Dawn of the Demontide (27 page)

Jake tried to get to his feet but the pain was too great. He looked down at his hands. No longer pale, his skin was now a molten mass of black and red. Fear and despair shivered inside him.

This was the end.

‘Over here! I’ve found him!’

A man’s voice, cool and cultured. Jake managed to look up into a grandfatherly face, the cheeks cracked with burst blood vessels. The man wore a patch over one eye. In his right hand he held a length of hardened peat that had been sculpted into the shape of a serpent.

Mother Inglethorpe loomed into view.

‘Do your best to heal him, Montague,’ she instructed. ‘There’ll be little point in the Master torturing the child if he’s already half-dead. I’ll get someone to retrieve Adam Harker and follow you back to Yaga Passage.’

The man called Montague crouched beside Jake. He held his hand over the boy’s scorched features and a faint red glow flowed from his palm. Deliciously cool, the magic spread like a mask across Jake’s face and began to ease the pain and heal the burns. As his vision cleared, Jake could make out the figures on the ground all around him.

‘M-my friend, Simon. Please, find him, Hel-help him. And the others?’ he pleaded.

‘Don’t push your luck,’ Montague said. ‘Healing of any kind goes against my nature, but Esther’s right—we must make you presentable for Master Crowden. Now, don’t try to touch your face, the mask will fall away when the magic’s done its work … ’

‘Please—they’re hurt. They’re dying.’

‘Yes, rather wonderful, isn’t it?’

His spell almost complete, Ambrose Montague grasped his patient by the scruff of the neck and lifted him from the ground. One long white finger pointed towards the sufferers.

‘Do not pity them,’ he said. ‘They are the lucky ones. When the dawn comes, when the Demontide breaks, many will wish for deaths as easy as these.’

Jake watched as the witches picked their way between the slow-dying Elders. Like a victorious army they mocked their vanquished foe and ignored the pleas for mercy. Pen and paper in hand, Mother Inglethorpe seemed to be taking an inventory of those present. She was clearly pleased with the magnitude of the slaughter, and yet a trace of anxiety remained on her face. There was no sign of Dr Holmwood or Simon Lydgate. Jake closed his eyes. Though he could do nothing to block out the screaming, he could at least shut out the sight of this one-sided battle.

Lost in the darkness, voices reached out to him. They sang an ancient song, their tones rustling, creaking, sighing. Sadness dripped from each note, melancholy from every strange syllable. The cries of fear and pain were silenced. The dying and the injured stared into the forest. Surely it was his imagination, and yet Jake felt convinced that the voices came from the trees …

‘Nature’s lament for the passing of Man.’ Montague looked down at Jake. ‘The last Omen. It is time to say goodbye to the world you knew, Master Harker.’

Montague tapped his peat cane against the ground. The snake came to life, hissing and snapping against the hand that held it. The old witch didn’t flinch as he fitted the harness into the creature’s mouth. Then, without the slightest effort, he lifted Jake onto his back. Jake struggled but the explosion had left him very weak.

‘If you fight me, I will very likely drop you,’ Montague said, ‘and I have used up all my healing magic for one night. Now, hold tight.’

There was nothing Jake could do except obey.

Montague leaned forward, whispered a few words to the snake, and a second later the thick body twisted beneath them. As the tail lashed, the witch and the boy were lifted into the air. They burst through the branches and out into the starless night sky. Their work done, the other witches joined the flight from Wykely Woods. Jake looked back and saw the boughs of the forest moving in slow waves, as if ruffled by a breeze. The lament of Nature stayed with him long into the night.

Dr Holmwood sat upon the stairs of his ancestral home, lost in thought. He hardly heard Malcolm Saxby’s dry little cough.

‘The numbers are in, sir. Seventeen dead, including Cynthia Mimms and Eric Drake. No trace of Jacob or Adam Harker … ’

‘I heard it, Saxby.’

‘I’m sorry?’

‘The lament of Nature for the world of Man. After the explosion, I thought my eardrums had ruptured, but then I heard the singing of the earth, of the trees … ’

‘Sir, we have to take stock. Prepare ourselves and—’

‘What time is it?’

‘Quarter to two.’

‘Three hours until dawn,’ Holmwood sighed. ‘Even if we followed the Coven to London, somehow managed to retrieve the boy, there would be no chance of getting him back here in time. The Demontide is now inevitable.’

