by Leo Hunt
“You’re not in Hell.”
“True,” the Shepherd says.
“I can send you back there whenever I want,” I say. I raise my right hand so he can see my sigil. “I say the words, and you’re right back in the darkness. You know I can do it.”
He swallows.
“You can,” he says.
“So, given that while I’m talking”— I gesture around at the stone circle —“you’ll be here, in Dunbarrow, on earth, do you not think it might be worth listening to what I have to say?”
The Shepherd says nothing.
“Well,” I say. “That’s a shame. I’ll have to try someone else.”
I raise my sigil to dismiss him.
“Wait!” he snaps. “Wait. Perhaps I have been . . . hasty.”
“Perhaps,” I say.
“What is it that you need from me, exactly?” he asks me.
I explain what’s happened in the past week. I tell him about Ash, Ilana, the Widow. I describe the witch blade, the magic mirror, our summoning of the Fury. I tell him about the ritual yesterday at dawn, Elza screaming in pain as spirit fire spewed from her mouth and eyes. That Ash’s house is gone, and there’s a passing place where it used to be. I tell him as much as I can as fast as I can, and he listens without saying a word.
When I’m done, the Shepherd bursts out laughing a second time. He cackles like a hyena, slapping his bony knees with his palms.
“You fool,” he says. “You blind, trusting fool!”
“Look —” I say.
“She is a fool as well,” he says, still chuckling. “How the years fly by! I remember Ashana when she was knee-high. Magnus Ahlgren’s whelp. She did not even think to check that the Book of Eight was within this reading device?”
“Well, lucky for me, right?” I say.
“Yes,” the Shepherd says, “lucky. If this is how the next generation conducts its affairs . . . I shudder to think. You are both incompetents. Necromancers cannot make such errors.”
“So what do I do?” I ask him. “Can you help me or not?”
The Shepherd sighs and takes off his glasses. I look into his wet black eyes. They don’t scare me like they used to, if I’m honest. I meet his gaze without even shivering.
“Elza Moss is gone,” the Shepherd says. “Whichever luckless warrior slays a demon is consumed by the creature’s own fire. This has been the way since the first man drew breath. Her animus has been consumed. She is part of the nonpareil now.”
“So how do we —”
“Ashana Ahlgren has this nonpareil, correct? Even now she travels through the lands of the dead with this precious object.”
“Yes, so I need to —”
“You cannot.” The Shepherd spits the words across the stone circle. “Elza is gone. You cannot bring her back. Live your life, boy. She is gone.”
“No,” I say. “I know there’s a way.”
“You asked my advice. I have given it to you. The girl is gone.”
“So there’s nothing you can do.”
“I did not say exactly that —”
“Well, that’s a shame,” I say, raising my sigil once more to dismiss him.
“Wait,” the Shepherd splutters, “wait!”
“So there is something you can do?”
“Perhaps,” he says, muttering something. “Perhaps if we . . . When did the Ahlgren girl cross over into the world of the dead?”
“I don’t know. Yesterday. She was gone by midafternoon.”
The Shepherd mumbles to himself, counting on his fingers.
“It is difficult to make proper calculations,” he tells me, “seeing as time between the two worlds does not run concurrently. But the journey she intends to make is long and arduous.”
“What is Ash doing?” I ask him.
“Acquiring a nonpareil is difficult in itself,” the Shepherd says. “I have only seen one before, and that was hundreds of years ago. But to properly make use of a nonpareil . . . it is no small task. Ashana Ahlgren must travel to a deep region of the spirit world. It lies far beyond this land of the living. She must travel through the Gray Meadows and the lands beyond. . . . She must reach the source of the underworld’s eight rivers, the Shrouded Lake, and offer the nonpareil to the entity that resides below its waters.”
“She’s going to the Shrouded Lake?”
“An ancient place. There is strange power there. But it is far away. Without a copy of the Book on hand, the world of the dead is ten times more arduous to traverse. She will make slow progress.”
