The Night Spinner

by Abi Elphinstone

  ‘If you fire your crossbow at him one more time, I’ll blow your brains out!’ Moll winced. Things weren’t quite going to plan, but then she hadn’t anticipated crossbows being fired at Gryff.

  A huge man – all kilt and beard and knuckles – burst through the door. ‘What the blazes is going on, Aira?’

  ‘Aira?’ Moll panted.

  And, as the woman closed one eye over the sights of her crossbow, Moll dropped her catapult and raised her hands. ‘Wait! We know your brother – Angus MacDuff,’ she spluttered.

  Aira paused for a second, then her face lit up and she let the crossbow hang down by her side. ‘Ach,’ she said, wiping the sweat from her brow. ‘Why didn’t you just say so?’

  Moll looked at the bolt jammed in the table leg. ‘Your crossbow put me off.’

  Aira set her weapon down on the floor and the man in the doorway took a step towards them. His beard spilled out beneath his chin, finishing in five little plaits knotted with twine, his boots were so large they filled an entire flagstone and below his rolled-up shirt sleeves Moll glimpsed arms stamped with tattoos.

  ‘Everything OK?’ he asked. His voice was low and gruff, as if he’d swallowed one of Gryff’s growls.

  Aira nodded. ‘I was just getting acquainted with the girl and her . . .’ She looked at Gryff who was now thumping his paws on to the ground in front of the crossbow, ‘. . . cat.’

  ‘Wild cat,’ Moll corrected, her chin raised.

  Aira looked at the man. ‘I’ll take it from here, Spud, but if you’re able to fix us some heather tea, that’d be braw.’

  Spud raised one ginger eyebrow and then, to Moll’s surprise, he mumbled, ‘I’m allowed back in the kitchen again?’

  Aira nodded. ‘So long as you don’t snack on anything.’

  ‘Wouldn’t dream of it,’ protested Spud as he left the room. Aira sighed. ‘Got to keep an eye on Spud. He’s the best fighter in the Highland Watch, but his appetite is out of control. Once he ate a whole chocolate cake before breakfast – and last week the youngest lad here woke up to find Spud nibbling on his toe in his sleep.’

  Moll was silent. She couldn’t decide who was worse: the woman with the crossbow or the chocolate-cake-eating cannibal.

  Aira folded her arms. ‘So, how on earth did you come by a wildcat, lass?’

  Again Moll stayed quiet. How she wished Domino and Sid were by her side; they’d know what to say. She scuffed her boot against the flagstones and, beside her, Gryff snarled.

  Aira nodded towards the wildcat. ‘The only animal you can’t tame, we say around here. And yet you have one right by your side willing to fight your battles.’

  Moll held her stare. ‘Gryff isn’t tamed,’ she said sternly. ‘He bites hard when he wants to and sometimes he even scratches people’s eyes out.’ It was a lie – the wildcat had never scratched anyone’s eyes out – but Moll was still wary of the crossbow.

  Aira took a deep breath and Moll wondered whether her first attempts at conversation might have been better without the mention of biting and scratching. She pressed on nonetheless.

  ‘Have you seen my pal Siddy? He’s a bit taller than me, with dark, curly hair, and he often wears a flat cap. We were out on the moors together, then the mist came in and . . .’ She couldn’t bear to finish the sentence, to say that she’d rushed off and left Siddy behind.

  Aira sat down in an armchair and motioned for Moll to do the same. Moll stayed where she was and Aira shrugged.

  ‘The Highland Watch rescued you from a peatbogger,’ she said, ‘just as it was about to drown you.’

  Moll frowned. ‘A peatbogger?’

  ‘Nasty creatures that live inside the bogs,’ Aira explained, picking a clump of dirt out from under her fingernails. ‘They’ve got bodies of mud and heather and they surfaced a month ago, when the witches first appeared. We’ve had quite a job holding all the dark magic on this side of the North Door . . .’ She paused. ‘Luckily, when you stumbled into a peatbogger, Spud and I were patrolling the moor behind our bothy so we heard the commotion and rode out to rescue you.’

  Moll could sense that now was the right time to say thank you, but she was worried sick about Siddy.

