Dawn of the Demontide (24 page)

A cold breeze whistled through the doorway. The candle fluttered. Tinsmouth jumped up, threw open the door and stared into the empty shop.

‘What is it?’ Jake asked.

‘Ghosts maybe,’ Tinsmouth said and returned to his seat. ‘Where was I? Oh yes, my rebirth. For the next ten years I educated myself in the ways of dark magic. You see, according to the Coven, a witch’s power comes from his demon, but it is just that: raw power. To work a spell you have to refine that power with mental application and ritual. In a simple transformation spell, for example, a demon can provide the energy, but you would need to find materials—fingernails, hair clippings, scraps of skin—from the person you wished to impersonate. Study is required for all magic. I was diligent, clever, naturally talented, and my soul was now as dark as any in the Coven. Dear God, the things I did with my hideous gift … But all of it was nothing compared to what was to come. The murder of an innocent child.’

Jake leaned forward. ‘Why did you do it?’

‘Because I could. Because I wanted to. Because it was fun.’

Silence, for a time.

‘All I had heard for years was idle talk about the Hobarron Elders. How they had defeated our Coven for centuries, denying us the Demontide. They believed themselves superior in every way, and yet we knew that their power was fading. I wanted to make my master proud. I wanted to show the Elders that they were not invulnerable. I would strike at the very heart of them.’ Tinsmouth took down the portrait of Olivia and held it to his chest. ‘You know the result.’

‘When you killed her, did you feel anything?’

‘Nothing. Not a sliver of pity or remorse. I was glad. Yes, glad.’

‘My dad told me you’d been arrested. That you were in an asylum.’

‘What else could he tell you? I was taken to the cells underneath the Hobarron Tower, separated from my demon and tortured for information.’

‘My dad wouldn’t have tortured you.’

‘He took no pleasure in it, Jake. Even then, before I knew him, I could see that. But this is a war, and good people do terrible things in wars.’

‘Were you hurt?’

‘Doesn’t matter.’

‘Show me.’

‘I said it doesn’t … ’

‘SHOW ME!’

Tinsmouth sighed. He lifted his shirt up to his chest. The skin was horribly scarred. Jake turned away in disgust.

‘Adam Harker is a good man,’ Tinsmouth insisted. ‘He has helped many “dark creatures” … ’ Tinsmouth’s eyes flickered in Simon’s direction. ‘Not just misguided witches. The Hobarron Institute wants to lock them up, study them, dissect them, but your father has done what he could to keep the innocent safe.’

‘If he didn’t like their methods why didn’t he just leave?’

‘By staying he could use his influence to do some good. And then there was his work on the weapon.’

‘The Incu box,’ Jake said under his breath. His gaze switched back to Tinsmouth. ‘What
is
the weapon?’

‘All in good time … For you to understand why your father trusted me, we have to go back to my days in the Institute cells. My demon had been taken away for “study” and, without it, I started to dream for the first time in years. Pure dreams, without the ever-present taint of evil thoughts. I started to catch glimpses of the life Crowden had taken from me, bits and pieces of my mother and father. Your dad would watch me as I slept. For years, he had been working on a form of dream hypnosis … ’

‘Hypnosis.’ Something stirred at the back of Jake’s mind. It was no good, the memory was too hazy …

‘The technique your father used on me was not wholly successful,’ Tinsmouth continued. ‘After my experience in the nightmare box, too much of my past self had been lost. Nevertheless, as I started to remember snatches of my childhood, so your father began to see a change in me. In my sleeping face, he saw glimpses of the boy I had been. Through suggestion and hypnosis he stripped away the evil. After two years of Adam’s help and training I had reclaimed my soul. That was when he broke me out of the Hobarron cells.’

The room seemed to be getting colder by the minute. Jake tried rubbing warmth into his arms.

‘It was fairly straightforward,’ Tinsmouth continued. ‘As a senior Elder, Adam had the security codes to the entire building. He staged a power cut and, in the ensuing chaos and darkness, he smuggled me out. He had a car waiting nearby to whisk me to Marmsbury Cove, an out-of-the-way seaside town.’

Simon stood up and started pacing the room.

‘Is there something the matter, Master Lydgate?’

Simon stopped abruptly. ‘You murdered a little girl. Oh, I know you’d suffered at the hands of Crowden, that he’d twisted you. But it was still
you
. If I’m right, the nightmare box only drew out the evil already inside you. You murdered Olivia Brown and you served a sentence of two measly years.’

