第1章 LICKING THE CUB

To my goddaughter Harriet, who shares my hunger for books and unlikely adventures

CHAPTER 1

The third time Makepeace woke screaming from the nightmare, her mother was angry.

'I told you not to dream that way again!' she hissed, keeping her voice low to avoid waking the rest of the house. 'Or if you do, you must not cry out!'

'I could not help it!' whispered Makepeace, frightened by her mother's fierce tone.

Mother took Makepeace's hands, her face tense and unsmiling in the early morning light.

'You do not like your home. You do not want to live with your mother.'

'I do! I do!' Makepeace exclaimed, feeling her world lurch under her feet.

'Then you must learn to help it. If you scream every night, terrible things will happen. We may be thrown out of this house!'

Behind the wall slept Makepeace's aunt and uncle, who owned the pie shop downstairs. Aunt was loud and honest, whereas Uncle glowered and was impossible to please. Since the age of six, Makepeace had been given the task of looking after her four little cousins, who were always needing to be fed, cleaned, patched up, dressed down or rescued from neighbours' trees. In between times, she ran errands and helped in the kitchen. And yet Mother and Makepeace slept on a bolster in a draughty little room away from the rest of the household. Their place in the family always felt loaned, as if it could be taken away again without warning.

'Worse, someone may call the minister,' continued Mother. 'Or ... others may hear of it.'

Makepeace did not know who the 'others' might be, but others were always a threat. Ten years of life with Mother had taught her that nobody else could really be trusted.

'I tried!' Night after night, Makepeace had prayed hard, then lain in the blackness willing herself not to dream. But the nightmare had come for her anyway, full of moonlight, whispers and half-formed things. 'What can I do? I want to stop!'

Mother was quiet for a long time, then squeezed Makepeace's hand.

'Let me tell you a story,' she began, as she occasionally did when there were serious matters to discuss. 'There was a little girl lost in the woods, who was chased by a wolf. She ran and ran until her feet were torn, but she knew that the wolf had her scent and was still coming after her. In the end she had to make a choice. She could keep on running and hiding and running forever, or she could stop and sharpen a stick to defend herself. What do you think was the right decision, Makepeace?'

Makepeace could tell that this was not just a story, and that the answer mattered a great deal.

'Can you fight a wolf with a stick?' Makepeace asked doubtfully.

'A stick gives you a chance.' Her mother gave a slight, sad smile. 'A small chance. But it is dangerous to stop running.'

Makepeace thought for a long time.

'Wolves are faster than people,' she said at last. 'Even if she ran and ran, it would still catch her and eat her. She needs a sharp stick.'

Mother nodded slowly. She said nothing more, and did not finish her story. Makepeace's blood ran cold. Mother was like this sometimes. Conversations became riddles with traps in them, and your answers had consequences.

For as long as Makepeace could remember, the two of them had lived in the busy little not-quite-town of Poplar. She could not imagine the world without the stink of coal smoke and pitch that blew in from the great, clattering shipyards, the pattering poplar trees that gave the place its name, and the lush green marshlands where the cattle grazed. London lay a few miles distant, a smoky mass of menace and promise. It was all so familiar to her, as natural as breathing. And yet, Makepeace could not feel that she belonged.

Mother never said, This is not our home. But her eyes said it all the time.

When she had first arrived in Poplar, Mother had changed her baby daughter's name to Makepeace so that the pair of them would be accepted more easily. Makepeace didn't know what her original name had been, and the thought of that made her feel a bit unreal. 'Makepeace' did not quite feel like a name at all. It was an offering, a way of 'making peace' with God and the godly folk of Poplar. It was an apology for the hole where Makepeace's father should have been.

Everyone they knew was godly. That was what the community called themselves, not out of pride, but to set themselves apart from all those on a darker road with Hell's mouth at the end. Makepeace was not the only one with a strange, pious-sounding name. There was a smattering of others—Verity, What-God-Will, Forsaken, Deliverance, Kill-Sin and so forth.

Every other evening, Aunt's room was used for prayer meetings and Bible readings, and on Sundays they all walked to the tall, grey, ragstone church.

