Dawn of the Demontide

by William Hussey

  ‘So, where’s my dad then?’ he smiled.

  ‘Called away on business. Didn’t have time to say goodbye. Asked me to look after you. I’ve got my work here, and so I’m afraid you’ll have to spend your summer holiday with me.’

  ‘Can I call him?’

  Joanna shook her head. ‘He’s somewhere in the wilds of South America. No satellite phone.’

  Again, a lie that could not be challenged.

  ‘I’d like to get a breath of fresh air.’

  ‘But you haven’t finished your sandwich.’

  ‘I’ve lost my appetite.’

  ‘All right. Don’t go too far, you’re still weak. Lunch at one.’

  Jake left the table and ducked into the low corridor. He was at the cottage door when Joanna called out.

  ‘Welcome to the Hollow!’

  Stonycroft Cottage, thatched and whitewashed, stood by itself at the end of a wooded lane. Jake stepped back and breathed in the atmosphere of the place. This was where his father had grown up. Years ago, Adam Harker had played in the cottage garden, climbed these trees and cycled this pathway. Jake found it hard to imagine his dad as a boy. All he knew of Adam’s past were the few things his dad had let slip—he had grown up in a village on the east coast of England; he’d had one sister, Joanna, who had teased him about the gap between his front teeth; his mother and father had died in a car accident. Apart from his love of horror comics, that was about it.

  Jake walked slowly up the lane. Bedridden for a week, the muscles in his legs ached like hell. By the time he reached the main road his head felt light. He took a few deep breaths and wandered on.

  Hobarron’s Hollow was little more than a group of cottages built on a steep hillside. From its position on the crest of the hill, an ugly church of weather-beaten stone overlooked the village. Jake decided against a trek uphill, and instead walked down the road towards what looked like a small town square with a war memorial at its centre. Further on, he saw the road plummet down to the cliffs. These pale red rocks curved out from the mainland to form a kind of natural harbour or bay.

  Entering the square, he saw the few shops that served the Hollow: a butcher’s, post office, off licence, corner shop, and a pub called The Voice of the Cave. Fishermen smoking briar pipes shared a joke on the steps of the pub. Cheery old folks waited at the bus stop. Mothers with babies dressed in knitwear called out greetings to one another. A perfect picture postcard of an English seaside village, Jake thought … Too perfect perhaps. Were those smiles a little strained? Were the jokes a little forced? And was it his imagination, or did the eyes of these people keep flickering in his direction?

  Jake crossed the square and entered the post office. The bell above the door jangled. He grabbed a notebook and a biro from the shelves and went to the counter. A man in his early forties with thinning hair and a warm smile punched the keys of an antique till.

  ‘One pound and fifty new pence, sir.’

  Jake swore under his breath.

  ‘I’m sorry, I’ve come out without any money.’

  ‘You’re Jacob Harker, aren’t you? Joanna’s nephew?’ The postmaster dropped Jake’s purchases into a brown paper bag. ‘No need to look so puzzled—I’m afraid we’ve all been gossiping about you. A new face is always a five-day-wonder in the village. I’m Eric, by the way. Eric Drake.’

  Drake. The same name as the boy who’d been spooked by ‘something nasty’ in Dr Holmwood’s boathouse. Eric must have caught the look on Jake’s face.

  ‘I know your father, of course. We all grew up together—Joanna, Adam, my brother and me. Walter went on to work at the Institute. I wasn’t brainy enough, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Funny,’ Jake said.

  ‘Hmm?’

  ‘How so many people from this village ended up at the Institute.’

  ‘Well, Dr Holmwood is a Hollow man, too. He has a great sense of family; likes to keep people together. And we have an excellent school here, so it’s no wonder we turn out so many bright kids. I don’t believe the Institute only employs people from the Hollow though,’ Eric laughed. ‘Your mother wasn’t from here, was she?’

  ‘No,’ Jake conceded.

  It was true that many of the top people at the Institute came from all over the world. Still, it was equally true that Jake’s father, Dr Saxby, and Eric Drake’s brother held some of the highest positions within the organization.

  Eric handed over the bag.

