Whispering to Witches

To Mary
and in memory of Magnus

Contents

Chapter One: An Unexpected Journey

Chapter Two: Spinning Wheels

Chapter Three: A Coven Uncovered

Chapter Four: The Dead~Nettle Witches

Chapter Five: An Irksome Girl

Chapter Six: Jam~Jars in the Library

Chapter Seven: First Flight Nerves

Chapter Eight: Scene of a Crime

Chapter Nine: The Midnight Market

Chapter Ten: Squib Speaks

Chapter Eleven: Dunkel and Fleck

Chapter Twelve: Two Hoots

Chapter Thirteen: A Batty Gathering

Chapter Fourteen: The Monsters of Much Marcle

Chapter Fifteen: Out of the Woods

Chapter Sixteen: Brainwaves and Bombshells

Chapter Seventeen: Joe’s Proposal

Chapter Eighteen: Searching by Torchlight

Chapter Nineteen: North to Tillygrundle

Chapter Twenty: Logan’s Accomplice

Chapter Twenty-One: The Spillikins of Doom

Chapter Twenty-Two: Flabbergasted

Chapter Twenty-Three: Within a Whisper

Chapter Twenty-Four: Transformations

Chapter Twenty-Five: Cuthbert Returns

Also from Bloomsbury

Chapter One
An Unexpected Journey

Joe flopped on to the seat and loosened his school tie. His suitcase jutted over the edge of the luggage rack above his head and its label dangled in front of his eyes. It read:

Joseph Binks

c/o Mrs Merle Taverner

2 Cloister Walk

Canterbury

Kent

Joe ripped the label from its piece of string, scrunched it into a ball and threw it into the farthest corner of the railway compartment. The woman sitting opposite him was too engrossed in her newspaper to raise an eyebrow. Joe slumped back into his seat and wished for the hundredth time that day that he was staying in London for Christmas.

It was the twentieth of December. Through the window, Joe could see a few people hurrying along the platform, weighed down with carrier bags. They had the hunched shoulders and haggard faces of typical Christmas shoppers. Yesterday, Joe had been one of them. He and his dad, Nicholas Binks, had struggled home from the supermarket with bags full of sausage rolls, peanuts, crackers and wrapping paper.

Joe sighed and looked at his watch. It was five minutes to four. Exactly twenty-four hours ago, he had been standing at the bottom of a stepladder, his arms filled with tinsel. Joe’s father had been at the top of the stepladder, banging drawing pins into the ceiling with the heel of his shoe. Bulging bags of half-unpacked shopping littered the carpet, much to the delight of Hamish who had thrust his nose into all of them.

‘Oi! Geddout of it!’ Nicholas had shouted when he spied Hamish sneaking under the sofa with a box of peppermint creams. ‘Joe, stop that dog! He’s about to wolf down Mrs Ingledew’s Christmas present!’

Yesterday, Joe had been looking forward to the last day of school and then two glorious weeks of holiday. Just Joe and his father: opening their presents, eating too much chocolate, watching telly, taking Hamish for walks on Tooting Common …

And then the phone call had come.

It had been well after midnight. A light came on and seeped underneath Joe’s bedroom door. Joe heard his father tramp to the phone. There was a muffled exclamation. Several grunts followed. The phone clicked back on to its cradle and Joe sat up in bed. His father’s footsteps padded past Joe’s bedroom door and the light went out.

In the morning, Joe almost tripped over his suitcase. The battered brown case was sitting on the landing outside his room. It was draped with gossamer, spun by spiders in the attic. Joe looked at it uneasily. Something was wrong. He hastened down the stairs and passed his father’s wine-coloured case which bulged ominously in the hall.

Hamish was playing with his lead in the kitchen. Joe’s father was leaning against the sink, munching a piece of toast. He was wearing a suit. ‘Listen, son,’ he said as Joe appeared in the doorway. ‘I’m afraid something … well, something’s come up. My aunt. She’s had a fall. You remember Great-aunt Adelaide, don’t you?’

Joe stared at his father.

‘She was like a mother to me when I was growing up. Anyway, I’m really sorry, Joe, but I’m going to have to go and see her. She’s not well at all.’ He took a deep breath. ‘Here’s the plan. A taxicab will be here in an hour, so you’ll need to have your suitcase packed by then. The taxi driver will drop you off at school. Then he’ll take me to King’s Cross station where I’ll catch a train to Scotland.’ Joe’s dad chewed a mouthful of toast. Then he brushed a few crumbs from his lip. ‘When school finishes, the same taxi driver will be waiting for you outside the gates. He’ll take you straight to Charing Cross. Your train leaves at four on the dot. I’ve … er … I’ve called your mum. She’s expecting you to arrive at Canterbury just before six o’clock tonight. Oh … you’ll be needing some money for the taxi and your train ticket.’ Joe’s father reached into his wallet and offered his son a sheaf of notes. Joe looked at them blankly.

