Before I started out on the road to Houghton, I called in at the little parish church to speak to Father Ainsworth. He’d been my teacher for as long as I could remember. His inspirational sermons and tireless work to aid the poor of the parish had made me want to follow in his footsteps. Not for me days of claustrophobic darkness toiling in the mine. I was going to be a priest and help people.
As I walked down the narrow lane that led out of Horshaw, I could see someone digging in the field that belonged to the church. At first I thought it was a gravedigger, but then I noticed he was working just outside the boundary of the churchyard—not actually in holy ground. Also, he seemed to be wearing a hood and gown, the garb of a priest.
However, I’d much more exciting things to think about, so I put it from my mind. I took a shortcut through the hedge and began to weave my way through the gravestones toward the dilapidated church. It was always in need of repair, and I could see now that there was new damage—a couple of slates missing from the roof, the result of a recent storm.
It was another of Father Ainsworth’s routine tasks to raise the necessary funds for such repairs. When I entered the church, he was standing in the central aisle, counting copper coins into a small leather pouch.
“I’ve come to say good-bye, Father,” I told him, my voice echoing from the high ceiling.
“Are you looking forward to it, John?” he asked, his eyes bright with excitement. It was almost as if he were going rather than me.
“Aye, Father. I can’t wait to get started on my studies. The Latin you’ve taught me should help me get off to a good start.”
“Well, you’ve been a good, diligent pupil, my boy. My hope is that one day you’ll come back and take over this parish. It would be a fine thing if a member of the local flock could one day be its shepherd. That would be fitting, John. Very fitting indeed. I can’t carry on forever.”
Father Ainsworth was a small, wiry, gray-haired man, well into his sixties. He still looked fit and far from ready to retire, but someone would need to take over this small church one day. I remember thinking how proud that would make my dad—one of his own sons becoming the parish priest!
“It looks like last Sunday’s collection plate was unusually good, Father!” I said, looking down at the pouch full of money that he was cradling in his hand.
Father Ainsworth smiled. “It was a little better than usual, that’s true, but what’s really made a difference is the money I got from the spook. Did you see him working by the hedge? He paid me to allow him to dig a grave there.”
Although spooks dealt with witches and got rid of ghosts and boggarts, the hierarchy of the Church considered them no better than creatures of the dark themselves. As spooks weren’t ordained into the priesthood, it was thought they had no right to meddle with the dark; priests were nervous of the methods they used. Some spooks had been imprisoned or even burned at the stake. However, Father Ainsworth was a tolerant man who took people as he found them.
“I thought he was a gravedigger,” I explained, “but it was odd because he wasn’t working in the right place.”
“Well, his apprentice died last night, and because of his trade he can’t be laid to rest in the holy ground of the churchyard. But the spook wants to bury him as close to consecrated ground as possible because it’ll make the boy’s family feel better. Why not, John? What harm can come of it?”
I took my leave of Father Ainsworth and set off north toward Houghton, my coat buttoned against the chill wind from the west. My path took me close to the place where the Spook was still digging.
The grave was almost deep enough, and I could see the body of a young boy lying on the ground beside it. He looked no older than I was. The eyes of the corpse were wide open, and even from a distance it seemed to me that the dead face was twisted into an expression of absolute terror. There was something else really horrible, too. Where his left hand should have been, there was just a red and bloodied stump. How had he died? An accident?
I shuddered and walked on quickly, but the spook glanced in my direction. I saw that he had very bushy eyebrows and a thick head of dark hair, but the most noticeable thing about him was a very deep scar that ran the whole length of the left side of his face. I remember wondering what sort of accident had left him with such a serious disfigurement. I shuddered, wondering if a witch had done it, raking down his face with her razor-sharp talons.
The late morning and afternoon passed quickly, and the sun began to sink lower in the sky. I’d no hope of reaching Houghton before nightfall and planned to spend the night in a barn or outbuilding. I had a pack of cheese sandwiches to keep my hunger at bay, so it was just a case of finding some shelter. At least it was dry, unusually for this time of year in the County, but as the sun went down, a mist began to swirl in from the west. Soon I could hardly see half a dozen paces in any direction. Somehow I wandered from the track and became completely lost.
It was getting colder, and soon it would be totally dark. I didn’t fancy a night in the open but had little choice in the matter. I’d reached the edge of a wood and decided to settle down under a tree and try to sleep. It was then that I heard footsteps in the distance. I held my breath, hoping they would pass by, but they just came nearer and nearer. I wasn’t happy at the prospect of meeting a stranger out here in the dark, miles from anywhere.
It could well have been a robber, someone who’d cut my throat simply to steal the coat off my back. People sometimes went missing in the County, never to be seen again. The countryside was dangerous at night—anything could be out there.
CHAPTER II
The Witch’s Lair
A figure emerged from the mist, walking straight toward me. For a moment his garb made me think he was a priest, but then I realized he was a spook. He wore a hood and gown, and boots of the finest quality leather. He came up really close, until I could see his scarred face. It was the same man who had been digging in the churchyard at Horshaw.
“You lost, boy?” he demanded, glaring at me from under his black bushy eyebrows.
I nodded.