“So someone could catch her,” I say. “They could go into Deadside, catch up with her, and take the nonpareil for themselves.”
“You do not know what you ask,” the Shepherd says. “The spirit world is no place for a living person to go. Few dare to tread those lands. Your father never set foot there.”
“But you’ve been, haven’t you?” I ask him.
“I have,” the ghost says. He replaces his glasses.
“I want you to take me there,” I tell him.
The Shepherd chuckles.
“You are my sworn foe, Luke,” he says. “You have gone mad. The loss of the witch child has dulled your reason.”
“Take me to Deadside,” I tell him again. “I want to catch Ash and take the nonpareil for myself. And then we’ll offer it to the Shrouded Lake —”
“Madness,” he says. “You will perish.”
“I’ll offer it there. And I’ll have Elza back.”
“Do you understand what you are asking?”
“Something difficult and dangerous,” I say. “I don’t care. Can you take me or not?”
The Shepherd licks his lips.
“What do I get from this, exactly?” he asks.
“The satisfaction that comes from helping your fellow man,” I say.
He just smiles. Says nothing.
“I’ll set you free,” I tell him.
“In what sense?” he asks.
“Free,” I say, waving my hand. “You can go where you like. You won’t be in Hell.”
“I want a new body,” he says. “Another life.”
“Can I give you that?”
The Shepherd looks at me hungrily.
“If I am present at a conception,” he says, softly, “I can do the rest.”
So this is what it comes down to. More debts and pacts. Remaking Dad’s Host, bringing my old enemy back into my life. Promising him something I don’t even want to think about. I don’t have a choice. I need a guide. I can’t just wander into the world of the dead on my own. Ash has the Widow, and she has a head start on me.
I have a good reason to do this. It’s either this or let Elza go, let Ash win, and the moment I saw Elza lying in the dirt under that plastic sheet, I knew I couldn’t let that happen. I don’t have a choice.
“If that’s your price.” Think of Elza. Just think about Elza, and try not to think of what she’d say about this deal. “I’ll do that for you. If we get back from Deadside with Elza. Not before then.”
“Of course,” the Shepherd says.
“Then . . . I’m going to bind you into my Host once more,” I tell him.
“You say that as if I have a choice in the matter.”
“I know that if you accept the role, the ritual is much shorter.”
“You truly do love this girl, don’t you? It’s absurd. You’re prepared to make your foe your brother in pursuit of the slightest chance that she may live again.”
“Do we have a deal, or not?” I ask.
The wind rummages in the oak boughs overhead. The Shepherd examines the tattooed palm of one hand. “The task you wish to undertake is difficult in the extreme,” he says quietly. “Even with my great expertise and skill, I make no guarantee of success. If we cannot resurrect the witch girl —”
“As long as I think you’ve wholeheartedly helped me,” I say, “I’ll keep my side of the bargain. I promise.”
“Swear by your sigil,” he says.
“Excellent,” the Shepherd says, clapping his hands. “Excellent. Onward to the Gray Meadows, then. Onward, on this ridiculous quest. Name me your Shepherd.”
I raise my sigil above my head. The ring pulses with cold.
“Honorable leader,” I say. “Beloved left hand. Speaker for the dead. I name you Shepherd.”
“I accept this name in turn,” the Shepherd replies. “I bind my soul to the Manchett Host, now and for eternity.”
My sigil hums, and I feel a rush of coldness as the Shepherd’s power joins with mine. For a moment the clearing is frozen in place, and we exist together outside time, an endless instant in which no wind blows and no grass grows and the secret language of the world seems written on the sky in the spread of the oak trees’ branches.
The feeling subsides, and I’m left standing in my magic circle, bound to a spirit I thought I’d defeated and sent into Hell. And this is my best plan. This is absurd. I feel like I’m climbing a tall, dangerous cliff face, and I need to remember not to look down. Keep going forward. You need to save Elza. That’s what this is all about.
What was it Dad said, that night when I saw him again?
You’ve got to live the life you have, rather than the life you wanted.