  ‘But there was only you,’ Aira said. ‘Your wildcat must have hidden in the heather as we approached because just now was the first time I’ve seen him.’ She shook her head. ‘You have to stick with your pals on the moors. The weather comes in fast up here – even more so since the dark magic began to stir. We’ve had storms that have lasted for days and mists so thick you can’t see your hands in front of you – it’s a dangerous place when you’re on your own.’

  Moll felt her knees grow suddenly weak and she reached for the back of an armchair and sat down. Losing Siddy wasn’t a possibility she could bear. She swallowed again and again to force the lump in her throat down while Gryff scratched a paw against her boot.

  It’s OK, he seemed to be saying. It’s going to be OK.

  But as Moll sat in her mud-stained clothes she knew things were far from OK. She’d lost another friend and she’d never find the last amulet on her own, not in time. She reached into her coat pocket and breathed a sigh of relief as she felt her fingertips brush against the piano string. But it didn’t make her feel any better about Sid and she hung her head, too afraid to meet Aira’s eyes in case the guilt and sadness spilled out.

  Aira twisted her head round towards the kitchen. ‘Spud, could you send a few more men out? There’s a young lad still lost on the moors.’

  There was a shuffling in the kitchen, then Spud emerged looking incredibly guilty. ‘Aye,’ he nodded, walking towards them with two mugs of steaming tea. ‘Will do.’

  Moll raised glassy eyes. ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘He’s called Siddy.’

  Aira took the tea and passed one mug to Moll, then she looked Spud up and down. He puffed out his chest and she narrowed her eyes.

  ‘Scones,’ she hissed. ‘You’ve been munching on the scones, haven’t you?’

  ‘No,’ Spud replied. ‘Definitely no.’ His beard twitched and he flexed his tattooed arms, then he threw his hands up in the air. ‘Ach, Aira, I’m sorry. I couldn’t help it. They were just sitting there all buttery and plump—’

  ‘Which, incidentally, is what you will be if you carry on snacking,’ Aira cut in. She brushed the crumbs from his beard. ‘We need this lad back here before the sun goes down. I’m counting on the Highland Watch, OK?’

  Spud nodded and, in a whirl of kilt, beard and crumbs, he left.

  Aira smiled at Moll. ‘Welcome to Fillie Crankie, home of the Highland Watch. We joined together last month to fight the dark beasts that have been cropping up in the northern wilderness: witches, peatboggers, trolls.’

  After the peatbogger, Moll didn’t have the stomach to ask about trolls.

  ‘Spud and the lads are a good bunch,’ Aira went on, ‘madly fond of fighting, high-spirited and quick to battle, but otherwise they’re fairly straightforward.’

  ‘Are you the only girl?’ Moll asked.

  Aira grinned. ‘Aye. The folk back in Glendrummie said fighting dark magic was a man’s business. But I’m up here to prove them wrong and, since the lads are useless at making decisions and getting things done, I seem to be the one in charge.’ She paused. ‘So, what’s your name?’

  Moll ran a hand across Gryff’s back. Revealing her name had got her into trouble in the past. Skull had used it to control her mind back in Tanglefern Forest and the Shadowmasks down by the sea had used it to stop her from moving. But Aira was fighting against the Shadowmasks’ dark magic and tucked inside the bothy Moll felt safer than she had in the Clattering Gorge. ‘I’m Moll,’ she said eventually. ‘And this is Gryff.’

  The wildcat curled back his lips and slid a tongue over his teeth – he hadn’t quite forgotten about the episode with the crossbow yet.

  ‘So, how did you come across Angus, young Moll?’ Aira asked.

  Moll took a deep breath and then she told Aira about he
r journey as a stowaway on the train north, about the storm and meeting Angus, and about her role in the Bone Murmur and her quest for the last amulet. She drew out the parchment Willow had left for her and, though it was smudged with mud, the words were still clear.

  ‘Me, Sid and Gryff fought our way past the witches by stealing the last note of their song,’ Moll explained, ‘and—’

  ‘You silenced the witches in the Clattering Gorge?’ Aira interrupted.

  Moll sniffed. ‘I’m quite handy when I’m not being drowned by peatboggers.’

  ‘That’s impressive, lass.’

  Moll looked down. ‘I had Sid to help me then. He was the one who patched up my neck after a witch chucked a noose of poisoned hair around it.’

  ‘You need cleaning up,’ Aira said. ‘You’ll catch a cold if we don’t wash that mud off soon.’

