Fire Girl (30 page)

‘I hope you know what you’re doing,’ Titus growled.

The demon leaped, and as it bounded towards her, Hazel flung her fire at the ground, igniting the fish oil with a
whoosh
. Green flames leaped eight feet into the air, spreading across the
paving slabs and filling the air with greasy smoke. Titus grabbed Hazel and pulled her away.

Moving too quickly to stop, Rawhead ran straight into the inferno. The demon slipped and fell forward, legs splaying out beneath it. There was a hiss like roasting meat, and then the flames
baking its flesh blossomed red and exploded.

Titus dragged her away, choking on the fumes as the fire died as quickly as it began, leaving behind a dark stain on the ground.

Hazel woke to the creak and roll of the wagon. She was lying on the bed with the hearth warming her toes. Bramley lay by her head on the pillow. It was night-time; she must
have slept for hours. Memories filled her mind and she struggled up on to her elbows.

Bramley stirred and yawned. ‘Up at last,’ he said.

‘I’ve got to go back to the church,’ she said. ‘Find a way to follow Ma . . . to bring her back.’

‘There’s no way to the Underworld from there any more.’ Titus sat with his feet on the table, looking keenly at her from under his brow. ‘It’s been sealed off, and
a good thing too.’

Hazel swung her legs over the bed, pleased to see Samson fast asleep in front of the fire, the only sign of his wounds being two scars by his neck. ‘I’m going to find a way somehow .
. .’

‘I thought you’d say that,’ Titus said, kicking her boots over to her.

‘Where’s David?’

‘Who do you think’s driving?’

‘And Murrell?’ Just saying his name made her heart ache with fury.

‘Tied to the roof.’ Titus picked up his pipe and cleaned the bowl out with his thumb. ‘The boy was all for taking you both to London. For the bounty, you understand.’

‘But you disagreed.’

‘I don’t work for Cromwell. Besides, you may be foolish and stubborn, but you’re not a criminal.’

‘Murrell is.’

‘Indeed. And believe me, I could retire comfortably on the money on his head. But he’s also the only man alive who has ever been to the demon world and survived. Which means . .
.’

Hazel’s eyes widened. ‘Which means if we want to find Ma, we need his help to do it.’

Titus jabbed his pipe at her. ‘Exactly.’

It took the rest of the day and the following night for them to reach Mary’s cabin, during which time they stopped only once to rest the horses. Hazel had just fallen
into a doze, with Samson lying on her feet and Bramley nesting in her hair, when the door opened and Titus looked in.

‘We’re here,’ he said.

Shaking off her weariness, she stepped outside, blinking in the warm summer sunlight. The wagon was parked behind Mary’s cabin by the vegetable garden. Grey clouds lay heaped on the
horizon like great piles of ash, but overhead the sky was clear and the sun had already warmed the grass under her feet. Hazel was relieved to see that the grave she’d dug for Mary was
undisturbed.

I hope she found the peace she wanted
, she thought.

David led Hercules over to Titus, his face impassive under the black scarf tied around his eye. Titus handed him a few coins. ‘We’ll need some food and supplies. We may be here some
time. Take the dog with you.’

David climbed on to Hercules’s back.

‘I know this is not working out how you wanted, David,’ Titus said. ‘But it’s the right thing to do.’

‘You’re the boss, Boss.’

David avoided even so much as looking at Hazel. He jabbed his heels into Hercules’s flank and trotted away with Samson by his side. Hazel and Titus watched him disappear into the
trees.

‘No reward,’ the old Witch Finder said. ‘No victorious entry into London with Murrell and a Fire Witch in chains. Just a disfigured face and a life-lesson hard learned.’
He shook his head. ‘I think I may be losing him.’

‘What have you done with Murrell?’ Hazel asked. Bramley shuddered behind her ear.

‘I’ve tied him up in the outhouse for now. I’ll let him stew for a bit. You get on inside and light the fire. You can do that, can’t you?’

‘I think so.’ Hazel managed a small smile.

‘Find them, bind them, burn them.’

Witch Hunter Captain John Stearne

H
azel lay in Mary’s bed with a heavy head and a heavier heart. She sat up, blinking as the first rays of the sun crept through the window and
the hole in the roof. Bramley stirred in her pocket and poked his head out, blinking sleepily.

‘Have you slept at all?’ he said, giving himself a wake-up shake.

‘Not really.’ Hazel rubbed her eyes. ‘I feel all foggy and confused. I don’t know what to do. How are we going to get Murrell to tell us what we need to know?’

‘We’ve been indoors for too long, and thinking too much. Why don’t we go out for some fresh air? Maybe find an apple tree to plunder?’

The thought of a cool breeze and a wash in the stream was appealing. ‘All right, why not?’ Hazel picked the little dormouse up and tiptoed downstairs to the kitchen. She was a little
surprised that the old Witch Finder was not still dozing in the rocking chair where she’d left him last night.

‘I wonder where Titus is,’ she said.

‘Perhaps he’s seeing to the horses.’

The forest was eerily quiet, although the sound of the chattering stream lifted Hazel’s spirits. Verdant patches of clover, their purple blooms waving in the breeze, grew in the
trees’ shadow not far from the cabin. Hazel walked through them, enjoying the feeling of wet leaves against her legs.

‘It’s nice to be outside again,’ Bramley said. ‘I’ve missed the feeling of the sun on my whiskers.’

Hazel froze as she bent down to pick some blooms.
There’s someone behind me!

Before she could move, a hand clamped over her mouth and dragged her into the undergrowth skirting the trunk of an oak tree. Fighting panic, she twisted around to see her assailant. Her eyes
widened. It was Titus.

He put a finger to his lips. Hazel nodded and he released her. ‘Whatever happens,’ he whispered, ‘don’t make a sound.’

