The kretch stood up on its hind legs. Its hands no longer wielded blades, but they were red with blood. In its left, it held the still-beating heart of Wynde. As I watched, it tore it in two and began to eat it, blood staining its teeth and running from its open jaws.
CHAPTER X
HER SPIRIT LIVES ON
Some worship dark gods, others serve the light;
but I walk alone.
I am Grimalkin.
I watched in silence, powerless, the anger beginning to build within me. The kretch had made certain that the lamia could not return. For Wynde there would be no afterlife as a dead witch. She had been sent straight back to the dark.
When it had finished devouring the lamia’s heart, the kretch shouted up at us. “Soon this is what I will do to you! Your days are numbered. Your heart will be mine, Grimalkin. This is the fate that awaits the enemies of my master!”
“For what you have done, I will kill you all!” I cried. “Each and every one of you will die at my hands. Scatter and flee—but I will hunt you to the ends of the earth. I swear it!”
The kretch and the mage simply laughed at my words, and immediately the witches joined in, the cacophony of cackling laughter and wild whoops of amusement echoing across the clearing.
It was time to give them a reply that they would understand, so I bent down, untied the leather sack, and drew forth the head of the Fiend. I held it up by the horns so that it was facing out over the battlements.
“Now I will hurt the one whom you most love, the one whom you all serve! This is what your actions have cost your master! He will hold you to account!”
I drew a dagger and plunged it into the right eye of the Fiend, twisting the blade savagely.
The head could not cry out because the mouth was filled with the green apple and rose thorns. But nevertheless, there was a terrible scream. It seemed to rise out of the ground beneath our feet. Then a voice boomed out from the bowels of the earth.
“You have failed me! Woe to you all! An eternity of torment awaits those who fail me a second time! What I suffer, you will each suffer a thousandfold!”
The earth trembled, the tower shook, and a vivid streak of forked lightning rent the sky from north to south, the answering rumble of thunder so loud that it drowned out the horrified screams of the witches below. But I could see their mouths open, their eyes filled with horror at what I had done and what the Fiend had said. They ran around in circles like headless chickens while a great wind buffeted the trees, bowing and shaking their branches.
At last calm descended, and I looked down at each of the witches in turn so that they could see the death waiting in my eyes.
“Be gone from this place. Go far!” I cried. “Tomorrow night at this time I will return to the battlements. If I see or sniff your presence in these woods, I will put out your master’s remaining eye! Do I make myself clear?”
No one answered from below. All were silent—even the bearded mage and the kretch. With bowed heads, they turned their backs on me and returned slowly to the cover of the trees.
Thorne was staring at me, her eyes shining. “You showed them! That shut them up!” she exclaimed.
I nodded grimly. “But for how long?” I asked.
Black blood was dripping from the ruined eye socket. I spat on the Fiend’s forehead, then returned his ugly head to the leather sack.
“If they stay away tomorrow night, we’ll leave this place,” I said.
“Aren’t we safer here than anywhere else?” Thorne asked.
“That’s not the problem, child. Without the winged lamia to hunt for us, we will eventually starve. Not only that—our enemies will gather here in greater and greater numbers. No siege can last forever.”
She grimaced. “Where will we go?”
“There are several possibilities, but none of them better fortified than here. Let me think awhile. In the meantime, we should go down to tell Slake what has befallen her sister.”
We went into the storeroom and passed down through the trapdoor onto the spiral steps and into the damp chill of the lower part of the tower. When we reached the dungeons, I sensed the presence of the lamia. She had already left the tunnels.
We found her kneeling at the foot of the lamia gibbet. The dead animals were still suspended from the chains, but blood no longer dripped into the bucket, which was now full to the brim. Just one torch flickered from a wall bracket nearby. I sensed no immediate danger. Only a few rats moved in the darkness.
Slake was muttering to herself and swaying rhythmically from side to side. At first I thought that she was weaving a spell, chanting some sort of incantation, but her voice was suddenly filled with fervor, as if she had some desperate need to be heard. She lifted her arms toward the gibbet and bowed three times. Was this some kind of worship? Was she praying to her god? If so, who could it be?
I gestured to Thorne, and we moved back into the shadows beyond the pillars. “Let her do what she must. We will speak to her when she is ready,” I whispered.
After a few minutes Slake bowed low before rising to her feet. Then she turned to the bucket of animal blood, gave a guttural cry, lifted it to her lips, and drank deeply. Three times she cried out, drinking immediately afterward. By the third cry, I realized that it was a word she was calling out—perhaps someone’s name.
When the bucket was empty, she replaced it at the foot of the gibbet, turned, and approached us. Despite her absorption in what she’d been doing, the lamia had been aware of our presence all along.
Slake bowed to us, though not as deeply as she had before the gibbet. The front of her dress was saturated with blood that had spilled from the bucket. Strangely, her face looked less human than when I had last seen her on the battlements. The eyes were savage, the mouth like a red wound that her own sharp teeth might have devoured from within.
“I’m sorry to bring you bad news,” I said softly, “but your sister died bravely, fighting the kretch. Then the merciless creature ate her heart.”
