Fire Girl

by Matt Ralphs

  Cold fingers traced down Hazel’s spine as she waited for David to continue.

  ‘But that was not the worst of it – b-because as the soul found no rest, n-neither could the corpse, so it wandered the moors, searching for a p-peace it would never find.’

  Hazel picked up the poppet and held it gingerly in front of her. Outside, the wind whispered around the eaves.

  ‘How do you know that this doll was used for the same thing?’ she asked.

  ‘The boss said the witch’s doll had its head w-wrapped in cloth, just like th-that one. It could be calling out right now.’

  ‘Calling out?’ asked Hazel. ‘To what?’

  ‘Its mortal remains.’

  20

  MORTAL REMAINS

  Fear will not hold me back.

  I am ready to face the Lord of Flies.

  Extract from the diary of Grand Magus Lars Göran Petrov

  Hazel tried to wrap her mind around what David had just said. ‘Are you trying to tell me that if there is a soul trapped in this doll, it is going to start calling out to . . . its dead body?’

  He opened his eye and nodded.

  ‘But. . . whose?’

  ‘How the h-hell should I know? That poppet c-could have been here for years until you d-disturbed it.’

  ‘I hate to say this,’ Hazel took a deep breath, ‘but this looks new to me. The straw’s fresh.’

  She hugged herself and looked through the grimy window at the shadowed skirts of the forest. Something caught her eye. Movement. She dragged her gaze towards it, quaking with dread.

  A thing edged up the garden path; a wasted husk of human remains wrapped in rags, crawling on its stomach like a wounded animal. A canvas sack, tied to a choke around the neck, covered its head.

  Hazel wiped a trembling hand over the misty window and shut her eyes. It’s not real. When I open my eyes it’ll be gone. Please, please be gone. She opened her eyes; it was still there, and closer. Closer to the door. The unlocked door.

  ‘Something’s out there,’ she croaked. ‘It’s standing up . . . it’s pointing at me.’

  The little colour left in David’s face drained away. ‘Put the poppet back where you found it. It’s our only—’ he collapsed back, his good eye rolling up into his head.

  The thing, whatever it was, lurched up the path. Clods of mud stuck to its rags. Like it’s crawled from the ground, thought Hazel. From its grave . . .

  She grabbed the poppet, dashed down the stairs and stopped dead by the door. She swayed on her heels, staring at the solid wood and stout latch. In her mind’s eye she saw the creature waiting for her on the other side – arms outstretched and ready to grab her.

  How far is it to the outhouse? She desperately tried to recall how many steps it was. Will I get there before it catches me?

  Her hand closed over the handle and she threw open the door.

  The thing crouched on the threshold, close enough for her to see its cracked fingernails reaching for her. Rot enveloped it like an invisible shroud. Paralysed with terror, Hazel could only stare.

  ‘For pity’s sake, close the door,’ Bramley squeaked, standing up in his teacup.

  Hazel slammed the door and slid home the bolt.Asecond later the creature crashed into it. The planks shivered under the blow and the wood around the hinges cracked. Hazel backed away.

  ‘Pick me up, pick me up,’ Bramley cried. Hazel lifted him from the cup and placed him on her shoulder. ‘What was . . . that?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Still staring at the rattling door, Hazel retrieved the poppet from the floor. ‘Whatever it is, I think it wants this.’

  ‘Then give it back!’

  Hazel dashed to the windows to check they were closed, and then heaved the heavy kitchen table in front of the door. ‘I’m not letting that thing in here. We’ll just have to hold on until Titus finds us.’

  ‘And what if he doesn’t?’

  Hazel had no answer. She climbed the stairs, closed the bedroom door and jammed a chair under the handle. Feeling her heart slow a little, she perched on the bed next to the unconscious David, worrying the hem of her dress with trembling fingers. The crashing from downstairs finally stopped. Everything went quiet.

  ‘Do you think—?’

  A low moan came from outside; there were no words, but the desolation in the sound chilled Hazel to her bones.

  ‘It’s circling the cottage,’ she whispered. ‘Trying to find a way in.’

  Branches scraped against a downstairs window. Hazel put her hands over her ears to shut it out. ‘It can’t get in, it can’t get in . . .’

