The Spook's Bestiary

by Joseph Delaney

  2 No doubt the reduced danger was in part due to that, but we must not discount the recent arrival of these elementals through the portal. After reaching our world, denizens of the dark always need time to achieve their full strength. —John Gregory

  3 This proved to be the case when we were in Greece and encountered fire elementals. One of the asteri was cut in two by my staff’s blade, but it was not the end of the elemental. It began to re-form, and we had to leave the location quickly. —John Gregory

  4 During our encounter with the Ordeen, a tremendous amount of water had fallen into the Ord, and this made some of the fire elementals less dangerous. —Tom Ward

  5 In a cave in the Pindhos Mountains, fleeing from maenads, Alice and I heard tappers all around us. They brought the roof down, and we only just escaped with our lives. —Tom Ward

  6 The predicted deaths do not always occur, leading me to suspect that coincidence may be involved, or that people simply die of fear, thereby fulfilling the prophecy. —John Gregory

  7 They are not to be confused with the Celtic witches (also known as banshee witches). Those mimic the action of a banshee but actually bring about the death of their chosen victim. These witches worship the Old Goddess known as the Morrigan, who often appears in the shape of a crow. —John Gregory

  The Cawley Stone Crawler

  Mysterious Deaths in the County

  Spooks catalog the creatures of the dark. Bit by bit, year by year, we learn more about the threats posed by the dark and develop ways in which to thwart or limit its effects. But there are still entities out there that defy our attempts to take their measure. In the County there have been many mysterious deaths that so far have not been explained.

  THE BLOATED BODY OF EMILY JANE HUDSON

  Emily Jane Hudson had lived in Ormskirk all her life but had taken to her sick bed two years before her plight was brought to my notice. Doctors had visited her regularly, attempting unsuccessfully to deal with her strange affliction.

  Emily was still alive when I first saw her. I had been called to her bedside by Dr. Gill, with whom I’d worked many times in the past; he was a liberal and intelligent man who understood the part played in the County by the servants of the dark and routinely sought my advice.

  At first I thought I was dealing with a woman who was extremely obese, but when the doctor lit a candle and pulled back the bedclothes slightly, I was astonished by the sight of poor Emily. Her face, shoulders, and neck were terribly swollen, but there was not an ounce of visible fat on her. The bright red skin was stretched tight by the blood beneath it. It was as if someone or something had forced blood into the space between skin and flesh. To support that theory, there were two large puncture marks on her neck, and the same on each shoulder.

  There are many cases in the County where blood has been removed from a living body. Witches who use blood magic do so routinely. Sometimes they drain their victim completely; at other times they draw blood in small amounts over days or even weeks. But never had I encountered a case where blood had been added rather than subtracted.

  I was unable to help, and within two hours poor Emily was dead. Fortunately the local priest allowed her to be buried within the churchyard, which was of some consolation to her family.

  Thus I was forced to record one more mysterious death in the County. I can only suppose that some unknown type of witch or dark entity was using her body as a place to store blood for some future ritual. But although I watched over her grave for weeks, they never returned to take it.

  THE CAWLEY STONE CRAWLER

  There have been many mysterious deaths near the outcrop of rock known as the Cawley Stone. At first it was animals being killed: sheep, rabbits, stoats, and squirrels. But twice I have been called to the area to investigate human deaths. The first was that of a hermit who lived in the woods nearby; the second time I traveled to view the remains of a shepherd who had pursued a stray lamb into the vicinity of the rock.

  Both the lamb and shepherd were dead, but they had no marks on their bodies—not even the slightest sign of violence.

  The Cawley Stone has one visible peculiarity. About six feet from the ground on its northern face, there is a shape that might be a carving carried out in the distant past. If so, it has been weathered and worn and the details are not sharp. Alternatively, the shape could be the result of natural erosion. Whatever the truth of the matter, it has the appearance of a head, with muscular shoulders, arms, and hands. In certain lights, particularly just before sunset, it appears to be climbing out of the rock. If so, let us hope that it never completes its slow escape, because there is something very frightening about the figure.1

  Some say that it is indeed emerging very slowly and claim to remember a time when it had not climbed out as far. Human memory is fallible, so we must allow for that, but I happened to speak to Jonathan Brown, the oldest resident of the nearby village. He says that as a young man he approached the Cawley Stone crawler for a dare and spent some time examining it closely. He was an artist who specialized in drawing landscapes and landmarks such as churches, so he took the opportunity to make a sketch of what he saw, striving, as usual, for accuracy. That sketch was still in his possession after all those years, and he showed it to me.

  In the drawing, the figure was much further embedded in the rock: only one hand had emerged. I looked at some of his other work and was impressed by his eye for detail—particularly in his sketch of the gargoyle of the Bane, which is located over the main entrance to Priestown Cathedral. I was satisfied that he had rendered the crawler accurately—as it was then!

  My suspicion is that we are dealing with some new type of earth elemental. It might well be that the rock face was worshipped in ancient times, sacrificial blood being splattered against it. That would have awakened the elemental, giving it strength and a sense of self. How it kills those who venture close, I do not know. But it is something to be aware of as it makes its slow escape from its rocky prison.

  It may not need my attention again, but no doubt some future spook will be forced to deal with it.

  THE MYSTERY OF THE CREEPING VINE

  Late in the August of my fiftieth year, I was called from my Chipenden home to view a death that defied explanation. A suspected witch, Agatha Anderton, had long been watched at a distance by wary and distrustful neighbors. I’d talked to her once and found no evidence to support their whispered accusations. Although advanced in years, Agatha was bright, alert, and in my opinion, completely without malice—definitely falling into the category of witch known as the falsely accused.