“Thought so. We’ve been heading in the same direction for miles. You make enough noise to wake the dead! Doesn’t do to draw too much attention to yourself in these parts. Where are you bound?”
“The seminary at Houghton. I’m going to study there for the priesthood.”
“Are you now? Well, you won’t get to Houghton tonight. Follow me—I’ll see if I can find you somewhere better to bed down. This area is even more dangerous than usual, but as you’re here you’d be better off in my company.”
I had mixed feelings about the offer. I felt nervous being anywhere near a spook, but at the same time it was better than spending the night on my own in the open, at the mercy of any passing robber. And what did he mean, “more dangerous than usual”?
It was as if the spook had read my thoughts. “Please yourself, boy. I’m only trying to help,” he said, turning his back and beginning to walk away.
“Thanks for the offer. I’d like to travel with you,” I blurted out, something deep inside having made the decision for me.
So I followed him through the trees, glancing nervously both left and right into the mist. It was said that spirits and all manner of creepy things were towed along in the wake of a spook because of his line of work. That’s why people usually crossed the road to avoid passing close to one—and here I was on a dark misty night near enough to touch him!
He finally led me to an old wooden barn, and we settled ourselves down on some dry straw. There were holes in the roof and the door was missing, but it wasn’t raining and there was hardly any wind, so it was comfortable enough. The spook took a lantern from his bag and lit it while I opened my pack of cheese sandwiches and offered him one.
He declined with a smile and a shake of his head. “Thanks for the offer, boy. That’s generous of you, but I’m working at present, and it’s my habit to fast when facing the dark!”
“Is something from the
dark nearby?” I asked nervously.
He grimaced. “That’s more than likely. I buried my apprentice today. He was killed by a boggart. Do you know anything about boggarts?”
I nodded. I’d been told that boggarts were spirits; they usually made a nuisance of themselves, scaring people by breaking plates or banging on doors. But I hadn’t heard of anyone being killed by one before.
“There was one that plagued the Green Bottle Tavern in Horshaw for a while,” I told him. “It used to howl down the chimney and whistle through keyholes. It never hurt anybody, though, and after a few weeks it just disappeared.”
“Sounds like a type we call a whistler, boy. They are mostly harmless. But there are lots of different kinds of boggarts, and some are more dangerous than others. For example, there are hall knockers, which usually just make noises. They feed on the fear they generate—that’s how they get their power. But hall-knockers sometimes change without warning into stone chuckers, which can hurl large rocks and kill people. But there are even worse types of boggarts. I’ve been trying to deal with what we call a bone breaker. They rob fresh graves, digging up the corpses, then scraping off the flesh and devouring the marrow inside the bones.”
I shuddered at the gruesome picture he’d painted, but he hadn’t finished yet.
“However, the worst of them develop a taste for the living. This happens when a witch gets involved. Some witches use bone magic as the source of their dark power. What better for such a malevolent witch than to control a bone breaker and get it to bring her what she needs!”
I shivered. “Sounds horrible!” I told him.
“It’s worse than that, boy. Soldiers fighting a battle rarely have to face such terrors. There I was, just two nights ago, on my way to bind a bone breaker, when the boggart struck. I heard it coming across the field, and I called out a warning to my apprentice. But it was too late. The boggart snatched the thumb bone of his left hand. Well, that’s what it wanted, but it took off the whole hand at the wrist. There was little I could do. I managed to stop the bleeding by binding his upper arm tightly with strips torn from his cloak. But he soon went blue round the lips and stopped breathing. The shock of the injury must have killed him.
“That was totally unexpected,” continued the spook. “The boggart would have had no idea we were in the vicinity. Someone must have directed it to us. I suspect a witch must have been involved . . .”
He fell silent and stared at the wall for a long time, as if reliving those terrible events. It gave me chance to study his face. The scar was exceedingly deep and ran from high on his forehead right down to his chin. He was lucky not to have lost the sight of his left eye. The scar cut a white swath through his eyebrow, and the two separated ridges of hair were not quite in line.
The spook glanced at me quickly. I looked away, but he knew that I’d been studying his face. “Not a pretty sight, is it, boy?” he growled. “Another boggart did that—a stone chucker. But that’s another story.”
“The boggart that killed your apprentice . . . is it close by?” I asked.
“It won’t be far away, boy. It all happened less than a mile from here. Over yonder to the east,” he said, pointing through the open doorway. “Just south of Grimshaw Wood—and that’s where I’ll be heading at first light. The job needs finishing.”
The thought of such a dangerous boggart so close to our shelter made me really nervous, and I jumped a few times when some noise outside disturbed me. But I was so tired that I eventually fell asleep.
Soon after dawn, with a brief “Good morning” and a nod, the spook and I parted, and I continued north through the trees. The weather had changed. It was now unseasonably warm, and dark clouds were gathering overhead. I’d traveled less than a mile when I heard the first rumble of thunder. Soon forked lightning was splitting the sky with flash after jagged flash. I’d never liked thunder—it made me nervous, and I wanted to get away from the trees and the risk of being struck by lightning.
