Pip and the Wood Witch Curse

by Chris Mould

  But the noise died down and the voices petered out. The crunch of feet stepping into the distance was the last thing he heard.

  Pip waited. For a good while longer he stayed where he was, but eventually the stiffness in his body was unbearable. His first few movements were painful as he lifted the flap and an icy wind rushed through him. He felt around in the dark, reached for the animal skin, and clambered out, knocking things here and there. Snowflakes were falling softly.

  If you had been there as Pip emerged you would not have seen a small boy. You would have seen a dreadful creature with hog’s teeth and a wolf’s head, stepping awkwardly through the thick snow and laying the most frightening shadows across the doorways of the buildings as, for the first time, Pip discovered the wonders of Hangman’s Hollow.

  Jarvis was long gone by now. If he had waited longer, he too would have seen the beast, creeping along in the snow with the drifts sweeping up around him. But he had grown tired and now he was slumped into his chair with his feet on the brickwork of the fireplace. Meager flames struggled and he held the flat of his right hand out to salvage what heat he could from the embers, his fingerless glove outstretched.

  “I’m getting close, Esther. I’ll find them. Wherever they are, whoever they are. I’ll find them all.”

  “Such a long time since you had any success,” Esther croaked. “Not a single prisoner in the forest keep, not for a long time. And to think the last ones escaped … Dear oh dear! Perhaps you’ve lost your touch.” Her feet were clamped to the mantelpiece and she preened her feathers with her beak. She did love to wind his cogs, but it always came at a cost.

  “Feathered freak!” he spluttered.

  He pulled the hook from his arm and hurled it toward her. It missed and lodged itself into an oak timber as she scampered across the lintel, sending papers and candlesticks crashing into the hearth.

  “And you’ve lost your patience,” she continued.

  He ignored her and went back to warming his one hand.

  Silas was different. There was a stillness about him, a brooding presence that somehow set him apart from the others.

  “All crows are equal,” Esther would squawk, but Silas knew how inadequate she felt in his company.

  He was always the first to know about everything. It was his keen eye, and his patience. So of course it was he who found something in the snow, something that made his heart thud and that he knew would set the woods alight with excitement.

  Pip could see only a snowy-white labyrinth of streets and alleyways, fairy-tale towers and winding stone staircases. Lantern lights spread a magical orange glow across everything. Here and there, where the overhangs jutted out, the snow was only a fine layer and for a moment it felt good to walk on solid ground.

  But there was a feeling as he walked, a sensation of dark and emptiness. As if something had happened here, something that killed the fairy-tale magic of the winding streets.

  The draw of torchlight lured him through an archway and up some steps, with his hog’s teeth pointing forward and the brush of his tail dusting behind him.

  A tall, wide building loomed down at Pip, with little windows and a low squat door with huge hinges that swirled and curved. A faded sign creaked gently overhead—the Deadman’s Hand.

  What happened next sent Pip’s heart racing at such a rate that it felt like it might, at any minute, pop out of his top pocket.

  A hand lunged at him from a half-open door and pulled him quickly inside.

  It had taken him by the scruff of the neck and lifted him right off his feet, hauling him in like a rag doll. The door slammed shut. A mound of snow fell from somewhere above and landed with a soft thump upon the ground.

  Pip looked up. He was now arranged untidily among a collection of small wooden barrels with his arms and legs in knots. Attached to the other end of the arm was a huge man, tall and wide with a wedge of black hair and spectacles perched on his nose.

  “You should be more careful, son!” he said, pulling Pip back onto his feet.

  “But wha—”

  “Don’t talk. Move,” he continued as he pushed Pip off through the back rooms of the inn.

  Back outside, Silas had heard the crunch of footsteps through the snow. He had been sleeping soundly in the recess of an archway but he was always on alert, even when he rested.

  He took a moment to come around before he flew silently through the air, stretching out the long fingers of his wings and following the disturbance upon the ground. Up he went, through Cleaver’s Walk and into Stones Alley.

