This year we were going to stay in a castle for the weekend, which did sound fun – but not as much fun as snorkelling in the sea. So I made a point of sulking in the back of the car for the two whole hours it took to drive there.
When we arrived I continued to sulk because the castle turned out to be no fun at all! No dungeons, no suits of armour and nothing at all for kids to do. It was like a big castle-shaped hotel with no TV. And because it was in the middle of nowhere, I couldn’t even nag Mum and Dad to take me into town to a cinema or an arcade.
So I was stuck for the whole weekend with nothing to do.
On the first day nothing much happened.
Mum wandered around the castle grounds and got really excited about the rose bushes. Dad followed Mum with a guidebook, pointing out statues and other things that were supposed to be interesting. While I trailed along behind both of them yawning as loud as I could.
By the end of the day Mum said she’d had just about enough of my sulking. She said if I wasn’t interested in all the wonderful historic things in the castle then I might as well go to bed – and sent me to my room.
And that’s when things finally got interesting.
I was sitting on my bed reading by torchlight (because I wasn’t tired and there was nothing else to do) when I heard a strange noise coming from under the bed.
I closed my book and listened carefully until I heard it again.
Clang, Clang, Clang!
Because it wasn’t a growling sound or a screaming sound (which would have been really scary – especially in a creepy old castle), I leaned over the bed and shone my torch underneath to find out what it was. But there was nothing there except a few balls of fluff on the dusty stone floor, and balls of fluff don’t make clanging sounds (in fact I don’t think balls of fluff make any sounds at all).
I shrugged and was about to leave it when I heard the noise again, but this time the fluff balls moved with a draught and I could see something sticking out of the floor.
Climbing down I reached under the bed, swept the dust away and found a small piece of rope attached to an old trapdoor!
I’d like to say I took a moment to think about it and considered not investigating the noise, so I could stay out of trouble (especially after what happened on the last holiday). But I was SO bored I didn’t see that I had much of a choice.
I pulled on the rope and the door creaked open.
Propping the trapdoor open with my book, I slid under the bed on my belly. Shining the torch down the dark hole in the floor I saw narrow stone steps leading to a passageway that ran directly under my room.
CLANG, CLANG, CLANG!
The sound made me jump; it was much louder with the door open and it seemed to echo through the passage. I was tempted to shut the trapdoor and forget all about it. It was very dark and anything could be lurking down there.
But then I remembered how bored I’d been all day and decided a bit of exploring was just what I needed.
It was probably just some rusty old pipes clanging anyway.
As I reached the bottom step I stopped and pointed the beam of light down the passageway (just to make sure nothing was lurking). It seemed to go on forever and my torch wasn’t bright enough to see what was up ahead, but I was already down there and decided to go a little further just to see where it went.
It felt like I’d been walking for ages when the narrow passage took a sharp bend to the left, and turning the corner I discovered a large wooden door ahead of me.
CLANG, CLANG, CLANG!
I jumped back with fright and dropped my torch, and as it hit the stone floor I heard the bulb crack and the light immediately went out!
GULP!
Looking around I was surprised to find the tunnel wasn’t pitch black as it should have been. There was light coming from the other side of the door, flickering through the keyhole and between the gaps in the wood.
I guessed I’d probably found a tunnel that led to the castle kitchen or something boring like that, and the noise was probably just the clanging of saucepans. So I stepped up to the door and peered through the keyhole.
Well, it definitely wasn’t the kitchen!
I hadn’t actually seen the castle’s kitchen, although I was pretty sure it would have electric light bulbs like the rest of the castle, and this room was lit with two flaming torches in iron holders on the wall!
I couldn’t see much else through the keyhole and still had no idea what was making the clanging sound, but I also didn’t want to go back the way I’d come without my torch.
I took a deep breath, lifted the latch and pushed the door open.
Suddenly a tall metal figure lurched across the room in my direction swinging a giant axe!
‘ARRRRRGGGGGGHHH!’ I screamed as the axe thunked into the wood above my head.
