A New Darkness

by Joseph Delaney

  “I see you work your apprentices hard!” she exclaimed, watching Jenny. Then she turned to me. “Here.” She held out a sheaf of paper bound with string. “These are my findings and speculations concerning the haizda mage and the Kobalos creatures I studied. It is the sum of what I have learned so far. Study it well. I will return within the week, and we will talk again.”

  “Are you heading north now?” I asked.

  “Northeast,” she replied. “I have a few things to organize.”

  When she had left, Jenny and I got cleaned up and went into the library. She spent the first half hour writing down what she’d learned about binding boggarts, while I began to read Grimalkin’s notes.

  The Contents of the Glass Containers: These are all biological, and in most cases held within some preserving material, usually a gel. Some are seeds; others animal (mammalian or reptilian samples plus hybrids).

  Many are still alive, held in a state of suspended animation. I believe that, if planted, the seeds would grow. The same is probably also true of the animal samples. (I tested only three, which confirmed this.) They are all capable of development and growth, but into what I cannot say without further dangerous experimentation.

  However, we know that the Kobalos have used dark magic to create many special creatures, such as builders (the whoskor, which maintain and extend the walls of Valkarky) and fighting entities (such as the haggenbrood). They may well use similar creatures in war. It could be that the dead haizda mage was preparing to create such entities locally and hide them within our borders, ready for a preemptive strike.

  The First Animal Sample: I removed this sample (labeled ZANTI on the jar) from its gel preservative and introduced it to a growth medium (two parts human blood, three parts ground bone of sow, two parts sugar, three parts human spittle).

  The sample was placed within the most powerful containment environment that I could generate—a large pentacle whose inner circle was fifty feet in diameter—in a meadow at least two hundred yards from the nearest tree. I also protected the pentacle from prying eyes and intrusion with spells of cloaking and menace.

  I was impressed by Grimalkin’s methodical approach and attention to detail, but a chill ran down my spine as I read on. The witch assassin, for all her knowledge, intelligence, and courage, had been dealing with unknown forces, and as Jenny had pointed out the day before, she’d greatly underestimated the danger posed by the varteks—a mistake that might have resulted in many deaths in the County.

  The first sample had been activated on the night of the full moon. There were lots of the small insect-like creatures. Just before dawn, they had burrowed into the soil, only to emerge again after dark the following day. At this point they were fewer in number, but the remaining creatures had grown to the size of a human finger, and Grimalkin believed that while underground they had been hunting and eating each other.

  They carried on doing this until only two remained. She described them as very thin, but roughly human in shape, with long claws on their fingers and toes. Finally she entered the pentacle and killed them with her blades. Grimalkin was brave, but I thought that sometimes she had too much self-belief for her own good. She’d been dealing with entities with unknown fighting capabilities.

  Not content with that, she repeated her experiments using a second sample from the jars. These new creatures chased and ate each other on the surface all day and night. These had long, cylindrical bodies in three segments like insects, although they eventually grew as big as a sheep, and much longer. They had a sharp protrusion on their foreheads, which they used to sting and paralyze their prey. Grimalkin nicknamed them stingers.

  These stingers had the power to summon their prey, and this worked even though Grimalkin had fortified the pentacle with a spell of menace to keep animals and humans away. They summoned and killed crows, wood pigeons, seagulls, geese, ducks, magpies, rabbits, hare, and even a deer before finally focusing their attention on the witch assassin.

  She’d felt their power as they tried to lure her into the pentacle. This time she had been wiser, slaying them from a distance with her throwing knives. After dissecting the dead creatures, she found that each of their body segments contained a heart, stomach, and brain tissue. A subsequent experiment showed that if one segment was destroyed, the creature could regenerate it. This made them fearsome entities indeed.

  Her final experiment was with the varteks. It went wrong because, after the young had burrowed underground, only one apparently emerged alive; she didn’t realize that a second one had also survived. When she learned that the creature was capable of eating rock and soil, she resorted to scrying. The future she saw was of a lone vartek burrowing under the pentacle to escape. So she prepared a pit and intended to lure it to its destruction there. But Grimalkin hadn’t foreseen my arrival with Jenny at the moment it escaped. Nor had her scrying told her of the second vartek. Despite the terrifying nature of all that I was reading, I smiled toward the conclusion of Grimalkin’s account: she had completely failed to mention our part in slaying the creature. No doubt our untimely appearance was an annoyance that she preferred to forget. She hadn’t described the pursuit and killing of the second vartek, either.

  I didn’t smile for long. I soon remembered that she had so nearly caused the deaths of many innocent men, women, and children. What was the future threat to the County from such creatures? Commanded by the Kobalos, they would cut swathes of death through any enemy that confronted them.

  Suddenly I knew what book I could contribute to the Spook’s rebuilt library. Combining the information from Nicholas Browne’s glossary, Grimalkin’s notes, and whatever we learned in the future, I would write a Bestiary of the Kobalos. It would be something worthwhile to bequeath to those who followed in my footsteps.

  I looked across at Jenny. She was staring into space, having lost concentration.