  He rested atop an ugly, carved stone face that served the spouts and gutters of the priory roof. He looked down, tucking his beak into the plumes of his chest. Under the dance of lamplight Silas hopped downward with his wings out until he was up close and inspected the imprints that broke the perfect layer of white. His head lifted to one side.

  There in the snow were the smallest footprints he had seen in a long time. Perfectly formed, deep and crisp and clear.

  “Children … on the move!” he cawed excitedly, in a long low sneer. “Children indeed. And by the looks of it, only moments ago!”

  As the snow continued and covered up the fact that the prints had ever been there at all, he raised his wings once more and set off excitedly toward the Spindlewood, where he knew he could barter with his newfound wisdom.

  Pip saw everything fleetingly. A large room with a roaring fire and shadows of drinkers stooped over tables or nestling in the alcoves. Noise spilling out from every corner. The stale smell of ale and tobacco hanging in the air. Thuds and clunks and clangs mixed with shouts and bellowing laughter and the gentle hum of background music from a fiddler.

  “My name is Sam,” said the huge man. “Where are you from?”

  “Not here,” said Pip. “Far away!”

  “How on earth did you get inside these walls, boy? Didn’t your mother ever warn you about Hangman’s Hollow?”

  “I don’t have a mother, sir.”

  “What’s your name then?”

  “My name is Eddie Pipkin, but everyone calls me Pip. Did you say Hangman’s Hollow? The place where—” But he was cut off.

  “Look, Pip, just don’t make any noise. Stay here,” Sam urged, squeezing him into a small cupboard. “When it grows quiet I’ll bring you something to eat.”

  “Thank you … I think!”

  “You’d have frozen to death out there,” said Sam. He was about to leave when he turned back.

  “Listen. If you understand nothing else, make sure you understand this. There are no children here. You mustn’t let them find you.”

  He closed the door and Pip was left alone in the darkness. And as he sat and waited he wondered about all the things he had heard about the hollow.

  In the still silence of an old cloth sack sat the old wooden soldier. He waited patiently among the odds and ends, with only darkness to keep him company. The years had scratched flakes of paint from his uniform and scuffed the tips of his boots, the once-proud plume in his hat was crooked and lifeless. And he was sleeping soundly until something woke him. Click-click. The lids opened. Two eyes shifted from side to side. “There are children on the move,” he thought to himself. “Somewhere in the depths of the hollow. Escaping!” But having just awoken, he was not sure where from, or where to. And anyway, there was no one there to tell. He closed his eyes, click-click, and fell quickly back to sleep.

  There was something unearthly about the forest at night. Strange knockings, wood against wood. Distant cackling. The breaking of branches and all manner of noises that hinted at sinister goings-on under cover of darkness. Heavy snow covered the carpet of leaves that autumn had scattered. Vague shapes shifted through the trees. The eyes of wolves shone through the black. Shrills and squawks pierced the air and if you listened carefully, words seemed to whisper along the branches.

  Silas was perched on a low bough. He knew it would not be long before he was seen. Something was clinging to a nearby tree, its tattere
d black cloak draped across the frosted bark. It had its head cocked to one side and one keen green eye staring through the strands of its long hair. Clawed hands loosened their grip on the gnarled wood and the creature scuttled across to meet him.

  “Silas! What brings you back to the wood?” she asked. Her voice was sharp and throaty.

  “I’m growing hungry, Hogwick,” he announced. “It is some time since I have eaten.”

  “Dear Silas,” she said, drawing a hand out from under her cloak and stroking his plumage, “I think perhaps you have brought news with you.”

  “Maybe.”

  “No, not maybe.” She grinned and he could see her excitement at the thought that there was something to tell. It was only a moment before more wood witches came, emerging from the hollows of the trees, scrabbling on all fours across the forest floor to meet with their sister, and then standing on two feet to lift themselves up to where Silas was perched. The first, Esmie, was blind and older than the rest. She was skinny and frail, a real bag of old bones. The second, named Pugg, was the opposite, large and round.