I gazed up at the knight in shining armour (although the armour wasn’t very shiny – it was dull and dusty and looked rusted around the joints). But the knight didn’t look down. In fact I think he couldn’t look down because the neck of the armour was so rusted.
Which meant he probably hadn’t even seen me.
As I suspected the knight just pulled the axe from the door and lurched off in the opposite direction, crashing into furniture along the way. He didn’t seem able to bend his knees either, so he looked like a great metal zombie.
The room appeared to be a dining hall. It had a long wooden table with metal plates and cups on it, but there was no food on them and everything was covered in dust and thick stringy cobwebs. There were shields and tapestries on the walls and racks of spears and swords at one end.
‘Hello?’ I yelled, as the knight crashed into the wall with a great big CLANG!
The knight was about to lurch in another direction when he stopped suddenly and shuffled around to face me (which took him quite a while).
‘Are you an actor?’ I said, because Dad had mentioned that sometimes actors came to the castle, dressed up in old-fashioned clothes and put on medieval shows for the guests (Mum said she’d like to be a damsel in distress, whatever that is).
‘Mmmf mmm mtttthhhh!’ the knight said, although I couldn’t understand what he was saying because everything was muffled inside his helmet.
‘Eh?’ I said, moving closer. ‘I can’t hear you.’
‘Mmmf mmm mtttthhhh!’ the knight mumbled again impatiently. This time he was trying to point to his helmet and the effort nearly made him topple over.
With a closer look I could see all the hinges on the helmet had rusted shut and the grille across the front was blocked up with dust and cobwebs. He obviously couldn’t see anything which explained why he was lurching around and bumping into things.
I suddenly realized an armed knight who couldn’t see what he was doing wasn’t a good idea, so I yanked the axe out of his hand and put it down on the table (it was really heavy and landed with a thud).
A grumbling sound came from inside the helmet – but I ignored it.
I told the knight to stay where he was and went over to the rack of spears and swords to find something to prise the helmet open. Instead I found a tin of grease and an old rag, which was even better.
Pulling a stool over to the knight I stepped up and started rubbing away the rust with a big dollop of grease. It took a while but eventually I managed to free the grille part of the helmet and flipped it up.
‘ARRRRRGGGGGGHHH!’
I screamed, and fell backwards off the stool.
I had no idea who or what I would find inside the helmet – but I’d definitely expected to find something! Instead what I found was nothing but a few stringy cobwebs.
The knight didn’t have a head!
Thinking about it, the CLANG, CLANG, CLANGING sound had been pretty hollow – which meant he probably didn’t have a body either!
So I did what any sensible person would do – I legged it in the direction of the tunnel, not caring any more how dark it was!
Suddenly the knight spoke in a st
range tinny voice that seemed to vibrate and echo around his armour.
‘I do beg your pardon,’ he said. ‘It was not my intention to give you a fright.’
I stopped before reaching the door and glanced back.
The knight was waving at me; at least his helmet was pointing in my direction and his metal glove was creaking from side to side, which seemed friendly enough. And he wasn’t holding an axe any more so there wasn’t any real reason to be scared.
‘Are you a ghost?’ I said, because when you’re not sure it’s always best to ask.
‘Um, yes,’ said the ghost.
‘I suppose I am.’
‘Then why can’t I see you?’ I said. Because I’ve seen ghosts before and this was the first ghost I’d seen that I couldn’t actually see!
The suit of armour shrugged as best he could, which didn’t look much like a shrug and was very noisy as metal rubbed against metal.
I was now more curious than scared of the ghost I couldn’t see, so I went back over to get a closer look. Standing back up on the stool I held the sides of the metal helmet and peered inside.
‘Helloooooooo?’ I called into the empty armour, and my voice echoed through his belly and limbs.
‘Please don’t do that,’ said the knight, and his voice was so close to my head it made me jump.
‘Sorry,’ I said, realizing that shouting into his armour was probably quite a rude thing to do.
‘Do you think you could rub some of that grease on my joints?’ said the knight. ‘I seem to have rusted up since they stopped cleaning me and it has restricted my movements somewhat.’
