The Last Apprentice: Complete Collection

by Joseph Delaney

  “Where is Wurmalde now?” demanded the Spook.

  “Gone! Gone! Gone to a place where you will never find her. Not until it’s too late. Soon my mistress will summon the Fiend through the dark portal into this world. For two days he will do her bidding. That done, he will choose his own path. Do you know what task she has set? What price the Fiend must pay for what my mistress gives him?”

  The Spook sighed wearily but didn’t bother to reply. I saw his hands twitch on the staff. He was readying himself to slay the creature.

  “The death of this boy is the task. He must die because he is his mother’s son. The son of our enemy. Once, in a distant land, she was an immortal like my mistress and wielded dark power. But she faltered. Despite many warnings, she reached toward the light. So she was bound to a rock and left to die—left there to be destroyed by the sun, the very symbol of the light she wished to serve. But, by mischance, a human saved her. A fool freed her from her chains—”

  “My dad was no fool!” I interrupted. “He was good and kind and couldn’t bear to see her suffer. He wouldn’t have allowed anybody to suffer like that.”

  “Better for you, boy, had he passed on by. For then you would never have been born. Never have lived your short, futile life! But do you think that merely by being rescued she was changed forever? Far from it! For a while she was in torment, not knowing which way to go, dithering between darkness and light. Old habits die hard, and gradually the dark drew her back. So she was given a second chance and commanded to slay her rescuer, but she prayed, disobeyed, and turned to the light once more. Those who serve the light are hard upon themselves. To make up for what she had done, she gave herself a cruel penance: She surrendered her immortality. But that was only half of it. She chose to give her youth, the best part of her pitifully short life, to her rescuer. She gave herself to a mortal man, a common sailor, and chose to bear him seven sons.”

  “Seven sons who loved her!” I cried. “She was happy. She was content—”

  “Happy! Happy! Do you think happiness comes so easily? Imagine what it must have been like for one who was once so high to serve a mortal man and his brood, the stench of the farmyard ever in her nostrils. To share his bed while his flesh withered with age. To deal with the tedium of the everyday routine. She regretted it, but at last his death has freed her, ending her self-inflicted penance, and now she has returned to her own land.”

  “No,” I said. “It wasn’t like that at all! She loved my dad.”

  “Love,” sneered Tibb. “Love is a delusion that binds mortals to their fates. And now your mother has risked all in a bid to destroy what my mistress holds dear. She wants to destroy the darkness, and she has fashioned you as her weapon. So you must never be allowed to grow up into a man. We must put an end to you.”

  “Aye,” said the Spook, raising his staff, “and now it’s time to put an end to you.”

  “Have mercy,” pleaded Tibb. “I need a little more time. Let me die in peace.”

  “What mercy did you show to Master Nowell?” demanded the Spook. “So what you gave to him, I’ll give to you—”

  I turned away as the Spook stabbed downward. Tibb gave a short scream that transmuted itself into the squealing of a pig. There was a brief snuffling and then silence. Still not looking at the creature, I followed my master up the steps and back into the study.

  “Nowell’s body will have to stay unburied for a while,” the Spook said, shaking his head sadly. “No doubt poor Father Stocks is still upstairs, and maybe we’ll never find out what happened to Constable Barnes. As for Wurmalde, from what that creature just said, she could be anywhere, and we haven’t time to just search blindly. We’ve still got the witch covens to deal with, so let’s start by getting back to the tower. James should return soon with the men from Downham. We can’t deal with the witches alone. We need to raise a small army and get ourselves organized. Time’s running short.”

  The Spook paused by Nowell’s desk. It wasn’t locked, and he started to search the drawers. Within moments he held up my silver chain.

  “Here you are, lad,” he said, throwing it toward me. “No doubt you’ll be needing this before very long.”

  We left Read Hall and set off in a heavy downpour for Malkin Tower, the things that Tibb had said going around and around inside my head.