Hazel’s scalp crawled at the sound of slow footsteps crunching across the vegetable garden and heading towards the cabin. Hardly daring to breathe, she peered cautiously around the
tree.

Creeping along a nearby row of cabbages was a helmeted soldier wearing a tarnished breastplate over a dark red tunic, with white facings on the cuffs. He had a sword on his hip and carried a
wheel-lock musket in both hands; as he passed the tree he blew on the glowing slow-match.

‘Roundheads,’ Titus whispered. ‘Cromwell’s men.’ He pointed across the vegetable garden. More soldiers emerged from the forest, crouched low and converging on the
cabin. ‘A company, at least.’

They’ll find Murrell
, Hazel thought in a panic.
And without him I’ll never be able to get into the Underworld.
Without thinking, she lunged forward.

Titus grabbed her waist and pulled her back behind the tree, clamping his hand over her mouth again. ‘Don’t be stupid,’ he hissed. ‘There’s nothing we can do,
there’re too many of them. Count yourself fortunate that you’re not being collared as well. Just as well I hid the wagon in the forest, or they’d be all over that too. Now
keep
still
.’ He leaned forward. ‘Wait a minute – who’s this?’

Hazel stopped struggling as a man in black trousers, shirt and muddy boots stalked out of the trees by the cabin, resting a heavy wooden club over his shoulder. Despite wearing no armour, it was
clear by the way the soldiers regarded him that he was in charge. She shivered at the brutal strength packed into his limbs, and the way he walked – like a dog used to winning its fights.

‘Captain John Stearne. The Witch Butcher himself,’ Titus muttered. ‘Of all the scoundrels . . .’

‘We can’t let them take Murrell,’ Hazel begged.

‘We must,’ Titus said.

Stearne stopped by the cabin, close enough for Hazel to see his flattened nose and dark eyes. He nodded to the Roundheads, who knelt in front of the cabin and trained their muskets on the
windows. Four more stood with their backs to the wall next to the cabin door, and two others readied themselves by the outhouse.

They waited, eyes on Stearne. At his signal the soldiers kicked the cabin and outhouse doors open and then plunged inside.

‘How did they find us?’ Titus muttered. ‘Why are they even looking?’

Hazel watched as the soldiers dragged Murrell from the outhouse. Stearne strolled up to him and threw a mallet-like fist into his stomach. The demonologist dropped to the ground, doubled up,
fighting to breathe.

A soldier poked his head out of the upstairs windows. ‘Place is empty, sir,’ he called down.

‘No sign of the girl or the drunkard?’

‘No, sir.’

‘Drunkard indeed . . .’ Titus grumbled as he pulled Hazel deeper into the thicket.

Stearne turned to one of his men. ‘Get the cage, and you might as well bring the songbird round as well. I’ve got some more questions for him about this merry little band.’ The
soldier nodded and jogged up the track into the forest.

Stearne surveyed his men as they searched the cabin and garden, clattering up and down the stairs and trampling over the vegetable patches. For the whole time he kept his foot on Murrell and
thumped the gnarled end of his club into the palm of his hand.

There was a rumble from the forest track as an enclosed cart hauled by two horses approached the cabin. It was built from heavy timber and had only one barred window. The crossed-hammer symbol
of the Order of Witch Hunters was emblazoned on the side.

Titus’s beard scraped Hazel’s cheek as he leaned over her shoulder. ‘No,’ he said. ‘It can’t be.’

Following his gaze, she saw a shaggy dog trotting down the road behind the wagon. Her eyes widened. ‘Is that . . . ?’

‘It’s Samson,’ Titus said.

‘If they’ve got Samson,’ Hazel said, ‘they must have . . .’

Samson stopped and turned back towards the forest, ears pricked. His tail wagged as David rode out of the trees’ shadow, into the dappled sunlight. Two cavalrymen rode on either side of
him with matchlocks over their shoulders.

‘They’ve got him prisoner,’ Bramley squeaked.

‘Wait a minute,’ Hazel said. The sun glinted on something at David’s hip. It was his pistol. ‘He’s still armed.’

Hazel and Titus stared as David reached the cabin, dismounted and shook Stearne’s hand.

‘Well done, lad,’ Stearne said. ‘You’ve helped us catch the most wanted man in England, and that will certainly please the General. As for the other two – well,
I’m sure we’ll find them soon enough.’

When the crashing, shouting and bellowing finally stopped, Hazel cautiously opened the door to Mary’s cabin and peered inside. Her eyes were red but she had wiped away
the last of her tears.

No more crying
, she had told herself, while she listened to Titus venting his fury on the contents of the cottage.
Not any more.

Stearne and his men had left hours ago, taking Murrell and the vital knowledge he possessed with them. Now, Titus stood alone, chest heaving, in the middle of the kitchen. Broken dish fragments
and the splintered remnants of the rocking chair lay scattered around him. The heavy oak table rested on its side against the fireplace.

‘Have you finished?’ she asked.

Titus turned his stormy glare on to her, fists bunched. ‘He betrayed me. The little turd
betrayed
me!’

‘I know,’ Hazel said. ‘Perhaps we should have seen it coming.’

‘The bond of loyalty between Witch Finder and apprentice is unbreakable.’ Titus shook his head as if trying to recover from a punch.

‘Evidently not,’ Bramley said.

‘He even took my dog, damn his eyes,’ Titus grunted.

Hazel picked up a fallen chair and sat down. ‘What will happen to Murrell?’ Her voice sounded far off, as if spoken by someone else.

Titus slumped into a corner and rested his head against the wall. ‘They’ll take him to London to face the Witch Hunter General. He’ll be interrogated, then they’ll
probably make a big show of his execution.’