Witch Silver (8 page)

A few days later, Clara sat on the edge of Neil's bed, catching her hair in a twist on top of her head so that it wouldn't blow all over her face while she was flying on her broomstick.

“Are you both ready?” Kitor asked, fluttering from the back of a chair onto the window sill. “Cassia's keeping watch outside, just in case.”

Neil and Clara had never quite managed to understand how they heard Kitor speak. He wasn't, of course, speaking English as such but they could hear his voice inside their heads; although, as Clara remarked, the sound didn't seem to come through their ears.

Neil picked up his broomstick and nodded. “You go first, Clara,” he said, disappearing from view as he switched his ring to the other hand.

Kitor soared out over the window sill into space and,
grasping
her broomstick tightly, Clara followed. She'd always hated heights but flying from the tower window was a piece of cake compared to some of the mountains she'd flown over in the past. Once they reached the level of the trees, however, she felt a lot more comfortable and started to take an interest in her surroundings. Cassia, she noticed, had flown up to join Kitor and the two broomsticks settled in behind them as they headed over the school grounds for Witches' Wood.

“Leave your broomsticks here,” Kitor whispered as they
dismounted
at the edge of a newly-ploughed field. “Cassia and I will look after them for you.”

“Is that the hill, over there?” Neil hissed, looking at the grassy, rounded hill topped by a stand of trees that rose steeply from the swirling pattern of furrows that surrounded it.

Kitor nodded. “You'll see the entrance on the right,” he
whispered
. “It's quite wide; so that the broomsticks can get in and out, I suppose. Just be careful you don't bump into anybody. They mightn't be able to see you but if they touch you, they'll know you're there.”

Neil nodded. “We'll be careful,” he whispered as they made to leave, “don't worry!”

He and Clara picked their invisible way carefully over the newly-turned furrows towards the entrance to the witches' lair. Without her firestone, Clara thought, she'd probably have seen a normal, peaceful country scene but wearing it changed
everything
. There were witches everywhere. Some were soaring over distant woods and fields but it was quite obvious where the entrance to the castle lay, for witches were coming and going all the time. It was breath-taking to watch as, crouched low over the handles of their broomsticks, they flew past them in the moonlight, their cloaks fluttering and flapping behind them as they swooped through the night sky.

Neil gulped at the sight of their evil, intent faces, suddenly aware of the dangers they were facing. Just as well, he thought, that their parents didn't know what they were up to! “Keep hold of my hand, Clara,” he whispered, trying to sound reassuring, “and remember what I said; if you lose me, get out at once and go back to Kitor and Cassia, okay?”

“Okay,” Clara said, her voice trembling with fear and
excitement
.

Neil's hand tightened its grip as they reached the damp
stonework
of the entrance. The flat, grey slabs of stone that sloped steeply downwards were running with moisture and here and
there bushes and clumps of creeping fern straggled in swathes over their cracked, uneven sides. Crouching down to avoid the broomsticks that were flying in and out over their heads, they paused and eyed the witches on guard apprehensively. Perched like ragged crows atop thin, spindly rocks round the entrance, they were screeching and cackling to one another but gave no sign of alarm as, choosing a moment when no broomsticks were in sight, they slipped silently down the passage into the hill.

The interior of the Earth Witches' castle was astounding. Built from huge blocks of pale grey stone it was a vast
construction
. Carved arches revealed long, eerie passageways decorated here and there with statues of wizards, witches and other
magical
creatures that looked so ghastly that Clara hoped fervently that she'd never have to meet them.

Neither was it as dark as they had expected, but full of a ghostly white light that threw deep shadows.

Choosing the broadest of the three corridors that confronted them so that there was less likelihood of bumping into anyone, they walked silently along, hugging the wall. At first, all went well. Several witches flew past them on broomsticks but as they paid them no attention whatsoever Clara relaxed and had almost persuaded herself that everything was going to be okay when a chattering group of young witches approached. Cloaks flapping, they took up the whole width of the corridor so that they both had to press themselves flat against the wall. Clara felt her heart thump alarmingly as the witches brushed past, their strong, hook-nosed faces so close that she could have reached out and touched them. She was shaking violently as she felt for Neil's hand and gripped it hard.