Not even a flicker of emotion passed across the lamia’s face. “I already know,” she replied. “I sensed the moment of her death. That is why I was praying.”
“To whom do you pray?” I asked. “Which god is it?”
“It is the god of all lamias, of course.”
I frowned. “I do not know of this god.”
“We call her Zenobia. She was the first—the ancestor of us all. You were with her in Greece. She is the mother of Thomas Ward, the Spook’s apprentice.”
“But she was destroyed fighting the Ordeen.”
Although I was not witness to the event, Tom Ward had told me how his mother, in her winged form, had held the Ordeen in a death grip. But as they fought, the Ordeen’s citadel had been consumed by a pillar of fire, and they were carried back into the dark.
“Not destroyed—her spirit lives on. She has spoken to us. She gave me instructions just then, as I prayed.”
I remembered how close Tom Ward had been to his mother. If she had spoken to this lamia, surely the spirit must have communicated with him too?
“Instructions . . . concerning what?” I asked.
“She commanded me to stay here without my sister and defend the tower against our enemies. Above all, I must protect the trunk, which contains information that might aid her son in his attempts to destroy the Fiend.”
“You’ve already searched that trunk and read the books. What did you learn? Tell me and I will pass it on.”
“It is not straightforward—far from it. Many ages ago Zenobia was in conflict with the Fiend. She tried in vain to destroy him—though she did manage to hobble him by means of dark magic, thus placing a limit on his power. These are the terms of that hobble: If he kills Thomas Ward himself, then he will reign on in our world for a hundred years before he’s forced to retreat back to where he came from. But if he enlists the services of one of his children to do the deed—the son or daughter of a witch—then the Fiend can rule on in the world indefinitely. Then t
here is a third way: If he can convert the boy to the dark, his dominion will also last until the end of the world.
“If we study the manner in which the hobble was imposed, we may get an idea of how we can move forward—how the Fiend might finally be destroyed,” Slake continued. “Zenobia believes that her son might glimpse something that she has missed. There could well be some loophole, a gap into which something new and efficacious may be added.”
I had heard about the hobbles before from Alice Deane. This was the first confirmation that Tom’s mother had been responsible. That limitation on the Fiend’s power had been vital—otherwise, he would have slain Tom Ward years ago. I suspected that the Fiend still hoped to convert the boy to the dark. The apprentice had certainly been moving slowly in that direction, being forced to compromise his beliefs by using the blood jar and allying himself with witches. But I suspected that the Fiend’s hatred for Tom and his need for vengeance would drive him to slay the boy the moment he was freed from the binding.
“If you stay here in this tower, how will you survive without food?” Thorne asked.
“I will go hunting for it,” the lamia replied. “My sister and I hoped to learn what was required and then escape from this refuge in human form and carry the knowledge to the apprentice. Now all has changed. What we seek is beyond our powers of understanding. Very soon the boy must return here and study the books for himself. I have already begun the process that will return me to the feral form. For a few weeks I will have to survive by drinking the blood and eating the flesh of rats, but once my wings are grown I will take to the skies and hunt larger prey—first animals, but eventually those who slew my sister.”
I nodded. “But can you defend the tower alone?”
“It will be hard at first, but I can do it. Later, once I am fully transformed, they will not dare to attack. The kretch is too large to enter the tunnels.”
“Then I think it best that Thorne and I leave while we can. Besides,” I said with a grim smile, “I do not share your taste for rats.”
Slake nodded. “You will leave immediately?”
“No, not until this time tomorrow night. First I will walk the battlements with the head of the Fiend. Immediately after the death of your sister, in revenge I put out one of his eyes with my dagger. If our enemies are nearby, then I will put out the second eye, just as I promised. But they know their master will hold them to account for what he suffers. I expect the wood to be free of witches so that we can travel some distance before being pursued again.”
“Where will we go?” Thorne demanded.
“I think that Clitheroe is probably the best option,” I told her.
“They say it’s now a ruined town, full of bandits and cutthroats,” Thorne observed.
“Then what could be a more fitting place?” I answered with a thin smile.
For a long time Clitheroe Castle had held out against the occupying forces. When it had finally fallen, starved out by siege, in revenge the enemy had put the defenders to the sword and burned the town. Now it was a ruin, but the fortification still stood.
The enemy had been defeated and driven south, but very few of the original inhabitants had returned to Clitheroe to rebuild their homes. Instead it had become a hideout for murderous robbers who pillaged the countryside west of Pendle. No doubt, in time, troops would be sent to put an end to such lawless activities, but in its present state it was just what we needed. We might well be able to get into the castle, seize it from those who occupied it at present, and take refuge there.
But first we had to leave Malkin Tower undetected and escape north through the woods.
CHAPTER XI
A GIFT FROM HELL!
A true knight has a strict code of chivalry
by which he lives his life:
He cannot refuse a challenge
and he always keeps his word.
I also have a code of honor,
but it is flexible.
