The Dreamsnatcher (16 page)

The witch doctor smiled. ‘I wrote you that poem calling you out to the heath.’ She paused. ‘Sometimes it’s the people we don’t expect who wind up looking out for
us.’ She shook her head. ‘I knew Skull once – I knew them all. But, when I found out what they planned to do, I—’

Alfie frowned. ‘You knew Gobbler – and Brunt and the boys?’

The witch doctor looked surprised. ‘No. I knew
the others
.’

An icy finger slid its way down Moll’s spine. No one said anything.

The witch doctor’s eyes widened. ‘You don’t know, do you?’

Alfie and Moll remained silent. Gryff’s ears flattened to his head.

The witch doctor gasped. ‘You think it’s just Skull who’s after you and your wildcat?’

Alfie and Moll stared at her blankly.

A look of horror washed over the old woman’s face. ‘I thought you
knew
. . .’ She shook her head for several seconds, then she hobbled still closer to them and said in a
low voice, ‘Listen, child, and listen well. There are seven powerful witch doctors in our country – known for their powers to cure people with leaves, ferns, flowers. Once that was all
they did. Then, ten years ago, in the dead of winter, they gathered in Tanglefern Forest.’

Moll listened in silence. Ten years ago. The year her parents had died.

‘And you,’ Alfie said slowly. ‘Were you there? Are you one of the seven powerful witch doctors?’

The old woman nodded. ‘I’d lived in Tanglefern Forest all my life, not far from your Sacred Oaks, and it was inside my hut that the witch doctors gathered. At first, it was nothing
– just talk of the ancient magic they’d heard had settled here in the beginning of time.’ She looked down. ‘And then things started to change. The talk became darker, deeper
– and I backed away. I told them I didn’t want to be a part of it. But it was as if something had got hold of them and all that mattered was destroying the Bone Murmur and setting the
dark magic free.’

A rattling wheeze frothed up inside the witch doctor and she coughed.

‘The others turned on me. They said I knew too much, that I’d stand in their way.’ She tucked her clawed hands beneath her rags. ‘And then they – they burned my
hands . . .’

Moll recoiled in horror. ‘Why your hands?’

‘A witch doctor’s hands are their tools. We can shape spells with them and twist incantations between the tips of our fingers.’

Moll shivered as she remembered Skull crushing the wax figure between his fingers.

The witch doctor looked round her hut. ‘They burned my hut and all my belongings, then they outlawed me to the heath and told me they’d kill me if I ever returned to the
forest.’

‘Only you
did
return,’ Alfie added. ‘To speak to her parents?’ he asked, nodding at Moll.

‘Yes, but it didn’t help. Their curse was too strong and it blinded your parents to the truth – that I was only trying to help them unravel the bone reading so they could find
the amulets.’

Moll’s stomach was a churning pit. ‘Why didn’t you tell my parents about the other witch doctors? Maybe it could’ve saved them if they’d known!’

The old woman shook her head. ‘Oh, I tried. But, when a witch doctor curses you, that curse follows you wherever you go, undoing any goodness you might try to do.’

Alfie gasped. ‘Is that why the letters of your poem spelt out
witch doctor
? Because Skull’s curse is following you?’

The old woman nodded grimly. ‘It must’ve seeped into my words. And, if I give up all the witch doctors’ names, the curse will kill me – it’ll eat me alive.’
She raised her eyebrows. ‘You don’t know who you’re dealing with.’

‘They killed my parents, didn’t they?’ Moll said, avoiding the old woman’s eye. ‘It wasn’t just Skull; he was with the five others.’ She thought back to
her nightmare. It was starting to make sense now. The masked figures weren’t Skull’s gang – his boys didn’t wear masks – they were the
other
witch doctors. Moll
looked up. ‘You know what happened to my parents, don’t you?’

‘You’re just a child. I can’t tell a child about magic this dark.’

‘But—’

‘I won’t do it. Nothing would make me.’

Alfie took a step towards her. ‘Tell us the names of the others. You could burn them into the leather, like you did with your poem.’

