The Spook's Blood (Wardstone Chronicles)
Read The Spook's Blood (Wardstone Chronicles) Online
Authors: Joseph Delaney
Contents
Chapter 4: She Whom You Most Love
Chapter 5: Another Use for the Girl
Chapter 7: Crossing it is Dangerous
Chapter 8: A Study of the Moroii
Chapter 11: The Curse of the Pendle Witches
Chapter 14: They’ll Expand Westwards
Chapter 18: The Most Dangerous Place
Chapter 19: The Terms of the Contract
Chapter 20: Just Like Old Times
Chapter 22: Let them Come to Us!
Chapter 23: Midnight Until Dawn
About the Book
‘I am Siscoi, the Lord of Blood, the Drinker of Souls! Obey me now or you will suffer as few have suffered.’
Time is running out for Thomas Ward. His final battle with the Fiend is drawing near, and the Spook’s apprentice has never felt more alone in his task.
The Fiend is set to send the greatest of his servants against him – Siscoi, a vampire god more ferocious than anything he has yet faced. Isolated and afraid, Tom must risk his life to prevent the evil beast from entering this world, even as he learns that the final destruction of the Fiend may involve a sacrifice more terrible than he can imagine . . .
The tension mounts in this, the tenth instalment of the chilling Wardstone Chronicles.
for Marie
CHARACTER PROFILES
Tom
Thomas Ward is both the seventh son of a seventh son and the child of a powerful lamia witch. He has abilities beyond those of a regular spook: as well as being able see and hear the dead, he can also slow down time to aid him in battle. For more than three years he has trained as an apprentice to the local Spook, and now as the wielder of the Destiny Blade he may be the world’s only hope of defeating the Fiend.
The Spook
The Spook is an unmistakable figure. He’s tall and rather fierce-looking. He wears a long black cloak and hood, and always carries a staff and chain. For over sixty years he has protected the County from things that go bump in the night, but his long battles have left him weary. Tom fears that the days when he can continue to rely on his mentor may be numbered.
Alice
Tom can’t decide if Alice is good or evil. She is related to two of the most evil witch clans
(
the Malkins and the Deanes
)
and was trained as a witch against her will. While she counts herself as an ally of the light, she has increasingly been forced to rely on dark magic to save her friends. Tom fears that each time she does it will draw her closer and closer to the dark.
Mam
Tom’s mam always knew he would become the Spook’s apprentice. She called him her ‘gift to the County’. There always were quite a few mysterious things about Mam, but even Tom never suspected the truth: that she was a lamia witch, and that she had planned for Tom to battle the Fiend since before he was even born. Tom’s mam fell in the battle against the Ordeen, but he hopes that she might still be watching over him somehow…
Grimalkin
Grimalkin is the current assassin of the Malkin witch clan. Very fast and strong, she has a code of honour and never resorts to trickery. Although honourable. Grimalkin also has a dark side and is reputed to use torture. Recently she has forged an unlikely alliance with Tom Ward against their common enemy, the Fiend. But can a true servant of the dark ever really be trusted?
The Fiend
The Fiend is the dark made flesh, the most powerful of all its denizens and the very oldest of the old Gods. He has many other names, including the Devil, Satan, Lucifer and the Father of Lies. Together, Tom Ward and his allies managed to sever the Fiend’s head in battle, but their fight to destroy him once and for all has only just begun …
T
HE HIGHEST POINT IN THE
C
OUNTY
IS MARKED BY MYSTERY
.
I
T IS SAID THAT A MAN DIED THERE IN A
GREAT STORM, WHILE BINDING AN EVIL
THAT THREATENED THE WHOLE WORLD
.
T
HEN THE ICE CAME AGAIN, AND WHEN IT
RETREATED, EVEN THE SHAPES OF THE
HILLS AND THE NAMES OF THE TOWNS
IN THE VALLEYS CHANGED
.
N
OW, AT THAT HIGHEST POINT ON
THE FELLS, NO TRACE REMAINS OF WHAT
WAS DONE SO LONG AGO,
BUT ITS NAME HAS ENDURED
.
T
HEY CALL IT –
T
HE
W
ARDSTONE
.
THE SPOOK WAS
perched on a log in his garden at Chipenden, the sun singing through the trees and the air bright with birdsong. It was a warm spring morning in late May – as good as it got in the County. Things seemed to be changing for the better. I was sitting on the grass wolfing down my breakfast and he was smiling to himself and looking quite contented for a change as he gazed back towards the house.
From it came the sound of sawing; I could smell the sawdust. My master’s house was being repaired, starting with the roof. It had been burned out by enemy soldiers, but now the war in the County was over, and it was time to rebuild and get on with
our
lives as a Spook and his apprentice dealing with all manner of things from the dark – boggarts, ghosts, ghasts and witches.
‘I can’t understand why Alice would leave like that without saying anything,’ I complained to the Spook. ‘It’s not like her at all. Especially as she knows we’ll soon be setting off east and will be away for at least a couple of days.’