They waited behind me as Doolan strode through the mud. With his right hand he drew a long bloodstained knife from his belt; in his left, casually held by the hair, was a severed head. I felt sick to the pit of my stomach. The Butcher raised it up so that the mages could get a good look at it.
I recognized that face—both beautiful and cruel, with high cheekbones and lips that were painted black.
“Behold! The head of the witch!” he cried.
I was looking at the face of the witch assassin.
Grimalkin was dead.
CHAPTER XV
DARK ANGEL
MY heart sank into my boots. Everything was lost. My hope of escape had been snatched away. Grimalkin had also offered our only real hope of binding the Fiend. I felt sad, too. She had been a malevolent witch, the assassin of the Malkin clan, but we had fought alongside each other. Without Grimalkin’s help, I would be dead already.
“Where is Scarabek?” asked Thin Shaun.
“She’s safe enough,” Doolan told him, “but was hurt in the struggle. I came on ahead to bring you the news. She is happy for me to deal with the boy and give him the slow death he justly deserves. I will start now,” he said, lifting the knife and licking the blood from its long blade.
I was pulled to my feet, and my bonds were cut. Then Thin Shaun seized me by the hair and dragged me toward the chief mage.
“Death has come for you, boy!” he cried. “Look upon his fearsome face!”
The Butcher, Doolan, smiled grimly. Then he said something really strange:
“Death has sent his dark angel instead!”
Dark angel? What did he mean?
I looked at Doolan and saw that there was something weird about him. A purple light shimmered around his head, and his face seemed to be melting. He was shifting his shape. His lips were now black. The forehead seemed narrower, too; the cheekbones higher. It was no longer the face of the chief mage.
It was Grimalkin.
As usual, the witch assassin was dressed to deal out death. Her body was crisscrossed with leather straps, each holding more than one sheath; they housed her blades and the scissors she used to snip away the thumb bones of her defeated enemies. From her left shoulder was suspended a small burlap sack. What new weapon did that contain? I wondered. Her lips were painted black, and when she opened her mouth I could see those terrifying teeth, each one filed to a sharp point. She looked dangerous, every inch a killer.
The witch assassin had used a cloak of dark magic to deceive her enemies. I felt a surge of joy; I wasn’t dead yet. In her left hand Grimalkin held the severed head of Doolan, which she now tossed disdainfully into the mud at her feet. In one fluid motion she hurled the long knife toward me with terrible force. But I was not the target, and Grimalkin rarely missed.
Thin Shaun screamed, and his hand convulsed before releasing my hair. I turned and watched him fall to his knees in the mud, the knife up to its hilt in his chest. The mages around me panicked and started to move backward, away from the witch.
Grimalkin ran forward, grabbed me by the left shoulder, and spun me behind her. I slipped and went down on my hands and knees in the mud. Now she was between me and our enemies, crouching, ready to attack. A guard launched a spear toward her chest. The aim was good and it was fast, but at the last moment she knocked it aside with the edge of her hand, simultaneously hurling another knife. The guard died even before his spear had been deflected to the ground. I scrambled to my feet.
“Run for the steps! Use the rope!” the witch cried, pointing toward the wall.
I did as she commanded, but I was unfit after long days and nights of imprisonment and ill treatment. My legs felt sluggish, the mud sucking at my boots and delaying my progress. I glanced back and saw that, as yet, Grimalkin was making no attempt to follow me. She was fighting a dozen mages and guards, whirling and cutting. I heard screams and groans of agony as her blades slashed and stabbed, driving back her foes.
I’d reached the steps; I began to climb as fast as I was able, my legs as heavy as lead. I was now at the ramparts and glanced back down again. Grimalkin had retreated and was fighting next to the iron pillar to which the end of the rope was tied.
I suddenly saw a great danger. Once she left that position and tried to make her own escape, they would cut through the rope. Surely she must be aware of the danger, I thought. I clambered over the edge of the wall and began to climb down. I felt dizzy and spun around and around on the rope, finding it hard to hold on.