Nicholas Binks sighed. ‘Look, I know you’d like to come with me, but it would be miserable for you, honestly. Scotland’s such a long way … and you’d be hanging around the hospital all the time. It wouldn’t be much of a Christmas, would it?’

Hamish sat at Nicholas’s feet and gazed longingly at the piece of toast he was holding. Joe’s father ruffled the dog’s dirty white fur. ‘Hamish is going to stay next door with Mrs Ingledew. Don’t look at me like that, Joe. He can’t come with you. Gordon doesn’t like animals, remember.’

Joe slid on to a stool and began to shake some cereal into a bowl. ‘Look, Joe … I’m sorry,’ continued his father. ‘I know how disappointed you must be, but it might only be for a few days. I could be back before Christmas Day … Joe! Are you listening to me? Well, say something!’

Joe put down his spoon and looked stonily at his father. ‘You’ve got a bit of marmalade on your chin,’ he said.

Doors slammed. A whistle blew. The train rattled and began to move jerkily out of Charing Cross station. Joe glanced around the carriage. It was almost full. Passengers sat shoulder to shoulder, their laps filled with intriguing bags and parcels. Joe’s gaze rested on the woman sitting opposite him. She smoothed a page in her newspaper and delved into her handbag, producing a green marbled fountain pen. Joe’s head began to loll and his eyes closed, flicking open briefly when a man in a pinstriped suit sat down heavily next to the woman and dropped his mobile phone on to the floor.

Joe was woken by another train whizzing past the window. He lifted his icy cheek from the glass, rubbed his neck and looked at his watch. Although he had been asleep for twenty minutes, the woman with the newspaper had not changed her position. She was sitting neatly with her ankles crossed. The newspaper was draped over her knees and her fountain pen hovered over the crossword.

Joe had nothing better to do, so he studied her appearance. She was wearing a salmon-pink woollen suit and black polo-neck jumper. Her hair was short and black, apart from a patch of grey which streaked from above her left temple. Balanced on her nose was a pair of half-moon spectacles, over which she glared nastily when the man’s mobile phone began to ring.

The man removed a minuscule mobile from the breast pocket of his pinstriped jacket and slapped the phone to his ear. ‘’Lo,’ he said. ‘Yeah, I’m on the train. Not bad. Lef’ London miles back. Everyfing’s peachy, yeah. Wassat? T’riffic. You’re jokin’ me! Uh-huh. Uh-huh.’

Joe yawned and glanced out of the window. The man was right. The city had been left far behind. London’s big warehouses and rows of squashed terraced dwellings had been replaced by endless lines of great, shadowy trees. In the rapidly descending gloom, Joe thought that they looked like sentinels guarding the railway track.

The sky darkened and, as Joe watched, snowflakes began to whirl against the glass. Joe studied his reflection in the window. He looked pale, ghostly even; and there were dark shadows under his eyes. His sandy hair was tousled and his fringe needed cutting.

Joe tugged off his school tie and allowed himself a brief smile. Usually, he was driven to Canterbury in his dad’s clapped-out Morris Minor which had trouble keeping up with the other cars on the motorway. At present, however, the Morris was in the care of Jim the mechanic, having blown a tyre and crashed into a pillar-box three days earlier. For Joe, it was a rare treat to enjoy a comfortable, speedy train journey. He found it exciting to travel on his own, even if his eventual destination was somewhat disappointing. Spending Christmas in Canterbury with his mum, her husband Gordon, and their strange daughter Esme, did not exactly fill him with glee.

By the time the train reached Paddock Wood it was completely dark outside. Joe stared past his reflection in the window and watched the snowflakes falling thickly. He hoped the snow would settle so that he could have a snowball fight the next morning. Then Joe’s heart sank when he remembered that his father would not be there for him to pelt snowballs at. Joe doubted whether his seven-year-old sister, Esme, would be a capable opponent, and he knew that Gordon never played any game rougher than tiddly-winks. His mother would be too busy, of course. Joe kicked a bottle top across the floor and sighed.

‘Wish I was your age again,’ said the man in the pinstriped suit, smoothing back his thinning hair and smiling at Joe. ‘I used to be a demon on a toboggan, I did.’ He leaned forward and shoved a crumpled paper bag under Joe’s nose. ‘Like a sweet, lad?’

‘Oh, thanks,’ said Joe warmly. He took a red one.

The man held out his bag to the woman with the newspaper but she sniffed disdainfully and shook her head. The man shrugged his shoulders and stuffed five sweets into his mouth at the same time.

Joe looked keenly out of the window every time the train stopped. Each station was as dark and unfamiliar as the last and Joe did not always manage to find the name of the station before the train moved on.