  “That’s enough writing for today,” I told her. “Go back to the garden and practice lowering the bait dish into the pit!”

  This was a tricky task that required a lot of skill. The dish contained blood, which was used to lure a ripper into a pit so that it could be bound there. This would keep her busy.

  She obeyed, but she didn’t look happy. She’d probably have preferred to carry on daydreaming.

  Once she’d left, I continued with my own studies.

  22

  Times Are Changing

  SHAKING my head, I read the final lines of Grimalkin’s report on the Kobalos for the third time:

  I believe that this third creature, the vartek (plural form: varteki), is the most formidable of the three samples I investigated. There could also be something far worse within the jars that I did not study.

  In view of our approaching conflict with the Kobalos, this does not bode well.

  What the witch assassin had learned was terrifying. These savage entities would no doubt be used by the Kobalos against us. How could we defend ourselves against creatures that had been crafted to kill?

  Previously I had looked upon the threat from the Kobalos as distant, both in terms of geography and time. I had managed to convince myself that they dwelled far from the County; it would be many years before they could fight their way to the eastern shore of the Northern Sea. Even then, they’d have to cross that stormy expanse of water to reach us.

  My opinion had now changed completely. That haizda mage had reached us already; moreover, it had the means to give life to creatures that could cause havoc in the County. There might be others of his kind, as yet undetected, already living here and growing fearsome creatures.

  I needed to clear my head, so I left Grimalkin’s report in the library and went out to see how Jenny was doing.

  As I’d instructed, she was practicing lowering a bait dish into the pit. I watched her as she frowned in concentration.

  The metal dish was attached to a chain by three small hooks, each located in one of three holes on its outer edge. Usually, especially when dealing with a ripper boggart
, the dish was filled with blood. For practice sessions, we used milk. The first task was to lower the dish to the floor of the pit without spilling a drop.

  I smiled with satisfaction as Jenny completed this stage perfectly. Of course, it was far more difficult on a real job. Nerves could be a problem; your hands might shake and your palms sweat.

  Jenny was still holding the chain and concentrating. You had to relax the hooks a little, then give a flick. If you got it right, they came free, leaving the dish at the bottom of the pit.

  She gave a cry of frustration. She was close, but she hadn’t yet gotten the knack. Two of the chains had come free; the other hadn’t. It tipped the dish over onto its side, spilling all the milk.

  “Don’t worry about it,” I told her. “Have five minutes’ rest and then try again. It took me weeks of practice to get it right. Better still, why don’t you go down into the village and collect this week’s groceries?”

  Jenny did just that, and on her return successfully set the dish down on the floor of the pit and released the hooks. Not one drop of milk was spilled.

  I was pleased. Her training was going well, and I liked working with her. My loneliness was fading by the day.

  Our recent encounter with Bibby Longtooth had been traumatic—especially when we found the bones of the children in her cottage afterward, some still wet with blood. It had resembled a butcher’s shop. For a few days I had wondered if Jenny would ever get over the experience, but now she seemed much more cheerful.

  John Gregory had trained so many boys who didn’t make the grade; lots ran away and didn’t complete their training. I really wanted my first apprentice to become a spook. I wanted it to work out. It was still very early days, but I had high hopes for Jenny.

  As she had promised, Grimalkin returned within the week. “You have read the notes I made on the investigations into the Kobalos war beasts?” she demanded.

  I nodded.

  “And you saw varteki in action—young ones, at that. So you see how dangerous the threat is . . . ?”

  “It’s very much worse than I imagined,” I agreed. So it was that when she asked me once more to accompany her on her journey north, I found it difficult to refuse. It now seemed the right thing to do.

  “We would be away for two months—three at the most,” she told me. “Surely you can spare that much time?”

  “What about Jenny? It hardly seems fair to drag her off into such danger so early in her apprenticeship. She’s enjoying her training and making real progress,” I replied.

  “Bring her with you. We will all learn together. Learn we must if we are to have any chance at all of defeating this terrible and powerful enemy. Or, if you prefer, give her the choice of staying here. You can continue her training on your return.”

  As she’d once done before, when preparing for the Battle of the Wardstone, Grimalkin set up camp in the garden. Up in the library, I broke the news to Jenny.

  “We’re going on a long journey with Grimalkin,” I told her. “We need to study the Kobalos so that we can discover how to defeat them. So we’re going to cross the Northern Sea and travel to the edge of their territory.”

  “How long will we be away?” she said, looking far from happy.

  “We’ll be back before winter really bites.”

  She nodded but didn’t seem convinced.

  “Can you ride?” I asked.

  She looked puzzled. “I’ve ridden a horse at one of the farms where my foster dad works, but not recently. It was when I was little.”

  “If it makes you feel better, I’m not much of a rider myself. Spooks prefer to journey on foot, but we’re traveling a long way, so we’ll be on horseback.”

  Jenny was silent.

  “I’ll tell you the truth,” I said eventually. “It will be dangerous. I feel that I must go, but you could stay here. You’d be safe enough, with the boggart to guard you. You could continue to develop your practical skills and work your way through the library, making notes. I might also be able to find someone else to train you for a while.”