At last, breathless and weak with exertion, I reached the ground and looked up. There were cries from beyond the ramparts; then Grimalkin appeared at the top of the wall and began her rapid descent. My heart was in my mouth, but she was suddenly there at my side, pointing to the east.
“Our best hope is to follow the coast that way!” she told me.
Without waiting for a reply, she ran off. I kept up as best I could, but she began to get farther and farther ahead. She halted and came back toward me. Turning, I could see the lights of torches on the distance.
“There are too many of them to fight,” she said. “Soon they’ll send for horses as well. You’ve got to move faster. Our lives depend on it.”
My mind was willing, but my body simply couldn’t match its demands. “I can’t,” I said. “I’ve been tied up for days and I’ve eaten little. I’m sorry, but I just haven’t the strength.”
Without another word, the witch seized me by my legs and heaved me up onto her shoulders as if I were no more than a sack of feathers. Then she headed east.
Grimalkin ran for at least an hour. Once she leaped across a stream; on another occasion she slipped to her knees on a slope. The next thing I knew, I was being taken into some sort of shelter and lowered to the ground. Then I fell into a really deep sleep. When I awoke, Grimalkin was cooking something over a fire, the smoke drifting up a chimney.
I sat up slowly and looked about me. It was daylight, and we were sheltering in an abandoned cottage. I could see no furniture, and animals had obviously been using the place before us. There was sheep dung on the stone flags near the doorway. The cottage had no door, and the single window was broken. It was drafty, but the roof was still intact, and it was dry.
The witch assassin was crouching in the hearth, slowly rotating two rabbits impaled on spits. She turned and gave me a smile, showing her sharp teeth. Then, to my surprise, I saw my staff leaning against the wall in the far corner of the room.
“I retrieved your staff from Scarabek’s cottage and left it here on my way to Staigue. Are you feeling better now?” she asked.
I nodded. “Yes, and thank you for saving my life. Again.” I gestured toward the fire. “Aren’t you bothered about the smoke from the chimney? Are they still searching for us?”
“Yes, but they won’t find us here—I’ve cloaked this place with magic. Once night falls we’ll continue our journey.”
“Where are we going?” I wondered.
“To Kenmare, to meet your master.”
“Have you spoken to him already?”
“Yes. He made his way back there—though Alice wasn’t with him and I’ve had no further contact with her. She’s well beyond the protection of the blood jar.”
I bowed my head. “The blood jar can’t help her now,” I said sadly. “The Celtic witch, Scarabek, gave Alice to the Fiend, and he took her away into his domain.”
“The poor girl,” Grimalkin replied. “Then she is lost. There is nothing we can do for her. I wish I’d known that. I let Scarabek go. She’d served her purpose—she was just a way to free you. I should have killed her!”
When I heard these words, I felt a stab of pain in my heart. They confirmed what I already believed, but coming from the witch assassin’s lips, they held a terrible finality.
“Now that she’s free, Scarabek will come looking for me again,” I told her. “I was with Bill Arkwright when he killed her twin sister. She seeks revenge before giving me to the Fiend.”
“Yo
u needn’t worry. You’ll be safe with me at your side,” Grimalkin said. “Besides, I took something else from the witch’s cottage.”
She handed me the burlap sack I’d noticed earlier. I opened it and, to my delight, saw that it contained my silver chain.
“Put it away,” Grimalkin said. “Even with it in the sack, it burned my fingers. I can’t bear to be near it!”
Then she lifted one of the spits and held it out toward me. “Eat up. You’ll need your strength.”
For a while we ate in silence. The rabbit was delicious. I was starving, and kept burning my mouth in my eagerness to wolf it down.
“How did your master take the news about the blood jar?” Grimalkin asked. “He said little to me; he seemed subdued and deep in thought. He can hardly find it easy to accept that his apprentice is protected by dark magic.”
