by Robin Jarvis
“Look, Pog,” Tully said, holding his neepjack high. “That’s keeping the evil fiends of the wild away. Ramptana the Court Magician, from the castle, lights these himself, every year.”
The other children laughed at him for talking to his turnip.
“Let me see your lanterns!” a soft, sad voice called.
The children turned back to the pond and saw a grey figure rising from the water, wrapped in mist, with long dark hair streaming upwards. It was the ghost of Brynwin, the miller’s daughter, who drowned whilst reaching too far picking water lilies on her tenth birthday.
“Hello, Brynwin!” they shouted, gathering on the bank. They all knew the drowned girl and weren’t afraid. She wasn’t wicked or frightening, she was just sad and moped a lot – but then she had good cause to. She couldn’t even leave the confines of the pond and spent most midnights skulking in the reeds, feeling sorry for herself.
“So many scary faces!” she said, her cold blue lips almost managing a smile. “I wish I had a turnip lantern. It might frighten off the family of toads that have moved in. Terrible noisy they are and they’ve got no manners.”
“We’d lend you ours,” Rufus offered. “But we’re on our way round the boundary and have to go straight home after.”
The drowned girl’s spectral face turned towards the village.
“You should go back now,” she warned them. “The Night of All Dark is not a time to play games. Evil is mustering about Mooncot. Dark shapes are slinking from the woods and creeping along the ditches. I can sense them. And there are other dangers…”
“Not tonight!” Tully said confidently. “The thirteen lamps will guard us.”
They bade her farewell and hurried on their way. The ghost of Brynwin retreated to the centre of the pond, shaking her head as she sank into the dark water.
If only they had hearkened to her words.
The eight children ran to the far corner of the next field, where the second marker stone was beneath a towering elm tree. It cast a glimmering radiance up into the lofty branches. Tully lifted Pog to see and, sniggering, the others mimicked him – even Rufus. Gently teasing him, everyone had given their turnips names now. There was Flameburp, Muckyroots, Sprouty Top, Burny, Candlebrains and Purple Fatty.
Relishing being out on this night-time adventure, they set off for the next marker, which stood in front of the long barrow where the bones of long-dead chieftains were interred. The village was left further and further behind.
“What’s that yonder?” Rufus called, pointing to a dark shape at the side of the path ahead, beyond the reach of their lanterns’ light.
The children halted a moment.
“Is it a bear?” Muddy Legs asked hopefully.
“That’s never big enough to be a bear!” Peasy chided, lifting Burny, her lantern, higher. “Besides, the Cinnamon Bear don’t never leave his cave up Hunter’s Chase and he’s the only bear in these parts.”
“A dead horse then?”
Lynnet scowled at him. “’Tis some old sacks dropped there by a wandering rogue, most like,” she said decisively.
“Ill-gotten gains, that’s what they’ll be,” Muddy Legs speculated. “Spoils and such. The hidey place of robbers and footpads.”
“Not a very good hidey place,” Rufus remarked. “Just at the side of the path, not even under the hedge. Why didn’t they put them in the barrow? It’s only across the next field and no one ever goes in there.”
“It’s too scary, that’s why!” Benwick muttered.
“No doubt they’ll be back soon,” Neddy said. “Their haul was prob’ly too much for one carting.”
“It might be stolen treasure!” Tully suggested.
“More like flour, stole from the mill,” Lynnet commented with her usual disregard for the fanciful.
“Or,” Muddy Legs said with relish, “it might be chopped-up bodies. Some arms and a head or two – murderers do that.”
The children didn’t like that idea. Even though they knew nothing could harm them that night, they were uneasy as to what those sacks might contain.
Holding their neepjacks out before them, they crept further along the path, trepidatious and fearful.
Suddenly Tully let out a cry, which made everyone jump.
“Why, those aren’t sacks at all! ’Tis a person!”
“A dead one?” asked the bloodthirsty Muddy Legs. “Is it murdered? Are there bits hacked off? Is there gore? Does it look like jam?”
