent and became benign, working for the good of others.

So had Meg eventually become benign? Had the Spook been right not to bind her in the pit?

Suddenly I realized how late it was and I ran out of the library to my lesson, my head whirling. A few minutes later my master and I were out on the edge of the western garden, under the trees with a clear view of the fells, the autumn sun dropping towards the horizon. I sat on the bench as usual, busy making notes while the Spook paced back and forth dictating. But I couldn’t concentrate.

We started with a Latin lesson. I had a special notebook to write down the grammar and new vocabulary the Spook taught me. There were a lot of lists and the book was almost full.

I wanted to confront the Spook with what I’d just read, but how could I? I’d broken a rule myself by not keeping to the books he’d specified. I wasn’t supposed to have been reading his diaries and now I wished I hadn’t. If I said anything to him about it, I knew he’d be angry.

Because of what I’d read in the library, I found it harder and harder to keep my mind on what he was saying. I was hungry too and couldn’t wait until it was supper time. Usually the evenings were mine and I was free to do what I wanted, but today he’d been working me very hard. Still, there was less than an hour before the sun went down and the worst of the lessons were over.