The minister was kind when you met him in the street, but terrifying in the pulpit. From the rapt faces of the other listeners, Makepeace could tell that there must be great truths shining in him, and love like a cold white comet. He talked of holding strong against the wicked temptations of drink, gambling, dancing, theatres and idle merriment upon the Sabbath, which were all snares laid by the Devil. He told them what was happening in London and the wider world—the latest treachery at court, the plots of foul Catholics. His sermons were frightening, but also thrilling. Sometimes Makepeace walked out of the church tingling with the sense that the whole congregation were shining soldiers leagued against the forces of darkness. For a little while she could believe that Mother and Makepeace were part of something bigger, something wondrous alongside all their neighbours. The feeling never lasted. Soon they were a lonely army of two once again.

Mother never said, These are not our friends, but her grip on Makepeace's hand tightened when they entered the church, or walked into the market, or stopped to greet anyone. It was as if there were an invisible fence running around Mother and Makepeace, cutting them off from everything else. And so Makepeace half smiled at the children the way Mother half smiled at the mothers. Those other children, the ones with fathers.

Children are little priests of their parents, watching their every gesture and expression for signs of their divine will. From her earliest days, Makepeace had known that the two of them were never truly safe, and that other people might turn on them.

Instead, Makepeace had learned to find comfort and kinship in speechless things. She understood the busy malice of horseflies, the frightened anger of dogs, the heavy patience of cows.

It got her into trouble sometimes. Once, her lip had been split and her nose bloodied for screaming at some boys who were throwing stones at a bird's nest. Killing birds for the pot or stealing eggs for breakfast was fair enough, but pointless, stupid cruelty roused an anger in Makepeace that she could never properly explain. The boys had stared at her in bewilderment, then turned their stones on her. Of course they had. Cruelty was normal, as much a part of their lives as the flowers and the rain. They were used to the grammar-school canes, the pig-screams behind the butchers and the blood in the sawdust of the cockpit. Smashing little feathered lives was as natural and satisfying to them as stamping in a puddle.

If you stuck out, you got your nose bloodied. To survive, Mother and Makepeace needed to blend in. Yet they never quite succeeded.

The night after the wolf-story, without explanation, Mother took Makepeace to the old graveyard.

By night, the church seemed a hundred times larger, its tower an unforgiving rectangle of utter blackness. The grass was tussocky underfoot and greyish in the starlight. In a corner of the cemetery stood a little brick chapel, long unused. Mother led Makepeace inside, and dumped armfuls of blankets in a corner of the dark building.

'Can we go home now?' Makepeace's skin was crawling. Something was close, some things were all around her. She felt the queasy tickle of their nearness, like spider-feet against her mind.

'No,' said Mother.

'There are things here!' Makepeace fought down her rising panic. 'I can feel them!' With horror, she recognized the sensation. Her nightmares had started with the same prickle of dread, the same sense of encroaching enemies. 'The demons in my dream—'

'I know.'

'What are they?' whispered Makepeace. 'Are they ... dead?' In her heart, she already knew the answer.

'Yes,' answered Mother, in the same cool, level tone. 'Listen to me. The dead are like drowners. They are flailing in darkness, trying to grab whatever they can. They may not mean to harm you, but they will, if you let them.

'You will be sleeping here tonight. They will try to claw their way into your head. Whatever happens, do not let them in.'

'What?' Makepeace exclaimed, aghast, briefly forgetting the need for stealth. 'No! I can't stay here!'

'You must,' said Mother. Her face was sculpted and silvered by the starlight, and there was no gentleness in it, no compromise. 'You need to stay here and sharpen your stick.'

Mother was always strangest when something was important. It was as though she kept this other self, this wilful, incomprehensible, otherworldly self, in the clothes chest below her Sunday best, for use in emergencies. At these times she was not Mother, she was Margaret. Her eyes seemed deeper, her hair beneath her cap thicker and witchier, her attention on something that Makepeace could not see.

Usually when Mother was like this, Makepeace kept her head down and did not argue. This time, however, terror overwhelmed her. She begged as she had never begged before. She argued, protested, wept and clung to Mother's arm with fierce desperation. Mother couldn't leave her there, she couldn't, she couldn't ...