After that, they passed several groups of witches, many of them talking and laughing in the same high-pitched cackle of sound they'd heard from the witches on guard at the entrance.
These witches, however, were easily avoided as they kept to the centre of the corridor and, glad that there was no repeat of the first nerve-racking incident, they walked on with steadily increasing confidence until they came to a flight of stairs that led deeper into the earth. Clara wasn't all that keen on going down but Neil pulled on her hand and she had to follow.

They moved further and further through the maze of
corridors
, peering into all the rooms, until they came at last to a door of obvious importance. A heavy, black, iron-studded door, which swung open as they approached.

Clara stopped dead in her tracks. She couldn't believe her eyes and almost fell over at the shock of it, for there, as large as life, walking in the middle of a group of witches, was her Drama teacher. It must have been Miss Markham she'd seen at school that night!

How had she not realized that she was a witch? All the signs were there: the hooked nose, the strong features, the black hair and piercing eyes. How on
earth
hadn't she noticed?

It was then that Neil jerked her to one side as the witches passed in a swirl of black robes. Miss Markham was frowning and talking sharply to a thin, seedy-looking witch whose robes shed lumps of earth as she walked.

“It'll come to me eventually,” she was saying. “I said the spell several times and each time I felt it trying to obey.”

Clara barely heard her words. She was still in shock! Miss Markham was a witch! Neil pulled her hastily forward and caught the door before it closed. He'd glimpsed what lay beyond it as the witches had swung through and his heart had leapt. This was what they were looking for; the witches' library.

The heavy door clicked shut behind them and left them standing in a totally silent room that almost literally took their breath away. It smelled incredibly ancient and they knew instinctively
that the room and its contents were thousands of years old.

And what books! Thick, heavy volumes with ragged,
irregular
pages made from parchment, not paper — the room was crammed with them. They lay on shelves, on tables and in scattered piles all over the floor. Books of all shapes and sizes, thousands of them, bound in old, rubbed leather that looked as though a touch would crumble them to dust.

Creeping quietly round tiers of shelving, they found, to their horror, that the library wasn't empty as they had first thought. Two witches were sitting at a corner table, reading from an enormous tome and making copious notes while another browsed through smaller volumes in a bookcase nearby.

What caught their eyes immediately, however, was a huge table, set to one side in a position of importance. It held only one book, a large volume that lay open on a carved book rest and it was interest, more than anything else that drew Neil towards it. They both froze, however, as they saw the detailed drawing that decorated the top of the right-hand page. An arm clasp, the MacArthur had said. A silver arm clasp. Clara knew immediately that it was the talisman. Neil squeezed her hand to tell her that he, too, recognized the description. This must be the book that contained the talisman spell — the book that Miss Markham had found.

The words on the page were meaningless, written in an unknown language, but as Clara's eyes read them avidly, they printed themselves on her brain and she knew, beyond a shadow of doubt, that this was the book they'd come for. Impulsively, she reached out her hands and drew the heavy covers closed to take it. It was a very old book, however, and didn't close easily. Its ancient covers creaked alarmingly and the pages made a rough whisper of sound as she stuffed it under her coat.

Neil stiffened and glanced at the witches. One of them
looked up at the sudden noise and scanned the room curiously, but seeing no one, returned to her task. He held his breath. Had she really seen nothing? He couldn't be sure.

Nerves made him grab Clara's arm hard but she barely noticed. Now that she had
The Book of Spells
firmly clasped to her chest, she was just as anxious as he was to get away. Moving steadily towards the door, Neil hoped fervently that the witches wouldn't notice that the book had disappeared. The empty book rest would tell its own story: there was no doubt about it; it would soon be missed.

They met their first setback when they reached the door. Neil couldn't open it. He heaved at the ringed handle with all his strength but it was no good. Clara clutched at his arm. How, she thought, were they going to get out?