Experimentally, I step out of the magic circle. The Shepherd does the same, and we stand facing each other, just in front of the tallest standing stone. Then, as the wind rises, the ghost bends on one knee, and plants a cold kiss on my sigil ring.
We make our way down the path from the stone circle to Dunbarrow High in awkward silence. The Shepherd is one of my least favorite people, alive or dead. I just promised him something so horrible that I don’t even want to think about it. I know what Elza would say about all of this. Just let me go.
No. How could I let you go? You didn’t know what you were asking. If you could feel what I felt when I saw you lying dead in the dirt, with leaves in your hair . . . you’d know why I’m doing this. You’d realize, Elza, that I can’t do anything else.
The Shepherd has a sour expression, like there’s something offensive about the spring woods. He walks stiffly, with his shoulders held rigid. I’m shocked, as I sometimes am, by how real the ghost is, how vivid and present. I can see a loose thread hanging from one of the buttons on his waistcoat. There’s a tiny yellow stain on the white collar of his shirt. The toes of his black boots are scuffed and worn.
“This isn’t going to be like last time,” I say.
“Whatever could you mean, Luke?” he asks.
“Any of it,” I say. “I know what I’m doing this time. So behave.”
“Yes,” the Shepherd says, “you have every appearance of a man utterly in control of his destiny.”
I don’t dignify this with a response. We walk across the playing fields in silence. We walk through the high-school grounds, empty on a Saturday afternoon, and down the same hill I’ve walked down from school a thousand times before. As we pass through the school gates, I remember seeing Elza smoking just beside them, that first day we spoke properly, and it feels like being stabbed. I have to look away.
The silence lasts through Dunbarrow, which is heaving with weekend traffic. The Shepherd makes no comment on any of it. We walk across the bridge, up the hill to Wormwood Drive. There’s a familiar silver car parked in our driveway, alongside Mum’s yellow one. I should have been expecting this . . . too busy thinking about magic. I see Mum standing at the front window, looking right at me. She turns to speak to someone else in the room. If I run away now, it’s going to look bad. There’s nothing I can do. I’ll just have to deny everything. I walk up the driveway like I haven’t got a care in the world and open the front door, which is unlocked.
Ham comes rushing out of the kitchen to greet me, and then sees the Shepherd. His ears flatten back against the sides of his head, and he snarls at the ghost.
“It’s fine, boy,” I whisper. “He’s with me.”
Ham gives me a disbelieving look and backs off into the kitchen, still growling.
“Luke?” Mum calls to me from the front room.
“Yeah?” I say with feigned lightness.
“Could you come in here, please?”
Her voice is stern. I go to find her.
As expected, Mr. and Mrs. Moss are sitting on the sofa with Mum. Mrs. Moss is small, broad-faced, with curly rust-colored hair. Mr. Moss, Elza’s dad, is tall and stringy, with thick glasses, a sparse beard, and receding brown hair. His smile is always apologetic. Elza gets her long, sharp face from her dad, but almost everything else from her mother. They’ve got cups of tea on the low table in front of them.
“Would you sit down, please?” Mum asks.
I sit in an armchair opposite the sofa, one that’s rarely used because you can’t see the TV from here.
“Hey,” I say to Elza’s parents. They give me thin smiles.
“Luke,” Mum says, “Mr. and Mrs. Moss wanted to speak to us. It’s about Elza.”
“Has something happened?” I ask, trying my hardest to look puzzled.
Unseen by the adults, the Shepherd is standing in the corner of the living room. His hands are clasped at his waist. It’s impossible to see where exactly he’s looking, because of his eyeglasses. His expression is equally opaque.
“We haven’t seen Elza since Wednesday morning,” Elza’s mum says. “It’s now Saturday. She was supposed to help her father with the gardening. We were wondering if you knew where she was.”
She’s wrapped in plastic in the woods on the far side of Dunbarrow. I can take you all there now. It’s my fault.
“I thought she was at home?” I say.
“She called me on Thursday evening,” Mr. Moss says, “to say she was staying here again with you, like she did on Wednesday.”