  Leaves rustled on the far side of the cabin, and then slowly the moaning faded away. Hazel waited. The silence stretched, disturbed only by David’s laboured breathing.

  ‘Has it gone?’ Bramley said.

  ‘I think so. For now, at least.’

  Hazel stood up and put him on the windowsill. Together, they peered out of the window at the empty garden. Clouds sagged, scraping the treetops as if weary of holding so much rain. She turned away and looked at David.

  ‘He knows, Bram,’ she said. ‘He knows I’m a witch.’

  ‘What?’ Bramley spluttered. ‘How did he find out?’

  ‘He saw me use magic to light the fire.’

  Bramley slapped a paw to his forehead. ‘You couldn’t have kept it secret for just a few days?’

  ‘It was so cold, and David was freezing . . . I was trying to do the right thing.’

  ‘You haven’t done the right thing since we left the Glade,’ Bramley snapped.

  They fell into a sullen silence. Hazel moved to the fire and stared into the flames.

  ‘Are you going to leave me up here forever?’ Bramley said from the windowsill.

  ‘Yes,’ Hazel said.

  The fire crackled, sending sparks up the chimney.

  ‘You do know that the first thing the boy will do when Titus gets back is tell him you’re a witch,’ Bramley said.

  ‘Of course I know that.’ Hazel slumped to the floor.

  ‘So? Don’t you think it’d be best not to be here when he does?’

  ‘You mean we should just leave him?’

  ‘I know you liked the boy,’ Bramley said. ‘But he’s our enemy now.’

  Beneath the bandages across David’s face, Hazel saw the once handsome boy who had agreed to help her find her mother. She shook her head. ‘I can’t leave him. It’s my fault he’s here in the first place. It’s my fault he might die.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘Enough.’ Hazel got up and tapped Bramley on his twitching nose. ‘Not another word.’ She picked him up and tucked him behind her ear. ‘I mean, look on the bright side – if that creature comes back, we’ll be dead long before Titus gets a chance to kill us.’

  21

  A GLINT OF SILVER

  In England, Witch Hunters are regarded with

  a mixture of respect and terror. In France they

  are celebrated for being wildly heroic.

  Travels with a French Witch Hunter by Markus Corrigan

  Alone on a frozen lake, the shores lost in mist. Her bare feet crunch on frost. Above, a starless sky stares down coldly. Below, black water swirls under ice. As she walks, a spider’s web of cracks begins to radiate around her. . .

  Hazel awoke with a start, the cracking of the ice becoming the crackle of the fire. It took a few moments to remember where she was. Dusk settled under a dark blue sky studded with stars. David was still asleep, his face tight with fatigue.

  ‘Bram,’ she whispered as she stoked some life into the fire. ‘Are you awake?’

  ‘No,’ he grumbled from his nest in her hair.

  She got up and sat in the chair next to the bed. David stirred, his one healthy eye roving under the lid. The simmering stew on the hearth didn’t mask the ripe smell coming from his wounds. ‘I’ll have to change his dressings when he wakes up,’ she said, wondering where she might find more bandages.

  Bramley craw
led out of her hair and perched on her shoulder. ‘I was having such a nice dream. I was back in my nest in the Glade and it was the beginning of summer.’ He sighed. ‘My favourite season.’

  ‘I always liked autumn best – the colour of the leaves and the smell of woodsmoke.’ Hazel pulled the blanket back over David’s shoulders. ‘Ma used to have nightmares sometimes. She used to wake up screaming.’

  Bramley pressed his warm body against her neck. ‘What were they about?’

  ‘She’d never tell me, no matter how many times I asked. They were always more frequent during winter when the frosts were bad.’ Hazel clasped her hands in her lap and stared into the fire. ‘It used to scare me when she woke up crying in the dead of night. But I’d lie next to her and stroke her hair until she went back to sleep, wondering what could have happened to make her have such terrible dreams.’ She sighed. ‘After what we’ve been through these past few days, I think I’m beginning to understand.’

  Bramley nudged her ear with his whiskery nose.

  ‘Next morning, she’d get up and we’d talk about the harvest and the garden, and the latest mischief old Tom had got into – never about the nightmares.’ A sense of loss crushed down on her. ‘I just want her back, safe and sound where she belongs. With me.’