Neil put his mouth to where he roughly thought Clara's ear must be. “Calm down,” he whispered in a voice that was barely a breath. “It'll be okay. We'll just have to wait until somebody comes in.”

Clara bit her lip with frustration. She clutched the book tighter and prayed that the witches wouldn't notice it was gone. What if one of the witches needed to consult the book and found that it had disappeared? The alarm would be raised and they'd be trapped. The very idea left her feeling positively weak at the knees. She stared at the heavy iron hinges and round studs that decorated the door and desperately willed it to open.

In actual fact, barely ten minutes passed before the door swung inwards but it felt more like ten hours to Neil and Clara. The witches that entered were carrying notebooks. More students, Neil thought thankfully as he caught the door as it started to swing to and pushed Clara through ahead of him.

Witches filled the corridors outside and although Neil had the sense to move carefully, his every instinct was to run madly
for the safety of the field. Calm down, he told himself sternly, or you'll make mistakes and be caught. Keeping well to the side of the corridor, they came to the flight of shallow stairs that led upwards. Once at the top, they wouldn't really have far to go, he thought, and as long as no one bumped into them, they should be safe enough.

Clara, meanwhile, was in a fever of excitement. They'd got the book and now all they had to do was walk out of this
dreadful
place. Thank goodness, she thought, that the MacArthur had put extra magic into their firestones. The witches would surely have sensed their presence otherwise and that would have been a disaster.

By the time they reached the long, wide corridor that led to the entrance, their spirits were starting to rise and just when Neil thought they'd got away with it, they heard the distant,
screeching
screams of the witches. Clara's heart sank. The book had been missed!

The old hags, perched like vultures on their rocky perches over the entrance, stopped their cackling and alerted by a hullabaloo that was getting louder by the second, sat up and took notice. Neil turned and saw witches pouring in a sweeping tide behind them and, throwing caution to the winds, urged Clara on at a run. What really worried him was the thought that the witches might close the entrance with a hex. And there wasn't a lot they could do if
that
happened …

The old hags, now awake to the threat of danger, were
slithering
like evil spiders from their perches and almost landed on top of them. They were seconds too late, however, for even as they dropped on all fours to the ground, blocking the entrance, Neil and Clara were through and already scrambling up the steep little slope that gave onto the field.

It was only when he felt the soft earth under his feet that Neil
let his breath out in a long sigh of relief. They'd done it! They'd got away with
The Book of Spells.
He pulled triumphantly on Clara's hand and, with that, they both started to run pell-mell across the furrows.

“Kitor! Cassia! We're here!” Neil hissed as they reached the edge of the field. Looking round, they found their broomsticks where they'd left them, lying lengthwise in the shadow of the old stone wall that bounded the field.

Kitor breathed a sigh of relief as he heard Neil's voice. The hue and cry that had erupted from the entrance to the witches' castle had told him that they had been discovered and his heart had been in his mouth as he'd looked across the field, hoping against hope that they'd escaped.

“Hurry,” he urged, flapping down to perch on the stone wall, “the witches will be here any minute!”

“Got your broomstick, Clara?” Neil whispered as he saw it lift off the ground and disappear.

“Yes,” she whispered. “Come on, Neil! For goodness sake, let's get out of here!”

Kitor and Cassia flapped heavily into the night air and as his broomstick soared skywards, Neil took one last look across the field and grinned, despite himself, at the total confusion that reigned round the little hill. Witches were soaring and swooping round the tree-tops like so many bats.

Even as the crows flapped off, however, an old man emerged silently from among the trees. Walking up to the stone wall as the crows disappeared from sight over a nearby wood, he turned and looked speculatively across the field where two lines of footprints showed clearly in the moonlight. A sour smile curved his lips. Neil and Clara still had a lot to learn. The witches were a sharp lot and not easy to fool. He lifted his hand and as he murmured the words of a hex, the footprints in the field blurred and vanished.