Mother pulled her arm free, and gave Makepeace a sharp shove that sent her reeling backwards. Then she stepped back out and slammed the door, plunging the room into pitch blackness. There was a thud of a bar dropping into place

'Mother!' shouted Makepeace, no longer caring whether they were caught. She rattled the door, but it did not budge. 'Ma!'

There was no response, only the rustle of Mother's steps receding. Makepeace was alone with the dead, the dark and the wintry trills of distant owls.

For hours Makepeace huddled awake in her nest of blankets, shivering with cold and hearing the distant vixens scream. She could feel the things haunting the corners of her mind, waiting for their moment, waiting for her to sleep.

'Please,' she begged them, pressing her hands against her ears, and trying not to hear the whispers. 'Please don't. Please ...'

But eventually her brain fogged with sleep against her will, and the nightmare came for her.

As before, Makepeace dreamed of a dark and narrow room, with an earth floor and walls of singed black stone. She was trying to close the shutters to stop the moonlight leaking through them. She needed to keep it out—it had whispers in it. But the shutters did not meet in the middle, and the latch was broken. Beyond the gap yawned the sickly night, where the stars swayed and glittered like loose buttons.

Makepeace braced herself against the shutters with all her might, but the night breathed the dead things into the room, by the score. They swooped for her, wailing, with their smoky, molten faces. Makepeace covered her ears and closed her eyes and mouth tightly, knowing that they wanted to get in, in, into her head.

They buzzed and whined against her ears, and she tried not to understand them, tried not to let the soft, sick sounds become words. The pale light prised at her eyelids and the whispers seeped and licked at her ears and the air was thick with them when she could not help but breathe ...

Makepeace woke with a jerk, her heart banging so loudly that it made her feel sick. Reflexively, she reached out for the warmth and reassurance of Mother's sleeping form.

But Mother was not there. Makepeace's spirits plunged as she remembered where she was. She was not safe at home this time. She was trapped, entombed, surrounded by the dead.

A sudden sound made her freeze. A rasping rustle at floor level, startlingly loud in the cold, crisp night.

Without warning, something small and light ran over Makepeace's foot. She screamed reflexively, but the next moment her pulse began to slow. She had felt the brief brush of fur, the tickle of tiny claws.

A mouse. Somewhere in this room a mouse's bright eyes were watching her. She was not alone with the dead after all. The mouse was not a friend, of course. It would not care if the dead things killed her or drove her mad. But it calmed her to think of it, sheltering from the owls and night-prowling beasts. It didn't cry, or beg to be spared. It didn't care if it was unloved. It knew that it could only count on itself. Somewhere, its currant-sized heart was beating with the fierce will to live.

And soon, Makepeace's own heart was doing the same.

She could not see or hear the dead, but she could sense them, pawing at the edges of her mind. They were waiting for her to tire, panic or let her guard down, so that they could strike. But Makepeace had found a little knot of stubbornness.

It was not easy to stay awake, but Makepeace pinched herself and paced through the long, dark hours, and at last saw night yield to the early grey light. She felt shaky and sick, her mind raw and scraped, but at least she had survived.

Mother came to collect her just before dawn. Makepeace followed her home in silence, head bowed. She knew that Mother always had reasons for everything she did. But for the first time, Makepeace found that she could not forgive her, and afterwards nothing was the same.

Every month or so, Mother would take Makepeace back to the graveyard. Sometimes five or six weeks would pass, and Makepeace would start to hope that Mother had given up the project. Then Mother would remark that she thought that 'it would be a warm night', and Makepeace's heart would plummet, for she knew what that meant.

Makepeace could not bring herself to protest. The memory of her desperate grovelling on that first night made her feel sick.

If someone throws aside their pride and begs with all their heart, and if they do so in vain, then they are never quite the same person afterwards. Something in them dies, and something else comes to life. Afterwards, it was as if some understanding of the world had sunk into Makepeace's soul like winter dew. She knew that she would never feel safe or loved as she had before. And she knew that she would never, ever beg that way again.

So she followed her mother to the graveyard each time, stony-faced. She had learned from the little mouse in the chapel. The ghosts were not cruel bullies who could be reasoned with. They were predators and she was prey, and she would need to be stubborn, fierce and alert to survive. Nobody else would save her.

