Dawn of the Demontide (15 page)

‘
Grrraaaggghhhh!
’

The cry made Mr Grype whimper. The little man gathered up what courage he possessed and bent down to the keyhole. At first, he could see nothing but shredded paper and torn bindings. Great heavy books, some thousands of pages thick, had been torn through, as if by powerful claws. The only light came from a bare bulb, which swung to and fro. It flashed across a dirty old bearskin rug in the centre of the room …

The ‘rug’ twitched.

And now Grype began to make out the features of a strange body. Legs covered in coarse hair pawed at the ground. A long snout snuffled the air. Intense green eyes with slit-shaped pupils stared through the keyhole. The thing saw Grype and drool dripped from its jaws. The witch staggered back as it launched itself at the door. He mumbled a half-forgotten strengthening spell and the cracks started to repair themselves.

Grype headed straight for his office. He dashed through the curtained doorway and into the Veil. The grey mist pressed in on him from all sides. Where was his master?

‘Librarian, what can I do for you at this ungodly hour?’

Marcus Crowden, his eyes hidden beneath the shadow of his wide-brimmed hat, stepped out of the mist.

‘Forgive my intrusion, Master.’

Crowden motioned with his fingers. His black cabinet emerged from the mist and began to swirl around Grype.

‘There is nothing to forgive. But let us hope your news is worthy of my time. Otherwise … ’

The door of the nightmare box opened a fraction. Ugly voices called out to Grype.

‘It’s the boy,’ Grype squeaked. ‘Simon Lydgate.’

‘What of him?’

‘He has woken.’

‘You forgot the sleeping spell?’

The cabinet inched towards Grype. Its mouth yawned …

‘Yes, but perhaps I did right by forgetting.’

Crowden held out his hand and the cabinet stopped an inch short of its prey.

‘How so?’

‘The boy. He is … changing … ’

Crowden’s eyes dazzled.

‘Pray tell me, Mr Grype—into what?’

‘ELEANOR!’

Jake’s eyes snapped open and he dragged himself from his dream of the Witchfinder. He just about managed to make it across the bedroom and open the window before vomiting. A pile of brilliant green puke splattered across the front step of Stonycroft Cottage. It was exactly the same colour as the toad’s poison.

Jake breathed deeply and looked out across the rooftops of Hobarron’s Hollow. The sky in the east was growing lighter by the second. He checked his watch—5:30 a.m. He had been asleep for over fifteen hours! He remembered coming back to the cottage after being bitten by the toad and managing to eat some lunch. Then he had gone upstairs for a lie down. Aunt Joanna had called after him.

‘Sure you’re all right, Jake?’

‘’M fine. Just feel a bit tired.’

‘You’re probably still weak from the fever. You get some sleep. Don’t let the bed bugs bite.’

‘Or the mutant toads,’ Jake had said under his breath.

Now he glanced down at his hand. A bandage had been wrapped around the wound. It looked like a professional job—Aunt Joanna must have called in a doctor. Jake peeked under the dressing to find the bite mark clean and smelling of disinfectant. He drew a few deep breaths of morning air, and his thoughts returned to the dream.

Where had these sights and sounds, these images and emotions come from? They unnerved him, and yet he had also felt a strange comfort while walking in the mysterious Witchfinder’s skin. A man who had been frozen in ice … Is that what his father had meant by saying that the answer to the Demontide was ‘frozen in time’? Without the weapon, and with his sacrifice looming, maybe this long-dead Witchfinder held the key? But how could that be?

Jake could make no sense of it. He pulled on some clothes and headed downstairs.

The kitchen was in darkness. Without turning on the light, Jake poured himself a glass of water. The pipes clanked and gurgled. Lollygag, the ginger tomcat, gave him a filthy look and sprang from the windowsill. He curled up under the table and was soon asleep again. Jake was swallowing down another glass of water when he saw the shadowy figure in the corner of the kitchen. The shock made him choke.

It was Aunt Joanna, slumped in an armchair. Her head was thrown back and her mouth was open. She didn’t appear to be breathing.

Jake shot across the room. He took his aunt by the shoulders and shook her.

‘Joanna? Are you OK?’

No response. Her lips had turned a pale shade of blue. There was no rise and fall of her chest. Jake shook her again.

‘Wake up! Come on!’

