So there was one way in which we weren’t alike.
Mam was a lot braver than I was.
Chapter Two
On The Road
I was up an hour before dawn but Mam was already in the kitchen, cooking my favourite breakfast, bacon and eggs.
Dad came downstairs while I was mopping the plate with my last slice of bread. As we said goodbye, he pulled something from his pocket and placed it in my hands. It was the small tinderbox that had belonged to his own dad and to his grandad before that. One of his favourite possessions.
‘I want you to have this, son,’ he said. ‘It might come in useful in your new job. And come back and see us soon. Just because you’ve left home, it doesn’t mean that you can’t come back and visit.’
‘It’s time to go, son,’ Mam said, walking across to give me a final hug. ‘He’s at the gate. Don’t keep him waiting.’
We were a family which didn’t like too much fuss, and as we’d already said our goodbyes, I walked out into the yard alone.
The Spook was on the other side of the gate, a dark silhouette against the grey dawn light. His hood was up and he was standing straight and tall, his staff in his left hand. I walked towards him, carrying my small bundle of possessions, feeling very nervous.
To my surprise, the Spook opened the gate and came into the yard. ‘Well, lad,’ he said, ‘follow me!
We might as well start the way we mean to go on.’
Instead of heading for the road, he led the way north, directly towards Hangman’s Hill, and soon we were crossing the north pasture, my heart already starting to thump. When we reached the boundary fence, the Spook climbed over with the ease of a man half his age, but I froze. As I rested my hands against the top edge of the fence, I could already hear the sounds of the trees creaking, their branches bent and bowed under the weight of the hanging men.
‘What’s the matter, lad?’ asked the Spook, turning to look back at me. ‘If you’re frightened of something on your own doorstep, you’ll be of little use to me.’
I took a deep breath and clambered over the fence. We trudged upwards, the dawn light darkening as we moved up into the gloom of the trees. The higher we climbed the colder it seemed to get and soon I was shivering. It was the kind of cold that gives you goose pimples and makes the hair on the back of your neck start to rise. It was a warning that something wasn’t quite right. I’d felt it before when something had come close that didn’t belong in this world.
Once we’d reached the summit of the hill, I could see them below me. There had to be a hundred at least, sometimes two or three hanging from the same tree, wearing soldiers’ uniforms with broad leather belts and big boots. Their hands were tied behind their backs and all of them behaved differently. Some struggled desperately so that the branch above them bounced and jerked, while others were just spinning slowly on the end of the rope, pointing first one way, then the other.
As I watched, I suddenly felt a strong wind on my face, a wind so cold and fierce that it couldn’t have been natural. The trees bowed low, and their leaves shrivelled and began to fall. Within moments, all the branches were bare. When the wind had eased, the Spook put his hand on my shoulder and guided me nearer to the hanging men. We stopped just feet away from the nearest.
‘Look at him,’ said the Spook. ‘What do you see?’
‘A dead soldier,’ I replied, my voice beginning to wobble.
‘How old does he look?’
‘Seventeen at the most.’
‘Good. Well done, lad. Now, tell me, do you still feel scared?’
‘A bit. I don’t like being so close to him.’
‘Why? There’s nothing to be afraid of. Nothing that can hurt you. Think about what it must have been like for him. Concentrate on him rather than yourself. How must he have felt? What would be the worst thing?’
I tried to put myself in the soldier’s place and imagine how it must have been to die like that. The pain and the struggle for breath would have been terrible. But there might have been something even worse...
‘He’d have known he was dying and that he’d never be able to go home again. That he’d never see his family again,’ I told the Spook.
With those words a wave of sadness washed over me. Then, even as that happened, the hanging men slowly began to disappear, until we were alone on the hillside and the leaves were back on the trees.
‘How do you feel now? Still afraid?’ I shook my head. ‘No,’ I said. ‘I just feel sad.’ ‘Well done, lad. You’re learning. We’re the seventh sons of seventh sons and we have the gift of seeing things that others can’t. But that gift can sometimes be a curse. If we’re afraid, sometimes there are things that can feed on that fear. Fear makes it worse for us. The trick is to concentrate on what you can see and stop thinking about yourself. It works every time.
‘It was a terrible sight, lad, but they’re just ghasts,’ continued the Spook. ‘There’s nothing much we can do about them and they’ll just fade away in their own time. In a hundred years or so there’ll be nothing left.’
I felt like telling him that Mam did something about them once, but I didn’t. To contradict him would have got us off to a bad start.
‘Now if they were ghosts, that would be different,’ said the Spook. ‘You can talk to ghosts and tell them what’s what. Just making them realize that they’re dead is a great kindness and an important step in getting them to move on. Usually a ghost is a bewildered spirit trapped on this earth but not knowing what’s happened. So often they’re in torment. Then again, others are here with a definite purpose and they might have things to tell you. But a ghast is just a fragment of a soul that’s gone on to better things. That’s what these are, lad. Just ghasts. You saw the trees change?’
‘The leaves fell and it was winter.’
‘Well, the leaves are back now. So you were just looking at something from the past. Just a reminder of the evil things that sometimes happen on this earth. Usually, if you’re brave, they can’t see you and they don’t feel anything. A ghast is just like a reflection in a pond that stays behind when its owner has moved on. Understand what I’m saying?’
I nodded.
‘Right, so that’s one thing sorted out. We’ll be dealing with the dead from time to time, so you might as well get used to them. Anyway, let’s get started. We’ve quite a way to go. Here, from now on you’ll be carrying this.’