  Moll shrugged. ‘I can’t be bothered to be clean – not when I need to find the feather from Willow’s clue before the Shadowmasks find me.’

  Aira gazed into the fire for a while and watched the flames dance, then she looked back at Moll. ‘I can help you try to find this feather,’ she said quietly. ‘Anything to force the Night Spinner and his Veil back and to make the north safe again.’ She paused. ‘I promise you we’ll leave at first light, but I’m not letting you go anywhere until you’ve had a bath.’

  After trying, unsuccessfully, to coax Gryff into the kitchen for food, Moll had given up and let him wander outside into the heather. She knew he wouldn’t stray far from her, that after finding a grouse or a rabbit to eat he’d slink back inside, so she followed Aira up the wooden stairs to the loft, past bunk beds laden with blankets, to a small room with a single bed and an old bath that stood on a stag’s hide. But, even as Moll undressed and slipped beneath the warm water, she couldn’t stop thinking about Siddy. It was getting dark outside and he was somewhere on the moors, at the mercy of the peatboggers and the Shadowmasks’ magic.

  Moll jumped. Down below, footsteps were traipsing into the bothy. She listened as the Highland Watch slumped down into their armchairs.

  ‘We couldn’t find him, Aira.’ Moll recognised Spud’s voice right away. ‘Only a leather satchel with a blanket and a flask of water inside.’

  The words hung in Moll’s ears.

  ‘Couldn’t find him?’ Aira said. ‘You’re the Highland flipping Watch! There’s not an animal you lot can’t track and you’re telling me you can’t bring a wee lad home?’

  Spud’s voice came, low and grave. ‘We couldn’t find him because he isn’t on the moors around here . . . not any more. We located his tracks on the path, then they stopped – cut clean off.’ He paused. ‘We reckon he’s been kidnapped. Taken by the dark magic.’

  Moll climbed out of the bath and wrapped a towel around herself, then she sat on the bed, shivering. She hugged her knees up to her chest and stared at the floorboards. If she’d just waited with Sid while he caught his breath, perhaps none of this would have happened. What would Domino say? And Oak? Her thoughts were broken by footsteps climbing the stairs and then Aira stepped into the room.

  ‘I’m so sorry, Moll, but the lads couldn’t find Siddy.’

  Aira sat down on the bed and clutched Moll’s hand, but she flinched and shuffled away. She wasn’t ready to let a stranger in; the hurt that beat inside her was something she felt alone, something that couldn’t be fixed with kind words or hands held.

  Aira looked at Moll. ‘We will find him,’ she said. ‘You and me. We’ll go after the feather at dawn and we’ll find Siddy – wherever the dark magic might have taken him.’

  Moll tried to summon up the energy to believe Aira, to will on the improbable as she did every time she fired an arrow from her bow. But it was getting harder to believe the impossible could happen. Alfie was gone. Siddy was missing. And now it was just her and Gryff against the Shadowmasks’ magic.

  From downstairs there came a droning noise, loud and solemn, that filled the whole bothy and stirred something deep inside Moll’s soul: the loss she felt for her parents and for her Tribe, and for adventures gone wrong and tasks unfulfilled.

  ‘What’s that?’ Moll asked.

  Aira smiled. ‘It’s Spud. He plays the bagpipes every evening when the sun goes down because the music keeps away the peatboggers who creep out of their bogs at midnight.’ She paused and placed a hand over her heart. ‘But it touches something in here too, doesn’t it?’

  Moll listened to the straining notes. They plucked at her heart, bruised and broken as it was, and she gazed out of the window. The tune rose and fell, flooding through her body and drawing out her yearning, and she wondered in that moment whether Siddy and Alfie could hear the music too, whether they were missing her under the same night sky. She flopped back on the bed, eyes closed.

  ‘Here,’ Aira said. ‘I thought you could do with some fresh clothes for the journey ahead. They were things I was making for my god-daughter back in Glendrummie, but she won’t mind, under the circumstances, if they arrive a little muddy.’

  The journey ahead. Just thinking about going on without Sid made Moll’s heart heavy. She hauled herself up, took the trousers, tartan shirt and thick, woolly jumper and changed into them. Then she slipped her catapult into the trouser pocket and turned to Aira.

  ‘A catapult at the dinner table?’ Aira said.