Tully and Rufus ran forward and knelt beside the stricken figure. It was an old man. Much to Muddy Legs’ disappointment, he was not chopped up. He was still alive, but out cold.
“Quick, your lanterns!” Rufus told the others urgently. The children brought them closer and they stared at the person prostrate on the ground.
“He’s not a serf,” Lynnet observed. “That’s velvet he’s wearing.”
“Turn him over,” Benwick said. “Let’s see who he is.”
“Look at the moons and stars on his gown,” Peasy said admiringly.
“And what a beard! It’s long as my dad’s arm, that is.”
“And white as milk!”
“That’s a nasty lump on his head. Seen smaller duck eggs.”
Tully rocked back on his heels. “You know who this is!” he breathed in disbelief. “It’s Ramptana the Court Magician!”
“No!” every child gasped.
“Why, so it is!” Neddy confirmed. “What’s he doing here?”
“And who clobbered him?”
“Robbers and murderers,” Muddy Legs whispered in mock terror.
Ever practical, Lynnet removed her cloak, rolled it up and placed it under the old gentleman’s head. She patted his face to try and bring him round, but he remained unconscious.
“We have to get help,” she said. “He must have been here for hours. He might’ve catched his death. Take off your cloaks and cover him, he’s icy.”
The other children obeyed then Rufus waved Wet the Bed Walter over the path and inspected the ground. “Look here,” he observed, “Footprints… well, paw prints!”
“Is it a dog?” Tully asked. “Did one of the hounds get out and attack him?”
“That’s no dog,” Clover said, who knew about these things because Bertolf the dog boy was his best friend. “It’s a…”
“A fox, I think you’ll find,” a new, strange voice interrupted.
The children started. Rufus and Muddy Legs leaped up. Everyone looked around anxiously.
“Who’s there?” Rufus demanded, peering into the surrounding darkness.
“You can’t chop us all,” Muddy Legs said defiantly, even though his voice wobbled.
“My dear grubby fellow,” the suave, cultivated voice replied, “I’ve no intention of carving you into kiddie collops. I did have a date planned with a few delectable chickens tonight, but alack, it appears I’m fated to miss out on a good clucking. I’m too tender-hearted, that’s my trouble. I’ve been sitting here wondering what to do for an interminably long time. That old clod is such a dunderhead, he’s only got himself to blame.”
The children could tell the speaker was close by, in the field bordered by the path, but he was concealed in the gloom. They held their neepjacks out and the radiating slices of orange light struck a reflected glint in two golden eyes.
It was a large dog fox, who stared back at them with an insolent grin on his face.
“What curious gimcracks,” the animal remarked. “Root vegetables with candles inside! You people really are most extraordinarily eccentric. Whatever next, fish slippers?”
“The fox with human speech!” Rufus exclaimed.
“The talking fox!” The others chimed in.
The fox rolled his eyes. “One day, one of you humans will surprise me with an original ‘hello’,” he sighed.
“Don’t listen to it!” Benwick told the others. “It’s an enemy of the Realm! The Ismus decreed it so. Look what it did to Ramptana.”
“I sit
before you, blameless in this!” the fox objected. “There I was, minding my own vulpine business, walking along, looking forward to some feathery jawplay in the henhouse, when I chanced upon this senile old charlatan doddering down the path towards me. He shied a stone in my direction so I directed some pointed backchat at him, larded with home truths. He didn’t like them so he ran at me – at his age too, the silly old conjuror! Anyway, the laces on the hapless booby’s shoe were undone. He tripped over them and hit his head on the very stone he propelled at me. Wasn’t that a poetic coincidence? I do so adore symmetry in life, don’t you?”
Tully and his brother marvelled at the urbane fox. They wanted to take him home and introduce him to their grandfather.
“Don’t believe it!” Benwick insisted. “Twisty as a snake, that’s what it is. It’s in league with the witch, everyone knows that.”
The animal flicked its brush and stretched.