Saxby slapped his palm against the banister.

‘I don’t understand it. How could the Coven have known we were bringing Adam to the Hollow?’

‘Marcus Crowden knows our ways,’ Holmwood said. ‘He is well aware that
all
Hobarron Elders must be present at the Demontide.’

‘Yes, but how did he know the route we would take, and at what time we would pass through the woods? How did he arrange for Jake to be there?’

‘That’s a point.’

‘You telephoned me that morning with the plan for us to meet you at Steerpike Bridge. I passed on the message to the other Elders. There was no break in the chain. It had to be someone working within our own ranks that informed the Coven.’

‘Or someone who was in the house when the phone call was received. Someone who overheard the plan. Someone who has already shown a marked reluctance to help our cause.’

Holmwood’s head snapped in Rachel’s direction.

‘Your daughter, for example.’

Rachel and Eddie Rice were still tied to their chairs. Despite being beaten by Alice Splane, neither had betrayed the whereabouts of Jake Harker.

‘Rachel?’ Dr Saxby said in an anguished voice. ‘She wouldn’t. She’s tried to protect Jake … ’

‘So she says,’ Holmwood whispered. ‘But her refusal to tell us his whereabouts has resulted in our losing him to the Coven. Maybe her motives are not as pure as she pretends. Let us ask her.’

The two men descended the stairs and made their way over to the children. Exhausted and frightened by the day’s events, Eddie had fallen into a kind of trance. He stared at the people around him, neither seeing nor hearing.

Dr Saxby knelt down in front of his daughter.

‘Rachel, I need you to be honest with me, can you do that?’

An expression of disgust tightened the girl’s features. She looked down at the bruises on her arms and turned her face away from her father.

‘I won’t tell you where Jake is,’ she said. ‘Now leave me alone.’

‘You may think you’re being very noble, Miss Saxby,’ Dr Holmwood seethed, ‘but your silence will be the death of every person in this room. Worse, by your obstinate refusal to talk you may already have condemned this world to oblivion. I pray that your treachery runs no deeper than mere foolishness.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I will ask you plainly: are you a spy working on behalf of the Crowden Coven?’

‘What?’

‘Did you eavesdrop on a conversation between your father and me? Did you then pass on information to Marcus Crowden and his witches?’

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

‘We shall see.’

Holmwood stalked out of the hall. He returned moments later with a small black box, secured with a chain and padlock, which he placed in front of Rachel Saxby.

‘If she has performed magic in recent days, if she’s opened a portal to the Veil, then we shall soon know. The traces of the spell will be all around her.
It
will sense them.’

‘Dad? What’s he doing?’ The fear was evident in Rachel’s voice.

As Dr Holmwood fitted the key into the padlock, Saxby laid a hand on his arm.

‘Please, Gordon. It could have been any one of the Elders who betrayed us. This is just a hunch. There’s nothing to suggest that my daughter … ’

‘If she’s innocent, we will know soon enough,’ Holmwood said. ‘But if she’s guilty … ’

The doctor opened the box.

Mr Pinch squinted in the light. Kept away from his witch for over six months, Tobias Quilp’s demon was a shadow of his old self. He pawed weakly inside his coffin and tried to raise himself up. What little strength he had left him in an instant and he collapsed back into the box. Like a maltreated dog, he mewled quietly to himself …

And then that old cruel light sparked once more in the creature’s eyes. His nostrils quivered with excitement. Mr Pinch could smell magic. His tongue slurped across his lips and, with fresh energy, he grasped the sides of the box. A pair of yellow eyes stared in the direction of the children.

‘Enough!’ Saxby cried.

Dr Holmwood slammed the lid shut. The box rattled as the chain was looped around it and the padlock refitted. Holmwood called one of his assistants over and the box and its horrible cargo was taken away.

‘It was her,’ Holmwood said, leading Saxby into a corner. ‘She’s the Coven’s spy, and indirectly responsible for the deaths of seventeen Elders.’

Saxby shook his head. ‘She might’ve overheard the plans and informed Crowden, but she wouldn’t have known about the ambush. My daughter isn’t a killer.’

‘The fact is, Rachel betrayed her own people,’ Holmwood insisted. ‘And now she must make amends.’

