Witch Hunter (19 page)

to kill her. And John saved my life. The idea of hurting

him bothers me more than I care to admit. ‘Did Veda

say I would?’

‘No,’ Nicholas says. ‘She didn’t. In fact, she implied

the opposite. That you may actually—’ He breaks off,

running his finger along Veda’s words, lost in thought.

‘Even taking that into consideration, there’s no guarantee.

And the risk—’

‘Becomes a certainty,’ I say. ‘You turn away my help,

you die. Without your protection, Blackwell will find them.

And they die, too.’

Nicholas scowls at me. But it’s the truth and we

both know it.

‘Blackwell always told us to remember the greater game,’

I say. ‘The greater victory. It’s good advice. You should

remember it, too.’

He looks at me and shakes his head, as if he can’t quite

understand me or doesn’t know what to do with me. ‘How

exactly did you become involved in all this?’

It’s the same question George asked me. So I give

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Nicholas the same answer: the truth. There’s no reason to

keep it from him now.

I start with the plague, with Caleb finding me and taking

me to Ravenscourt. I tell him about working in the kitchen,

about Blackwell asking Caleb to witch-hunt for him. About

my going along. I even tell him about training, something I

never talk about.

‘We trained for a year,’ I say. ‘There were tests along the

way. We had to pass them in order to move forward.’

‘What kind of tests?’

‘Fighting, mostly. Swords, knives, archery, unarmed

combat. We fought one another at first, then Blackwell

brought in creatures for us to fight. At first, they were fairly

regular. Snakes, scorpions, storks—’

‘You fought a stork?’

‘Yes. It was seven feet high, with bright red eyes and a

steel beak. The scorpion was probably twelve feet long

with a stinger that dripped poison that killed on contact.

The snake had a head that if you cut it off, it grew two

more in its place.’

‘These creatures were, as you say, fairly regular?’

‘I just meant they were recognisable. After that, we had

to fight things I couldn’t name. Things that looked like giant

rodents but had six legs and a head like a crocodile. Or

reptiles with wings and metal feathers that would fly off

their bodies and try to impale you. Something that, just as

you started to kill it, changed its appearance so it couldn’t

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die. So if you tried to poke its eye out, it would change into

something that didn’t have an eye. You see.’

‘I’m starting to,’ Nicholas murmurs.

‘Then there were endurance tests. Like spending the

night in a severely haunted house.’

I particularly hated that one. I spent the night huddled

into a ball, a foul-smelling, frigid wind swirling in the air,

the ghosts’ hateful voices echoing around me while they

scratched frightening messages to me in blood on the wall. I

thought it couldn’t get much worse than that test. Of course,

as I came to find out later, I was wrong.

‘There was a hedge maze we had to figure our way out

of. The walls would shift. Things would come after you.

We had no food, no water. No supplies. It took me three

days to get out.’ The only person who got out in less time

than I was Caleb. It took him two and a half days.

‘What happened if you couldn’t get out?’ Nicholas asks.

I don’t reply. What does he think happened? We lost

three prospective witch hunters to the maze test. I never

did see them again.

He’s quiet for a while. His eyes shift from me to the

parchment on the table in front of him, then back to

me again.

‘Well?’ I say. ‘Do we have a deal or not?’

Nicholas starts to speak but is cut off by a knock at the

door. It’s George.

‘We’ve got a problem.’

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Nicholas pushes past him into the other room, George

and I behind him. Immediately, I see what’s wrong. Veda is

standing in the middle of the room, arms held stiffly by her

side. Her tiny body is rigid, but her head lolls from side to

side, her eyes rolling into the back of her head. Avis and

Fifer are kneeling next to her.

‘What happened?’ Nicholas demands.

‘I don’t know,’ Fifer says, looking frightened. ‘We were

sitting on the floor, playing with the doll I brought her.

Then she jumped up and started doing this.’

Nicholas crouches in front of her. He’s so tall that he’s

practically on his hands and knees to get eye level with her.

‘Veda? Can you hear me?’ He places his hand on her

cheek and mutters something under his breath. Nothing

happens. I take a step towards her to get a better look, but

Nicholas glances up at me.

‘Stay back, Elizabeth—’

At the sound of my name, Veda’s head snaps up and her

eyes stop rolling. She stares straight ahead and speaks, her

soft voice ominous.

‘They’re coming. They’re coming for her. They’re

coming.’ She looks at me. ‘They’re here.’

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The reaction is instantaneous. Fifer and George race to the

window, flinging back the lace curtains. Veda bursts into

tears. John scoops her up, grabs Avis’s arm, and pulls them

into the bedroom. Nicholas joins Fifer and George at the

window, and together they peer into the darkness.

In the distance, I hear male voices: shouting,

laughing, catcalling. Soft at first, growing louder by the

second. Pinpricks of light flicker between the cottages in the

village. Torches.

I rush to the window and quickly start to count.

Two, six, ten, fourteen bobbing lights. Fourteen. I give a

little huff of relief. It’s only the king’s guard. They always

patrol in groups of fourteen. But what are they doing

out here? We’re too far from Upminster for this to be part

of their route.

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Then I see it: a fifteenth torch blazing to life, its bearer

stepping from behind a house and into the empty street.

He holds the torch high above his head, the bright flame

illuminating his features. He’s far away still, too far for me

to hear him. But there’s no mistaking who it is.

‘Caleb,’ I whisper.