“He took it very badly,” I answered, automatically checking that it still lay in my pocket. “For a moment I thought he was going to smash it immediately—sending the three of us to the dark forever. But then he relented; it was as if your plan had given him new hope. Life’s dealt him a bad hand in recent months. His house and library were burned to the ground—the heritage it was his duty to keep safe. He’s never been the same since.”
“Well, he won’t have expected us to be allies again after Greece. That won’t be easy for him either,” she remarked.
“Did Alice tell you that the jar is cracked and starting to fail?”
Grimalkin nodded. “She did, and it’s essential that we deal with the Fiend as soon as possible.”
“How did you escape from Scotland?” I asked.
“By terrifying a poor fisherman into bringing me here,” she replied with a fierce smile. “I paid him by sparing his life.”
“And how are things back in the County?” I asked, licking the last fragments of succulent rabbit from my fingers.
“At the moment it’s very bad. People have nothing—the enemy soldiers have taken everything. But they will not hold sway forever.”
“But we still might have to wait a long time before venturing home,” I guessed.
I thought of my family, living in the County. How were they surviving the enemy occupation? The farm might well have been raided and the animals driven off to be slaughtered as food for the troops. Would my brothers Jack and James have tried to resist? If so, they could be dead.
“The enemy has advanced too far. Their forces and their lines of supply are stretched thin,” Grimalkin asserted. “And they have not yet overcome the most northerly counties. Beyond them, the Lowland Scots are gathering; in the spring they’ll be joined by the Highlanders. Then they will launch an attack together, and the men of the County will rise up again—we witches will play our part, too. There will be many deaths. We will drive the enemy south, then into the sea. Our scryers have seen it come to pass.”
Witch scryers really did see the future, but I knew that they could also be wrong, so I didn’t comment. Instead, I directed Grimalkin’s thoughts toward our most powerful enemy. “Do you really believe that we can bind the Fiend?” I asked.
“Would I have come all this way otherwise?” She gave me a brief smile. “Though we need to discuss everything with John Gregory. The attempt will be dangerous and could be the end of us. It’s a big risk—but yes, I do believe that it can be done. Where the Fiend is bound is important. It must be possible to hide the site from those who might wish to release him.”
“By dark magic?”
The witch assassin nodded. “Yes, I will wrap a cloak of dark magic about the place. But it must be remote—we mustn’t have anyone stumbling upon it by chance.”
After dark we continued toward Kenmare. I was feeling much stronger now, and was pleased to feel my staff in my hand and to hear the familiar chink of my silver chain in my pocket. Mostly we strode along in silence, but I was preoccupied by thoughts of Alice’s plight, and eventually I brought the subject up again.
“Is there really no hope for Alice?” I asked. “No way of getting her back?”
“I fear we can do nothing. I wish it were otherwise.”
“But what if we do manage to bind the Fiend? Won’t that make a difference?”
“When we destroy the blood jar, he will come, desperate to seize you. He will leave Alice behind, and there she will remain. I know it is a terrible thing to accept—but console yourself with the thought that, once he’s been bound and cut off from his domain, Alice’s pain will surely lessen. He will not be there to mete it out.”
Grimalkin’s attempt to console me failed. I thought of Alice, trapped in the dark, lonely, afraid, and in unimaginable torment. I remembered the words of Pan:
The Fiend is a law unto himself and owns the largest domain of all. It is a terrible place for a mortal to be, living or dead.
CHAPTER XVI
THE DRAGON’S LAIR
WE reached Kenmare about two hours before dawn and approached the high wall that enclosed Shey’s fortified mansion. Intercepted by several aggressive guards at the gate, Grimalkin drew a blade and showed them her pointed teeth. In the lantern light she looked every inch the fearsome witch, but the men, although they recognized me, were wary of a witch and prepared to attack.
