‘Yes, you should, but I won’t be able to go with you,’ Adriana said. ‘My mother’s too ill to move. I’ll have to stay here.’
‘Let’s see what Mr Gregory thinks,’ I suggested, and we headed back to the house. But before we reached it, Alice spotted a runner – a yeoman – in the distance. At that moment the Spook came out of the house to join us; he must have seen the man from a window. He stood beside us, holding his staff diagonally in a defensive position.
The yeoman approached us, but seemed unarmed. He stood there for a few moments, head bowed and hands on his hips, gasping for breath. Then he reached into his pocket and held out an envelope. ‘It’s for a Tom Ward,’ he said.
I took it and tore it open, unfolding the letter within and starting to read. Dear Master Ward, I have left the employment of the witch. In truth I was lucky to escape with my life. I am now recruiting a force with which to oppose the new ruler of Greeba Keep and we are on the road to Peel. We will meet you at the mill. To help defeat our enemy I need the expertise of you and your master. Yours, Daniel Stanton
‘Well, lad, don’t keep us waiting,’ said the Spook. ‘Read it aloud!’
I did as my master asked. When I’d finished, he scratched at his beard and glared at me. ‘Do you trust this Daniel Stanton?’
I nodded. ‘He’s a soldier and probably hasn’t lived a totally blameless life, but that’s true of all of us. Yes, I do trust him.’
‘Right, then we’ll wait and see what he has to say.’
‘I wonder how he knew I’d be here at the mill?’ I asked.
‘Well, it’s not too difficult to work out, lad,’ replied the Spook. ‘He knows that we escaped with Adriana and that she’d be desperate to be reunited with her mother.’
‘Well, if he knows where we are, it’s pretty certain that Lizzie will too.’
‘Aye, lad, she’ll know for sure. But she’s probably too busy with her new-found power to bother about us for a while. She’s confident she can deal with us easily when the time comes. Right now she’ll be devoting all her energies to seizing control of this island. She’ll come for us eventually – you mark my words.’
Just over an hour later, Stanton arrived with his men. There were perhaps no more than fifty in all, but they were armed with pikes and clubs and looked formidable.
Adriana, the Spook, Alice and I sat round the kitchen table with him while he explained the situation.
‘The witch has got over three hundred men under arms while I’ve barely a sixth of that so far. More will join me – and they’re prepared to fight, make no mistake. Two days ago Lizzie led raiding parties against some of the local landowners and farmers – those who’d refused outright to pledge their support. Some families – men, women and children – were murdered in cold blood. But I was already away by then.
‘Lizzie’s sent me to St John’s with some of the men you see here now. Our task is to seize the area and prepare for the meeting of the Tynwald in a few days’ time. The witch wants to dissolve the Parliament and have power handed over to her. She’s planning to go there herself once I have it under control.
‘But I talked to some of the lads and a few Tynwald members too, and we’ve decided to try and tackle her. We’re not standing for it. We’ve never had to answer to anyone before and we never will.
‘That’s where you come in,’ he went on, looking at the Spook and me. ‘I’ve been close to the witch and she terrified the life out of me. All the strength seemed to drain out of my body. She kills people without even touching them – how do we deal with that?’
‘It’s something I’m still pondering,’ said the Spook. ‘The power she wields – killing from a distance with such ease – is more potent than anything I’ve encountered before in a single witch. But now we know its source we’ll find a way to stop it eventually, don’t you worry.’ My master sounded more determined than he had for some time.
‘The only problem is that Lizzie has supporters – lots of well-armed yeomen bought with bribes of wealth and power – and it won’t be so easy to get her on her own again,’ Stanton told us.
‘You said that you were lucky to escape with your life… What happened?’ I asked him.
‘That night when the witch killed your father’ – he nodded towards Adriana – ‘I’d already decided to make an attempt on her life. But I was as helpless and terrified as the rest of that gathering and my blood just turned to water. And she sensed something. It was almost as if she could read my mind.
‘Later she questioned me. Wanted to know how loyal I was. She said she was starting to have doubts about me and ordered me to tell her the truth. I could feel her right inside my head, twisting and prodding. I began to shake and sweat, and it took all my will power not to admit that I’d planned to kill her. It was close – very close.’
‘Well, it seems to me that a lot will depend on just how much support you can muster,’ said the Spook. ‘With enough men you could attack when the Tynwald meet. In the confusion we might be able to put an end to her. If Lizzie was distracted, she could still be bound with a silver chain.’
‘Or I could put my sword through her heart,’ Stanton said. ‘I’m going to send runners to the nearest towns and villages to drum up support. Anyone who can carry a weapon and wants to fight for the freedom of our land will do.’ Although word had already been spread to the surrounding villages, by noon only about a dozen new men had rallied to Stanton’s cause. Most were farm labourers who had brought nothing better than clubs – though three boasted pikes and one had brought a spear. These latter had once been yeomen, but they were no longer young and their weapons were rusty. Despite that, Stanton had greeted each man warmly and accepted his pledge of loyalty.
And then another arrival brought a delighted smile to Adriana’s face: a young man carrying a stout stick. It was Simon Sulby.
‘Any news of Captain Baines?’ the Spook asked him when he could finally extract himself from Adriana’s embrace.
‘I’m afraid he was arrested at St John’s,’ Simon replied. ‘He wasn’t supposed to leave Douglas, so they took him back to his ship under guard. And there he’ll stay until they need him to return those refugees to the County.’ Early evening brought a fresh band of about twenty armed yeomen, which swelled our supporters to over eighty – along with several women who had followed their menfolk. They in turn had brought a number of children, including at least three babes in arms.