Nicholas lifts a hand and at once, Caleb’s voice fills the

tiny sitting room.

‘I want this whole village searched,’ he barks. ‘I want

every house torn apart until she’s found.’

I’m up against the window now, my fingers gripping

the windowsill. Caleb and the other witch hunters make

their way down the narrow, lamp-lit lane. I watch him

kick down door after door, storm into house after house.

Listen to his threats, his demands, the terrified screams of

the people inside. Hear the anger in his voice as he shouts

my name over and over. I know it’s an act, a show he’s

putting on for the other witch hunters. There’s no reason

for me to be afraid.

But the pounding of my heart tells me otherwise.

I turn to Nicholas. ‘You said they couldn’t find us.’

Nicholas glances at me but doesn’t reply.

‘Well?’ I say.

‘Shut your mouth,’ Fifer hisses. ‘How dare you question

him.’

‘Don’t tell me what to do,’ I fire back. ‘I’ll question who

I want.’

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‘Quiet,’ Nicholas says. ‘Both of you. They’re heading

this way.’

I turn back to the window as the witch hunters approach

Veda’s home. Caleb leads the way, Marcus, Linus, and

the others behind him. They point and gesture in the

direction of the cabin.

‘They know,’ George whispers.

He’s right. Maybe one of the neighbours was frightened

into giving them our location, maybe they’re guessing.

Either way, if they keep walking, they’ll run right into us.

The illusion acts like a veil: as long as the house stays behind

it, it’s invisible. But if they somehow manage to slip through

it, it won’t be. And neither will we.

The room erupts into silent movement. Nicholas

whirls away from the window, points to the table in the

corner. Fifer and George rush to it, pick it up, and move it

quietly to the side. On the floor beneath it is a small door.

George reaches down and, with a creak and a puff of

dust, opens it to reveal a narrow staircase that descends

into darkness. John emerges from the back bedroom, still

carrying Veda. Avis is on his heels. One by one they start

down the stairs.

I turn back to the window. Caleb is so close now I can

see his face: his blue eyes narrowed, forehead slightly

creased. I don’t know what he’s thinking. Is he worried

about me? Is he afraid of what will happen if he finds me?

Or what will happen if he doesn’t?

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‘Elizabeth.’ The whisper in my ear makes me jump. It’s

John. ‘We need to go.’

The cottage is empty now save for Nicholas and Fifer.

They both stand at the window, muttering some kind of

spell. Caleb and the others are having difficulty moving

now, their quick strides turning slow and sluggish, as if

they’re walking through water.

John takes my arm and steers me towards the door in

the floor, down the narrow wooden stairs. I go willingly,

but when I reach the bottom, I baulk. I’m in a tunnel. It’s

tiny: six feet high, three feet wide, carved entirely from dirt.

I feel as if I’m standing in a grave.

I yank my arm from his grasp and lunge for the stairs.

I make it to the bottom step before Nicholas and Fifer

appear, closing the door from above and bolting it shut. I’m

plunged into darkness, the dank smell of earth and decay

surrounding me.

Immediately, I’m transported back to that last day of

training as a witch hunter. The day I should have died. But

somehow, miraculously, lived.

I sink to the ground, press my head to my knees, and try

to stop the memories.

It was our final test, our final challenge as recruits. If we

succeeded – the eighteen of us who had made it this far –

we would receive our stigmas and become the most elite

of the king’s guard: a witch hunter.

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None of us knew what awaited us, what we’d have to

fight. Frances Culpepper thought witches. Marcus Denny

was hoping for demons. Linus Trew guessed we’d have to

fight one another. Only Caleb thought it would be more

sinister than that. I saw the look on his face as Blackwell

delivered his final speech, when he gave us the barest hint of

what was to come.

‘You’ll be fighting whatever frightens you the most,’

Blackwell said. ‘In order to succeed as a witch hunter,

you must learn to face your greatest fear and control it.

Then – and only then – will you realise that your greatest

enemy isn’t what you fight, but what you fear.’

Caleb betrayed no emotion – almost none. Only I knew

him well enough to see the way he pressed his lips together,

the set of his jaw, and recognise what it meant. He was

afraid. And if Caleb was afraid, then I had cause to be very

afraid indeed.

Guildford, one of Blackwell’s guards, led me to my test. I

couldn’t speak, could barely breathe, terrified of what

awaited me. My greatest fear. What could it be?

‘We’re here,’ Guildford’s voice broke the silence. We

stood at the edge of the forest, dying trees all around me,

crackling leaves under my feet, the sound of water rushing

somewhere in the distance. The shadowy, predawn light

made everything feel all the more ominous.

Guildford bent over and unearthed an enormous brass

ring. It was attached to a narrow wooden door set into the

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forest floor. He tugged once, twice, and on the third pull it

opened to reveal a narrow wooden set of stairs. At the

bottom was another door, as rickety and rotten as the stairs.

There was no handle, only a smattering of iron nail heads,

rust staining the wood like blood.

I started down the stairs, counting as I went. Two. Four.

Six. When I reached the bottom, I placed my hands on the

door, looked over my shoulder at Guildford.

He nodded.

With a shove, the door creaked open, the rusted hinges

shrieking in protest. I could see nothing on the other side,

but there was a smell: something sharp, rancid, rotting. I

buried my head in my sleeve and started through the

opening. I was halfway in when Guildford spoke.