He had raised his hand, and was about to slap her face, when the woman grunted. Her eyes opened a fraction.

‘M’uh? That you, Adam? Or is it my darling Luke?’ She let out a heartbreaking sob and tears ran down her cheeks. ‘No, Luke’s dead. My sweet boy. They killed him, you know. They took his blood, every last drop … For the greater good, they said. Tragedy is, they were right. My poor, poor boy … ’

A photograph album lay open in her lap. There was only one picture on the page. It showed three children standing on the clifftops, arm-in-arm. They were smiling as only children can. Rusty red hair identified Adam and Joanna Harker. The name of the third child—a boy with pale skin and wide, dark eyes—was written beneath the photograph.

Luke Seward.

The boy who was sacrificed to stop the last Demontide
, Jake thought.

He reached for the photograph. An empty bottle that had been resting beneath the album fell to the floor and shattered. Jake leaned in and smelt his aunt’s breath. It reeked of whisky. Her eyes closed again and she started snoring. Jake swept up the glass and covered her with an old blanket brought down from his bedroom. He wanted to look at the photograph more closely but his head began to pound. He needed some fresh air.

He strode along the lane and up to the main road. He wanted to see Rachel. Why was she in the village? Maybe she knew something about what was going on here. It was much too early to call at the Saxby house but he headed uphill anyway.

Despite the road being very steep he kept up a quick pace. Birds flitted between the trees, busy with a bit of early-morning nest building. A milk float rattled by. A boy delivering newspapers freewheeled down the hill at a suicidal speed. Jake jogged along the road and drank in the atmosphere of the slow-waking village.

Before he knew it, he was at the gate of St Meredith’s.

The church was a hideous block of a building. Built out of large, crudely carved stones, it was not cross-shaped, like most churches, but a simple rectangle. Slates were missing from the roof and the short steeple leaned drunkenly to one side. Small, undecorated windows and a plain archway entrance only added to its ugliness. Still, it wasn’t doing
too
badly for its age—a plaque above the door dated the church from AD 785!

A far more impressive structure stood nearby.

The grand mausoleum dominated the graveyard. It was a kind of over-ground crypt, about four metres in height with big Roman pillars supporting the roof and marble steps leading up to a large oak door. Although clearly very old, there were no cracks in its sandy stonework and its pillars were free of moss and vines. Often these mausoleums had the names of those buried within written on the walls. There were no such markings here. Instead, dozens of paintings had been etched all the way round. The colours of the frescoes had faded and yet the scenes were still dramatic and forceful. Jake saw faces, terrifying and sublime; bodies, broken and beautiful; eyes filled with compassion and loathing. Each picture showed a great battle raging between angels and demons.

Jake’s breath caught in his throat. His heart pounded. Slowly, almost reverently, he climbed the mausoleum steps. He had reached the great door, and was stretching out a hand to touch the frescoes, when a shadow fell over him.

‘You can’t go inside,’ a voice whispered. ‘The door’s locked. It won’t open again until the end of the world.’

Jake turned.

A boy with pale skin and dark eyes stood at the bottom of the mausoleum steps. Jake recognized him immediately.

It was Luke Seward.

Shafts of golden light shone against the spectre’s pale skin.

The ghost and Jake stared at one another.

Meanwhile, the world beyond the graveyard plodded on as normal—the birds’ dawn chorus came to an end; the milk float rumbled past; aeroplanes left trails in the sky—all as if ghosts and witches and demons did not exist.

The ghost held out his hand.

‘Hello, Jake.’

‘Luke … ’

The boy frowned. ‘What did you call me?’

Jake stepped forward. Seen from a slightly different angle, the spirit appeared more solid, more lifelike.

‘You’re real.’

‘I think so,’ the boy laughed.

Now that Jake had emerged from between the pillars of the mausoleum, the kid’s voice no longer echoed. The hollow, spectral tone was gone and he sounded exactly like what he was—a boy of about ten years old.

‘I’m sorry,’ Jake smiled, ‘I thought for a moment you were a ghost.’

‘Cool!’

‘You’d like to be a ghost?’

The boy considered. ‘I guess it would be fun, maybe for just a day. Spying on people and scaring them stupid, that’d be a laugh. I dunno though. I think it would be pretty lonely. Not like vampires—they’re dead, too, but in lots of stories they hang out together in gangs. Being a vampire would be wicked.’