  ‘We’ll find her,’ Bramley said. ‘You’ll see.’

  They sat for a while, bathed in the glow of the fire as night cast its cloak over the outside world. Hazel was just dropping into a doze when she heard a hollow moan, seeping out of the forest and getting closer.

  ‘It’s come back,’ she whispered. The ivy trailing up the outer wall rustled. ‘It’s trying to climb up.’

  ‘Why?’ Bramley squeaked. ‘It can’t get in through the bedroom windows – they’re too small.’

  Hazel looked up at the ceiling, at the widely spaced beams and the layer of thatch resting on top. ‘It’s going for the roof. That’s its way in.’

  Bramley buried his face in his paws. ‘Why us? Why me?’

  Hazel could tell from the rustling that it was already level with the bedroom and climbing higher. The rustling stopped just below the eaves.

  ‘Maybe it’s—’

  There was a thump and then a fevered scrabbling over their heads. The thatch sagged. It was on the roof.

  Hazel shook David roughly by the shoulder and screamed in his face. ‘Wake up! Oh, you stupid boy, wake up, will you?’

  ‘Leave him,’ Bramley said. ‘You can’t help him now. Let’s go before that thing gets in. Who knows what it’ll do to us?’

  ‘I won’t leave him.’ Hazel followed the rustling of straw as the thing crawled away from the edge of the roof. It stopped over the bed. David’s pistol lay on the windowsill, but she didn’t know how it worked, or even if it was loaded.

  ‘What are you going to do then? Ask it nicely to leave? Oh I see,’ he said as Hazel wrapped her hands in her skirt and unhooked the steaming pan from over the fire. ‘You’re going to feed it to death.’

  ‘Quiet, mouse.’ Hazel backed into a corner, watching the bulge in the ceiling. Strands of straw drifted down on to the bed. ‘I’m going to fight it.’

  ‘With soup?’

  She glanced at David. If he woke up now they might have a chance to get out of the cabin and escape. And then what? No, she said to herself. I’ve got to end this here. The pan was heavy and her arms started to shake. Lumpy stew spilt on to the floor.

  The scratching stopped.

  Hazel pressed her back against the wall as an arm burst into the room. Bones clicked as it ripped away a handful of thatch, revealing a patch of night sky.

  Hazel gripped the pan tightly as the creature’s furious assault on the thatch forced a hole big enough for it to push its head and shoulders into the room. It hung upside down like an enormous bat, twisting round to face her.

  ‘How can it see us through the sack?’ Bramley yelped.

  The corpse crashed to the foot of the bed in a shower of debris. Clambering jerkily to its feet, it reached out with mould-streaked arms.

  Hazel hurled the pan as hard as she could. It flew through the air, spraying brown lumps of stew in every direction and bashing the creature on its head. Knocked off its feet, it collided with the chair jammed under the door and smashed it to pieces. Drenched in stew, it lay whimpering in the wreckage.

  Shaking all over, Hazel picked up the pan and brandished it like a weapon. The firelight glinted on something around the thing’s wrist. I recognize that bracelet . . .

  ‘Oh no,’ she cried, dropping the pan. ‘Mary.’

  22

  BLIND MARY APPLEGATE

  The world is full of magic.

  It is carried in water, air, fire and earth.

  A Study of Magic by Jeremy Usborne

  ‘This is your friend, Blind Mary?’ Bramley gasped from his hiding place in her curls. ‘What happened to her?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Hazel said, her voice heavy with grief. ‘I should have recognized her earlier.’ She knelt down and helped her old friend sit up against the wall. ‘Mary, it’s me, Hazel. Can you hear me?’

  Mary nodded, moaning quietly.

  ‘Mary, dear,’ Hazel said, reaching out, ‘I’m going to untie your head so I can see you.’ Mary wailed and grabbed the sack with both hands. ‘All right, we’ll leave that on for now.

  Can you stand up? Here, take my hand.’ Mary’s fingers felt as fragile as bird bones. ‘Up you get.’

  ‘Give her back the poppet,’ Bramley said. ‘Perhaps that’ll make her feel better.’