  This final time I was summoned because of the state of her house and garden. The latter had been overrun by a strange yellow vine that had displaced her herbs and flowers; worse, and far more ominously, it had grown over the exterior of her cottage, covering walls, doors and windows in a profusion of sickly smelling bloodred blossoms. No smoke had come from her chimney for days, and her neighbors believed that witchcraft was involved.

  The vine was tough. Although it looked like fresh growth, the stems were woody and I had to use an ax to cut it away from the front door. Once inside, although it was just before noon, I was forced to light a lantern because the rooms were so dark. I gasped in shock, finding it difficult to believe my eyes.

  The vine had apparently sprouted directly from poor Agatha’s body before displacing the floorboards and splitting the wooden bed upon which the old woman lay. She was cold and dead and had been in that condition for some time; her corpse was severely decayed.

  But the real horror lay in what the vine had done to her body. Buds erupted from her dead flesh; shoots sprang from her ears and eyes; tendrils snaked down her nostrils and coiled about her throat; her feet and hands were covered in red blooms. The creeping vine had used her body as its soil, a nutrient to sustain its prolific growth.

  Though it was hard to cut her from the bed, it had to be done. A priest was called, but although he said a few prayers over the body, he would not allow her to be bur
ied in holy ground. So with his grudging permission, I laid her to rest just outside the churchyard.

  From her grave the vine continued to sprout—but far more slowly than previously. Nevertheless, it’s a dense, tangled growth from which both animals and humans keep their distance. After many years, it now covers a roughly circular area of approximately one hundred yards in diameter. I say circular, but it has extended in every direction but one; it has halted at the boundaries of the churchyard, almost encircling it but seemingly unable to encroach upon holy ground.

  Why did it happen? It must remain one of the great mysteries of the County. I have no doubt that dark forces were involved. But whether it was conjured by Agatha Anderton or by some unidentified enemy, we will never know. If dark magic was used, it is a spell unknown to the witches of the County, suggesting that an incomer was involved.

  1 I passed by the Cawley Stone just before sunset with my master, John Gregory, and we examined the crawler. It did appear to be climbing out of the rock and looked very scary indeed. I noticed that while we were there, everything was very still; there wasn’t a breath of wind and the birds had stopped singing. —apprentice Henry Burrows

  Final Words

  This Bestiary, my personal guide to the dark, is the last remaining book from the old spooks’ library.

  It is hard for me to convey the sense of loss I felt when the Chipenden library was destroyed. Up in flames went words written by generations of spooks, a great store of knowledge, the heritage of countless years of struggle against the ever-growing power of the dark. I was its guardian, and it was my task to extend and preserve it for the future. And now it is gone.

  Its destruction filled me with a great sense of personal failure. It was a terrible blow that literally brought me to my knees.

  Now I have had time to reflect, and I am filled with renewed strength and determination. My fight against the dark will continue. One day I will rebuild the library, and this book, my personal Bestiary, will be the first to be placed upon its shelves.

  John Gregory of Chipenden

  About the Author and Illustrator

  JOSEPH DELANEY lives in Lancashire and has three children and seven grandchildren. His home is in the middle of boggart territory, and his village has a boggart called the Hall Knocker, which was laid to rest under the step of a house near the church.

  JULEK HELLER has been creating acclaimed fantasy illustrations for more than thirty-five years. His work appears in books such as The Chronicles of Narnia, Giants, and The Mammoth Book of Arthurian Legends. He also provides concepts and visualizations for film, television, and theater. Julek Heller lives with his family in London.

  Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors.

  Copyright

  This book is a work of fiction. References to real people, events, establishments, organizations, or locales are intended only to provide a sense of authenticity, and are used to advance the fictional narrative. All other characters, and all incidents and dialogue, are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real.

  The Spook’s Bestiary

  Text copyright © 2011 by Joseph Delaney

  Illustrations copyright © 2011 by Julek Heller

  The right of Joseph Delaney to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Delaney, Joseph, (date).

  The Spook’s Bestiary / by Joseph Delaney ; illustrations by Julek Heller.

  p. cm. — (The Last Apprentice)

  Summary: Ready to be presented to the last apprentice, Tom Ward, the spook’s notebook contains instructions for vanquishing boggarts, witches, the unquiet dead, and other dark creatures and spirits.

  ISBN 978-0-06-208114-8 (trade bdg.)

  EPub Edition © 2011 ISBN: 9780062081162

  [1. Supernatural—Fiction. 2. Apprentices—Fiction. 3. Horror stories.]

  I. Heller, Julek, illustrator. II. Title.

  PZ7.D373183Sm 2011 [Fic]—dc22 2010049856

  11 12 13 14 15 LP/RRDH 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  First Edition

  About the Publisher

  Australia

  HarperCollins Publishers (Australia) Pty. Ltd.

  25 Ryde Road (P.O. Box 321)

  Pymble, NSW 2073, Australia

  www.harpercollins.com.au/ebooks

  Canada

  HarperCollins Canada

  2 Bloor Street East - 20th Floor

  Toronto, ON, M4W, 1A8, Canada

  http://www.harpercollins.ca

  New Zealand

  HarperCollins Publishers (New Zealand) Limited

  P.O. Box 1

  Auckland, New Zealand

  http://www.harpercollins.co.nz

  United Kingdom

  HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.

  77-85 Fulham Palace Road

  London, W6 8JB, UK

  http://www.harpercollins.co.uk

  United States

  HarperCollins Publishers Inc.

  10 East 53rd Street

  New York, NY 10022

  http://www.harpercollins.com