‘How?’

‘She is related to the Seward family, is she not? She is of Hobarron blood?’

Saxby staggered back against the wall. His face turned the colour of sour milk.

‘No. She—she’s my
daughter
!’

‘You were ready enough to sacrifice Adam Harker’s son for the greater good.’

‘But he’s different. My Rachel’s blood will not be strong enough. She is another generation on from Luke Seward, and his blood barely held back the Demontide last time. It won’t work.’

‘Not with one sacrifice, I agree.’ Holmwood’s eyes fell upon the boy sitting in the chair next to Rachel. ‘But if we drain
both
of them … ’

‘Impossible. The blood of two children can’t be mixed; it must be pure. The Door will reject it.’

‘The situation calls for desperate measures, Saxby. This is our only chance now.’

‘Please, Gordon,’ Saxby caught at Holmwood’s sleeve. ‘Remember how the murder of Luke Seward haunted you? That’s why you set up the Institute—so that it would never have to happen again!’

‘You sound like Adam Harker,’ the doctor said. ‘You are not my conscience, Malcolm, and we have no other option left. They
must
be sacrificed.’

They flew high over the city. A parade of London landmarks swept by—Covent Garden with its big old colonnades, Admiral Nelson atop his column, the great stretch of the Mall with the windows of Buckingham Palace shining just beyond.

Ambrose Montague tugged at the rein and the snake’s head turned eastward. Jake glanced over his shoulder and saw the phalanx of witches fall into line. There were ten of them in all. One of the witches towards the back, a large man with a heavy black beard and broad shoulders, was carrying something on his back. No prizes for guessing that his burden was the unconscious Dr Adam Harker. Even in this desperate situation, the prospect of seeing his father after all these weeks lifted Jake’s spirits.

Suddenly, a powerful shaft of light swept across the Coven, dazzling each of the witches so that they had to struggle to keep control of their snakes. It was with some surprise that Jake saw the source of the light. A guard or policeman stationed on the ramparts of the Houses of Parliament guided the spotlight up and down the line of fliers. His eyes as round as dinner plates, he held a walkietalkie up to his chin. Before he could give his report, Ambrose Montague pointed his long forefinger at the man and muttered a few words.

Jake lunged forward and grabbed hold of the witch’s wrist. A bolt of dark magic shot out from Montague’s finger and missed the guard by inches. It hit the spotlight and shattered the glass. Montague threw his arm back and caught Jake a blow on the shoulder.

‘Sentimental idiot,’ he cried. ‘You might have killed us both! If the Master hadn’t insisted you be brought to him unharmed I would gladly throw you into the Thames!’

As he spoke, they flew over Westminster Bridge and Jake saw the great old river far below. A mass of dark, choppy water, it reflected the sky. The heavens rumbled and Jake looked up. Shoulder to shoulder, thunderclouds towered above the city like a scrum of grey giants. Bursts of lightning lit up their bellies while their thunder-voices rattled angrily between them.

Montague saw the danger and made a downward motion with his hand. A few of the younger witches took fright and zoomed past their leader, plummeting towards the arrow-shaped bulk of Waterloo Station. With a barked curse, Montague followed. He had descended several metres when one of the thunder giants roared and took a swipe with its lethal fist.

The bolt struck Montague square in the chest. Even as he let go of the old man and jumped back along the length of the snake, Jake felt the raw power of the lightning. It fizzed into his body and made his heart spasm. For a moment, his senses disappeared into a white glare, similar to that of the Steerpike Bridge explosion. The smell of burnt flesh brought him round.

Threads of smoke rose up from the body of Ambrose Montague. He dropped the reins and slumped forward. Then the old man tipped to the left and, with heavy grace, slipped off the back of the snake. Rolling and tumbling like a clumsy high diver, Montague plunged towards the Thames.

The moment the witch disappeared into the depths of the river, his magical force vanished from the world. Beneath Jake, the snake ceased its writhing flight and returned to the inanimate peat from which it had been conjured. Cold air roared around Jake, buffeted him to and fro and flipped him like a pancake. His eyes narrowed into slits and he saw the river below grow larger and larger. He had read somewhere that, if hit from a great height, water could be as hard as concrete. Maybe the impact would kill him instantly …

And then the memory of flying returned to him.