Suddenly I saw what I took to be a ruined cottage ahead. One of the windows was boarded up, another had a broken pane, and the front door hung wide on its hinges. It seemed like a good place to shelter while the storm passed. But no sooner had I stepped inside than I realized I’d made a very big mistake.
The place showed signs of recent occupation. The ashes of a fire were still smoking in the grate of the small front room, and I saw the stub of a fat candle on the window ledge. A candle made from black wax.
When I saw that, my heart began to hammer with fear. It was said that witches used such candles: They were that dark color because blood had been stirred into the molten wax. This cottage must be a witch’s lair!
I held my breath and listened very carefully. The cottage was totally silent. All I could hear was the rain drumming on the roof. Should I run for it? Was it safer out there, at the mercy of the elements? Ready to flee at the slightest hint of danger, I tiptoed to the kitchen doorway and peered through. What I saw was bad. Very bad . . .
There were bones in an untidy heap in the far corner of the flagged floor: leg bones, arm bones, finger bones, and even a skull. But they weren’t just animal bones left over from cooking. My whole body started trembling at what I saw.
They were human bones. And among them were thumb bones. Lots of them.
I turned around and made straight for the cottage door, but I was too late. I glimpsed something through the broken window. Someone was approaching through the trees—a woman dressed in black, her long gown trailing on the wet grass. The sky was very dark now, and at first I couldn’t make out her face. But she suddenly came to a halt and the lightning flashed almost directly overhead, so I could see her clearly. How I wished I hadn’t! Her expression was cruel, her eyes narrow slits, her sharp nose almost fleshless. As I watched, she tilted her head upward, and I heard her sniff loudly three times. Then she started to move more quickly toward the cottage, as if she knew I was there.
I ran back into the kitchen. Could I escape through the back door? Desperately I tried to open it. The door was locked and too sturdy to force open. There were only two places to go. Either up the stairs or down stone steps into the darkness of the cellar! It was no choice at all, so I quickly tiptoed upstairs. The witch would surely have reached the front door by now.
I crept onto the landing and saw that there were only two bedrooms. Which one should I choose? There was no time to think. I opened the door and stepped into the first one. There was no bed, just a small table and lots of rubbish on the floor: a heap of moldering rags, pieces of a broken chair, and an old pair of pointy black shoes with the soles worn right through.
I sat down on the floor and tried to keep as still as possible. I heard the witch enter the house. She crossed the front room and stepped into the kitchen. Would she come up the stairs?
Lightning flashed just outside the window, to be answered by a loud crack of thunder. The storm was now almost directly overhead. I heard the click-click of the witch’s heels as she crossed the kitchen flags. Next the creaking of the wooden stairs. She was coming up toward me. And as she climbed, I began to feel very cold—the same sort of cold I’d experienced when my dad had locked me in the cellar and I’d come face-to-face with the dead miner.
Maybe the witch would go into the other room? This one was only a storeroom, but there might be a bed in the one next door. A bed where she’d settle down and go to sleep. I’d be able to sneak out of the house and make my escape then.
“Please, God! Please!” I prayed silently. “Make her choose the other room!”
But my prayer was in vain. My last desperate hopes were dashed as the witch came directly to the room where I was hiding. For a moment she paused outside: My heart pounded in my chest, the palms of my hands began to sweat, and the cold became more intense. Then she opened the door and looked down at me, her cruel eyes staring into mine so that I felt like a rabbit in thrall to a stoat. I tried to stand but found that I couldn’t even move. It wasn’t just fear. I was bound to
the spot. Was she using dark magic against me?
To my horror, the witch pulled a knife from the pocket of her black gown. It had a long, sharp blade and she held it out, moving toward me purposefully. Was she going to take some of my bones? She held the knife above my head and suddenly grasped me very tightly by my hair, twisting my head backward. She was going to kill me!
CHAPTER III
A Spook’s Bones
“OH! I’m sorry! Really sorry!” I cried out. “I didn’t mean to come into your cottage. I didn’t know it was occupied. I just wanted to shelter from the storm—”
“Of course you didn’t intend to come here, child,” the witch said, her voice a cruel rasp. “I brought you here with a spider spell. I lured you into my web. And now you’re in a right tangle, aren’t you?”
With those words, the blade swept down toward my head. I gasped in anticipation of pain and closed my eyes, but the next second she released me, and I opened them again. She was holding a clump of my hair. She’d used the knife to cut it off.
“Without my help, you’ll never get free—never leave this house,” she warned. “At least not while you’re still breathing. But if you’re obedient, I’ll let you go. So are you going to do exactly what I tell you?”
I was shaking like a leaf now and felt utterly weak and powerless. I still couldn’t move, apart from my mouth, which I opened to say, “Yes.”
“I can see you’re going to be a sensible boy,” the witch continued. “But if you get up to any tricks, I’ll set Snatcher on you. And you wouldn’t want to meet him. Snatch your bones, he will, and bring ’em straight back to me!”
By Snatcher I guessed she meant the boggart. The spook had been right. The bone breaker was being controlled by a witch.
“All you have to do is bring the spook to this house. He’ll be hunting me down soon enough, so I’ll deal with him once and for all.”
The Last Apprentice: Complete Collection Page 272