by Robin Jarvis
Out into the night the witches flew, holding on to each other more lightly now. Over the clustering yards of the East Cliff they sailed, soaring above the chimneys and riding the air like thistledown.
Susannah marvelled at the sensation and the others trilled with pleasure. Miriam had never felt so buoyant and she giggled helplessly whilst Hillian surveyed the buildings below, her small mouth pulled into an inane grin.
But the flight did not last long, for soon they began to descend, down towards the grassy slope of the cliffside, to where a white-washed cottage nestled in the shadows.
The neat-looking house grew larger as they glided down, descending unerringly to a darkened window that peeped out beneath the eaves.
The glass rippled before them and they passed through the window as though it were a sheet of smoke. Into the cottage they floated and found themselves standing upon a rag rug in a darkened bedroom lit only by a chink of grey light that poured through a gap in the curtain.
"Here doth the enemy of all our designs slumber, unaware of your presence," the voice of the fishmonkey resounded in their heads. "Behold the human worm, the insolent whelp who dares to challenge the sovereignty of our great master."
Susannah and the others stared about them; the room was tiny and they bent their heads beneath the sloping ceiling as, together, they stole towards the bed.
Beneath the blankets a small figure slept soundly and as her eyes adjusted to the inky darkness Susannah's mouth fell open in horror.
The sleeper was a child!
Staring at Ben in disbelief she shook her head mutinously. Was that young boy the one whom the Allpowerful feared so much? Was that sweet innocent life the one they were commanded to extinguish? Her mind revolted at the thought and her forehead dripped with perspiration.
Beside her, her sisters looked down on the boy dispassionately, their faces betraying no emotion whatsoever. The child was nothing to them; if he had to die then so be it; their hands were already steeped in the blood of so many others.
"This scrap of bones and blood", the contemptuous voice continued, "is all that stands betwixt your hearts' desire and the high plans of our most noble lord. Yet see how easily this impertinent mortal is destroyed—look to his left hand!"
Susannah could hardly raise her eyes. Yet she did as the creature ordered and gazed at Ben's hand that lay outside the bedclothes.
It was clenched into a fist and even as the witches peered at the curled fingers they heard the chilling voice begin to chant once more.
Upon the bed, Ben murmured in his sleep and he rolled over, his face moving into the dim light that streamed through the curtain.
Susannah wept with pity and hot tears trickled from the eyes that were too stricken to blink.
The incantation rang out sharply and, very gently, the boy's fist opened. In the centre of his palm was the solid, round shape of the ammonite, and the fishmonkey squealed in evil joy as it barked out the dreadful spell.
Susannah began to shake in terror, for as she watched, the fossil in Ben's hand began to move.
With a jerk, the ancient stone ammonite convulsed and uncurled, twitching and writhing upon the boy's warm skin.
The snake-like fossil wriggled and stretched as the power of the enchantment imbued it with life and filled it with murderous intent.
Like a loathsome worm, it pulled itself along the open palm, crawling over Ben's wrist and up his arm.
Miriam's eyes widened at the sight, but she was flushed with excitement and licked her teeth, revelling in the fiendish situation and feasting upon the macabre agony that was to come.
The living ammonite was now slithering over the boy's chest, creeping ever closer towards his head.
Susannah's wiry hair was drenched in sweat and hung lankly over her face. She wanted to scream; this was utterly insane.
Over Ben's throat the stone shape squirmed and he muttered under his breath as it reared up to cling to his chin. For a moment it dangled there like a leech, then with a flick of its twisting tail the fossil fell on to the boy's lips.
Susannah tried to pull her hands away from the others—this was obscene.
"Stop!" she protested. "It's vile! Stop it!"
But her sisters gripped her hands tightly and she could not break free. Hillian's grasp was vice-like and Miriam's huge fists crushed Susannah's fingers, staunching the blood until they throbbed.
Malevolently, the ammonite wormed across the boy's mouth, and pushed itself inside.
In desperation, Susannah struggled against the tenacious grasp of the others, lashing out and kicking them.