  Hazel held it out. ‘Here you are. Take it if you want.’ Mary drew it to her breast and let out a long sigh. ‘Get away from her,’ shrieked a voice from behind them.

  It was David, shivering with fever, drenched in sweat and aiming his pistol straight at Mary.

  ‘David, no! It’s all right, she’s—’ Hazel began, but before she could move, he pulled the trigger.

  The pistol roared, filling the room with smoke. The shot buzzed passed Hazel’s ear, causing her to step back and slip on spilt potage. There was a whump and a hole appeared in Mary’s chest. Shreds of fabric blew out in a powdery cloud. Knocked clean off her feet, the old witch fell backwards through the flimsy wooden door and down the stairs.

  Hazel grabbed the bedpost, aware of a high-pitched whine in her left ear. David fumbled as he tried to reload his pistol.

  ‘Quick, close the door,’ he said, ‘before that . . . thing . . . c-comes back.’

  ‘You stupid boy,’ Hazel gasped. ‘She wasn’t going to hurt us.’

  David goggled at her. ‘What are you—? It’s a dead thing, an abomination—’

  ‘She’s my friend,’ Hazel bristled at him. ‘And I’m going downstairs to help her.’

  ‘Your friend?’ David’s face hardened. ‘A witch,I suppose – just like you. I’m really at your mercy now, aren’t I?’

  Hazel grabbed the pistol from him. ‘Don’t be so soft-brained. No harm’s coming to you. Just trust me.’

  ‘Never t-trust a witch,’ David said.

  Hazel tucked the pistol into her belt, covered David with the blankets and left the room. She found Mary in the kitchen, clutching the poppet to her chest. Smoke drifted from the hole in her chest but there was no blood.

  ‘Mary,’ Hazel said. ‘Can you speak?’

  Mary shook her head, She shuffled to the dresser and took out a roll of parchment, a bottle of ink and a peacock-feather quill with a silver nib. Beckoning for Hazel to join her at the kitchen table, she sat down and flattened out the parchment.

  Hazel sat opposite, tears prickling behind her eyes. Somewhere under the dirt-caked clothes was Mary, her old friend. A knot of anger hardened inside her. I know who did this, she thought. And I’ll get him for it, too.

  Mary dipped the quill into the ink and began to write.

  Dearest Hazel, It shames me for you to see me so rotten and faded.

  ‘Oh, Mary,’ Hazel said, tears falling freely now. ‘You mustn’t feel asha
med – this isn’t your fault. Can you tell me what happened? What can I do to help?’

  First I must ask – where is your mother?

  Hazel looked down at the table and told Mary everything; after she had finished, Mary put her head in her hands and moaned.

  ‘It’s all right,’ Hazel said. ‘I’m going to find Ma and bring her home. You can come and live with us and we’ll look after you, I promise.’

  Mary picked up the quill and started scribbling.

  This is all my fault. I told Murrell where you lived, and how to get through the Border Hedge.

  ‘So it was him who did this to you.’

  He told me he’d feed me to his demon if I didn’t do what he asked and I was too weak to stand up to him. He wanted your mother and her healing magic, and I gave her up. But I didn’t tell him about you, little Hazel. I kept you a secret, because I knew he’d want you too.

  ‘Well, he knows all about me now,’ Hazel said with a small smile.

  I’m so sorry.

  Hazel thought of Mary, all alone, being menaced by Murrell and Rawhead. ‘This isn’t your fault. Can you tell me what happened?’

  After I told him where to find Hecate, he said he wanted my help to fight the Witch Hunters. I refused. The scratching quill flew across the parchment. He said I deserved to be punished for betraying the cause, so he

  The quill stopped. A blob of ink formed around the nib. Hazel waited, chewing on a strand of hair.

  sentenced me to this death state. He trapped my soul in this doll – she caressed the ugly thing as if it was a beloved child – then buried my body in the garden to rot. I felt every shovelful of cold earth fall on me. Then darkness, silence.

  Mary stopped writing.

  ‘I found the doll in the outhouse,’ Hazel said with a growing sense of horror. ‘I was going to burn it . . .’

  When you removed the poppet from the magic circle it cried out. My body heard, and dug its way out of the grave. Her head drooped. Body and soul together, but still apart.

  ‘Is there anything I can do to help?’