  Esmie tilted her head to one side and waited. “Come on, come on. Out with it, Silas.” She cackled excitedly, showing her crooked teeth.

  “Quiet,” said Hogwick. “Silas belongs to me. I cannot remember the last time your companions brought us anything useful. Now let the bird have his say.”

  “I have seen and heard something this very night,” Silas announced, “but my belly aches so much with hunger I do not think I can get the words out.”

  “Stay there, Silas. Don’t move.” Hogwick skipped away, retrieving something from inside the hollow of a tree. They watched him swallow it whole.

  “Perhaps a little more,” he persuaded. “The cold nights seem to make me more hungry.” And the whole scenario was played out several times before eventually Silas was satisfied and let out his secret.

  “Are you sure?” questioned Hogwick excitedly. “A child, you say. A small child!” All three rubbed their hands with glee.

  “Children! Oooh, you’re making me feel hungry,” groaned Pugg. She laughed and set Esmie off doing the same.

  “QUIET. Where did the child go?” asked Hogwick, trying her best to dampen the excitement.

  “Mmmmm … I’m not sure. The snowfall has been heavy but beneath the overhangs its thickness peters out and the trail is lost,” Silas said. “It is hard to tell but the tracks were fresh and ran past the priory.”

  “Keep an eye out,” Hogwick said, “and I shall do the same, and be sure to come and seek me out if you grow hungry again.”

  The witches disappeared into the velvet black of the forest, trailing their feet through the white carpet and chattering to themselves.

  “There is nothing worse than a fitful sleep.” The old wooden soldier tossed and turned in the cloth sack. He’d had the same dream for several nights. At first, a girl all alone in the darkness. And now a small boy, lost and far from home, his tiny footprints embedded in the snow. If he thought hard enough he knew he could find them all, every last one of them, and one day soon he probably would. Click-click. He drifted back into sleep.

  It must have been the early hours of the morning when Pip heard the latch lift on the cupboard door. He’d been worn out and weather-beaten into a fitful sleep, but for how long he wasn’t sure.

  Sam took him to the large open room of the tavern, stocked with barrels and tankards, with candles flickering at the tables. Portraits of city folk were dotted around the room on the cracked plaster and it seemed as if the place had been furnished with whatever could be found. Church pews, wing-backed chairs, seats and tables made from barrels. But it was snug and warm and felt like a homely place.

  The inn had emptied and the only sound came from the dying fire as it spat and crumbled.

  Sam stared at the fire and Pip watched his face grow hypnotized by the flames.

  “They say they used to hang people here, in those woods,” Sam began. “Bad people. From those twisted boughs that creak and groan in the wind. And they say that all the badness from those people somehow found its way into those old Spindlewood trees, so deep that it planted its evil right down into the spiny roots. And that’s where those things came from.”

  “What things?” asked Pip, who was now perched on the edge of his chair.

  “You don’t know anything about this place, do you Pip?”

  “No sir, not at all. Once I heard of this place in a fairy tale. But the tale was so dark and twisted that I presumed the place didn’t exist and that none of it was true!”

  “Let me start at the beginning, Pip. Long ago.”

  They sat huddled up to the hearth and Sam gave Pip a plate of something hot. He ate it so fast he barely took any notice of what it was, and sat back in his huge chair.

  “It’s a hundred years now since these streets were newly laid,” said Sam, who was easing gently into his tale. “Craftsmen came to build up the timber frames and lay the stone. Cobbled walkways were sunk into the dry earth. Rooflines poked into the sky and chimney pots belched out smoke as the streets filled with people. The city was new then and there was the happiness that comes with a fresh start. For a good while it was peaceful, but then something awoke in the forest. The trees began to creak and groan. Not the creak and groan that is normal for a tree when the wind blows or the branches stretch out to grab hold of the sunlight. No, a painful long-lasting sound that signified some sort of change.