Slipping over Ben's teeth, the fossil wriggled on to his tongue and in his sleep, the boy coughed.
Deeper it squirmed, reaching further into his throat.
Ben began to choke. The ammonite had lodged itself inside his windpipe and there it remained.
The boy's body contorted as he gagged and gasped for air. His hands tore at the collar of his pyjamas and his choking cries gargled piteously from his mouth.
Miriam was transfixed. She was glued to the horrendous scene and relished every despairing second. Her bosom heaved and she gazed at the dying child adoringly.
"Magnificent!" she drawled. "Exquisite invention!"
At her side, Hillian watched with cold detachment. Never had she witnessed so beautifully simple a death. No one could possibly be held responsible for this.
Ben clutched at his throat and writhed in the bed. His lungs were bursting and his heart thumped in his chest. But no air could pass by the ammonite and the boy's strength gradually began to fail as his agonies increased and a tingling blackness crept over him.
Suddenly, Susannah threw back her head and screamed at the top of her voice.
"NNNOOOOOO!" she bellowed. "IT'S EVIL!"
At once the string of beads around her neck snapped. With a clatter, the wooden trinkets fell to the floor and Susannah O'Donnell was finally free of Nathaniel's control.
Darting forward, she bit Miriam's hand and pulled herself free, then savagely punched Hillian in the ribs.
The circle was broken.
Susannah tore herself away and immediately found that she was back in the bookshop.
At her feet, the fishmonkey shrieked at her.
"The charm is ruined!" the shrivelled creature squawked. "You have destroyed its power!"
Sprawled over the carpet, Hillian clutched her aching side and glared up at Susannah whilst Miriam snarled and nursed her bleeding hand.
In the cottage, Ben retched and choked until finally the ammonite was dislodged and he coughed it up from his throat and spat it on to the bedclothes.
Gulping down the sweet air, the boy collapsed on to his back, and when he had recovered enough he examined the now inanimate fossil in his trembling hands.
It appeared the same as it had always done, but Ben flung it to the floor and leapt from the bed to look out of the window.
All seemed quiet outside and his wheezing breath quickly steamed up the glass. Yet in the misty condensation he drew a mysterious sign and snorted defiantly.
"I warned you the hunchback was lapsing,"
Miriam snapped. "Now look, her necklace is broken. She is no longer one of the sisters."
Susannah was terrified; the expressions upon the witches' faces were deadly and full of menace.
"It was only a child," she pleaded. "I could not let you do that!"
Hillian polished her spectacles and gave a brisk shake of the head. "Your oath is violated," she said in a soft, sinister voice; "this night we could have achieved everything the coven has longed for."
"Don't you understand?" Susannah cried. "It isn't worth it—can't you see that? Are you mad? Listen to me!"
Upon the wooden chest, the fishmonkey lashed out with its claws and tore long rents in the woman's trousers, gouging out a ribbon of skin beneath each sharp nail.
Susannah howled and clutched her leg as the blood welled up between her fingers.
"You ha
ve failed us," Hillian muttered, "betrayed my trust in you. You do realise that you must be disposed of?"
Susannah backed away. "No!" she screamed. "No!"
Whirling around, she fled down the spiral staircase and raced through the shop below.
Miriam sprang forward. A bestial growl rumbled from her lips as she snarled and put her hand to her own necklace. A hellish light began to blaze in the almond-shaped eyes and the varnish flaked from her nails as they quivered and grew.
"No," commanded Hillian, "there is not time for that. I shall deal with her!"
Like the wind, she hared down the staircase and found Susannah scrabbling at the locked door.
"Let me go!" she begged. "I won't tell anyone—I swear. Oh Hillian, please!"
"You are faithless," the witch spat vehemently. "Your words mean nothing and nor so do you."
"Don't come near me!" Susannah warbled. "Keep back!"
"Come away from the door, O'Donnell," Hillian told her. "Don't make this harder for yourself."