  Wet and bedraggled, we made the journey through the tunnels without mishap. Then, as we prepared to climb the spiral steps up into the tower, I turned to the Spook, wanting to get a few things off my chest.

  “Do you think what Tibb said was true?” I asked.

  “Which bits are you referring to, lad?” asked the Spook gruffly. “The creature belonged to the dark, and that makes anything it said dubious, to say the least. As you well know, the dark deceives whenever it is to its advantage to do so. It said it was dying, but how could I be sure that was the case? That’s why I had to kill it there and then. It might have seemed cruel, but it was my duty. I had no choice.”

  “I mean the bit about my mam once being like Wurmalde—being an immortal? As mam’s sisters are lamias, I thought she’d be the same.”

  “No doubt she is, lad. But what does being an immortal actually mean? This world itself will end one day. Maybe even the stars themselves will go out. No, I don’t believe that anything lives forever in this world, and nothing with any sense would want to. But lamias live a very long time. In their human form they may seem to age, but once feral again they become young once more. They could have many lifetimes in human shape, and start out each time looking like a young woman. One day we may find out what that creature meant. Maybe it lied. Maybe it didn’t. As your mam said, the answers are in those trunks, and one day, if all goes well, you’ll maybe get a chance to look through them properly.”

  “But what about the Fiend coming through the portal? What is a portal anyway?”

  “It’s a sort of invisible gate. A weakness between this world and the places where creatures such as the Fiend dwell. Using dark magic, the witches will try to open it and allow the Fiend through. We’ll just have to do our best to put a stop to it,” said the Spook, his voice echoing up the steps. “We need to break up the Lammas sabbath and halt the ritual. Of course, that’s much easier said than done. But, even if we fail, your mother’s made provision. That’s why she left you that room—”

  “But would I have time to get there if the Fiend’s been ordered to hunt me down and kill me? It’s a long way home.”

  “Things loosed into the world often take time to gather their wits and gain power. Remember how the Priestown Bane was disorientated for a while? Once freed into the wider world, it was weakened at first and grew in power slowly. Well, I suspect this so-called Fiend may have the same problem. You’d get some time—how much, it’s impossible to say. But if I do give the word, get yourself home just as soon as you can and take refuge in that room of yours.”

  “There was something else Tibb said that bothers me,” I said. “Something he said when I saw him for the first time. He said that Mam was singing a goat song and I was at its center. What could that mean?”

  “You should have been able to work that out for yourself, lad. In your mam’s tongue, the word tragos means goat. And oide means ode or story. So a goat song is a tragedy. That’s where we get the word from. And if you’re at its center, Tibb is saying that your life will be tragic—wasted and doomed to failure. But it’s best to look on the bright side and take all that with a pinch of salt. Each day we make decisions that shape our lives. I still can’t accept the idea that anything can be preordained. No matter how powerful the dark becomes, we have to believe that, somehow, we’ll defeat it. Look up there, lad! What do you see?”

  “Steps leading to the upper part of the tower . . . ”

  “Aye, lad, steps—and a lot of them! But we’re going to climb them, aren’t we? Weary as my old bones are, we’re going to climb every one of those steps until we reach the upper floor and the waiting light. And that’s what life’s
all about. So come on! Let’s get on with it!”

  So saying, the Spook led the way up the spiral steps and I followed at his heels. Up toward the light.

  CHAPTER XXI

  Back to Downham

  THERE was good news waiting for us back in the tower. Alice had found something that she really thought might finally cure Jack.

  “Sent him into another deep sleep, it has,” she explained. “But this potion heals the mind rather than the body. I translated it from one of your mam’s notebooks—how to mix it, how much of each herb to use. Everything. And all the ingredients were inside the trunk, each one labeled.”

  “I can’t thank you enough,” Ellie said, smiling at Alice warmly.

  “Ain’t me you need to thank—it’s Tom’s mam. Take years to learn all there is in that trunk,” Alice continued. “Compared to this, Bony Lizzie knew nothing.”