Inch by painful inch, Makepeace started to build her own protections. As the rain thudded and her breath wisped in the cold air, Makepeace recited home-made prayers and invented words of banishment. She learned to brace against the scrabble and buffet of the dead spirits, and to lash out at them, even though the contact sickened her. She imagined herself as Judith from the Bible, standing in an enemy camp with her borrowed sword, a general's blood bright on the blade. Come near me, she told the night whisperers, and I will slice you to pieces.

And all the while the living things in the graveyard helped keep her calm and sane. Scuttles in the bushes, eerie fluting calls, the flicker of bats—these were now a comfort to her. Even their claws and teeth were honest. Humans living and dead might suddenly turn on you, but wild things just lived on in their brute, wild way, caring nothing for you. When they died, they left no ghosts. When a mouse was killed by a cat, or a chicken's neck was wrung, or a fish was tugged from a river, Makepeace could see their faint wisps of spirit melt away instantly like morning mist.

Makepeace's simmering cauldron of resentment needed an outlet. Instead of complaining about the night trips, Makepeace found herself arguing with Mother about other unrelated things, pushing back and asking forbidden questions in a way she never had before.

In particular, she started to ask about her father. Until now Mother had crushed all such questions with a look, and Makepeace had settled for hoarding the tiny details her mother had let slip. He lived far away in an old house. He did not want Mother or Makepeace with him. Suddenly this was not enough, and she felt angry that she had been too scared to ask for more before.

'Why won't you tell me his name? Where does he live? Does he know where to find us? How do you know he doesn't want us with him? Does he even know about me?'

Mother did not answer such questions, but her stormy glances no longer cowed Makepeace. Neither of them knew what to do with each other. Since Makepeace's birth, Mother had decided everything, and Makepeace had gone along with it. Makepeace did not know why she could no longer be docile. Mother had never needed to compromise before and did not know how to start. Surely if she battered Makepeace with the force of her own personality everything would return to normal? No. It would not. Everything had changed.

And then, two years after her first 'stick-sharpening' expedition, Makepeace returned from a particularly bitter, sleepless night in the chapel shivering uncontrollably. A few days later she was burning with fever, and her muscles ached. Within a fortnight her tongue was speckled, and an unmistakable rash of smallpox pimples was spreading across her face.

The world was hot, dark and terrible for a while, and Makepeace drowned in a choking, abysmal terror. She knew she would probably die, and she knew what dead things were. She could not think straight, and sometimes she wondered whether she might already be dead. But the black tide of the disease slowly went out, leaving her still alive, with just a couple of pockmarks on one of her cheeks. Whenever she saw them reflected in her water pail, they gave her a little spasm of fear in the pit of her stomach. She could imagine a skeletal figure of Death reaching out to touch her face with the tips of two bony fingers, then slowly withdrawing his hand.

After her recovery, three months went by without Mother mentioning the graveyard, and Makepeace assumed that the smallpox, at least, had frightened Mother out of her project.

Unfortunately, she was wrong.

CHAPTER 2

On a blandly sunny day in May, Makepeace and Mother ventured into the city itself to sell some of Mother's lace. The spring was mild, but London had been crackling like a storm cloud. Makepeace wished they were not there.

As Makepeace had been changing and becoming angrier, so had Poplar and London. According to the gossip of the teenage apprentices, so had the whole country.

At prayer meetings, red-nosed Nanny Susan had always been full of visions of the end of the world—the sea brimming with blood, and the Woman Clothed with the Sun from the Bible walking down Poplar High Street. But now others were talking in the same way. A couple of summers ago, it was said that during a mighty storm vast clouds had taken the shape of two great armies. Now there was an uneasy feeling that two such armies might really be forming across the land.

The Poplar folk had always prayed hard, but now they prayed like a people besieged. There was a feeling that the whole country was in danger.

Makepeace could not keep track of all the details, but she understood the heart of it. There was a devilish Catholic plot to seduce King Charles, and turn him against his own people. The good men of Parliament were trying to talk sense into him, but he had stopped listening.