  ‘No charge. Call it a “welcome to the Hollow gift”. Drop by again and I’ll tell you some tales about your old man!’

  Jake smiled and left the shop.

  He sat down on the steps of the memorial. Print covered all four sides of the obelisk, but this was not a traditional monument to the war dead. There was no mention of any particular conflict. Instead, it was just a list of names, each of which began with the title ‘Elder’. Jake found several Harkers, Saxbys, Drakes, and Holmwoods on the list, dates beside each. The earliest death was recorded as 1645.

  Comfortable with a pen in hand, Jake looked down at the notepad. He had not written since his mother’s death. Stories would not come to him. But this was not a story, it was real life, and he had to make sense of it. He wrote:

  HOBARRON ELDERS

  THE COVEN

  Dr Holmwood

  Coven leader (someone named

  Dad

  Crowden?)

  Dr Saxby

  Mother Inglethorpe (and demon—

  Aunt Joanna

  one I saw in the boathouse?)

  Walter Drake

  Mr Quilp (and Pinch)

  A coven traditionally consists of thirteen members. If this is true there are at least ten other witches in the Coven. As for the Elders—who knows? Maybe the whole village! Remember Dr Holmwood saying that he would have to notify them that I was coming so that they didn’t frighten me away.

  Each Elder belongs to one of the old families that have lived in the Hollow for generations—right back to when Tiberius Holmwood founded the Elders in 1645. The Institute was established by Dr Holmwood some time in the last thirty years in order, I guess, to study, monitor, and defend against witchcraft. The Elders only ever become really active at the time of THE DEMONTIDE—a time of Evil and, possibly, the end of mankind. The Coven has worked for centuries to bring this about but the Elders have stopped them every time. The next Demontide will take place here, in Hobarron’s Hollow, in a few days …

  QUESTIONS:

  1. The machine in the blueprint was called the ‘HOBARRON WEAPON: INCU’—a high-tech box with cables & wires—but what does the weapon do? Mum called it ‘a machine of ferocious power’. Is it a bomb? Aunt Joanna must have found the blueprint in my room—no hope of seeing it again now.

  2. Why did my dad ask me to find Sidney Tinsmouth? Does he really hold the secret to what’s going on here?

  3. As the weapon doesn’t work, Saxby says there is only one other way to stop the Demontide: the Elders must be prepared to kill—a child sacrifice. Dr Holmwood said he had ‘committed such an act once before’. A boy called Luke was murdered …

  4. I have dreamed of someone called the Witchfinder. Why?—and who is this man?

  Jake chewed the end of the biro. He scanned what he had written and, although there were many questions unanswered, what he should do next seemed pretty clear.

  He should take his dad’s advice and RUN.

  After all, it was obvious that he was the intended child sacrifice. Why else had it been so important that Aunt Joanna should bring him here? If he was smart, he would start running now and not stop until he was far away from Hobarron’s Hollow and its creepy inhabitants.

  There was only one problem with this plan: his dad had said that the answer was in the Hollow. By finding this answer, Jake felt that he might be able to make things right. He had watched helplessly as his mother was murdered, he had failed to save his friend Simon Lydgate. Whatever the cost, he could not now abandon his father. He would stay in Hobarron’s H
ollow until the truth was known. And he would find a way to stop the Demontide.

  Jake reread what he had written. Sidney Tinsmouth was the obvious starting point, but all his dad had said was that Tinsmouth lived ‘in the lion’s head’. For the moment, Jake could make no sense of that cryptic statement, and so he decided to begin his investigations here in the Hollow.

  Jake glanced up from the notebook. Mouth open, he stared across the square.

  ‘Rachel?’

  Her name had barely left his lips when Rachel Saxby disappeared down a side street. Jake thrust pen and notebook into his pocket and raced across the square. Spots of rain spat into his eyes. The sky darkened and the breeze strengthened. There were a few startled murmurs from the OAPs at the bus stop. The mothers looked up fretfully and pushed their prams under shop awnings. One of the fishermen let loose a string of swear words. Quite an overreaction for a bit of drizzle, Jake thought.

  A toad exploded at his feet.

