Joseph Delaney - The Spook's Curse

‘There’s no marrow inside old bones. But old bones still have memories, see. I stroke old bones, I do, slowly so that they give up all their secrets. I see the flesh that once covered them, the hopes and ambitions that ended in this dry, dead brittleness. That fills me up too. That eases the hunger.’

The Bane was very close to my left ear, its voice now hardly more than a whisper. I had a sudden urge to turn round and look at it but it must have read my mind.

‘Don’t turn round, boy,’ it warned. ‘Or you won’t like what you see. Just answer me this question…’

There was a long pause and I could feel my heart hammering in my chest. At last the Bane asked its question.

‘After death, what happens?’

I didn’t know the answer. The Spook never spoke about such things. All I knew was that there were ghosts who could still think and talk. And fragments called ghasts that had been left behind when the soul had moved on. But moved on to what? I didn’t know. Only God knew. If there was a God.

I shook my head. I didn’t speak and I was too scared to turn round. Behind me I had a sense of something huge and terrifying.

‘There’s nothing after death! Nothing! Nothing at all!’ bellowed the Bane close to my ear. ‘There’s just blackness and emptiness. No thinking. No feeling, just oblivion. That’s all that waits for you on the other side of death. But do my bidding, boy, and I can give you a long, long life! Three score years and ten is the best that most feeble humans can hope for. But ten or twenty times that I could give you! And all you have to do is open the gate and let me go free! Just open the gate and I’ll do the rest. Your master could go free too. I know that’s what you want. Go back, you could, to the life you once had.’

A part of me longed to say yes. I faced the Spook being burned and a lonely journey north to Caster with no certainty that I’d be able to continue my apprenticeship. If only things could return to the way they’d been! But although I was tempted to say yes, I knew that it just wasn’t possible. Even if the Bane kept its word, I couldn’t allow it to roam loose in the County, able to work its evil at will. I knew the Spook would rather die than let that happen.

I opened my mouth to say no, but even before I could get the word out the Bane spoke again.

‘The girl would be easy!’ it said. ‘All she wants is a warm fire. A home to live in. Clean clothes. But think what I offer you! And all I want is your blood. Not a lot, see. And it won’t hurt that much. Just enough is all I ask. And then a pact we’ll make together. Just let me suck your blood so I can be strong again. Just let me through the gate and give me my freedom. Three times after, I’ll do your bidding and you’ll live a long, long life. The girl’s blood is better than nothing but you’re what I really need. A seven times seven, you are. Only once before have I tasted sweet blood like yours. And I still remember it well, I do. The sweet blood of a seven times seven. How strong that would make me! How great would be your reward! Isn’t that better than the nothingness of death?

‘Ah, death will come to you one day. It will surely come despite all that I do, creeping towards you like the mist on a riverbank on a cold damp night. But I can delay that moment. Delay it for years and years. It would be a long time before you’d have to face that darkness. That blackness. That nothingness! So what do you say, boy? I’m got proper. I’m bound. But you can help!’

I was scared and tried again to wake up. But suddenly words tumbled out of my mouth, almost as if they’d been spoken by somebody else:

‘I don’t believe there’s nothing after death,’ I said. ‘I’ve a soul and if I live my life right, I’ll live on in some way. There’ll be something. I don’t believe in nothingness. I don’t believe in that!’

‘No! No!’ roared the Bane. ‘You don’t know what I know! You can’t see what I see! I see beyond death. I see the emptiness. The nothingness. I know! I see the horrible state of being nothing. Nothing at all, there is! Nothing at all!’

My heart began to slow and I suddenly felt very calm. The Bane was still behind me but the crypt was starting to get warmer. Now I understood. I knew the Bane’s pain. I knew why it needed to feed upon people, upon their blood, upon their hopes and dreams…

‘I’ve a soul and I’ll live on,’ I told the Bane, keeping my voice very calm. ‘And that’s the difference. I have a soul and you don’t! For you there is nothing after death! Nothing at all!’

My head was pushed hard against the near wall of the crypt and there was a hiss of anger behind me. A hiss that changed to a bellow of rage.

‘Fool!’ shouted the Bane, its voice booming to fill the crypt and echo beyond it down the long, dark tunnels of the catacombs. Violently, it swatted my head sideways, scraping my forehead against the hard, cold stones. Out of the corner of my left eye I could see the size of the huge hand that was gripping my head. Instead of nails, its fingers ended in huge yellow talons.

‘You had your chance but now it’s gone for ever!’ bellowed the Bane. ‘But there’s someone else who can help me. So if I can’t have you, I’ll make do with her!’

I was pushed downwards into the heap of bones in the corner. I felt myself falling through them. Down and down I went, deep into a bottomless pit filled with bones. The candle was out but the bones seemed to glow in the darkness: grinning skulls, ribcages, leg bones and arm bones, fragments of hands, fingers and thumbs, and all the while the dry dust of death covered my face, went up my nose into my mouth and down my throat, until I was choking and could hardly breathe.

‘This is what death tastes like!’ cried the Bane. ‘And this is what death looks like!’

The bones faded from view and I could see nothing. Nothing at all. I was just falling through blackness. Falling into the dark. I was terrified that the Bane had somehow killed me in my sleep, but I struggled and struggled to wake up. Somehow the Bane had been talking to me while I slept and I knew who it would now be persuading to do what I’d refused.

Alice!

At last I managed to wake myself up, but it was already too late. A candle was burning close beside me but it was just a stub. I’d been asleep for hours! The other one had gone and so had Alice!

I felt in my pocket but only confirmed what I’d guessed already. Alice had taken the key to the Silver Gate…

When I staggered to my feet I felt dizzy and my head hurt. I touched the back of my hand to my forehead and it came away wet with blood. Somehow the Bane had done that to me in a dream. It could read minds too. How could you defeat a creature when it knew what you intended before you had a chance to move or even speak? The Spook was right – this creature was the most dangerous thing we’d ever faced.

Alice had left the hatch open and, snatching up the candle, I wasted no time in climbing down the steps into the catacombs. A few minutes later I reached the river, which seemed a bit deeper than before. The water, swirling downstream, was actually covering three of the nine stepping stones, the ones right in the middle, and I could feel the current tugging at my boots.

I crossed quickly, hoping against hope that I wouldn’t be too late. But when I turned the corner, I saw Alice sitting with her back against the wall. Her left hand was resting on the cobbles, her fingers covered in blood.

And the Silver Gate was wide open!

The Burning Alice!’ I cried, staring in disbelief at the open gate. ‘What have you done?’

She looked up at me, her eyes glistening with tears.

The key was still in the lock. Angrily, I seized it and pushed it back into my breeches pocket, burying it deep within the iron filings.