The Spook's Nightmare (4 page)

‘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 win, they may not venture any further 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. ‘There 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.

W
e 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 got 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 further to the east of Caster than usual. As soon as we reached the canal it became clear that it would be impossible to travel further 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 further 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 north-east 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 for ever,’ 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 westwards.

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, north-west 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 to 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 towards 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 daemon . . .’

I opened the Bestiary, flicked through to the section on daemons 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 daemon 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 daemon 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 south-east 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 confined 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 further 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 weather-beaten face and, despite the chilly damp, had his sleeves rolled up above his elbows. He was thick-set 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 armour. 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!’

‘We’d little choice but to leave it,’ said the Spook mildly. ‘Enemy soldiers burned my house and we were in peril of our lives. All we ask is to stay here for a short while until it’s safe to return. We come prepared to work and earn our keep as best we can.’

The man lowered his club and nodded. ‘You’ll work all right, if you’re given the chance – just as hard as all the others. So far, most seeking refuge from the County have been coming ashore at Douglas, to the north. But we knew some would try to sneak in like you lot, so we’ve been keeping watch,’ he said, looking first at the Spook and then at me. I saw him note our distinctive hooded cloaks, then our staffs and bags. Even those on Mona would recognize the garb and accessories of our trade.

Next he studied Alice, looking down at her pointy shoes, and I saw his eyes widen. He quickly crossed himself. ‘What’s a spook doing in the company of a witch?’ he demanded.

‘The girl’s no witch,’ the Spook replied calmly. ‘She’s been working for me copying books. And this is my apprentice, Tom Ward.’

‘Well, he won’t be your apprentice while he’s here with us, old man. We’ve no call for those of your trade and have our own ways of dealing with witches. Once sorted, those chosen will all work on the land. It’s food we need, not your hocus-pocus.’