Joseph Delaney - The Spook's Curse

‘But what about the boggart? Won’t it guard the house and gardens? How can they even get in without the risk of being torn to pieces? Or is it too weak now?’

The Spook sighed and stared down at his boots. ‘No, it’s still got strength enough to deal with the Quisitor and his men but I don’t want unnecessary deaths on my conscience. And even if it killed those who entered, some might get away. What more proof would they need then that I deserve to burn? They’d come back with an army. There’d be no end to it. No peace until the end of my days. I’d have to flee the County.’

‘But won’t they catch us anyway?’

‘No, lad. Not if we take the route over the fells. They won’t be able to use their horses and we’ll have a good few hours’ start. We have the advantage. We know the County well, but the Quisitor’s men are outsiders. Anyway, let’s get started. We’ve wasted enough time already!’

Heading for the fells, the Spook set off at a very fast pace. I followed as best I could, carrying his heavy bag as usual.

‘Won’t some of his men just ride ahead and wait for us at Caster?’ I said.

‘No doubt they will, lad, and if we were going to Caster, that could just be a problem. No, we’re going to pass the town to the east. Then we’re going southwest, as I just told you, to Heysham, to visit the stone graves. There’s the Bane still to be dealt with and time is running out. Talking to the ghost of Naze is our last chance to find out how to do it.’

‘And after that? Where will we go? Will we ever be able to come back here?’

‘I see no reason why we couldn’t in time. Eventually we’ll throw the Quisitor off our trail. There are ways to do that. Oh, he’ll search for a bit and make a nuisance of himself, no doubt. But before long he’ll go back to where he came from. To where he can keep himself warm during the coming winter.’

I nodded but I wasn’t entirely happy. I could see all sorts of flaws in the Spook’s plan. For one thing he might have set off strongly, but he still wasn’t fully fit and crossing the fells would be hard work. And they might just catch us before we reached Heysham. Then again, they might search for the Spook’s house anyway and burn it out of spite, especially if they lost our trail. And there was next year to worry about. In the spring the Quisitor was bound to come north again. He seemed like a man who’d never give up. I couldn’t see any way that life would ever return to normal. And another thought struck me…

What if they caught me? The Quisitor tortured people to make them answer questions. What if they forced me to tell them where I used to live? They confiscated or burned the homes of witches and warlocks. I thought of Dad, Jack and Ellie with nowhere to live. And what would they do when they saw Mam? She couldn’t go out in sunlight. And she often helped the local midwives with difficult deliveries and had a big collection of herbs and other plants. Mam would be in real danger!

I didn’t say any of this to the Spook because I could see that he was already weary of my questions.

We were high on the fells within the hour. The weather was calm and it looked like we’d have a fine day ahead.

If only I could have got out of my mind the reason we were up there, I’d have enjoyed myself because it was good walking weather. We’d only curlews and rabbits for company, and far to the north-west the distant sea was sparkling in the sunshine.

At first the Spook strode out energetically, leading the way. But long before noon he began to flag, and when we stopped and sat ourselves down close to a cairn of stones, he looked utterly weary. As he unwrapped the cheese, I noticed that his hands were trembling.

‘Here, lad,’ he said, handing me a small piece. ‘Don’t eat it all at once.’

Doing as he advised, I nibbled on it slowly.

‘You do know the girl’s following us?’ the Spook asked.

I looked at him in astonishment and shook my head.

‘She’s about a mile or so back there,’ he told me, gesturing south. ‘Now we’ve stopped, she’s stopped. What do you suppose she wants?’

‘I suppose she’s nowhere else to go, apart from east to Pendle and she doesn’t really want to go there. And she’d no choice but to leave Chipenden. It wouldn’t be safe when the Quisitor and his men arrived.’

‘Aye, and maybe it’s because she’s taken a shine to you and just wants to go where you go. I wish I’d had time to deal with her before we left Chipenden. She’s a threat because wherever she is, the Bane won’t be too far away. It’ll be hiding underground for now, but once it’s dark she’ll draw it to her like a moth to a candle flame and it’ll be hovering about for sure. If she feeds it again, it’ll grow stronger and start seeing through her eyes. Before then it may chance upon other victims – people or animals, the effect will be the same. After bloating itself with blood, it’ll grow stronger and soon be able to clothe itself in flesh and bones again. Last night was just the start.’

‘If it hadn’t been for Alice we’d never have left Chipenden,’ I pointed out. ‘We’d be prisoners of the Quisitor.’

But the Spook chose to ignore me. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘we’d best get on. I’m not getting any younger while I’m sitting here.’

But after another hour we rested again. This time the Spook stayed down longer before finally forcing himself to his feet. It went on like that throughout the day, with the periods of rest getting longer and the time we were on our feet getting shorter. Towards sunset the weather began to change. The smell of rain was strong in the air and soon it began to drizzle.

As darkness fell we began to descend towards a patchwork of drystone wall enclosures. The fell side was steep and the grass was slippery and we both kept losing our footing. What’s more, the rain was getting heavier and the wind starting to build from the west.

‘We’ll rest while I get my breath back,’ the Spook said.

He led the way to the nearest section of wall and we clambered over and hunkered down on its eastern edge, to shelter from the worst of the rain.

‘The damp gets deep into your bones when you’re my age,’ said the Spook. “That’s what a lifetime of County weather does to you. It gets us all eventually. Either your bones or your lungs suffer.’

We crouched against the wall miserably. I was tired and weary, and even though we were outside on such a night it was a struggle to keep awake. Before long I fell into a deep sleep and began to dream. It was one of those long dreams that seem to go on all night. And towards the end it became a nightmare…

Nightmare On The Hill It was quite definitely the worst nightmare I’d ever had. And in a job like mine I’d had a lot. I was lost and trying to find my way home. I should have been able to manage it easily enough because everything was bathed in the light of the full moon, but every time I turned a corner and thought I recognized some landmark, I was soon proved wrong. At last I came over the top of Hangman’s Hill and saw our farm below.

As I walked down the hill, I began to feel very uneasy. Even though it was night time everything was too still and too quiet and nothing was moving below. The fences were in a poor state of repair, something that Dad and Jack would never have allowed to happen, and the barn doors were hanging half off their hinges.

The house looked deserted: some of the windows were broken and there were slates missing from the roof. I struggled to open the back door, and when it yielded with the usual jerk, I stepped into a kitchen that looked as though it hadn’t been lived in for years. There was dust everywhere and cobwebs hung from the ceiling. Mam’s rocking chair was right at the centre of the room and on it was a piece of folded paper, which I picked up and carried outside to read by the light of the moon.