  Jake skidded to a stop. Slap, slap, slap. A dozen more toads hit the pavement and vanished in a blur of blood. The murmurs turned into gasps. A scream broke out. The fishermen, burbling in their thick accents, hurried back into the pub. The OAPs tottered off in the direction of the post office. As Jake watched, something large and green hit one old girl directly on the head. In an instant, her plastic shower hood turned a disgusting shade of red. Thick strands of toad guts hung from her shoulders like party streamers.

  The perfect picture postcard was gone.

  Chaos reigned.

  Chapter 10

  The First Omen

  Jake closed the post office door behind him.

  Thirty or forty people had crammed their way into the little shop. Now they jostled for space, fear and anger in their eyes. Tins of food, packets of washing powder, newspapers and dozens of other goods were knocked off their shelves in the panic. Roller blinds, a shade greener than the amphibians falling from the sky, had been lowered to shut off the view of the square. Above the hubbub, Jake could hear a steady thump-thump-thump against the windows.

  The mothers and the OAPs tried their best to clean the gore from their coats, hats, and faces. A baby sitting in its pushchair sucked happily on a severed toad’s leg. There was a general wailing and chirrup of frightened voices—Mind your arm, Jonas Sykes!—Now look what you’ve done, Roger! I’ll have to pay for that jar of peanut butter!—Raining toads! It’s happening again, ain’t it, Maggie? Jake tore a page from his notebook and used it to clean bits of toad off his trainers.

  ‘Toads—then the mist—then the monsters.’ One of the young mothers shivered and held her baby to her chest. ‘That was what my grandfather told me. First came the toads … ’

  ‘She’s right!’ This woman was in her forties and very glamorous. Her long red nails pointed at the blinds just as another toad smashed against the glass. ‘I remember the last time very well. I was about seventeen. Ross McDale and I were parked in his car on the clifftops. We were … Well, we were young.’

  Despite the weirdness of the situation, a few titters greeted this remark.

  ‘We saw it coming in from the sea,’ Long Nails continued. ‘The mist. The second day and the Second Omen. Each day a fresh sign. Four in all. Four signs before the Demonti—’

  ‘Miss Daniels!’

  The entire crowd turned to Mr Drake, the postmaster. He was staring at the glamorous woman with daggers in his eyes.

  ‘Let’s not talk nonsense in front of our new friend.’ Drake glanced over to where Jake stood in the doorway. ‘I’m sure you’ve all heard about young Mr Harker here. Adam’s son—Joanna’s nephew. He’s come to spend his summer holiday in the Hollow. This is Jake.’

  Forty faces—young and old, plain and beautiful, smooth and weather-beaten—made an effort to relax into easy smiles. Most didn’t manage it.

  ‘You—you must forgive us,’ Miss Daniels flustered. ‘We are a superstitious people here in the Hollow. We get excitable over such silly nonsense.’

  They all murmured in agreement.

  ‘Welcome, Jake!’ a voice shouted from the back. This greeting was soon taken up, and the chant almost managed to drown out the thunder of toads on glass.

  ‘We tend to get ourselves a little worked up when this sort of thing happens. It’s almost like a ritual of ours,’ Mr Drake chuckled. His gaze swept the crowd, looking for support. ‘You see, Jake, this sort of thing isn’t that unusual.’

  ‘Raining toads?’ Jake said, disbelieving. ‘Not unusual?’

  A middle-aged woman with jet-black hair and a beaky, birdlike face spoke up.

  ‘Not in these parts. It’s all to do with atmospheric pressure, you see. We have lots of hot air currents streaming in at this time of year. They pass over cold seawater and that causes fish, frogs, any smaller form of sea life, to be drawn into the air. Later they are deposited on the mainland like rain. A very natural phenomenon.’

  ‘You seemed scared enough a few minutes ago,’ Jake observed.

  The woman gave a cool shrug of the shoulders.

  ‘I think it’s stopping,’ said Mr Drake.

  The postmaster went to the window and raised the blind.

  Jake jumped as a single toad smacked the glass. This one hit without any force and dropped groggily to the ground. A gruesome mess of red and green, the post office window looked as if an ogre had been slaughtered right outside.