Nobody wanted to blame the King directly. That was treason, and might get your ears lopped off, or your face branded with hot irons. No, they agreed that it was all the fault of the King's evil advisers—Archbishop Laud, 'Black Tom Tyrant' (also known as the Earl of Stafford), and of course wicked Queen Mary, poisoning the King's mind with her French wiles.

If they were not stopped, they would persuade the King to become a bloody tyrant. He would turn to false religion, and send out his troops to murder all loyal, God-fearing Protestants in the country. The Devil himself was abroad, whispering in ears, curdling minds, and shaping the deeds of men with sly and subtle hands. You almost expected to see his singed hoof-prints in the roadway.

The fear and outrage in Poplar was very real, but Makepeace sensed an undercurrent of fierce excitement as well. If everything did fall apart, if a time of trials did come, if the world did end, the godly of Poplar would be ready. They were Christian soldiers, ready to withstand, and preach, and march.

And now, walking through the London streets, Makepeace could feel a tingle of that same excitement, that same menace.

'There's a smell here,' she said. Mother was her other self, so it was natural to voice her half-formed thoughts.

'It's the smoke,' said Mother curtly.

'No, it isn't,' said Makepeace. It wasn't a smell exactly, and she knew Mother understood. It was a warning tingle of the senses, like that before a storm. 'It smells like metal. Can we go home?'

'Yes,' said Mother drily. 'We can go home and eat stones, since you don't want us earning our bread.' She did not break stride.

Makepeace always found London oppressive. There were too many people, buildings and smells. Today, however, there was a new fizz and fierceness in the air. Why was she even more nervous than usual? What was different? She glanced from side to side, noting the dozens of new placards stuck to doors and posts.

'What are those?' she whispered. It was a pointless question. Mother could not read any more than Makepeace could. The bold black letters looked as though they were shouting.

'Ink-lions roaring,' said Mother. London was awash with raging pamphlets, printed sermons, prophecies and denunciations, some for the King and some for Parliament. Mother always jokingly called them 'ink-lions'. All roar and no claw, she said.

There had been a lot more silent roaring over the last two days. Two weeks before, the King had summoned Parliament for the first time in years, and everyone Makepeace knew had been ecstatic with relief. But two days ago he had dismissed Parliament again in a right royal rage. Now gossip had an ominous rumble, the pale sun seemed to teeter in the sky, and everyone was waiting for something to happen. Whenever there was a sudden bang or shout, people looked up sharply. Has it started? their expressions asked. Nobody was sure what it was, but it was unquestionably coming.

'Ma ... why are there so many apprentices out on the streets?' Makepeace murmured quietly.

There were dozens of them, she realized, loitering in twos and threes in doorways and alleys, crop-headed, restless, their hands calloused from loom and lathe. The youngest were about fourteen, the oldest in their early twenties. They should all have been labouring away, doing their masters' bidding, but here they were.

The apprentices were weathercocks for the mood of the city. When London was at ease with itself, they were just lads—dawdling, flirting, and jabbing at the world with crude, clever jokes. But when London was stormy, they changed. A dark and angry lightning arced unseen between them, and sometimes they broke out into wild, passionate mobs, breaking doors and skulls with their boots and cudgels.

Mother glanced around at the little loitering groups, and she too began to look worried.

'There are a lot around,' she agreed quietly. 'We will go home. The sun is sinking anyway. And ... you will need your strength. It will be a warm night tonight.'

For a brief moment Makepeace was relieved, then Mother's last sentence sank in. Makepeace stopped dead, overwhelmed by disbelief and outrage.

'No!' she snapped, surprised by her own firmness. 'I won't go! I am never going back to the graveyard again!'

Mother cast a self-conscious glance around, then gripped Makepeace's arm firmly and dragged her into the mouth of an alley.

'You must!' Mother took Makepeace by the shoulders, staring into her eyes.

'I nearly died last time!' protested Makepeace.

'You caught the smallpox from the Archers' daughter,' retorted Mother without hesitation. 'The graveyard had nothing to do with it. You will thank me for this some day. I told you—I'm helping you sharpen your stick.'

