The boggart! It was rushing to attack!
I hardly had time to get to my feet before the lantern went out and I was blown onto my back, the impact driving the breath from my body. While I gasped for air, I could hear logs being hurled against the wall, but the loudest sound of all was that of the maenad screaming. The noise went on in the darkness, for a long time; then, but for the pattering of heavy rain, there was silence. The boggart had done its work and gone.
I was afraid to light the lantern again. Afraid to look at the maenad. But I did it anyway. She was quite dead and very pale, drained of blood by the boggart. There were lacerations to her throat and shoulders; her dress was in tatters. On her face was a look of terror. There was nothing to be done. What had happened was unprecedented. Once she was my bound captive, the boggart shouldn't have so much as touched her. And where had it been when it should have been defending the garden?
Shaken by the experience, I left the maenad's body where it was and went back into the house. I thought about trying to contact Alice with the mirror. I owed her my life and I wanted to thank her. I almost weakened, but I'd made a promise to the Spook. So, after struggling with my conscience for a while, I simply had a wash, changed my clothes and waited for the Spook to return.
He came back just before noon. I explained what had happened and we went out to look at the dead assassin.
'Well, lad, this raises a fair few questions, doesn't it?' my master said, scratching at his beard. He looked seriously worried and I couldn't blame him. What had happened made me feel very uneasy too.
'I've always felt confident that my house here at Chipenden was safe and secure,' he continued, 'but this makes you think. Puts doubts in your mind. I'll sleep less easily in my bed from now on. Just how did this maenad manage to get across the garden undetected by the boggart? Nothing's ever got past it before.'
I nodded in agreement.
'And there's another worrying thing, lad. Why did it attack and kill her later, when you had her bound with your chain? It knows not to behave like that.'
Again I nodded.
'There's something else I need to know – how did you know she'd got into the garden? It was thundering and raining hard. You couldn't possibly have heard her. By rights, she should have entered the house and killed you in your bed. So what gave you warning?' asked the Spook, raising his eyebrows.
I'd stopped nodding and was now gazing at my feet, feeling my master's glare burning into me. So I cleared my throat and explained exactly what had happened.
'I know I promised you I wouldn't use the mirror to talk to Alice,' I finished, 'but it happened too quickly for me to do anything about it. She's tried to contact me before but I've always obeyed you and looked away – until now. It was a good job I did read her message this time though,' I said a little angrily, 'otherwise I'd be dead!'
The Spook stayed very calm. 'Well, her warning saved your life, yes,' he admitted. 'But you know how I feel about you using a mirror and talking to that little witch.'
I bristled at his words. Perhaps he noticed because he let the matter drop. 'Do you know what a maenad assassin is, lad?'
I shook my head. 'One thing I do know – when she attacked, she was almost insane with fury!'
The Spook nodded. 'Maenads rarely venture from their homeland, Greece. They're a tribe of women who inhabit the wilderness there, living off the land – eating anything from wild berries to animals they find wandering across their path. They worship a bloodthirsty goddess called the Ordeen, and draw their power from a mixture of wine and raw flesh, working themselves up into a killing frenzy until they are ready for fresh victims. Mostly they feed upon the dead but they're not averse to devouring the living. This one had anointed her face to make her appear more ferocious; probably with a mixture of wine and human fat – and wax to hold the two together. No doubt she'd killed someone recently.
'It's a good job you managed to knock her down and bind her, lad. Maenads have exceptional strength.
They've been known to tear their victims to pieces using just their bare hands! Generations of them have lived like that, and as a result they've regressed so that now they're barely human. They are close to being savage animals but they still have a low cunning.'
'But why would she sail all the way here to the County?'
'To kill you, lad – that's plain enough. But why you should pose a threat to them in Greece I can't imagine.
Your mam's there fighting the dark though, so no doubt this attack has something to do with her.'
Afterwards the Spook helped me unwrap my silver chain from the body of the maenad and we dragged her into the eastern garden. We dug a narrow pit for her, deeper than its length and breadth, me doing most of the work as usual. Then we eased her into that dark shaft head first. She wasn't a witch, but the Spook never took any chances with servants of the dark – especially those we didn't know too much about. One night when the moon was full, dead or not, she might try to scratch her way to the surface. She wouldn't realize that she was heading in the opposite direction.
That done, the Spook sent me down to the village to find the local stonemason and blacksmith. By late evening they'd fashioned the stones and bars over her grave. It hadn't taken my master long to deduce the answer to his two other questions. He'd found two small wooden bloodstained troughs right at the edge of the garden. Most likely they'd been full of blood before the boggart had drunk its fill.
'My guess, lad, is that there was something mixed into the blood. Maybe it made the boggart sleep, or confused it. That's why it didn't detect the maenad entering the garden and later killed her when it shouldn't have. Pity she died. We could have questioned her and found out why she'd come and who'd sent her.'
'Could the Fiend be behind it?' I asked. 'Could he have sent her to kill me?'
The Fiend, also known as the Devil, had been loose in the world since the previous August. He'd been summoned by the three Pendle witch clans – the Malkins, Deanes and Mouldheels. Now the clans were at war with each other – some witches in thrall to the Fiend, others his bitter enemies. I'd encountered him three times since then, but although each encounter had left me shaken to my very bones, I knew it was unlikely the Devil would try to kill me by his own hand because he'd been hobbled.