Joseph Delaney - The Spook's Curse

I was cold, as cold as ice, and my mind was blank. I was thinking about nothing at all. I pulled myself up further and stepped from the chain onto the stone floor of the upper chamber. The Bane was too preoccupied with what it was doing to be aware of my presence. No doubt in that respect it was like the Horshaw ripper: when it was feeding, hardly anything else mattered.

I stepped closer and pulled the piece of the Spook’s staff from my belt. I raised it and held it above my head, the blade pointing at the Bane’s scaly green back. All I had to do was bring it down hard and pierce its heart. It was clothed in flesh and that would be the end of it. It would be dead. But just as I was tensing my arm, I suddenly became afraid.

I knew what would happen to me. So much energy would be released that I would die too. I would be a ghost just like poor Billy Bradley, who’d died after having his fingers bitten off by a boggart. He’d been happy once as the Spook’s apprentice but now was buried outside the churchyard at Layton. The thought of it was too much to bear.

I was terrified – terrified of death – and I began to tremble again. It started at my knees and travelled right up my body until the hand holding the blade began to shake.

The Bane must have sensed my fear because it suddenly turned its head, Alice’s fingers still in its mouth, blood trickling down its big curved chin. But then, when it was almost too late, my fear simply evaporated away. All at once I realized why I was there facing the Bane. I remembered what Mam had said in her letter…

‘Sometimes in this life it is necessary to sacrifice oneself for the good of others.’

She’d warned me that of the three who faced the Bane, only two would leave the catacombs alive. I’d somehow thought it was going to be the Spook or Alice who would die, but now I realized that it would be me! I was never going to complete my apprenticeship, never going to become a spook. But by sacrificing my life now I could save both of them. I was very calm. I simply accepted what had to be done.

I feel sure that at the very last moment the Bane realized what I was going to do, but instead of pressing me dead on the spot it turned its head back towards Alice, who gave it a strange, mysterious smile.

I struck quickly with all my strength, driving the blade towards its heart. I didn’t feel the blade make contact but a shuddering darkness rose before my eyes; my body quivered from head to foot, so that I had no control over my muscles. The candle dropped out of my mouth and I felt myself falling. I’d missed it’s heart!

For a moment I thought that I’d died. Everything was dark but for now the Bane seemed to have vanished. I fumbled around on the floor for my candle and lit it again. Listening carefully, I gestured to Alice to be silent, and heard a sound from the tunnel. The padding of a large dog.

I tucked the piece of staff with the blade back into my belt. Next I eased Mam’s silver chain from my jacket pocket and coiled it round my left hand and wrist, ready for throwing. With my other hand I picked up the candle, and without further delay I set off after the Bane.

‘No, Tom, no! Leave it be!’ Alice called out from behind. ‘It’s over. You can go back to Chipenden!’

She ran towards me but I pushed her back hard. She staggered and almost fell. When she moved towards me again, I lifted my left hand so that she could see the silver chain.

‘Keep back! You belong to the Bane now. Keep your distance or I’ll bind you too!’

The Bane had fed for the final time and now nothing she said could be trusted. It would have to be dead before she’d be free.

I turned my back on her and moved away quickly. Ahead of me I could hear the Bane; behind me the click-click of Alice’s pointy shoes as she followed me into the tunnel. Suddenly the padding ahead stopped.

Had the Bane simply vanished and gone to another part of the catacombs? I stopped and listened before moving forward more cautiously. It was then that I saw something ahead. Something on the floor of the tunnel. I halted close to it and my stomach heaved. I was almost sick on the spot.

Brother Peter lay on his back. He’d been pressed. His head was still intact; the wide-open, staring eyes showed the terror he had obviously felt at the time of his death. But from the neck downwards his body had been flattened against the stones.

The sight horrified me. During my first few months as an apprentice I’d seen many terrible things and been close to death and the dead more times than I cared to remember. But this was the first time I’d seen the death of someone I cared about – and such a horrible death.

I stood, distracted by the sight of Brother Peter, and the Bane chose that moment to come loping out of the darkness towards me. For a moment it halted and stared at me, the green slits of its eyes glowing in the gloom. Its heavy, muscular body was covered in coarse black hair and its jaws were wide revealing the rows of sharp yellow teeth. Something was dripping from that long tongue which lolled forwards, beyond the gaping jaws. Instead of saliva, it was blood!

Suddenly the Bane attacked, bounding towards me. I readied my chain and heard Alice scream behind me. Just in time I realized that it had changed its angle of attack. I wasn’t the target! Alice was!

I was stunned. I was the threat to the Bane, not Alice. So why her rather than me?

Instinctively I adjusted my aim. Nine times out of ten I could hit the post in the Spook’s garden but this was different. The Bane was moving fast, already beginning to leap. So I cracked the chain and cast it towards the creature, watching it open like a net and drop in the shape of a spiral. All my practice paid off and it fell over the Bane cleanly and tightened against its body. It rolled over and over, howling, struggling to escape.

In theory it couldn’t get itself free and neither could it vanish or change shape. But I wasn’t taking any chances. I had to pierce its heart quickly. I had to finish it now. So I ran forward, pulled the blade from my belt and prepared to stab downwards into its chest. Its eyes looked up at me as I readied the blade. They were filled with hatred. But there was fear there too: the absolute terror of death; terror of the nothingness it faced, and it spoke inside my head begging frantically for its life.

‘Mercy! Mercy!’ it cried. ‘Nothing for us, there is! Just darkness. Is that what you want, boy? You’ll die too!’

‘No, Tom, no! Don’t do it!’ Alice shouted out behind me, adding her voice to the Bane’s. But I didn’t listen to either of them. No matter what the cost to myself it had to die. It was writhing within the coils of the chain and I stabbed it twice before I found its heart.

The third time I lunged downwards the Bane simply vanished, but I heard a loud scream. Whether it was the Bane, Alice or me who made that sound, I’ll never know. Maybe it was all three of us.

I felt a tremendous blow to my chest, followed by a strange sinking feeling. Everything went very quiet and I felt myself falling into darkness.

The next thing I knew I was standing by a large expanse of water.

Despite its size, it was more like a lake than a sea for although a pleasant breeze was blowing towards the shore, the water remained calm, like a mirror, reflecting the perfect blue of the sky.

Small boats were being launched from a beach of golden sand, and beyond them I could see an island quite close to the shore. It was green with trees and rolling meadows and seemed to me more wonderful than anything I’d ever seen before in my whole life. Amongst the trees on a hilltop was a building like the castle we’d glimpsed from the low fells as we skirted Caster. But instead of being constructed of cold grey stone it shimmered with light as if built from the beams of a rainbow and its rays warmed my forehead like a glorious sun.