  Jack continued to sleep until late in the afternoon, and we were feeling really optimistic that, before long, it would be the old Jack who woke. But then we got the bad news.

  James returned. But he returned alone. The Downham villagers were too afraid to help.

  “I tried my best,” James said wearily, “but there was nothing more that I could do. Their courage has deserted them. Even Matt Finley, the blacksmith, refused to leave Downham.”

  The Spook shook his head sadly. “Well, if they won’t come to us, then we’ll just have to go to them. But I’m not optimistic, James. You got through to them last time, and I felt confident that you’d be able to do it again. But we’ll have to try. Tomorrow night is the Lammas sabbath, and we must disrupt it at all costs. No doubt Wurmalde will be with the other witches, and I think that’s going to be my best chance of finding and binding her.”

  So, soon after dark, we prepared to return to Downham. We were leaving Ellie, Jack, and Mary behind in the tower, where they’d be safe.

  “Well,” said the Spook, looking at James, Alice, and me in turn, “I wish there were an easier way. But it’s got to be done. I just hope we all come safely through what lies ahead. Whatever happens, one thing is in our favor. This tower is now in our hands, and the trunks and their contents are safe. So at least we’ve achieved that.”

  My master was right. The lamias controlled Malkin Tower now. With luck, I’d soon be able to return and look through Mam’s trunks properly. But first— hopefully with the help of the Downham villagers—we had to face the witch clans and break up their sabbath before the ritual could be carried out.

  So we left the tower, using the tunnels once more. As we walked north, the wind was blustering in from the west and there was a chill in the air. At Downham we spent the remainder of the night in Father Stocks’s cottage, grabbing a few hours’ sleep while we could. Up before dawn to catch the men before their working day began, we wasted no time in calling at each house in the village, desperately trying to rally an army. I accompanied Alice, dealing with the outlying cottages and nearest farms, while the Spook and James concentrated on its heart.

  We arrived at the first cottage just in time to find its occupant stepping out into the gray dawn light. He was a farm laborer, gnarled and grumpy, rubbing sleep out of his bleary eyes with the prospect of a long, hard day’s work ahead. Even before we spoke, I could tell that he’d give us short shrift.

  “There’s a meeting at dusk in the church,” I told him. “All the menfolk of the village are invited. It’s to plan how we can deal with the threat from the witches. We’ve got to sort them tonight.”

  Alice’s pointy shoes didn’t help. The man’s eyes flicked suspiciously from them to my cloak and staff. I could tell that he didn’t like the look of either of us.

  “And who’s calling this meeting?” he demanded.

  I thought quickly. I could use James’s name. Most of them would know him by now, but they’d also rejected his recent plea. The man seemed nervous enough already, and if I mentioned the Spook, I’d probably scare him off altogether. The lie slipped from my lips even before I could think.

  “Father Stocks.”

  The man nodded when he heard the name. “I’ll do my best to be there. Can’t promise, though—I’ve a busy day ahead.” With that he slammed the door shut, turned on his heels, and set off up the hill.

  I turned to Alice and shook my head. “I feel bad about lying,” I told her.

  “Ain’t no use thinking that way,” she told me. “Did the right thing for sure. If the priest were still alive, he would be calling the meeting. What’s the difference? We’re just calling it for him, that’s all.”

  I nodded uncertainly, but from that moment the pattern was set and on each subsequent occasion I used Father Stocks’s name. It was difficult to judge how many were likely to attend the meeting, but I wasn’t optimistic. The truth was, some didn’t even bother to answer their doors, others muttered their excuses, while one old man went into a rage:

  “What’s your sort doing in our village? That’s what I want to know,” he said, spitting toward Alice’s shoes. “We’ve been hag-ridden enough in the past, but it’ll happen no more! Get ye gone from my sight, little witch!”