I haven’t been thinking about this. I’ve been thinking about the Book, the Shepherd. I’ve almost lost track of our lies.
Mum rang Elza’s mum on Wednesday, but on Thursday evening, we’d just captured the demon. We drove back to Pilgrim Grove with Ash. And we both called our parents and said —
“Luke,” Mum says, “you told me you were staying with the Mosses that night. Elza didn’t stay here. What were you doing?”
“We changed our minds, stayed at a friend’s,” I say. “The blond girl, Ashley. You met her on Wednesday. Remember?”
“We haven’t heard from Elza since then,” Mrs. Moss says to me. “We’ve tried calling her, and she doesn’t pick up. Her phone isn’t receiving calls.”
“I don’t know anything,” I say, immediately realizing how guilty that makes me sound. “Last time I saw her, she said she was going home.”
“Luke,” Mum says softly, “this is serious. We’re all really worried about Elza.”
“It’s not like her,” Mr. Moss says, frowning. He’s a strange person, quiet almost to the point of being comical, but the fear in his voice now hits me harder than Mrs. Moss’s anger. I feel the chair moving under me, like I’m floating in space. I keep seeing Elza lying in the dirt. Keep folding the tarpaulin back over her face.
“She’s a very conscientious girl,” Mrs. Moss says to Mum.
“She’ll be fine,” I say, feeling my tongue move by itself.
There’s a general silence.
“How do you know that?” Mrs. Moss asks me. “You just told us you didn’t know anything.”
“She’s . . . busy,” I say. “Elza is busy.”
“Luke, if you know where she is . . .” Mum begins.
“Where is our daughter?” Mrs. Moss asks.
“I don’t know,” I say. My body feels hot and enormous, like I’m inflating. Guilt. I’m being pumped full of it.
“Where is she?” Mrs. Moss asks again.
“Luke,” Mum says.
Mrs. Moss is breathing hard. “We’ll have to get the police,” she says.
I want to scream. How am
I going to get out of this? Every moment I sit here is a moment I’m not busy saving her. Ash is getting closer to the Shrouded Lake with every second that passes. I give the Shepherd a despairing look.
“There’s really no need,” I say.
Mrs. Moss looks at her husband and Mum in disbelief. “Why is he lying to us like this? What are you hiding?”
“Luke,” Mum starts to say, “if you and Elza are in trouble —”
She stops halfway through the sentence. She seems like she’s having trouble moving her mouth. Her eyes roll up into the top of her head, and she collapses onto the sofa. Her eyes close. She’s snoring. Elza’s parents are also asleep, Mrs. Moss’s head resting on Mr. Moss’s shoulder.
“Our time is not endless,” the Shepherd announces.
“Did you . . . ?”
“I have induced them to sleep. It is no great sorcery. No harm will come to them, I assure you. But we cannot delay. If you mean to catch up with the Ahlgren girl, we cannot wait another moment.”
“Sure.” I look at the parents, asleep on our big sofa. I take a deep breath. Part of me is just glad he stopped Mr. and Mrs. Moss from looking at me like that. I walk over to the window and draw the blinds. “Will they really be OK?” I ask. The scene is quietly gruesome, three limp bodies with their heads lolling against the cushions. You can hear them breathing, but they look dead.
“They will sleep until you return to the house, or until three days have passed, whichever arrives first. They will awaken disoriented and remember little of the circumstances that brought them to this room.”
“All right,” I say. I can’t think what else to do with our parents. “So what do we need to do?”
“Preparations . . .” The Shepherd strokes his beard. “You will leave your body behind at the threshold of the gateway. It would be wise to provide shelter for it, while you are occupied.”
“So a tent,” I say. “We’ve got one in the garage.”
“As for what we will need in the spirit world, the Book of Eight and your sigil are paramount, for they are the tools with which your will may be imposed. You should feast before you attempt the crossing: your body needs sustenance while the spirit wanders. I might also suggest you bring your familiar.”