The witch doctor was silent for several seconds. ‘You’ve got courage, young man – and you’re going to need it.’ She tore a scrap from her rags. ‘I can’t
tell you their names because I won’t give myself up to their curse. But I can tell you one thing and, if you’re wise enough later, it might help you. Pass me the ink and
quill.’

Moll watched as the witch doctor’s shrivelled hand wrapped itself round the quill. A single word was taking shape. Seconds later, it was complete:

SHADOWMASKS

The old woman underlined the first six letters. ‘SHADOW: six letters, six witch doctors, six masks. They became the Shadowmasks after I left them ten years ago.’

Moll’s eyes widened and she turned to Alfie. ‘Skull hasn’t got a shadow.’

The old woman was silent, her eyes darting to the window then the door, as if she was afraid of being overheard. ‘When the six gathered in Tanglefern Forest ten years ago, they performed a
hex full of darkness and evil.’ She paused. ‘They tore away their shadows.’

Moll’s eyes were wide. ‘What! How’s that
possible
? And – and why?’

The witch doctor shook her head. ‘I’ve said too much. And you’ll learn soon enough.’ Then she picked up the rag and added, ‘Keep this safe. You’ll need it to
understand things later because, although it’s only Skull now, they will all come and you’re the only one who can stop them, Molly. You and your wildcat.’

‘And Alfie,’ Moll added, looking at the boy.

The witch doctor looked a little surprised and then nodded. ‘Perhaps.’

‘B
oth my parents threw the Oracle Bones before they died,’ Moll said slowly. ‘No one knows what my ma saw, but my pa read out a
message, a clue.’ She willed her words on. Even though her parents hadn’t trusted the witch doctor, somehow Moll did. ‘If we show you, can you help us make sense of it?’

The old woman blinked, hooded eyes closing over purple shadows. ‘We’ll see.’ She looked Moll up and down. ‘But you’ll have to put that stick down.’

‘It was Alfie’s idea,’ Moll mumbled as she propped it against the wall of the hut.

Alfie glowered at Moll, then reached into his pocket and held out the bone fragments:

DEW HILL MAIDEN

The witch doctor said nothing, but Moll could almost feel her thoughts whirring in tight circles. The clue had meant something to the old woman; that much was sure.

‘So can you help us?’ Moll asked. ‘Because we haven’t got much time.’

The witch doctor shook her head, ‘Neither have I . . .’

She looked up, as if waking from a heavy thought, and then she smiled, the sad smile of someone who has seen too much of the world and is ready to depart it. She took the bones from Alfie in her
withered, shaking hand then, for a moment, her eyes danced.

‘There’s another message within this.’

Moll glanced at Alfie who grinned. Then Gryff padded over to the door. At the threshold, he turned back and met Moll’s eyes.

‘He’s going to keep guard outside the hut,’ Moll said. ‘He’ll warn us if anything’s coming.’ She followed him to the door. ‘Stay close,’ she
whispered and Gryff dipped his head before slinking into the darkness.

‘The pestle and mortar by the fox fur, Alfie,’ the witch doctor wheezed, pointing the blackened stump of a finger towards the table. ‘Pass them to me.’

Then she hobbled to the shelves at the side of the hut. Her clawed hands, more wrinkled than raisins, fumbled with the contents of a scooped-out piece of bark. She came back to the table with a
fistful of yellow and pink flowers.

‘Gorse and heather,’ she muttered and lifted a jar down from the shelves; it was filled with hollowed-out eggs: green and speckled. She took one out, crushed the shell in her palm
and let the pieces patter into the mortar.

‘Warbler’s egg,’ she muttered. She took a brown feather from a jam jar and used her knuckles to strip the vanes from the shaft. ‘Belonged to a nightjar once.’

Moll raised her eyebrows. ‘How’s all this going to help?’

‘Never underestimate the power of a bird, Molly. In a bird, we see our soul set free.’

Moll thought of Rocky Jo, the murderous highwayman cockerel back in Oak’s camp. She felt certain her soul hadn’t been set free inside him. She pictured Siddy taking a swing at the
cockerel and hoped harder than ever that Oak had rescued her friend from the river.