Tinsmouth nodded. ‘Jake’s father thought the same. But you know, the darkest prison is one’s own conscience. When I was brought to Marmsbury, Adam told me that I had not served my time for the murder. That perhaps my punishment would never end. You can see how I live, with the eyes of my victim staring down at me. I opened the shop to spread some happiness—it makes no profit and I give away my tricks. I never go out, never see anyone.’ Tinsmouth tapped his forehead. ‘In here is where I serve my time.’

‘If you live like this I wonder why my dad set you free,’ Jake said.

‘Because of the Institute policy that, after a witch has been tortured for every scrap of information, he must be killed.’ Tinsmouth shrugged. ‘It makes sense. Most dark witches do not renounce evil. They have lived with it for so long that there is no way back. Remember, I had been a witch for only ten years.’

‘But you’ve started practising magic again,’ Simon said. ‘Surely that’s dangerous.’

‘True magic is
not
evil,’ Tinsmouth said. ‘Adam Harker taught me that. More than any other Elder before him, Adam has studied the history of magic. He knows more about the subject than anyone, even Dr Holmwood—even Mother Inglethorpe and Tobias Quilp. Perhaps only Marcus Crowden himself could claim greater knowledge, but the Master’s love of demons had blinded him to the truth. Gentlemen, what I am about to tell you constitutes the greatest trick ever played on humankind.’

Tinsmouth leaned forward. The magician opened his palm. A golden flower of breathtaking beauty grew slowly out of his hand.

‘
Magic does not come from demons
.’

The flower shivered, dropping its golden blossom across the floor. Then it withered back into Tinsmouth’s palm.

‘A simple spell but not a demon in sight.’

‘Then how did you … ?’

‘Oldcraft.’

‘Oldcraft,’ Jake echoed.

Some hidden chamber deep inside Jake’s soul shuddered. The door to this forbidden place flashed in his mind’s eye and then vanished again into a fathomless darkness.

‘You recognize the word,’ Tinsmouth said, his eyes alight. ‘That’s good. It means your father was right about everything! Oldcraft is the practice of pure magic. It is the magic of the world around us: of the earth, the wind, the sea. Centuries ago, before demonkind perverted our knowledge, we knew this truth. But, as we began to practise darker spells, born of greed and lust and violence, so mankind opened the door to demons. They are beings of pure evil, Jake. They made witches believe that magic could only be perfected with their aid. They destroyed much of the history of Oldcraft until only weak pockets of knowledge remained. Today, Wiccans and white witches work without demons, drawing on the magic of the earth, but their power is virtually non-existent. People with natural magical abilities like me can automatically tune into Oldcraft, but there are no good witches left to teach it, and we are soon picked up by dark covens and told the lie that our abilities come from invisible demonic forces.’

‘But what do demons want with us?’

‘We are their way into this world. Every time a witch summons a demon, the barrier between our world and theirs is weakened. They long to escape their fiery prison, even if it is only for brief periods of time. And they take delight in destroying us. We believe them to be our magical servants and yet
they
are the puppet masters. They whisper evil in our ears and we obey, murdering our souls in the process.’

‘Why can’t witches be told this?’ Jake asked. ‘If they knew … ’

‘The demons blind them to the truth. Oldcraft is laughed at as a crazy superstition. No dark witch would dare abandon his demon and risk his magic by believing such nonsense. Even a man as clever as Marcus Crowden cannot see the truth. And who is there now that could convince him otherwise? The last powerful practitioner of Oldcraft died over three hundred years ago. Crowden knew him, and to this day he believes that the Witchfinder unwittingly used invisible demons to power his magic.’

‘Who was the Witchfinder?’ Jake asked.

‘His name was Hobarron.’

‘After his sacrifice, the villagers honoured the Witchfinder by building him a grand mausoleum and naming their community after him,’ Tinsmouth said. ‘It really was the least he deserved.’

‘You know his story?’ Jake asked.

‘Bits of it. No full record of the Witchfinder survives, just scraps of information. We know for a fact that he was the last true practitioner of Oldcraft. He had a natural instinct for magic, an understanding of its raw power. Some say he did not even need spells and incantations to work his will—conjurations came as easily to him as walking and breathing.’

‘And he wasn’t taken in by the demon lie?’