‘Do you read many vampire stories?’

‘Yeah, I’ve got books and books at home. They’re my favourite monsters.’

‘Mine too,’ Jake laughed.

‘But they’re pretty weak, really. There’s loads of ways you can kill a vampire: put a stake through its heart, cut off its head, drown it in holy water … ’

‘Ah, but not
all
the legends are the same. Did you know that, in many stories, you would have to stake a vamp, then cut off its head
and
stuff its mouth with garlic to make sure it didn’t come back?’

‘Wow.’ The boy looked genuinely impressed. ‘Someone told me you knew loads of stuff about monsters, and you really do!’

‘Who told you?’

‘Might’ve been your Aunt Joanna.’ The kid shrugged. ‘Or your dad. He comes to the Hollow sometimes to visit my mum. I like your dad a lot. Sometimes he brings me comics, horror comics like the ones you’ve got.’

‘You’ve met my dad?’

‘Course. But he’s not been around much lately. Where is he?’

‘Abroad, so they say … ’ Jake realized that the boy was still waiting for his outstretched hand to be shaken. ‘Sorry, mate, didn’t mean to leave you hanging. So, what’s your name?’

‘Eddie Rice.’

‘What are you doing up this early, Eddie?’

‘I’m always up early. I’m like a backwards vampire.’

Jake laughed again.

‘Anyway, I saw you passing my house a few minutes ago and I thought I’d come and say hi. Sorry if I scared you. Though I am pretty psyched that I managed it, you being a hardcore horror fan and all. Which reminds me, will you come and have a look at my comic collection? I don’t think I’ve got as many as you—your dad told me you’ve got, like, millions—but maybe I’ve got a few you haven’t.’

‘Sure, why not?’

Eddie Rice grinned from ear to ear and led the way down the path.

The boys turned right out of the churchyard gate and onto a country lane. Leaving the village behind, they walked into open countryside. Cattle grazed in the fields while crows pecked at the blackberry bushes on either side of the lane.

‘I know why you called me Luke,’ Eddie said. ‘You know about my uncle, don’t you?’

‘Your uncle?’

‘Luke Seward. He was my mum’s brother. My mum says I have to call him “uncle” when I speak about him. Which feels strange, because I never met the guy. He died years and years ago.’

Jake nodded. ‘I saw a picture of him in my aunt’s photo album. You really look like him.’

‘Your dad says I’m Luke’s “double”. They were best friends, your dad and my Uncle Luke. I reckon that’s why Adam comes and sees me whenever he’s in the Hollow. I remind him of the friend he lost.’

‘How did your uncle die, Eddie?’

‘He was murdered.’ The kid’s voice was calm, even. ‘He was thirteen years old on the night they came for him … ’

‘They?’

‘The killers. My grandparents were away for the night and the housekeeper didn’t hear a thing. They dragged him from his bed and took him down to the bay. The police said, from the footprints, it looked like there were three of them. They took Uncle Luke to Crowden’s Sorrow.’

‘Crowden’s … ?’

‘Yeah. It’s a huge cave in the bay. The killers dragged Luke into the cave and cut his throat. There was a big investigation, but they never found out who did it or why.’

He was a sacrifice
, Jake thought,
butchered by Dr Holmwood and the Elders to prevent the Demontide
. But how could the death of an innocent boy have stopped the Crowden Coven from achieving their victory? Having said that, how was the ‘Incu’ weapon supposed to have stopped them?

‘I never knew Luke but his death makes me sad,’ Eddie continued. ‘It makes me sad because it makes other people sad. My mum’s never got over it. I think that’s why my dad left us. And your dad, he really loved Luke.’

It was so strange, this secret life Jake’s father had led. There had never been any mention of Hobarron’s Hollow or Eddie Rice, and yet it was obvious that Adam Harker had often visited the boy here. He had even brought Eddie comic books, treating him like a second son. Maybe Jake should be jealous but he couldn’t help liking the kid.

‘Here we are,’ Eddie said, bringing Jake out of his daydream.

The Rice house stood at the end of a dusty track. It was a big old building made out of the same kind of irregular grey bricks as the church. On the roof, a weathervane in the shape of a cow turned in the breeze. As Jake and Eddie approached, a woman emerged from the house.

Mrs Rice wore a tatty black dress. Fearful eyes stared out from her gaunt face.