‘They’re here, Tom!’ she cried, her voice full of concern. ‘The mages! And there are so many of them!’
I followed her to the window, which faced east, and gazed out. There were lights snaking towards us as far as the eye could see. Our enemies had certainly arrived in force. It was impossible to count them, but judging by the lights, more were here than Shey had predicted.
‘Don’t worry, Alice,’ I said, trying to reassure her. ‘We have enough food here to last for weeks, and anyway, once the time for the ceremony has passed, the siege will be in vain – they’ll go away.’
We sat together by the window, holding hands but not speaking. Enemy campfires began to spark into life, encircling the castle completely. No doubt Alice was thinking the same thing as me: the Celtic witch would be down there, sitting by one of those fires. Was it the one seeking revenge? Would she know that I was here? I reassured myself with the thought that she couldn’t reach me – the thick castle walls would keep her away.
But the dawn brought news to shatter some of my hopes. A team of oxen was slowly dragging something towards the castle – a big metal cylinder on wheels. They had a siege gun – a big eighteen-pounder!
Alice and I had both seen such a powerful gun in action. One had been used by soldiers to breach the walls of Malkin Tower. It had been fired with great accuracy, the huge cannonballs striking almost exactly the same spot in the wall, until at last it had given way and was open to the attackers. But a lot would depend on the skill of the gunners here. Would they be experienced enough to breach the defences of Ballycarbery Castle?
Neither Shey nor his men seemed much perturbed by what was happening outside our walls. After a hearty breakfast of oats and honey, Alice and I joined him and the Spook on the battlements.
‘Did you know they’d have a siege gun?’ asked my master.
‘I knew they had one in their possession. It was cast in Dublin over fifty years ago and has seen action twice, proving itself to be a formidable weapon. The mages bought it and transported it here last year. But our spies report that they lack experienced gunners.’
The gun was dragged into position to the west of the castle. I studied the men clustered around it. At the siege of Malkin Tower, I remembered that the noise had been deafening, but I’d noted the skill of the gunners – how they had worked as an efficient team, each performing his task with an economy of movement.
Amongst our armed defenders were about six or seven archers and, using their longbows, they now started to aim for the gunners. However, the distance was too great, the wind against them, and their arrows fell short.
I watched the heavy iron ball being rolled into the mouth of the cannon and the fuse being lit. By now the gunners were covering their ears.
There was a dull thud and a puff of smoke from the mouth of the cannon as the iron ball began its trajectory. It fell far short of the castle walls and skidded across the rough turf to end up in a clump of thistles. This brought a chorus of jeers from the defenders on the battlements.
It took the enemy about five minutes to fire the next shot. This one hit the wall of the castle very low down. There was a loud crack on impact, and a few fragments of stone fell onto the grass. It wasn’t a good shot but this time there were no jeers. The next one again fell short, then after that every firing of the cannon resulted in a strike somewhere against the stone walls of the castle. The noise was unnerving, but no serious damage was being done to the stone.
Shey went off to talk to his men, patting each one on the back in turn. He was a good commander, attempting to keep up their morale.
‘You have to be extremely accurate and hit the same point on the wall each time,’ I pointed out to the Spook. ‘These men lack the skill to make a breach.’
‘Then let’s hope they’re not fast learners, lad,’ he remarked, ‘because they’ve plenty of round shot down there, and a week or so to improve their aim!’
It was true. In addition to barrels of water for cooling the cannon and many bags of gunpowder, there were dozens of pyramids of cannonballs stacked close to the big gun, and wagons of more ammunition waiting in the distance. All they lacked at present was the expertise to use their potentially dangerous weapon effectively.
After about an hour the gun fell silent, and a man approached the castle gate. He was unarmed and carried a white flag which fluttered in the westerly wind. He stopped close to the gate and shouted his message up at us. He looked scared.
‘My masters demand that you release the mage, Cormac, into our hands immediately. Do so and we will leave in peace. Failure to comply will result in dire consequences. We will batter down your walls, and everyone within will be put to the sword!’
Shey’s face twitched with anger, and I watched the archers draw their bows and target the messenger, who was just seconds from death. But Shey gestured to them and they lowered their weapons.
‘Go back and tell your masters that we refuse!’ he shouted. ‘Their time is almost over. This castle cannot be breached by the fools they have hired as gunners. Soon it will be your turn to be under siege. We will tear down your fort until not a stone remains standing.’
The messenger turned and walked back towards the ranks of our enemies. Within five minutes the gun began firing again.
The Spook decided that this was an opportunity for me to catch up on my studies. Late in the afternoon he was giving me a lesson – I was studying the history of the dark. The Spook had been telling me about a group of mages called the Kobalos, who supposedly lived far to the north. Though they stood upright, they were not human, and had the appearance of foxes or wolves. But there was little evidence that they really existed – only the jottings of one of the very first spooks – a man called Nicholas Browne. I had read about them already, and none of it was new to me, so I tried to get the Spook onto a subject that I found much more interesting. After all, we were dealing with hostile malevolent mages who worshipped Pan.
‘What about Pan?’ I asked. ‘What do we know about him?’
The Spook pulled the Bestiary from his bag and leafed through until he came to the section on the Old Gods. He handed the book to me. ‘Read that first and then ask your questions,’ he commanded.
The entry on Pan was quite short and I read it quickly:
PAN (THE HORNED GOD)
Pan is the Old God, originally worshipped by the Greeks, who rules over nature and takes on two distinct physical forms. In one manifestation he is a boy and plays a set of reed pipes, his melodies so powerful that no birdsong can equal them and the very rocks move under their influence.