Read Online The Spook's Battle by Joseph Delaney - Free Book Online Page B

also have to watch out for other, even moredangerous members of the Mouldheelfamily.At first it was easy. I could see the glow of the lanterns and hear the three girls moving through the wood ahead of me. They were making quite a lot of noise: voices were raised and they seemed to be arguing. At one point, despite all my care, I stepped on a twig. It broke with a loud crack and I froze to the spot, afraid that they might have heard me. I needn't have worried. They were making their own even louder noises ahead, and were completely unaware that I was following.When we left the wood, it became more difficult. We were in the open, on a bleak slope of moorland. The moonlight increased the risk that I would be seen, so I had to stay much farther back, but soon I realized I had another advantage. The three girls came to a stream and followed its banks as it changed direction, before it curved back in a bow shape and allowed them to continue on their way south. That confirmed for me that they were indeed witches.
     They couldn't cross running water!But I could! So instead of always folio-wing behind, I could take a more direct route and, to some extent, anticipate where they were going. As they dropped down off the moor, I began to travel parallel with them, keeping to the shadows of hedgerows and trees whenever possible. This went on for some time, but the terrain gradually became rougher and more difficult, and then I saw another dark wood ahead, a thick clump of trees and bushes in a valley that ran parallel to Pendle Hill on my right.At first I thought it would be no problem. I simply slowed down and allowed them to get ahead again, folio-wing at a safe distance as before. It -was only after I'd moved into the trees that I realized that something -was now very different. The three sisters -were no longer talking loudly as they had been in the previous -wood. In fact they -weren't making any noise at all. An eerie silence prevailed, as if everything was holding its breath. There hadn't been more than a slight breeze before, but now not even a twig or a leaf was moving. Nor -were there any of the rustling noises made by small creatures of the night, such as mice or hedgehogs. Either everything in the wood really was immobile, holding its breath, or the wood was empty of all life.It was then, with a sudden shiver of horror, that I realized exactly where I was and why things were as they -were. This was a small wooded valley. And another name for a small wooded valley is a dell.I was "walking through what Father Stocks had called Witch Dell!
      This was where all the dead -witches gathered to prey on those who passed through or even skirted the wood. Lives were lost here every year. I gripped my rowan staff and kept perfectly still, listening carefully. Nothing seemed to be approaching, but there -was soft loam under my feet, and decades of dank autumns had provided perfect hiding places for dead witches. One could already be close by, hidden under the leaves. Step forward and she would grab my ankle! One quick bite and she'd start sucking my blood, growing stronger by the mouthful.I could use my rowan staff and probably manage to get myself free--that's what I told myself. I'd have to be quick. As the witch waxed stronger, my own strength would be waning. And what if I met one of the really strong witches? Father Stocks said there were two or three who roamed far beyond the dell in search of victims. I put this thought firmly from my mind.I began to move forward slowly and cautiously. As I did so, I wondered why the three sisters had now become so silent. Could it be that they were also worried about attracting the dead? Why should that be? Weren't they all witches together?
     And then I remembered what Father Stocks had said about the ancient animosity between the three covens. Although there'd been some intermarriage between the Deanes and the Malkins, the clans only ever gathered together when they had to combine their dark