  “Hollows appeared in many of the trees. People claimed that something had hatched out from the Spindlewood. A darkness hung about the forest and the air turned heavy and oppressive. Animals disappeared from the woods and the birdsong stopped. Rumors whispered among the people and soon even the hardest of hunters and woodsmen were afraid to enter.

  “And then they came. Creatures from the forest, wood witches, and other things, creatures of all kinds and in great numbers.”

  Pip shivered and moved a little closer to the fire.

  Surely what Sam told him wasn’t true, it was just a story to teach him a lesson.

  Wasn’t it?

  “I don’t do fairy stories,” said Sam. “Not at this time of night!”

  He watched the boy’s expression and let the tale sink in.

  “Did you say creatures?” asked Pip.

  “You heard me right,” said Sam. “Creatures. All kinds of things that lurk and skulk in the twilight, that nest in shadowed streets and prey upon those foolish enough to venture out.”

  Suddenly, Pip’s home in the Oakes Orphanage and even the cabin aboard Snark’s pirate ship seemed like heaven. He had gone from bad to worse.

  “I should go from here,” he started. “Right now.”

  “That’s not as easy as you might think, young Pip. Even if you made it through the city to the gates, they would turn you over to the authorities. Any children discovered in the hollow are imprisoned until they are old enough to fight against the forest armies. And any adults found concealing children face a far worse fate!”

  “What! But can’t you smuggle me out?” asked Pip, with a lump well and truly placed in his throat.

  “And then what? You’re so far from anywhere you would perish if you tried to make it alone, and if I was caught they’d hang me at the gallows.”

  “I thought that tales of beasts and witches belonged in storybooks,” exclaimed Pip, staring deeply into the fire.

  “Of course,” said Sam. “But right here is where those stories came from!

  “Where the forest meets the city there is a gate. In the past, people left things there, for the beasts, of course. They believed it would prevent them from stealing their children, from making prisoners of them in their bid to take the city.

  “I do not wish to frighten you, Pip. But it is important that you stay safe. Children are becoming a thing of the past. When the wars began the creatures emerged from their lairs and took the little ones, imprisoning them in the forest. As the problem grew the people of the city became careful to
lock up their young and keep them out of sight. The creatures used their companions to seek out more little ones. Wolves and crows, rooks and ravens. Before long many children were gone and to prevent further disaster no one was allowed to bring children into the hollow.

  “Now the streets are empty of young life. Many people still have children and hide them away, but no one knows where or how many or if indeed it is true at all. No man trusts his neighbor. What fool would reveal the hiding place of his most prized possession?

  “The authorities search for children too. Young life is a threat to the safety of the city. They come in the night: voices in the early hours, shouts and yells, banging at the doors, shaking the timber frames. Raids, spot checks, call them what you will. It takes a crafty child to escape imprisonment by the authorities.

  “For now you must keep your head down. Don’t even look through the windows. It’s most important you’re not seen by the crows. For the taste of an old carcass they would betray your darkest secret.”

  “What kind of a place is this?” shuddered Pip. “And why are you helping me?”

  “It is a place to be feared and avoided,” said Sam. “And I am sorry that you came here not knowing that, but now that you are here and in my care, we must make sure you stay hidden. I have my own reasons for helping you.

  “If you hear horses’ hooves and voices and doors banging in the night, you must be ready to move. Make sure you sleep with your boots on. It’s my golden rule.”

  Pip was left to sleep by the fireside. The shutters were closed and the burning logs would keep him snug through the early hours. But the scene was almost like the one from his dream.

  While he slept his parents took their places in the empty chairs. Twisting knotted branches of Spindlewood wound around the carved wooden legs. Deadly forest creatures curled around the tendrils and crawled across the floor.