Witch Hunter (15 page)

him. I don’t want to do that. He’s grown on me a little. So I

let him be.

I open the door slowly, quietly. Tiptoe out, then down

the hallway to the head of the stairs, and listen carefully. It’s

silent: no voices, no sound of footsteps or dishes at the table.

Nothing. I hurry down the stairs into the entrance hall.

First stop, dining room. Pewter plates, silverware, I’ll

even take those ugly snake glasses if I have to. I rush to

the cabinet where all the food was laid out last night and

rip open the drawers, one after the other. They’re all

empty. Damnation.

I cross to the room on the other side of the entrance hall.

It’s a sitting room, very grand. Tall stained glass windows

line the room, each pane in a different shade of blue. A large

fireplace takes up one wall, a tapestry of a pleasant woodland

scene covers another. A table sits underneath it, surrounded

by chairs covered in blue brocade.

I race around the room, searching. Under the rug for a

loose floorboard. Behind the tapestry for a secret alcove.

The underside of the table for hidden drawers. The seams

along the walls for a concealed door. Nothing. Where the

hell are all the weapons? I’m in the home of the biggest

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traitor in Anglia – sorry, make that second-biggest – and

there’s not a single sharp, strung or incendiary device in the

whole place? It’s not possible. Nicholas hasn’t got this far by

leading a rebellion with his bare hands.

The only place I haven’t looked is the kitchen. It’s risky.

That’s Hastings’s territory. And servant or no, he’s still a

ghost. I don’t know how Nicholas managed to tame his

destructive side, but it’s there. With ghosts, it always is.

Witch hunters are sometimes requested for hauntings, but

it’s pointless. We can’t do anything except stand back and

watch the chaos. The last haunting Caleb and I were called

to, the ghost ripped a barn from the ground and sheared the

entire flock of sheep inside. Scattered the wool for miles.

Such a mess, it looked as if it were snowing in July. Caleb

and I sat on a hill and watched, giggling like children.

I swallow hard and push him out of my head. I can’t

think about Caleb right now.

Next to the dining room is a doorway that opens into a

narrow, dark hall. I can’t be sure, but my guess is it leads

to the kitchen. I step inside, pause, and listen. Silence. If

Hastings is around, surely I’ll hear him? The hall is cold,

dank, and draughty. That could be because it’s made entirely

of stone, but it could also be Hastings. Ghosts make

everything cold. I shiver a little and keep going.

Finally, the hall opens into the kitchen. I stop in the

doorway and look around. It looks like a smaller version of

the kitchen at Ravenscourt. To my left is the oven. It’s huge.

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The opening is tall enough for a man of Nicholas’s height to

walk inside without having to duck. There’s a fire burning

inside, and something turning on the roasting rack. It looks

like deer.

In front of me is a trestle table. On top are baskets heaped

with fruit, vegetables, flour, spices. Underneath are more

baskets filled with everything from firewood to onions to

eggs. In one corner are caskets of wine, ale, and salted fish.

In another, hanging by their feet from a rack, are dozens of

dead birds: chicken and duck and quail and pheasant. And

everywhere lie kettles and cauldrons, skillets and pans. It’s a

properly stocked kitchen. Which means somewhere there

are knives, cleavers, meat forks, scissors. At this point I’d

even take a cheese grater.

I watch the room for a few minutes. There’s no

movement. Nothing floating in the air, nothing stirring of

its own accord. And didn’t John say Hastings usually wears

a white hat? I don’t see that, either. Satisfied he’s not around,

I rush to the table and start digging through everything. Sift

through the flour, pick through a pile of apples. Nothing

inside but a spoon and a tiny three-pronged fork. I pocket

them anyway. Crawl under the table and rummage through

the other baskets. Nothing, nothing, and, damnation, now

I’ve gone and broken a load of eggs. I wipe my hands on my

trousers and get to my feet, looking around. Then I see the

ladder leading below the kitchen. The larder.

Larders are used to store meat, cheese, butter, freshly

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caught fish. Things you need to keep cold so they won’t

spoil. They’re tiny rooms, dark, freezing. Usually on the

north side of a house, where they get the least amount of

sun. Usually underground. Always terrifying. I hate small,

dark spaces. But a larder is the perfect place to cure meat.

And where there’s meat, there are knives. I grab my bag and

start down the ladder. My heart speeds up the second I’m

plunged into the dark, small space. I breathe deeply, hum a

little. Imagine the cache of beautiful, pointy weapons I’ll

find down here. It helps.

When I reach the bottom of the ladder, I realise my eyes

are closed, so I open them. It takes a moment to adjust to

the lack of light – there’s only a sliver of it coming through

the vent in the wall. When they do, I feel them grow round.

There, hanging neatly along the wall, is the most gorgeous

array of carving tools I’ve ever seen. Blunt cleavers. Curved

skinning knives. Short boning knives. There’s even a bone

ax. I nearly squeal with glee.

I hook as many knives as possible on my belt and shove

the rest into my bag. There are a couple of pairs of heavy

gloves, and I take those, too. They may come in handy. I

sling the bag across my shoulder and start back up the

ladder. There’s still plenty of room inside for pewter plates

and silverware. Enough to trade for clothes, food and

weapons. My plan is coming together.

I poke my head into the kitchen. It’s still quiet, but I

check everything anyway. A neat pile of apples, a slightly

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skewed basket of onions. A dusting of flour on the tabletop.

Everything is just how I left it. I scramble to my feet and

head to the door opposite the one I came in through: the

scullery. Where those valuable pewter dishes are washed

and stored. I take about three steps, then it happens.