“If you insist on defaming me with crude and clumsy clichés, and repeating groundless slander,” he said, “I shall bid you goodnight. I only tarried because of the foulness gathering around your village. Beardy here may be as useful as a sugar shield, but he doesn’t deserve to be tormented by the evil horrors massing out there. Now you small people are here to take care of it, I can depart. There may yet be time for some fowlness of my own – ho ho!”
“Wait!” Tully cried. “What’s this?”
He had been examining the large satchel Ramptana had been carrying and drew from it a silver cylinder studded with coloured glass. There were more inside.
“The warding lamps!” Rufus uttered in dismay.
“He didn’t light them all!” Peasy exclaimed as Muddy Legs began to wail.
The fox flicked his ears. “What’s amiss?” he asked.
“The village is undefended!” they said in horror. “On Witching Eve!”
“Our parents!” Clover cried. “My little sister – they’re up on the hill. They do not know.”
“And you,” the fox told them. “You little cubs are out here, alone… with the hungry terrors of the woods closing in.”
“What will we do?” Benwick asked in a panic.
“Muddy Legs is the fastest runner,” Lynnet said. “He must run to the hilltop and warn them. We’ll hurry back to the village.”
“But what about Ramptana?” Tully cried. “We can’t leave him here to get chewed or worse.”
“He’ll slow us down,” Benwick said.
“He’s right,” the fox intervened. “If a mere four-legged animal, with a trifle more innate cunning and a keener sense of self-preservation than any of you possess, may proffer a suggestion? Warning your kin won’t be enough. They cannot stand against the forces gathering around your village and none of you will make it back there if you attempt to carry that bearded burden with you.”
“What then?” Rufus asked.
“I shall run,” the fox volunteered, “fleet and silent, to the White Castle and call for aid. Cover the wrinkly old nuisance’s face with your cloaks and hope he is passed over by the things that are approaching. Flee for your hearths as fast as you can. Don’t look back, don’t pause to challenge unfamiliar shadows and do not think to dart across the empty fields to call your parents home. You will never make it to that hill alive.”
“I don’t trust it,” Benwick said uncertainly. “Who in the castle is going to listen to the talking fox? It’s Haxxentrot’s familiar!”
The fox looked affronted, but there wasn’t time to argue. “Why are you still stood there like Widow Tallowax’s washing on a line?” he barked. “The Bad Shepherd is abroad this night!”
That was enough. The children turned pale and took flight back down the path, their turnip lanterns swinging wildly in their hands, throwing abstract shapes around them.
The fox watched them sprint into the dark and took a deep breath as he flexed his legs, preparing for the long, desperate race to Mooncaster.
“Now,” he said grimly. “I’ve a favour owing from the son of an Under King and it’s time to collect.”
There was a creamy flash of the tip of his tail, a scrape of soil was kicked into the air – and he was gone.
Back at the bonfire a sudden screech cut through the merrymaking. It was a hideous, malice-filled voice and went echoing across the sky.
Aiken Fingers stopped playing and the villagers looked around in consternation. Where had it come from?
It was little Gunnhild who saw it first. The weaver’s six-year-old daughter cried out and pointed high above the fields.
“Witch!” she shrieked. “Witch!”
Mothers clutched their children and oak-hearted men blanched. For in the night sky, the figure of Haxxentrot, the malevolent crone, was riding her hayfork – flying through the darkness.
A Bogey Boy sat behind her. His stunted legs swung from side to side and his white, wobbly head was grinning at the sight of the horrified villagers down on the hill. Haxxentrot cackled and croaked an order. Jub opened his sack and a ghastly green light illuminated his ugly face. He delved his long fingers into the bag and fished out a glowing glass phial. Haxxentrot leaned to one side and the hayfork veered towards the hilltop.
“How can this be?” the villagers cried. “What of the warding lamps? How have they failed? Run!”
“My sons!” Rufus and Tully’s mother wept. “They are out there!”
Fleeing from the stone circle, they rushed down the hill, stumbling and tripping in their haste to escape the hag from the Forbidden Tower.