There were five of them, but I wouldn’t have given much for their chances against Grimalkin. However, sense prevailed, and I persuaded them to send one of their number back to the house to wake Shey and the Spook. The guard returned quickly, muttered an apology, and we were escorted in.
I had a brief meeting alone with my master and told him what had happened. When I came to the part where the Fiend had disappeared, taking the terrified Alice back into the dark with him, a lump came into my throat and I gave a sob, my eyes filling with tears.
The Spook put his hand on my shoulder and patted it gently. “There’s little I can say to make you feel better, lad. Just try to be strong.”
Grimalkin and I joined the Spook and Shey in the study in the east wing, where a peat fire was burning in the hearth.
I suppose I’d never expected to see the leader of the Land Alliance again, thinking he was bound to be killed when the walls of Ballycarbery Castle were breached. But he told us that the enemy forces had merely come to take the mage we’d held prisoner so that he could be sacrificed. So once that aim was achieved, they’d immediately called off the siege.
“You did well, boy!” Shey congratulated me. “One of our spies brought us word. Magister Doolan is dead. Single-handed, you stopped the ritual. It took some courage to free the goat and push it off the platform.”
“I wasn’t really alone,” I told him. Then I explained about my visit to the Hollow Hills and how Pan had played his part.
They all listened in silence, but when I’d finished, Shey reached across and clapped me on the back.
“It was incredibly brave,” he said. “Most people would have been driven insane by him.”
“Indeed, but we’re seventh sons of seventh sons,” explained the Spook. “In such situations, that gives us the strength that others lack.”
“Maybe,” said Grimalkin, “but Tom is more than that. Remember, he also has the blood of his mother running through his veins. Do you really believe that Pan would have deigned to cooperate with you, John Gregory, in that way? I think not.”
The Spook didn’t reply, but neither did he disagree. Instead, he reached across and picked up Shey’s map of Kerry. Then he unfolded it and spread it out on the table.
“Am I right in saying that you’ve once again reached a stalemate with the mages?” he asked, looking directly at the leader of the Land Alliance.
Shey nodded. “I’m afraid so. The rites may have been brought to a premature end, but they gained some power—any further attack made on them now may be risky.”
“Well, we are going to attempt something very dangerous, but if it succeeds, it could help your cause too,” the Spook went on. “We are going to try and bind the Fiend—the Devil himself. If that can be achieved,
the power of the dark and all its other servants will be reduced. Aye, and that would include the mages.
“What we need is a remote location, a suitable place to bind him. This is your land. Where do you suggest?” he asked, pointing at the map.
Shey got to his feet, rested his hands on the table, and studied the map, tracing the line of the coast southwest toward Cahersiveen with his index finger before moving inland. “There’s a ruined church there,” he said, jabbing at a point with his finger. “Kealnagor. The locals think it’s haunted, so they stay away. You couldn’t choose better than that.”
“It’s a little too close to the ring fort at Staigue,” said the Spook. “The last thing we want is one of the mages coming across it—especially while we’re doing the binding.”
Shey moved his finger eastward and tapped Kenmare. “Why not do it near here, then? This is probably the area that’s safest from the interference of the mages. And there is one place that most local folk avoid: a stone circle that lies just outside the village.”
“Is that haunted too?” the Spook asked him.
He shook his head. “There’s something there for sure, but perhaps not a ghost. I visited it once for a wager and felt it myself, though I could see nothing. It’s a creepy place, especially after dark. I kept shivering—I just knew that there was something nearby, something huge and terrifying. Even in daylight, people keep well away.”
“Well, I suggest that we go and see this haunted stone circle.” The Spook smiled. “It could be just what we’re looking for!”
It was a bright, clear morning, and the ground was dusted with frost. As yet there was little warmth in the sun, and our breath steamed up into the crisp air. As the stone circle wasn’t far from Shey’s house, we set off before breakfast, as soon as it was light. It was perfect weather for walking, and we took the dogs. They ran ahead, barking excitedly, glad to be out and reunited with us all again.
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