The temperature in the room plunges in a second. I suck

in a surprised breath, and when I exhale, it comes out in a

plume of white frosty air. A frigid wind begins to swirl

around me, lifting my hair from my shoulders, whipping it

across my face and into my eyes. Then I hear a whisper. Soft

at first, like steam from a teakettle. As the wind grows

stronger, the voice grows louder. I can’t make out the

words, but I can hear the anger behind them.

Hastings.

I lunge for the door, forgetting the scullery. The pewter

isn’t as important as getting out of here. There’s no telling

what Hastings is capable of. I make it as far as the trestle

table when a basket comes flying towards me. I realise

what’s in it a split second too late: flour.

It swirls into the air, flies into my eyes, my mouth, my

hair. I’m coated in it. I drop my bag to the floor and start

coughing and gagging, wiping the stuff from my eyes. I

clear them just in time to see a dead pheasant flying at my

head, beak first.

I snatch one of the knives from my belt and hurl it at the

bird. I get a direct hit, and both bird and knife go clattering

to the floor. I make it another step before more birds come

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at me. Three ducks. Two chickens. A peacock. A brace of

quail. I empty knife after knife into them.

Finally, Hastings runs out of birds. I drop to my knees

and crawl along the floor, trying to retrieve my knives.

I manage to locate several and yank the blades from

the birds’ bellies. But when I get to my feet, the doors to the

bread ovens fly open and hot loaves go pelting in my

direction. I bat away most of them, but one or two clip

my face, leaving white-hot welts on my skin. They heal

quickly enough, but I’m getting annoyed. I’ve lost countless

weapons, I’m a flour-covered mess, and the smell of all

this food is making me hungry.

I turn on my heel and sprint to the fireplace. The deer is

still on the spit, roasting nicely. Hastings takes pride in his

work. If I’m right, he won’t sacrifice a fine piece of meat just

to taunt me. I scramble up the rack, all the way to the top,

out of reach of the flames. Then I whirl around.

‘Go ahead!’ I shout. ‘Throw something! I dare you!’

I look around. The air is still thick with flour, but nothing

comes flying at me. Everything’s gone still. Smirking, I hop

down from the spit. Saunter across the room, snatch my

bag off the floor. Then I survey the scene.

Flour on every surface, bird carcasses strewn along the

floor. Broken loaves of bread, smashed eggs, feathers

everywhere. What a disaster. But I held my own against a

ghost, and that’s no small thing. Caleb would be proud.

I start for the door. Then, through the haze of flour still

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hanging in the air, I see him. Standing in the doorway, arms

folded, eyebrows raised.

George.

‘Well, well,’ he smirks. ‘If it isn’t our little maid, back

in the kitchen.’

My heart sinks to the bottom of my too-big boots. How

long has he been standing there?

‘I knew there was something funny about you.’ He

steps towards me. ‘I couldn’t put my finger on it. Are you

going to tell me the truth now? Or am I going to have to

drag it out of you?’

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’ I drop my bag

on the floor and kick it aside.

‘No?’

‘No.’

‘Suit yourself,’ he says. Then he pulls a dagger out of his

jacket. My eyes widen.

‘Don’t,’ I say.

‘Catch,’ he says. Then he hurls the knife at me.

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The knife whistles through the air, heading straight for my

head. It’s less than an inch from my eye when I catch it,

smacking the blade flat between my palms. Before I can

react, George is at my side.

‘We need to talk.’ He grabs my arm and drags me from

the kitchen.

Upstairs, he pushes me into my room and rounds

on me.

‘You prowl around the king’s palace like a rat in the

rafters.’ George holds up a finger. ‘You crushed a glass in

your hand, yet there’s not a scratch on you. You’re all

moony over this Caleb, who just happens to be the new

Inquisitor.’ He holds up three fingers now. ‘And where’d

you learn to throw knives at birds like that? The circus?’ He

narrows his eyes. ‘You’re a witch hunter.’

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I open my mouth, a denial on the tip of my tongue.

‘It’s a damned good thing I am,’ I snap. ‘Otherwise you’d

have some explaining to do. I could have lost an eye.’

George groans and pushes me away. He paces the room,

hands clasped behind his head.

‘I knew it,’ he says. ‘I knew there was something

about you. The way you look, your face and all this.’ He

gestures at me with a sweep of his hand. ‘I thought you

were a Gallic spy.’ He flops down in the chair by the fireplace

and buries his head in his hands. He looks so distraught

I almost feel sorry for him. ‘A witch hunter,’ he mutters.

‘A bloody witch hunter.’

‘Just let me go,’ I say. ‘I can be out that door and gone

within minutes. No one has to know. It’s nothing to you.’

‘It’s not nothing to me.’ He peers at me through his

fingers. ‘You make it sound as if you’re here by mistake. It’s

not a mistake. You’re here for a reason.’

‘Yes. Because your seer is naming witch hunters,’ I say.

‘So you can find them and kill them.’

‘You’re not here for that,’ George says.

‘You don’t know that,’ I say. ‘Nicholas said he didn’t

know why I was here.’

‘That’s not exactly true.’

I narrow my eyes. ‘What do you mean?’

‘I can’t tell you.’

‘Then I can’t stay.’ I start towards the door.

‘Stop.’ He sticks his leg out in front of me. ‘I’ll tell you.

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You’re here because Nicholas needs to find something.

Whatever it is, it’s important. According to Veda, you’re

the only one who can get it.’

‘What?’ This makes no sense. ‘What could I possibly find

for him? He’s a wizard and I’m a witch hunter, and – oh.’ I