WE spent our remaining time in the tower resting to regain our strength for the ordeal ahead, but ate sparingly of the pieces of mutton that Wynde had brought us. Slake would need it more than we did; soon she would have to survive on a diet of rats.
While Thorne was guarding the tunnels and Slake was up on the battlements keeping watch, I decided to talk to the Fiend once more. My intention was to exert some pressure on him and make our escape from the tower more certain, so I pulled the head out of the leather sack and placed it on a low table. Then, after I had removed the apple and thorns, I sat down cross-legged before it so that our faces were at the same height.
“If you are able, speak to your servants now. Tell them to go! If they do not leave the wood, I will take your remaining eye.”
“What is evil?” asked the Fiend, disregarding what I had said completely.
“You tell me!” I retorted. “You are the one who should know!”
The mouth smirked, revealing the stumps of broken teeth. “The only evil is to deny yourself what you really want,” he replied. “Thus I do no evil because I always impose my will upon others. I always take what I want!”
“You twist everything,” I accused him. “No wonder they call you the Father of Lies.”
“What is better—to use one’s power to the very limit and test oneself, or to restrain one’s natural urges?” he demanded. “It is better to do the former, to expand and grow in the doing. And what of you, Grimalkin? What is the difference between you and me? That is what you practice too!”
I shook my head. “I like to test myself and grow in strength and skill, but not at the expense of the weak. You have always hurt others just for the pleasure it gives you. What is the pleasure in that—to hurt those unable to defend themselves?”
“It is the greatest pleasure of all!” cried the Fiend.
There was one question that I had never asked him because I found it very difficult to put into words. But I asked it now, emotion constricting my throat so severely that I barely managed to speak audibly. “Why did you kill my child?” I demanded, grief threatening to overwhelm me.
“Our child, Grimalkin! Our child! I did it because I could. I also did it to hurt you! I did it because I could not suffer it to live! Grown to manhood, that child would have become my deadly enemy, and a dangerous one too. But now another has replaced him—the boy called Thomas Ward. I will destroy him as well. I cannot allow him to become a man. He must die too, just like your child. First, I will do it because I can! Second, to prevent him from destroying me. Third, to hurt you, Grimalkin. Because without him, your last hope of revenge will be gone!”
Without another word I stuffed the apple and thorns into the ugly mouth and pushed him back into the sack. I was shaking with anger.
Later, Thorne and I both dipped into the books in the large trunk but discovered nothing of any direct use. I did read something written on a single sheet of paper—Tom’s mother’s account of how she had hobbled the Fiend. But, unlike the faded ink of the other notebooks, this seemed to have been written very recently—surely it could not be her hand?
The Dark Lord wished that I return to his fold and make obeisance to him once more. For a long time I resisted while taking regular counsel from my friends and supporters. Some advised that I bear his child, the means used by witches to be rid of him forever. But even the thought was abhorrent to me.
At the time I was tormented by a decision that I must soon make. Enemies had seized me, taking me by surprise. I was bound with a silver chain and nailed to a rock so that at dawn the sun’s fierce rays would destroy me. I was rescued by a sailor, John Ward, who shielded me from the sun and freed me from the silver chain.
Later we took refuge in my house, and it soon became clear that my rescuer had feelings for me. I was grateful for what he had done, but he was a mere human and I felt no great physical attraction to him. However, when I learned that he was the seventh son of his father, a plan began to take shape within my mind. If I were to bear him sons, the seventh would have specia
l powers when dealing with the dark. Not only that: The child would carry some of my attributes, gifts that would augment his other powers. Thus this child might one day have the ability to destroy the Fiend. It was not easy to decide what to do. Bearing his seventh child might give me the means to finally destroy my enemy. Yet John Ward was just a poor sailor. He came from farming stock. Even if I bought him a farm of his own, I would still have to live that life with him, the stench of the farmyard forever in my nostrils.
My sisters’ counsel was that I kill him or give him to them. I refused because I owed him my life. The choice was between turning him out of my house so he could find a ship to take him home, or returning with him.
But to make the second option a possibility, I first had to hobble my enemy, the Fiend. This I did by subterfuge. I arranged a meeting on the Feast of Lammas—just the Fiend and me. After choosing my location carefully, I built a large bonfire, and at midnight made the necessary invocation to bring him temporarily into our world.
He appeared right in the midst of the flames, and I bowed to him and made what seemed like obeisance—but I was already muttering the words of a powerful spell, and I had the two sacred objects in my hand.
As I read this account, it seemed to me that Zenobia had hated the Fiend as much as I did and had taken a risk similar to mine when she had summoned him. It had been good to fight beside her in Greece. And now, although no longer clothed in flesh, she was still an entity to be reckoned with. It was gratifying to have her on my side.
I continued reading.
Despite all his attempts to thwart me, I successfully completed the hobble, paving the way for the next stage of my plan, which began with my voyage to the County and the purchase of a farm.
And so I became the wife of a farmer and bore him six sons, and then, finally, a seventh, whom we named Thomas Jason Ward; his first name chosen by his father, the second by me, after a hero from my homeland of whom I was once fond.
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