For the last time, Susannah fumbled with the lock but the key was upstairs with Miriam so, panic-stricken, she blundered into the window and banged upon the glass, screaming for help.
"Stop that!" Hillian shrieked, lunging after her and catching the woman by the hair. "Do you want to wake up the whole of Whitby?"
Violently, she dragged Susannah from the window and hauled her back into the gloom.
But Susannah fought against her. With a yell, she shoved the witch against a shelf and the books came crashing about their heads.
Hillian roared and flew at her, wrapping her hands about the woman's throat. Susannah wrenched the strangling fingers away and threw her attacker to the ground.
With papers fluttering all about her, she picked up a chair and ran towards the window with it. But Hillian tripped her and Susannah careered headlong into the counter. The till shuddered as she crashed into the panels below and the woman let out a horrible moan.
Panting for breath, and with her expensive clothes torn, Hillian Fogle seized Susannah's feet and pulled her to the rear of the shop, grunting at the dead weight.
"No... no one leaves the... the coven of the Black Sceptre," she breathed, stooping over the limp body and pressing her fingers into the fleshy neck.
Susannah bucked beneath her and Hillian dived helplessly into a carousel of audio cassettes that toppled to the floor and exploded in a flurry of plastic boxes and festoons of magnetic tape.
Groggily, Susannah lurched to her feet and she peered at the witch lying motionless in the heap of books and tapes. Then she spun round to flee but it was too late.
Down the spiral staircase Miriam Gower had come. Through the wreck of her shop she had pounded and from the floor she had snatched up the largest book she could find.
With a ferocious screech, she brought it smashing down upon Susannah's skull which splintered beneath it, and with a whimper, the woman sank to the floor.
As the swirling shreds of paper settled within the bookshop, Miriam gazed down at Susannah's crumpled body and moistened her lips.
With a groan, Hillian staggered to her feet and stared at what Miriam had done.
"She is dead?"
"Must be," the other replied acidly. "Just look what her blood's doing to my Dickens."
Hillian bent over their former sister and searched for a pulse.
"Yes," she affirmed, "she is no more."
Both witches looked at one another—what were they to do with the body? This was not some primitive corner of the world where death is easy to conceal.
"What shall we do?" Miriam breathed. "The police will come; we must escape while we can."
Hillian kicked a pile of books and buried her face in her hands. "After all my work!" she complained bitterly. "All that planning—for it to fade merely for this!"
Her sobs subsided and they fell into dumbfounded silence as they desperately pondered on what was to be done.
And then they heard it. Above them the fishmonkey was calling and the witches hurried up the staircase.
"Susannah is dead!" Hillian cried, climbing the final steps. "We must leave at once."
The wizened creature twisted its head and the yellow eyes became narrow slivers that glowed brighter than the candle flames.
"Listen to me!" it hissed. "Panic no more, for you are not alone. Hearken to my words and obey this instruction. The body of your perfidious sister shall be taken for you. Do not trouble over such a billing concern. Do this only: remove the mortal remains from this place and put them in the alley without."
"What?" Miriam bawled, "That's idiotic! You can't dump corpses by the bins for collection. It will be discovered."
"Silence!" squealed the fishmonkey. "At the precise hour of three this night, something will come. The carcass shall be taken—have no fear. It will be as if your sister had never existed."
Hillian nodded her agreement. "It shall be done," she said, "but what of the boy? How are we to complete your master's wishes? Are we to resume what we have begun?"
The yellow eyes closed fully as the creature considered this and he reached out with his thoughts.
"No," he said at length, "that route is now barred to us. The mortal scum is becoming aware of his own strength. It is vital we do not arouse his suspicion any further—not yet."
"Then what must we do?"
"Waiting is all. My master must construct a new design. When the rest of thy coven is assembled, then we shall try again."
The fishmonkey's voice began to fade and its movements became ever more laboured. "My time is over," it uttered. "Summon me only when you are ready." And with that the eyes closed and it became a lifeless preserved curiosity once more.
Hillian looked at her sister. "So we wait," she sighed.