The sun sank rapidly, as if time itself was moving faster and faster. Soon a dozen fires were lit by the mill; fires that grew brighter as the dusk thickened into night. One of the yeomen hung a flag, with its emblem of three legs, from the roof of the mill. It fluttered in the breeze, and the makeshift camp echoed with laughter, the talk filled with optimism. Someone produced a fiddle, and the women kicked off their shoes and the grass was suddenly awhirl with dancers, Simon and Adriana quickly joining in. Some of the locals arrived and watched from a distance. They were clearly afraid of getting involved.
Stanton now prepared to march his men east towards St John’s under cover of darkness. He planned to hide them in the forest at the foot of Slieau Whallian and attack at noon, when the Parliament assembled. Scouts had already reported that the route was clear, so we would take the main road for the majority of the way.
The Spook, Alice, Stanton and I followed behind the yeomanry, but the women and children were staying at the mill. Adriana reluctantly remained to care for her mother. After the doctor’s medicine had failed to bring about any improvement, Alice had treated her with herbs and potions, but to little effect.
The Spook handed me his bag to carry. ‘The odds are certainly stacked against us,’ he said to Stanton, shaking his head. ‘A witch like Lizzie can sniff out approaching danger. More than likely she’ll know that we’re coming and use dread – the spell that terrifies her enemies. If she does that, brave as your men are, they’ll take to their heels.’
But Stanton refused to be daunted by the Spook’s words. ‘I’ve seen what she’s capable of but we have to try. If we don’t make a fight of it, she’s won,’ he told us. Some hours before dawn we were hidden deep in the forest but within easy range of St John’s. Stanton posted guards, and the rest of us grabbed the chance to rest.
Dawn brought drizzle and grey skies, but we couldn’t risk lighting fires so had to make do with a cold breakfast; for the Spook and me that meant cheese, and he grumbled as he ate a small portion. He liked to fast before facing the dark but always kept up his physical strength with a little cheese.
‘This isn’t a patch on our County cheese, lad,’ he commented. ‘I prefer it yellow and very crumbly!’
I had no appetite and ate little. I was nervous and my stomach was in knots. I’d a very bad feeling about what we were about to attempt. Lizzie’s new-found powers were so strong, and she had too many men. We had no hope of getting near her. If we weren’t killed in the attack, we’d be taken prisoner again. If that happened, I dreaded to think what Lizzie would have in store for us all – especially the Spook.
Daniel Stanton was a capable commander and it was clear that his men trusted him and obeyed his orders without question. The first stage of the attack went well.
We advanced through the trees in a thin arc towards St John’s, the yeomen spread out to deal with enemy patrols. They encountered three: two surrendered without a fight; the third put up only token resistance. If this had been a straightforward military engagement, the element of surprise would have been with us. But Lizzie was different.
Back in the early days of my apprenticeship to the Spook, Lizzie had moved into the Chipenden area and been staying in a cottage only a few miles from the village. She’d snatched a child to take its bones. I managed to rescue it and, enraged, the local men set off with clubs and sticks to get her. Using long-sniffing, she’d sensed the danger and fled. The mob had then burned her cottage to the ground.
But this time Lizzie was the one in the position of power. She’d sense the threat we posed, then use her superior forces to swat us as easily as you would a fly. To counter this we planned a lightning raid that would strike straight at the witch herself, taking her unawares.
Under Stanton’s orders, the yeomen re-formed, the thin crescent becoming a compact wedge, to drive through any resistance and make directly for the witch. As we approached St John’s, the Spook, Alice, Simon and I were to the rear of the yeomen.
My master turned to me and Alice. ‘Use these lads as cover for just as long as you can, then go straight for her!’
I nodded, and we released the retractable blades in our staffs. Alice didn’t usually carry a weapon but Simon had given her a knife. She now wore it at her belt. I wondered if she’d be able to use it against her own mother. Somehow, for all her harsh words about Lizzie, I doubted it.
‘Stay close to me!’ I told her, concerned that the battle might separate us, and that she’d lose the protection of the blood jar.
My mouth was dry with fear and excitement. We were near the edge of the trees now: I could see buildings and a large green straight ahead. A big gathering of people stood there, some holding pikes and spears. Our yeomen readied their weapons.
‘Now!’ cried Stanton, and led the charge. We broke into a run, still holding our tight wedge formation. I couldn’t see much through the press of men, but in the distance I spotted the four-tiered grassy mound known as Tynwald Hill, where the Parliament was already gathered. Lizzie might be addressing them right now; she had to be somewhere close by.
Then I heard shouts and cries of pain as our yeomen made contact with the enemy. Our forward movement was starting to slow as the resistance hardened.
Whether we would have reached the centre of the green or not I’ll never know, because at that moment, just as we’d expected, Lizzie used the spell called dread. I felt a sudden overwhelming fear; the strong need to turn and run from some terrible unseen threat moving towards us. I resisted the urge, knowing that Alice and my master would be doing the same. But our yeomen were powerless in the face of such a spell, and they broke formation immediately, scattering to every point of the compass – as did Simon Sulby. How could he do otherwise? He’d never before been subjected to such a feeling of terror.
But it wasn’t all bad: such a spell isn’t selective, and it affected Lizzie’s own troops as well as our own. Had she not realized that would happen? The spell had surely failed to gain her any advantage at all, I thought. Perhaps the power had gone to her head.