‘Can’t you just step out of the armour?’ I said, because ghosts can usually walk through walls and stuff, so I couldn’t see the armour being much of a problem.
‘Unfortunately, no,’ said the ghost, pulling the face grille back into place with a clang. ‘I’m somehow attached to it. Some ghosts have a whole castle to haunt, while I appear to be stuck with this wretched suit of armour.’
‘Can’t you haunt the castle in the armour?’ I said, dolloping grease on the metal knees and elbows and working it in with the rag to free them up. ‘That would be cool! Especially if you carried the axe with you!’
‘Oh, I used to, dear boy, and it was a lot of fun,’ laughed the ghost. ‘But then one day my helmet rusted up and I couldn’t find my way out of this secret room. And I’ve been stuck here ever since.’
‘People must have heard you trying to get out,’ I said. ‘I heard you.’
The suit of armour shrugged again, but this time it looked like a proper shrug because his elbows and shoulder joints were moving freely.
The ghost gave an excited gasp.
‘I can move!’ he said, reaching his arms high in the air and swinging them around (which reminded me of when Mum does her aerobic exercises). ‘Thank you so very much. Is there anything I can do to return the favour?’
‘Well…’ I said, scratching my head and pretending to think about it, although I immediately knew what I wanted. ‘There is one thing you could do, if you don’t mind.’
‘I am your humble servant,’ said the knight, bowing freely.
‘We have to get you out of here first, though,’ I said.
The suit of armour looked around at the walls, scratched the top of his helmet with his metal-fingered glove and then led me over to the wall. He counted the stones while nodding his head from side to side and then stepped forward.
‘I can’t walk through walls!’ I gasped.
‘Neither can I,’ said the knight. He reached forward and pushed one of the stones, which slid into the wall. Suddenly a whole section of wall creaked open like a giant stone door.
‘I’ve been trying to find that brick for years!’ sighed the knight. ‘But with my grille clogged up, I couldn’t see a thing.’
Which definitely explained all the CLANG, CLANG, CLANGING!
Suddenly I remembered something and quickly ran back to the table.
‘You’ll be needing this!’ I said, grabbing the axe.
The secret door led into the main hallway of the castle and luckily there was no one around to see us. They would definitely have got a fright if they’d seen a knight with an axe stepping through the wall.
I led the knight carefully up the stairs and along the corridor until we reached the door of my parents’ room.
‘If you could just burst through the door and wave your axe around in the air, that would be great,’ I whispered.
‘No chopping?’ asked the knight.
‘NO!’ I gasped. ‘No chopping at all!’
The knight nodded.
‘OK, I have to go to my room and pack my bags now,’ I said, patting the knight on the shoulder. ‘It was very nice meeting you.’
‘You’re leaving the castle?’ the knight said, and sounded disappointed.
I glanced at the door to Mum and Dad’s room.
‘I think I will be very soon,’ I smiled, and then legged it down the corridor.
From my room I first heard the screams, followed by the yells, followed by running footsteps and the sound of Mum and Dad hammering on my door.
I grabbed my rucksack and stepped out into the corridor.
‘WE’RE LEAVING!’ gasped Mum and Dad together.
‘Oh, I was just beginning to enjoy myself!’ I said. ‘Castles are full of cool stuff!’
‘Well, you’ll just have to make do with the beach instead!’ Mum snapped, grabbing my arm and dragging me down the corridor. ‘And I don’t want to hear another word about it!’
‘OK,’ I said, smiling to myself.
Mum and Dad hurried me down the stairs and out through the entrance hall, where I saw the knight standing against the wall. The castle staff were all gathered around him and the manager was rubbing his chin.
‘Where on earth did he come from?’ he said to the cleaner.
‘I have no idea,’ said the cleaner, flicking over the knight’s armour with a feather duster. ‘But first thing tomorrow morning I’m going to give him a really good polish!’
Dad shielded Mum’s eyes as they passed the knight, and as I tagged along behind I saw him give a tiny wave with his metal gauntlet.
Jake Cake: The Visiting Vampire Page 3