  Moll wedged her hands in her pockets. ‘You read with a crossbow on your lap.’

  Aira grinned. ‘I think you and I are going to get along quite well.’

  They walked down the stairs to find the Highland Watch in the armchairs around the fire pit, drinking whisky – a huddle of ginger beards, tartan bonnets and freckled skin. Spud stood by the front door, playing his pipes, his large cheeks swelling like balloons, but when Aira clapped her hands he lowered the instrument and took a seat.

  ‘Lads,’ Aira said. ‘This is Moll.’

  Moll felt her face redden, then she caught sight of Gryff’s tail poking out from behind the log pile and felt a tiny bit stronger.

  ‘I’m going to need you to guard the moors close tonight and tomorrow because Moll and I are going to Whuppity Cairns.’

  The Highland Watch exchanged nervous glances and a few began to whisper to each other. Moll frowned. Was Whuppity Cairns where Aira thought the feather was? Or perhaps even Siddy?

  Spud looked at Aira. ‘You can’t just march off to Whuppity Cairns! That goblin there’s a trickster. Only a handful of the people who have visited him have actually come back!’ He nodded at Moll. ‘And she’s just a wee scrap – she won’t stand a chance against him.’

  Aira clipped Spud on the back of the head and drew herself up tall. ‘This girl has beaten her way past the witches of Clattering Gorge, she’s armed with a catapult, a quiver of arrows and a wildcat – and, to top it all off, she’s the child from the Bone Murmur that the legends speak of. So, don’t let me hear any of you calling her just a wee scrap.’

  The Highland Watch looked at Moll, their eyes wide.

  Aira carried on. ‘Moll has been sent a message from the old magic with clues on how to crush all this evil. We need to find a feather from burning wings and you know as well as I do that Whuppity Cairns is the best place to search for it.’ She budged one of the men out of his chair so that Moll could sit down. ‘So, you great pack of jessies, I suggest you lot get acquainted with Moll while I go fix us up some neeps and tatties.’

  Spud raised a hand. ‘Any chance of you making us some clootie dumplings, Aira?’ He twizzled his beard.

  Aira nodded. ‘Fine, but the next time you flutter your eyelashes like that at me, Spud, you’ll feel the back of my hand.’

  Spud reddened and pretended to be extremely interested in his tattoos as Aira marched off into the kitchen. Then, one by one, the Highland Watch turned to look at Moll. She lifted her catapult out of her trouser pocket and turned it over in her hands, embarrassed at the attention.

  Spud cleared his throat and leant forward. ‘Most of the girls I knew back in
Glendrummie played with dolls not catapults. But that’s a fine-looking thing you’ve got there.’

  Moll looked up. ‘There was a girl back in my camp in the forest who had a doll. I used it as target practice when I was learning to fire my catapult.’

  The rest of the Highland Watch sniggered and Spud gave up with the small talk and picked up Aira’s crossbow. ‘Ever fired one of these?’

  Moll shook her head.

  ‘Well, I think we’ve got our evening’s entertainment sorted then,’ he replied.

  The next morning, frost clung to the moors, stiffening the heather and juniper, and any dips in the track were sealed with ice. Moll blew into the sheepskin lining of her gloves while Gryff prowled restlessly up and down the path and Aira saddled the two highland ponies in front of the bothy. They were nothing like Jinx, Moll’s cob back home. He was a palomino – small, nifty and soft to touch – but these horses were larger, with coarse coats and untrimmed manes.

  Aira fastened the toggles on her thick green cape, then adjusted the girth beneath the dappled pony. ‘This is Salt,’ she said. ‘I’ve been riding her since I was a wee lass.’ She ran a hand over the mare’s tousled white mane, then turned to the pony on her other side; its coat was dark grey like a smudge of smoke. ‘You’ll be riding Pepper – Salt’s brother.’

  Moll glanced at the black mane trailing over the pony’s eyes. ‘His mane’s so long he won’t be able to see where he’s going,’ she mumbled.

  Aira hauled a saddle up on to Pepper’s back. ‘Highland ponies always know where they’re going. They’re the hardiest animals on the moors and wherever you find yourself – on a hillside of scree, at the top of a crag or halfway down a bog – they’ll get you safely home. The only time you’ve got to watch them is if they leave the moors because they get spooked by carts and cottages.’