There was no answer, but everything became very still and quiet. This was the calm. I was the storm.
Now I draw two weapons. In my left hand I grip the long blade that I use for hand-to-hand combat; in my right a throwing dagger. My enemies are entering the trees now, so I descend the hill, advancing to meet them. First I will slay the mage; next the abhuman; finally the familiar witch, the strongest of all.
I am walking slowly, taking care to make no noise. Some of my enemies either lack the skill to do likewise or are careless. My hearing is acute and I detect the occasional distant crack of a twig or the faint rustle of long skirts trailing through the undergrowth.
Once in position above the mage, I come to a halt. He is only a man and will be the easiest of the three to overcome. Even so, he is undoubtedly more powerful than six of the advancing witches. A witch assassin must never underestimate her opponent. I will kill him quickly, then move on to the next.
I coil myself like a sharp metal spring and concentrate on my attack, searching for the mage, probing the darkness with my keen eyes. He is a young man, but although his magic is strong, physically he is out of condition and overweight, breathing heavily from the climb.
I whirl into motion. Three rapid steps downhill, and I hurl the throwing blade without breaking my stride. It takes the mage in the heart and he falls backwards, dead even before he can cry out. His magical defences proved inadequate.
The abhuman is my next target. He is big, with wide-set eyes and sharp yellow fangs jutting up over his top lip. Such creatures – children of the Fiend and a witch – are immensely strong and need to be kept at a distance and tackled at arm’s length. To fall into their grasp is to risk being torn limb from limb. They are invariably brutal and morally debased, the worst of them capable of anything. If my child had been such an evil creature I would have drowned it at birth.
I sprint towards him at full pelt, plucking another throwing knife from its leather sheath. My throw is accurate and would have taken him in the throat, but he has been protected. The witches have infused him with their power, creating wards that deflect my blade. It skitters away uselessly and he surges towards me, roaring in fury, wielding a large club in one hand and a barbed spear in the other. He swings the club and jabs with the spear. But I have moved before either reaches me.
The heavy sack bounces against my back as I change direction again. Then, with my long blade, I cut the abhuman’s throat, and he falls choking, a stream of blood spraying upwards. Still without checking my stride, I run on.
Now I must deal with the third enemy – the familiar witch.
I am running widdershins, against the clock, so that my left and more deadly arm is facing towards the slope and the remaining witches, who are still moving upwards in my direction. A witch attacks, but not the one I seek. I ram the hilt of my blade into her face and she falls back. She will live, but without her front teeth.
By now the powerful familiar witch has sensed my attack, and she turns to face me, sending dark enchantments like poisoned spears towards my heart. I flick them aside and head directly towards her. I hear the beating of wings and something swoops towards my face with claws outstretched. It is a small hawk – a kestrel. I sweep my blade upwards in an arc and the hawk screams, its feathers falling upon me like blood-flecked snow.
The witch shrieks as her familiar dies; she shrieks again when I cut her the first time. My next blow ends her life, and the only sounds now are the slip-slap of my feet on the ground and the wish-swish of my breath as I accelerate down the hill and leave the cover of the trees.
I speed eastwards out of the wood, leaving my enemies to find their dead. As I run, I go over in my mind what has happened. An assassin must evaluate both her successes and her failures; she must always learn from the past.
I consider again the means by which they have found me. The witch was powerful, but her familiar was just a small hawk. Their combined magic could not have seen beyond the cloak that I had cast about myself. No, it has to be something else.
What about the strange presence advancing with the larger group further back? What is it? Is it this that has discovered me? If so, it must be powerful. And it is something that I have never encountered before. Something new.
It is wise to be wary of the unknown. Its unfamiliarity makes it dangerous. But soon it will be dead. How can it hope to defeat me?
I am Grimalkin.
Each day say to yourself that you are the best, the strongest and the most deadly. Eventually you will start to believe it. Finally it will come true. It came true for me. I am Grimalkin.
JUST BEFORE DAWN I rested for an hour, drinking cool water from a stream and chewing my last few strips of dried meat. My supplies were almost exhausted and I would need fresh meat to keep up my strength. Rabbits would have been easy to trap, but I was still being pursued and could not afford to rest for more than a few moments. The majority of my enemies were almost two miles back now, but one of their number had come on ahead of the group and was closing on me. It was the unknown creature that I had first sniffed in the wood.
It was moving faster than I was. Whatever the danger it presented, soon I would have to turn and face it. But first I had to know more. So I took a small mirror from its sheath on my shoulder strap, muttered a spell and then breathed on it.
Within moments a face appeared. It was that of Agnes Sowerbutts. She was a Deane but bore no great love for her own clan. She lived apart from the life of Pendle and had helped me before. We had a bond between us – a common interest. She was the aunt of Alice Deane and a close friend of Tom Ward, the Spook’s apprentice.
Agnes is skilled in the use of the mirror. Few are her equal in locating people, objects and dark entities. But she keeps herself to herself and few know that she is also a powerful scryer – far better than Martha Ribstalk, our greatest Malkin seer, who is now dead.
It was too dark for Agnes to read my lips, so I breathed on the mirror and made my request by writing on its surface. I wanted to know about the creature that pursued me.
I wiped the mirror. Agnes merely smiled and nodded. She would do her best to help.
So I ran on, trying to maintain the same distance between myself and my pursuer. The leather bag slapped against my back with each second stride. The Fiend’s head seemed to be growing heavier by the hour. It was undoubtedly slowing me down. The pursuit was relentless, and gradually I was being overtaken. That fact did not displease me. Running like this was not my preferred option. I looked forward to the moment when I would have to turn and fight.