  The shop started to empty. Most of the people filing past Jake held out their hands and wished him a ‘pleasant holiday in the Hollow’. Jake did his best to nod and smile. The bell jingled one last time and he was alone again with the postmaster. Mr Drake took a broom from behind the counter and started sweeping up the mess.

  ‘Old-fashioned broom, that,’ Jake observed. ‘Looks a bit like a witch’s.’

  Mr Drake blinked twice and went on sweeping.

  ‘So, do you believe all that stuff about Omens?’ Jake said lightly. ‘Or was that woman just a bit mental?’

  Drake paused. He rested a forearm on the broom and fixed Jake with a hard stare.

  ‘You don’t know this village, Mr Harker. It’s not your home. We have our own beliefs and customs here, and I won’t have them made fun of, understand? Now, unless there’s anything else I can help you with?’

  Jake was halfway out of the shop when he turned back.

  ‘Mr Drake?’

  The postmaster beamed at Jake, as bright and friendly as ever.

  ‘Does Dr Saxby have a house in the Hollow? I’d like to pop by and say hello.’

  ‘What a nice idea. Yes, Dr Saxby’s family home is at the top of the village. Just take the road to the right of St Meredith’s church and you’ll come to it.’

  Jake closed the door behind him.

  ‘Weirdo,’ he muttered.

  The clouds had vanished and the sun shone down on a bizarre scene. A carpet of tiny green corpses covered the town square. The Elders’ memorial was now so smattered with slime that it was impossible to read the names. Jake picked his way between the toads, careful not to step in any fresh goo. A couple of the fishermen stood on the steps of the pub and surveyed the amphibian graveyard from beneath bushy brows. They raised their pipes in greeting as Jake passed.

  He had reached the road that led back uphill when a deep croak brought him to a halt. The only toad left unexploded sat on the pavement in front of him. Jake sank to his knee and examined the creature. Except for its milky white belly, warts covered every inch of its skin. Orange eyes with black slit pupils shone in the glare of the sun. The toad waddled towards Jake.

  ‘Bufo bufo.’

  Jake blinked. It took a moment for him to realize that it was not the toad that had spoken. He looked up at the beakyfaced woman from the post office.

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘Bufo bufo. The Latin name for the common toad. Ugly brute, isn’t he? I’m Alice Splane, by the way.’ She gave Jake a stiff nod. ‘I’m an ornithologist by profession—that’s a fancy word for someone who knows a lot about birds�
�but I dabble in herpetology, too: the study of reptiles and amphibians. The common toad is identifiable by his webbed hind feet, his broad body, and his rounded snout.’

  Alice pointed out these details, all the while keeping her hand a good distance from ‘Bufo bufo’.

  ‘What about that?’

  Jake indicated a dark blemish on the toad’s back. It was so well-defined that it seemed as if someone had drawn it with a black felt-tipped pen.

  ‘Just the usual markings,’ Alice shrugged.

  Jake shook his head. ‘It’s crazy, but I think I’ve seen that symbol somewhere before … ’

  ‘“Symbol”? It can hardly be called a symbol, Jake. Such a word would suggest that the toad had been deliberately marked by someone. Like a toad tattoo!’

  Alice Splane tittered. It struck Jake as an uneasy laugh.

  ‘No, no,’ Alice continued, ‘it’s just Nature’s blemish. We all have them: beauty spots, moles, acne scars.’

  ‘I guess.’

  ‘Honestly, I would suggest that you’re seeing patterns in things that aren’t there. Like noticing a face in the clouds or pictures in the flames of a fire. Our brains are programmed to seek out these things.’ She glanced at her watch. ‘Goodness, is that the hour? I must be going.’

  And with that, the woman turned and strode away.

  ‘Weirder and weirder,’ Jake said.

  The whole village seemed to be in on the conspiracy to keep him in the dark about the Demontide and the sacrifice that was needed to stop it. Despite the horror of it, Jake couldn’t help smiling at their bumbling attempts to keep the secret.

  Rrrurrrp.

  The toad hopped across the pavement. Jake dropped to his knees again and lowered his head to get a better look at the toad’s tattoo. He had seen it before. Think …