The large woman eyed her dubiously. "Are we really going to lug Plain Little Susie outside and put her in the alley?"
"Of course. What else can be done?"
"But what if someone sees us?"
"No one shall. Now make haste—there is a shop to get back in order."
At three in the morning, a squelching darkness crept over the cobbles of Church Street and moved purposefully towards The Whitby Bookshop.
The bloated shadow flowed through the alleyway, its quivering membrane brushing over the walls and coating them with slime.
Half hidden by the bin sacks, the forsaken body of Susannah O'Donnell lay upon the wet ground, a fine dew sparkling over her face.
Taking a break from cleaning her premises, Miriam Gower realised the time and peeped curiously out of the first floor window which overlooked the alley.
A black, formless shape had obliterated the place where she and Hillian had deposited the corpse and Miriam shuddered.
"Never did like that ugly Quasimodo," she sneered. "Now at last that voice of hers is silenced forever." And she resumed the cleaning, humming pleasantly to herself.
When the dawn came, no trace of the body remained. But the plastic of the bin sacks where Susannah had briefly lain had melted and the contents were spilled over the ground.
No one ever noticed the wisp of red hair that was glued to the cobbles by a peculiar trail of slime, for in the afternoon the rain came and the last fragment of Susannah O'Donnell was washed away forever.
5 - The Horngarth
With her baggy trousers rolled up to her knees, Nelda ambled slowly through the shallow waves at the water's edge and flapped the hem of her gansey.
She had walked some distance from Whitby, for that afternoon the tourists were swarming everywhere and the beach beneath the cliffs was filled with their clamour. Dozens of human children scrambled over the rocks, shrieking at one another and daring to explore the shallow caves set into the cliff side.
The fisherfolk half dreaded the fine weather which the month of May brought with it; the brilliant sunshine inevitably heralded this riotous invasion of holidaymakers. The aufwaders hated the constant noise which their cars, radios and raucous picnics caused. In t
he past they had always retreated further into the grottoes beneath the cliff to escape the landbreed babble but now that was impossible, and in the entrance chamber behind the great doors the human voices echoed from outside and resounded around the walls.
This, combined with the baking heat, had turned the cavern into an unendurable place in which the fisherfolk either sweltered or were driven to distraction. For many of the tribe it had proven too much and they ventured above the ground to seek a secluded refuge free from noise, hoping that the blistering weather would cease.
Yet the parched month continued and it seemed that the sizzling spell would never break. Summer had come early and showed no sign of dissipating, for today had been the hottest yet.
Beneath the thick wool of her gansey and the leather jerkin she now wore, Nelda felt as if she was melting. It was stifling and unbearable, yet she dared not remove the thick layers of clothing for she needed them to conceal her stomach, which she felt was growing larger every day. The young aufwader's condition was still a secret known only to herself and Old Parry, but Nelda knew she could not keep it from her grandfather for much longer.
"I must tell him," she muttered, patting her belly morosely. "He isn't blind and there's folk enough who'll notice even if he were."
Almost wilting from the heat, Nelda waded a little deeper into the sea and let the waves splash around her waist. She was tired, the unborn child sapped all her strength and she yearned for an undisturbed night's sleep without the constant ache that twinged and cramped in her back.
Scooping up the salt water in her hands, she threw it over her scorched and sunburned face then shielded her eyes to squint at the cloudless sky. The afternoon was nearly over and she yearned for dusk when the heat would subside and peace return to Whitby's shores.
Eventually, as the sun blazed orange and swollen above the horizon, her solitary figure padded back through the waves towards the cliffs. The familiar rocky stretch drew closer and Nelda was relieved to see that it was now deserted—except for two small shapes sitting upon the great stones, watching her as she approached.
Eurgen Handibrass and Judd Gutch drew on their long clay pipes and regarded the girl with sour expressions graven on their weathered faces. Normally they were two of the kindliest members of the aufwader tribe, but no glimmer of a smile twitched over their whiskery mouths as Nelda came nearer.