  Alice took it calmly, and we simply turned and went on our way. The Spook and James had had little more success than us. My brother said that it all depended on the blacksmith. He’d seemed in two minds, but if he did decide in favor of action, then many of the others would follow his lead. When I told the Spook about my lie, he made no comment, simply nodding in acknowledgment.

  The remainder of the day was spent in anxious waiting. Time was running short. Would the villagers turn up in sufficient numbers to give us a chance? If they did, would we be able to persuade them to act? Then again, would we have enough time to race to Pendle Hill and disrupt the Lammas rituals? While these thoughts were whirling through my head, I suddenly remembered something else: August 3, two days after Lammas, was my birthday.

  I remembered the celebrations we used to have back at the farm. When one of our family had a birthday, Mam would always bake a special cake. I’d traveled a long way from such happy times. How could I even think beyond the danger we would face when dark fell? It seemed useless to hope for too much from this life. Such happiness belonged to my brief time as a child, and now that was over.

  As the sun went down, we waited patiently in the narrow church with its single aisle. We’d helped ourselves to candles from the tiny sacristy and placed these on the altar and in the metal candlesticks on either side of the doorway.

  Long before the first villager came nervously into the church and took a seat near the back, the sky had darkened to the hue of Horshaw coal. This first visitor was an oldish man who walked with a limp—one better suited to resting his weary bones by the fireside than venturing up onto Pendle Hill to fight a battle that was fraught with peril. Others followed, either singly or in pairs, but even after almost half an hour had passed there were no more than a dozen. Each man removed his cap on entering. Two of the boldest nodded toward James, but without exception all kept their eyes averted from the Spook. I could sense their extreme nervousness. The men had frightened faces, some visibly shivering despite the mildness of the air, and looked ready to flee rather than fight. It seemed to me that at the first sign of a witch they’d scatter and run.

  But then, when all seemed lost, there was a murmur of voices from outside in the darkness and a big man dressed in a leather jerkin walked into the church at the head of at least another two dozen villagers. I guessed that this was Matt Finley, the blacksmith. Out of respect for the sanctity of the church, he removed his hat, and as he took his place in the front pew, he nodded to James and the Spook in turn. We’d been standing to the left of the small altar, close to the wall, but when the newcomers had all taken their seats, the Spook signaled to my brother, who stepped forward and positioned himself facing the aisle.

  “We really appreciate that you’ve all taken the time and trouble to listen to us tonight,” James began. “The last thing we want is for you to place yourselves
in danger, but we do desperately need your help and wouldn’t ask if it were possible to do what’s required by ourselves. A terrible evil threatens us all. Before midnight there’ll be witches up on Pendle Hill. Witches who plan to loose a great mischief into the world. We need to stop them.”

  “If I’m not mistaken, there are witches up on yonder hill already,” said the blacksmith. “They’ve just lit a beacon that can be seen for miles!”

  At these words, concern tightened the Spook’s face; he shook his head and stepped forward to stand beside James. “There’s serious work to do tonight, lads,” he said. “Time is short. That beacon up yonder signals that they’ve already begun their foul work. It gives notice of the threat to you, your families, and all that you hold dear. The witches think they own the whole land now. No longer content to cower in remote dells, they flaunt their evil from the very top of Pendle Hill! If we don’t stop them, darkness will fall upon this land. None of us will be safe—neither the strong nor the weak, neither adult nor child. No more will we sleep easy in our beds. The whole world will become a place of danger, plague, and famine, and the Fiend himself will walk the lanes and byways of the County, while witches rule the earth and prey upon your children. We must make this land safe!”

  “Our village is safe now!” snapped the blacksmith. “And we’ve fought hard to make it that way. Not only that. If needs be, we’d fight again to keep it this way. But why should we risk our lives to do the work that’s the duty of others? Where are the men of Roughlee, Bareleigh, and Goldshaw Booth? Why don’t they drive out the canker that’s in their midst? Why is it up to us?”