'I know, I know!' Makepeace exclaimed, unable to keep the frustration out of her voice. 'The "wolves" are the ghosts, and you want me to learn to be strong, so I can keep them out. But why can't I just stay away from graveyards? If I keep away from ghosts, I'll be safe! You're throwing me to the wolves, over and over again!'

'You are wrong,' said Mother softly. 'These ghosts are not the wolves. These ghosts are mere hungry wisps—nothing in comparison. But the wolves are out there, Makepeace. They are looking for you, and some day they will find you. Pray that you are full-grown and strong by the time they do.'

'You are just trying to frighten me,' said Makepeace. Her voice shook, but with anger this time, not fear.

'Yes, I am! Do you think you are a poor martyr, sitting there at night with those little will-o'-the-wisps licking at your face? This is nothing. There is far worse out there. You should be frightened.'

'Then why can't we ask my father to protect us?' It was a dangerous angle to take, but Makepeace had come too far to turn back. 'I bet he wouldn't leave me out in graveyards!'

'He is the last person we can go to for help,' said Mother, with a bitterness Makepeace had never heard before. 'Forget him.'

'Why?' Suddenly Makepeace could not bear all the silences in her life, all the things that she was not allowed to say or ask. 'Why do you never tell me anything? I don't believe you any more! You just want me to stay with you forever! You want to keep me to yourself! You won't let me meet my father because you know he would want me!'

'You have no idea what I saved you from!' exploded Mother. 'If I had stayed in Grizehayes—'

'Grizehayes,' repeated Makepeace, and saw her mother turn pale. 'Is that where he lives? Is that the old house you talked about?' She had a name. At long last she had a name. It meant that she could look for it. Somebody, somewhere, would know where it was.

The name sounded old. She could not quite picture the house it described. It was as if a heavy, silvery mist lay between her and its ancient turrets.

'I won't go back to the graveyard,' said Makepeace. Her willpower set its pike in the earth, and braced for the onslaught. 'I won't. If you try to make me, I'll run away. I will. I'll find Grizehayes. I'll find my father. And I'll never come back.'

Mother's eyes looked glassy with surprise and anger. She had never learned to deal with Makepeace's new defiance. Then the warmth leaked out of her expression leaving it cold and distant.

'Run, then,' she said icily. 'If that's what you want, good riddance to you. But when you are in the hands of those people, never say that I did not warn you.'

Mother never yielded, never softened. When Makepeace challenged her, Mother always raised the stakes, calling Makepeace's bluff and pushing back harder. And Makepeace had been bluffing about running away but, as she stared into Mother's hard eyes, for the first time she thought that she might actually run. The idea made her feel breathless, weightless.

And then Mother glanced at something over Makepeace's shoulder, out on the main street, and stiffened, aghast. She breathed a few words, so faintly that Makepeace only just caught them.

... Speak of the Devil ...

Makepeace looked over her shoulder, just in time to see a tall man in a good coat of dark blue wool stride past. He was only of middling years, but his hair was a flare of white.

She knew the old saying, Speak of the Devil and he will appear. Mother had been talking of 'those people'—the Grizehayes people—and then she had caught sight of this man. Was he someone from Grizehayes, then? Perhaps even Makepeace's father?

Makepeace met Mother's gaze, her own eyes now wild with excitement and triumph. Then she turned, and tried to dart for the street.

'No!' Mother hissed, grabbing her arm with both hands. 'Makepeace!'

But Makepeace's own name jarred against her ear. She was tired of 'making peace' with troubles that were never explained. She wriggled free, and sprinted into the main thoroughfare.

'You'll be the death of me!' Mother called after her. 'Makepeace, stop!'

Makepeace did not stop. She could just make out the stranger's blue coat and white hair in the distance, disappearing around a corner. Her past was getting away from her.

She reached the corner just in time to see him disappearing among the crowds, and set off in pursuit. Makepeace was aware of Mother calling her name somewhere behind her, but did not look back. Instead, she pursued the distant figure down one street, then another, then another. Many times she thought she had lost her quarry, only to glimpse a distant shock of white hair.