The witch doctor hobbled closer. ‘In my mind, the Bone Murmur’s about freedom. Freedom from
the others
. And I’m looking to these birds for help.’ She ground
everything together with the pestle. ‘Now the phial – on the second shelf, Molly.’

The phial was filled with black liquid. It felt cold in Moll’s hands and she was glad to hand it over. When the old woman shook it, black petals swayed inside the glass.

‘Mellanthas – soaked in bog water.’

Moll turned up her nose.

The witch doctor smiled. ‘You want the truth?’

Moll nodded. She wanted it more than anything; it would be one step closer to avenging her parents.

The witch doctor poured the black liquid into the mortar. ‘Well, the truth isn’t always pretty.’

‘The flowers inside the liquid . . .’ Alfie murmured. ‘They’re the ones leading up to your house, aren’t they?’

The witch doctor nodded. ‘Mellanthas are rare flowers. Not always pretty and known by most as standing for trickery. But they’re loyal, always flowering at the same time every
year.’ She looked at Moll. ‘You knew the flowers stood for trickery, didn’t you?’

Moll nodded.

‘Yet you still came, though your parents and your camp didn’t believe me. That’s something – trusting and hoping, despite what other people say. It’s a good sign,
Molly.’

‘Mmmmmmn,’ Moll mumbled. She wanted to tell the witch doctor that it had been Gryff who’d led them up to the hovel while she had been thinking about spinning heads and rolling
eyes.

The old woman looked at the black flowers settling on the surface of the liquid. ‘Some say a name chooses you,’ she whispered. ‘And I came to be known after these black
flowers. Mellantha.’

Moll wasn’t sure how to respond to this so she clicked her tongue and focused on the mortar.

Mellantha reached towards a row of jars on the shelf. ‘No, not bat spleens . . .’ she muttered to herself. ‘And not toad tongues this time.’ She lifted a jar of jellied
eyeballs up. ‘Hmmmmmn . . . Perhaps not eels’ eyes . . .’ She picked up another jar. ‘Of course, of course . . .’

Moll grimaced at the contents of the jar: a small, dead reptile floating in liquid.

Mellantha passed it to Alfie who winced but unscrewed the lid nonetheless.

‘We need the tail of a newt,’ she said, ‘because newts are special creatures.’

‘Why?’ Alfie asked.

‘If they lose a limb, they can grow another. One of nature’s miracles.’ Mellantha sliced off the tail with a knife. ‘And we need a miracle right now.’

‘Don’t believe in miracles,’ Alfie mumbled.

‘Yet you believe in magic,’ Mellantha said quietly.

‘And what I’ve seen of that isn’t pretty.’

‘How can you live in a forest and not believe in the glittering magic of it all?’ Mellantha whispered.

Alfie looked to Moll for support. But she only shrugged. ‘Haven’t you heard the tree spirits whisper? And the wind – it helped us escape the vapours! That’s proper magic.
The drums and chants and pits in the ground that Skull calls magic is just a rotten copy of the real stuff.’

She peered into the bowl. The liquid was a swirl of black, purple and yellow, like marbled dyes mixing together, and the ground-up egg and feather floated on the surface.

‘We’re nearly there,’ Mellantha said.

She picked up the bones from the table and placed them in the bowl. They bobbed on the surface of the multi-coloured mixture, the words staring blankly up at them. Alfie and Moll watched for
several seconds.

‘Nothing’s happening,’ Alfie mumbled as Moll glowered at the bones.

‘Wait,’ said Mellantha.

She picked up a rattle and closed her eyes. And then, into the silence, she shook the rattle again and again. Each thrust sounded like a gust of wind rushing through the trees. Moll’s
breath caught in her throat. The last rattle she’d heard had been from Skull’s Dream Snatch. She swallowed. This was different, she told herself. It
had
to be . . .

And then, very quietly, Mellantha began to whisper strange words under her breath: they seemed to start from the very back of her throat, deep and guttural, and then finish in soft swishing
sounds. Moll had never heard anything like it before. It wasn’t like the Dream Snatch. It was different somehow and she wasn’t afraid.

Then something extraordinary happened. The bones started to judder, as if brushed by an invisible wind, and, almost so slowly that it seemed as if it wasn’t happening at all, they started
to break.