  Jenny didn’t appear too happy at the prospect.

  “I’ll take you to meet another spook north of Caster, and then you can decide. I’m going to ask him to keep an eye on Chipenden while we’re away. It would mean extra work for him, but I’m sure he could deal with the most important spook’s business in both areas. Once you’ve met him, you might agree to him training you.”

  Jenny’s face fell further at this.

  “What’s the matter?” I asked.

  “Nothing . . . well, it’s just the thought of leaving Chipenden to travel to the far north. I like to travel—I’ve seen most of the County on my wanderings—but to sail overseas and see foreign lands is something I’ve only dreamed about. I’m not sure what to think, but I reckon I’d rather stay here. And I don’t want to be trained by anyone but you.”

  “I’d rather stay here too, Jenny!” I told her. “I feel exactly the same, but I don’t really have much choice.”

  So I spent another ten minutes spelling out the threat from the Kobalos and what their intention was: to kill all human males, boys and men, and then enslave all females. Then I reminded her about the varteki we’d faced and how those would be used against us.

  “So you see, Jenny, I have to go. Anyway, keep an open mind until after you’ve met Judd.”

  Jenny frowned again, but now that I’d made up my mind to help Grimalkin, I had no time to dawdle.

  We traveled north over the fells, passing east of Caster and then continuing along the bank of the canal, which ran northward. I set a fast pace, for there was a real nip in the air now. Long before we reached Kendal, I headed west, leading Jenny along a path by a stream until we came to the edge of the shallow moat that surrounded the water mill.

  It had once been a working mill, and then home to Spook Bill Arkwright. My master had sent me to work with him for a while; he wanted me to learn about water witches and other creatures of the dark that dwelled in that region. But Bill’s main task had been to toughen me up and give me combat training. He had certainly done that. I’d grown to like him, though, and still mourned his passing.

  Judd Brinscall, another ex-apprentice of John Gregory, was the Spook in residence now. He had not impressed me on our first encounter: he had been threatened, his family in fear for their lives; under such duress, he’d betrayed my master. But later he had helped us, and my master had forgiven him. I’d not found his actions so easy to forget, but he had been useful since, and besides, he was the only other Spook I knew of nearby, the only one qualified to give me further training, something he’d promised to do.

  Looking down at the moat, I turned to Jenny. “This is designed to keep water witches at bay,” I told her.

  “If they’re water witches, why are they deterred by water?” Jenny asked, her face creased in puzzlement. “That doesn’t make sense.”

  “In common with most types of witches, they don’t like salt,” I explained. “Every few days, Judd tips a few barrels into the moat. That keeps them out.”

  “Are there a lot of water witches around here?” Jenny wondered.

  “Yes, they’re drawn to the marsh,” I said, pointing toward it. The sun was setting, and a mist was coming in from the distant sea. “It’s an important place for water witches. It’s sacred to them in some way. So despite the presence of a spook and his dogs, they come here from time to time. Then Judd hunts them across the marsh. He covers a big area, ranging north of Morecambe Bay as far as the lakes, right to the northern County border.”

  As I waded through the salted moat, I heard dogs barking, which meant that Judd was at home.

  As the two animals bounded toward us, I felt Jenny flinch behind me. I didn’t blame her. They were big, fearsome wolfhounds.

  They reached me before I came to the door, and I paused to pat them and to be licked in return. I was happy to see them, but sad as well. There were only two of them now, Blood and Bone. Their mother, Claw, had
been killed at the Battle of the Wardstone, where my master had also died.

  “Come inside!” a voice shouted. “It’s like the middle of winter out here!”

  Judd was waiting at the door, and he greeted me warmly. However, I noticed that as we approached, he gave Jenny a strange look.

  “This is my apprentice, Jenny,” I told him.

  I watched his jaw drop in astonishment. I supposed I would have to get used to this sort of reaction.

  Soon we were at his table, tucking into a supper of delicious cod. This close to the sea, there was always plenty of fresh fish available.

  I’d recently communicated with Judd by letter, but it was the first time we’d met face-to-face since the battle, and I had a lot to tell him. I decided to delay that until after we’d eaten.

  “How’s the hand, Judd?” I asked him. He’d lost two of his fingers at the Wardstone; they’d been bitten off by an enemy witch.

  He held up his right hand and grimaced. “The soreness is gone, though the hand is still a little stiff. But we adapt, don’t we? I can’t do anything about it, so I just carry on as best I can. The truth is, I’d have given twice as many fingers if I could have Claw back. I hadn’t had her long, but I’d grown really attached to her.”

  After that, we talked little as we ate, but Judd kept glancing at me and Jenny curiously; as soon as I’d cleared my plate and eased my chair away from the table, he pointed to the stairs.

  “Your room is on the first floor, the second on the left, young lady,” he told Jenny. “There are fresh sheets and pillowcases in the cupboard on the landing. You look tired, so you’d best get up to bed.”

  Jenny didn’t argue, as I expected her to, and with a nod to us both, she left the table and set off up the stairs. She’d been unusually quiet since we arrived at the mill; she hadn’t spoken at all during the meal. I wondered if she was sickening for something.