I still delight in remembering the moment of our victory. The Fiend was standing on all fours, tossing his head about like an enraged bull and roaring with pain. I stabbed the first nail into his left hand, then struck the broad head three times with the hammer, driving it right through the flesh to pin his huge hairy paw fast to the rock. However, in my eagerness to bind him I became careless, and that was the moment when I almost died.
He twisted his head, opened his mouth wide and lunged towards me as if to bite my head from my body. But I avoided those deadly jaws, then swung the hammer back hard into his face, smashing his front teeth into fragments and leaving only broken bloody stumps. Few things have given me greater satisfaction!
After that, Tom Ward wielded the Destiny Blade given to him by Cuchulain, the greatest of Ireland’s dead heroes. With two deadly blows, the Spook’s apprentice cut through the Fiend’s neck and I carried that severed head away with me.
While body and head are apart, the Devil is bound. But his dark servants pursue me. They want to return the head to its body and pluck out the nails and silver spears so that he is free once more.
To thwart them, I keep moving. By doing this, I buy time so that the Spook and his apprentice can discover the means by which the Fiend may finally be destroyed or returned to the dark. But I cannot run for ever and my strength is finite. Besides, it is in my nature to fight, not run. This is a conflict I cannot win; there are too many of them – too many powerful denizens of the dark for even the witch assassin of the Malkin clan to overcome.
‘It feels good to have you in my power!’ I told the Fiend as I sat in front of him.
For a moment the severed head did not reply, but then the mouth slowly opened and a dribble of blood-flecked saliva trickled down his chin.
‘Unstitch my eyes!’ he bellowed, his voice a deep growl. His lips moved but the words seemed to rise up from the ground beneath the head.
‘Why should I do that?’ I demanded. ‘If you could see, you’d tell your servants where I am. Besides, it is my pleasure to watch you suffer.’
‘You can never win, witch!’ he snarled, showing his broken teeth again. ‘I am immortal; I can outlast even time itself. One day you will die and I will be waiting. What you have done to me I will repay a thousand times over. You cannot begin to imagine the torments that await you.’
‘Listen, fool!’ I told him. ‘Listen well! I don’t dwell on past failings, nor do I project my mind into the future more than is necessary. I am a creature of the “now” and I live in the present. And you are here in the present, trapped with me. It is you who suffer now. You are in my power!’
‘You are strong, witch,’ the Fiend said quietly, ‘but something stronger and more deadly stalks you. Your days are numbered.’
Suddenly everything grew quiet and still. Our reference to ‘time’ had spurred him to attempt again what he had already tried but failed to do the previous occasion I’d lifted him out of the sack. He had the ability to slow or halt time – though being separated from his body had limited his usual powers. However, taking no chances, I rammed the thorn-wrapped apple back into his mouth, then twisted my hooked implement out and pulled it free.
The Fiend’s face twitched, and beneath the stitched lids I could see the orbs of his eyes rolling in spasm. But I could hear the breeze whistling through the leaves above my head once more. Time was moving forward. The moment of danger was past.
I returned the head to the leather sack, stared into the leafy darkness and concentrated. One quick sniff told me that this was still a safe place. Nothing dangerous lurked in this copse that shrouded the summit of a hill and it was an excellent location. My enemies could not approach undetected.
My pursuers had gradually been increasing in number, but I had lost them late in the evening, and soon after had employed some of my precious remaining magic to cloak myself. I had to use it sparingly because my resources were almost exhausted. Now it was nearly midnight and I intended to rest here and regain my strength by sleeping until dawn.
Some time later, I awoke suddenly, sensing danger. My pursuers were climbing the hill towards me and they had spread out to encircle the wood.
How could that have happened? I had cloaked myself well: they should not have been able to find me. I sprang to my feet and swung the leather sack onto my shoulders.
I had been running for too long. Now, finally, it was time to fight. The thought lifted my spirits; the anticipation of combat always did that. It was what I lived for: to test my strength against my enemies’; to fight and kill.
How many were there? I fingered the thumb-bones that hung from the necklace I wore around my neck, drawing forth their magical power before probing the darkness with my mind.
There were nine creatures approaching. I sniffed three times to gather more information. There were others further back – almost a mile away – maybe twenty or more moving in this direction. Something puzzled me and I sniffed again. There was a new addition to this larger group; someone or something with them that I couldn’t identify. Something strange. What was it?
Something stronger and more deadly stalks you.
That was what the Fiend had said. Was this what he was referring to?
Perhaps it was, but for now that whole larger group could be forgotten. First I had to deal with the more immediate threat, so I began to assess the level of danger posed by the group of nine.
Seven of them were witches. At least one of them was of the first rank and she used familiar magic. That might be how they’d found me. A witch’s familiar could be anything from a toad to an eagle. Sometimes it was a powerful creature of the dark, although they were hard to control. So the familiar might have been able to find me despite the cloak I’d wrapped about myself.
I could also tell that one of the group climbing the hill was an abhuman – and that the ninth was a man; a dark mage.
It would be easy to make my escape by choosing the path of least resistance. Two of the witches were young – hardly more than novices. I could simply break through the encircling line at that point and flee into the darkness. But that was not my way. I had to remind them who I was. Send a clear message to all who pursued me that I was Grimalkin, the witch assassin of the Malkin clan. I had run for so long that they had grown disrespectful. I had to teach them fear again. So I called down the hill to my enemies.
‘I am Grimalkin and I could kill you all!’ I cried. ‘But I will slay only three – the strongest three!’