‘Not him.’ Tinsmouth smiled. ‘He was blessed with two rare gifts. The first was his magical ability; the second was a sensitivity towards Evil. He could feel its power, see it plainly for what it was, and he was repulsed by it. This instinct was nurtured by his father, who was a preacher man and well-versed in the wiles of demonkind. His abilities led Hobarron into the life of a witchfinder.’

Jake remembered his dream in which he had walked inside the Witchfinder’s skin. Tinsmouth was right—the man had had a
feel
for evil.

‘But why be a witchfinder?’ Simon asked. ‘I’ve read about people like that. They were vicious men, accusing innocent people of witchcraft so that they could claim their reward.’

‘On the whole, you’re right,’ Tinsmouth said. ‘People like Matthew Hopkins, the Witchfinder General, were at best depraved lunatics, at worst money-grabbing murderers. Hobarron did not ask to be called “witchfinder”, however, and his work brought him into direct conflict with Hopkins and his kind.

‘When there was an accusation of witchcraft, Hobarron would go to the town and use his ability to sense demonic evil. He was a hard man and, if he found a witch truly
had
conspired with demons and had worked evil spells, he would gladly stand back and watch her hang. If, however, he believed the woman was innocent or, like him, a practitioner of Oldcraft, he would use all his powers to rescue her from the gallows. In this way, he probably saved hundreds of people. Each time he did so, he risked his own life, for it would have been very easy to accuse Hobarron himself of witchcraft. Despite the dangers posed to him by Hopkins and others, he found his work relatively easy. Stupid witches and their miserable demons were no match for
him
.

‘And then he was summoned to a little village on the coast. There he found the greatest evil he had ever known … ’

‘You know about the Demontide. You are aware of the danger facing not just this village but the entire world. It is your duty to tell us the whereabouts of Jacob Harker.’

‘Why do you want to hurt him? What good will it do?’

‘Those are questions, not answers.’

The cane lashed down and Rachel cried out. Another angry red welt blossomed from the flesh on her arm.

Alice Splane raised the stick again.

‘If you talk, I will stop.’

‘I won’t tell you where he is.’

Thwack!

After being dragged from the library, Rachel and Eddie had been taken to Holmwood Manor. They were now seated in the great hall, their hands tied behind their backs. Those Elders that had abducted them stood on the staircase while Alice Splane did her best to get the truth out of Rachel. Their faces remained as hard as the stones from which the old building had been constructed. Only Mrs Rice and Dr Saxby flinched at the sound of the cane.

Now, as Alice turned to her son, Mildred Rice cried out. She bolted forward but the others managed to hold her back.

‘Come now, Edward,’ Alice said, ‘you are a good boy, I know that. I’m sure you want to help us find Jake.’

‘M-maybe,’ Eddie stammered. ‘But is Rachel right? Do you want to hurt him?’

‘Just tell her, Eddie!’ Mrs Rice shouted.

‘You should do as your mother says, she only wants the best for you.’

‘Don’t listen, Ed,’ Rachel murmured.

‘But why do you want to hurt him?’

‘You’re just a child, Edward,’ Alice Splane purred, ‘you wouldn’t understand.’

Eddie swallowed hard. ‘You people are no better than the witches and the demons,’ he said. ‘You think you’re good but you’re bad.’

Rachel stared at her father. ‘He’s right, isn’t he, Dad? I wondered why Jake wouldn’t let me talk to you about all this. He was trying to protect me from the truth. That it’s you, the Hobarron Elders, who are the
real
monsters.’

Alice looked at Malcolm Saxby. The doctor bowed his head in a silent assent. The cane whipped through the air.

‘As I say, there is no full account of Hobarron’s time as a witchfinder,’ Tinsmouth said. ‘A few old books hint that he kept a diary, but if so it has never been found. And so we can only be sure of a few details.’

Jake shivered again. The little room seemed colder than ever. And yet perhaps it was the sense of foreboding that made him tremble. Ever since the Witchfinder’s name had been revealed, he had felt as if he knew the story that was to come. Knew it even better than the storyteller perhaps …

‘It was the summer of 1645 and the height of the English Civil War, the bloodiest and most brutal conflict in our history. Neighbour was fighting neighbour, brother killing brother. Hunger and fear stalked the land. When people are afraid they often cast around for someone to blame. Usually their victims are those that live on the outskirts of society: the hermit, the madwoman, and the witch. There is no record of what brought Hobarron to the village … ’