Haxxentrot zoomed through the flurrying embers that soared into the night. The twinkling ash eddied and swarmed about her. Then she circled around and Jub flung the glowing phial.
Like a sickly falling star it burned a trail of green fire through the air. When it struck the ground, there was a flash of olive-coloured flame and a sulphurous cloud belched forth. Jub threw another and another and another until the lower slopes were completely encircled by a curtain of thick, choking, yellow vapour.
The villagers halted. They were too afraid to pass through that barrier of unnatural smoke. It did not disperse. It curdled and churned, clinging firmly to the ground. They were trapped on the hillside.
Wulfhand the stonemason stepped forward. He was the broadest man in Mooncot, and the strongest person in the village since the disappearance of Dora the blacksmith’s daughter. He could plough a furrow faster than two oxen and shook acorns down from trees.
“Smoke holds no terror for me,” he declared.
Rhoswen, his tiny sapling of a wife, flung her arms about him. “’Tis witchery!” she cried. “Go not into that foulness. Stay – I beseech you!”
Her husband cupped her tearful face in his big palms and stooped to kiss her brow. Then he straightened his mighty back and strode towards the twisting fog bank. The cloying vapour wrapped round him and he was lost from sight.
The villagers waited anxiously and Rhoswen wrung her hands. Suddenly a man’s terror-filled scream sounded from the smoke and an instant later, Wulfhand came blundering back out.
High above, Haxxentrot cackled shrilly.
The village folk crowded round the stonemason. He was shivering and sweating.
“Don’t go in there!” he cried. “Don’t…”
“What did you see?” his wife implored.
Wulfhand glanced back and shuddered. “There are… things growing and moving,” he uttered. “Creatures with baleful eyes.”
“Look!” Aiken shouted. “There are shapes in the smoke!”
Shadowy silhouettes were prowling within the sulphurous fumes. The horrified villagers counted nine of them. They were the size of bulls. Each possessed two long, serpentine tails and their eyes shone like rushlights. Skulking in the smoke, they paced around the hill and began to yowl and mewl.
“What are they?” the villagers cried, backing fearfully away, up the slope.
Haxxentrot came swooping down. The prongs of her hayfork raked through the vapour and she called out to her newly grow
n creatures.
“Go, my Tibbs!” she cackled. “The mice are there for the hunting. Torment and devour them! Kill them all!”
A paw as large as a hoof emerged from the yellow fog. Then another. Then a monstrous head came after. It was a hideous giant cat – covered in coarse, dark green fur. Spitting ferociously, it slinked out on to the grass, its two tails flicking behind. More of the nightmares came from every side.
The villagers uttered cries of despair. They were only peasants, without swords or spears to defend themselves. Their longbows had been left in their homes. All they had were short knives, but those would be useless against such horrors as these.
“To the fire!” Aiken called. “Pull out burning sticks! Arm yourselves with flame. ’Tis our only hope.”
Screaming, they ran back up the hill.
Padding the ground with their paws, their claws extending and retracting, ripping through the turf in anticipation of a substance much more tender and succulent, the green cats lowered their great heads and hunched down. The blades of their shoulders pushed up into twin points. Their sinister, hungry purring was harrowing to hear. They allowed their scurrying quarry enough distance to make the sport more amusing. Then they flattened their ears and sprang after them.
Haxxentrot shrieked with evil laughter. From her lofty perch in the sky, she stared down at the terrified people racing towards the bonfire. Behind her, the Bogey Boy sniggered gleefully. Then Jub’s eyes grew rounder than ever and he pointed across the land, over the thatched rooftops, towards the high white walls of the castle. Horses were galloping out, over the drawbridge. He saw the bright glitter of swords held high and the gleam of knights in armour, with the Jack of Clubs riding at their head. The talking fox had succeeded!
Jub tugged at his mistress’s cloak and she shook a bony fist at the unwelcome sight, spitting with displeasure. Then her annoyance turned to consternation as Jub let out a squeak of alarm. Flying above the knights, a silver-tipped wand in his right hand, the fabled Moonshield in the other, was the Ismus.