‘Was that Chartham?’ asked Joe as the train eased away from another platform. The man in the pinstriped suit crunched a sweet and nodded vaguely. Joe squinted as they passed a white sign, but the letters on it were nothing more than a blur. ‘If that was Chartham, we’ll be stopping at Canterbury in a minute,’ said Joe anxiously.

‘Don’tcha worry, I’ve got your luggage.’ The man reached up and his navy pinstriped suit strained against his bulk. His sleeves slid back, exposing his wrists, and on one of them, Joe saw a tattoo. It looked like the letter ‘S’. The train gave a sudden jolt and the man lurched around the compartment, holding the suitcase above his head, before he flung himself down in the seat next to the woman with the newspaper.

‘Phew! What you got in there?’ he said, handing the case to Joe. ‘’Alf a dozen ‘ouse bricks?’

Joe grinned and heaved the suitcase on to his knees. ‘Just a few books and clothes and stuff.’

‘No gold ingots?’ teased the man. ‘No cannonballs? No –’

‘Shh.’ The woman looked up from her newspaper and peered past the headrest of Joe’s seat down the aisle of the carriage. Joe glanced at the crossword on her lap. Not one of its little white squares had been filled in, even though it had been an hour and three-quarters since they left Charing Cross. Joe thought this was very odd because he was sure that he had heard the nib of her fountain pen scratching away for most of the journey.

The train gave a slight wobble and the woman fell against the man; either that or she nudged him with her elbow. At the same moment, the locks on Joe’s suitcase sprang open with a clunk and a wrinkled mass of clothes tumbled on to the floor. Joe felt his cheeks burning with embarrassment as he shoved his clothes back into the case and pressed the lid down. He felt someone patting his arm as he struggled with the locks. It was the woman who had been attempting to do the crossword.

‘You’ve dropped your ticket, boy,’ she said urgently. Joe looked down at the floor and scooped up the scrap of paper.

‘Thanks,’ he muttered. ‘Must’ve slipped …’

She nodded at him and smiled, then removed her half-moon spectacles, folded her newspaper, and slipped her green marbled fountain pen back into her handbag.

‘Excuse me. I do beg your pardon. Is anyone sitting here?’ A tall woman carrying a wicker cat basket sat down next to Joe without waiting for an answer. She smoothed the creases from her double-breasted black velvet coat and lifted the cat basket on to her lap, poking her red manicured nails through a tiny barred window in its side.

‘What a relief to find a place to perch at last,’ she said. ‘My darlings have had such a long journey. They really are getting quite crotchety.’ She shook her long chestnut curls and sighed. ‘We’ve been travelling all day and my coiffure has suffered dreadfully. I’m sure I must look absolutely frightful.’ She looked at Joe with unusually pale blue eyes, their lashes coated in black mascara.

‘Oh, no,’ said Joe quickly. ‘You don’t. Not at all.’ Joe thought she was the most glamorous person he had ever seen.

‘Thank you, treasure,’ she said, her glistening red lips curling into a smile. Joe was sure that she must be someone famous. The man in the pinstriped suit certainly seemed to think so. He was gazing at the woman without blinking and when she crossed her legs and touched his knee with the pointed tip of her black ankle boot, he looked like he was going to faint.

Joe peered through the tiny window in the cat basket and, just for a moment, he glimpsed a patch of grey fur and the flash of a yellow eye. ‘Not too close, my sweet,’ cautioned the woman. ‘Their claws are like needles and they have been known to bite.’ She gave a tinkling laugh and her earrings sparkled as they swung from side to side. ‘The little darlings.’

The cat basket shifted on her lap as the train began to slow down. Joe gripped the handle of his suitcase and chewed his lower lip. When the platform slid into view, he craned his neck to see if he could spot Gordon’s bushy ginger hair or Esme’s frantically waving hands. He had not been looking forward to this moment. Once he had jumped down from the train, there was bound to be an awkward silence while they struggled to find something to say to each other. Then Gordon would probably take Joe’s luggage, his mother would tell him how much he had grown and Esme would tug at Joe’s sleeve with a goofy look on her face.

The man prodded Joe’s elbow. ‘Your stop, lad,’ he said.

As the train juddered to a halt, the lights in the carriage flickered and went out. Joe peered through the window. The platform was swathed in shadow. The only source of light was a feeble beam from a single lamp. Joe squinted and thought he glimpsed a figure standing on the platform. His eyes searched for the name of the station but he could not see it.

‘Your stop,’ prompted the man again.

Joe stood up, wriggled into his grey school blazer and slammed down the window. Icy air leaked into the compartment. The train engine had stopped and it was so quiet that he could almost hear the snowflakes colliding with each other as they drifted towards the stone platform. He looked at his watch. It was nearly six o’clock. Joe reached through the window and began to fumble with the door handle.

Then a strange sound made him stop.