Makepeace could not give in, even when she found herself hurrying across London's great bridge and into Southwark. The buildings on either side grew dingier and the smells more sour. She could hear laughter drifting from the waterside taverns, and oaths and oar-creaks from the river itself. It was darker now, too. The sun was sinking from view, and the sky had dulled to the colour of stained tin. Despite this, the streets were unusually crowded. People kept getting in her way, and blocking her view of the white-haired man.

It was only when a road spat her out into a large, open space that she halted, suddenly daunted. There was grass under her feet, and she realized that she was on the edge of St George's Fields. All around her seethed a shadowy, restless, raucous crowd, heads silhouetted against the darkening sky. She could not judge how far it stretched, but there seemed to be hundreds of voices, all of them male. There was no sign of the white-haired man.

Makepeace stared around her, panting for breath, aware that she was attracting hard, curious glances. She was dressed in clothes of plain, cheap wool and linen, but her kerchief and cap were clean and respectable, and here that was enough to draw stares. She was also a lone female, and one of less than thirteen years.

'Hello, love!' one of the dark figures called. 'Come to tickle up our courage, have you?'

'Nah,' said another, 'you're here to march with us, aren't you, miss? You can throw stools at those bastards, like the Scottish ladies! Show us your cudgel arm!' Half a dozen men laughed uproariously, and Makepeace could sense menace in the teasing.

'Is that Margaret Lightfoot's girl?' asked a younger voice suddenly. Peering into the darkness, Makepeace could just make out a familiar face, the fourteen-year-old apprentice of the weaver that lived next door. 'What are you doing here?'

'I got lost,' Makepeace said quickly. 'What's happening?'

'We're on a hunt.' There was a fierce, wild light in the apprentice's eyes. 'Hunting old William the Fox—old Archbishop Laud.' Makepeace had heard that name hundreds of times, usually being cursed as one of the King's evil advisers. 'We're just going to go and knock on his door, and say hello. Like good neighbours.' He hefted his cudgel and slapped it hard into his other palm, fizzing and fidgeting with excitement.

Too late, Makepeace guessed at the meaning of all the placards. They had been announcing a great and angry gathering in St George's Fields. The crowd was full of apprentices, Makepeace realized, as her eyes adjusted. All of them were hefting makeshift weapons—hammers, broom-handles, fire-irons and planks—with a fierce jollity that meant business. They were hell-bent on dragging evil out of its palace and breaking its crown. But in their bright eyes Makepeace could see that it was also a game—a game of blood, like a bear-baiting.

'I need to go home!' Even as Makepeace spoke the words, they had a bitter taste. She had lost her one chance of finding out more about her past, but what if she had lost her home too? Her mother had called her bluff by telling her to run away, and Makepeace had done just that.

The apprentice's brow wrinkled, and he stood on tiptoe, craning to see past the crowds. Makepeace did the same as best she could, and realized that the road she had run down was now clogged with a solid mass of figures, all pouring into St George's Fields.

'You stick with me,' the apprentice said anxiously, as the crowd started to surge forwards, carrying the two of them with it. 'You'll be safe with me.'

It was hard for Makepeace to see past the crush of taller figures, but as she was swept along, she heard more and more voices joining the rallying cries and laughing at the jests. The apprentice army sounded vast now. No wonder they were so confident, so bristling with purpose!

'Makepeace! Where are you?'

The call was almost swallowed by the crescendo of yells and bellows, but Makepeace heard it. It was Mother's voice, she was sure of it. Mother had followed her, and was now caught up in the crowd somewhere behind her.

'Ma!' Makepeace called out as the crowd bore her relentlessly onward.

'There's Lambeth Palace!' came a cry ahead. 'There's lights at the windows!' Makepeace could smell the river again, and could see a great building ahead at the water's edge, with high, square towers, its silhouetted crenellations biting into the evening sky.

From the front of the mob came sounds of furious argument, and the crowd took on a feverish, wavering tension.

'Turn yourselves about!' somebody was bellowing. 'Go home!'

'Who's there ahead?' a dozen voices in the crowd were demanding, and a dozen different answers came back. Some said it was the army, some the King's men, some that it was the archbishop himself.

'Ah, shut your mouth!' one of the apprentices shouted at last. 'Put William the Fox out of doors, or we'll break in and halloo the whole bunch of you!'

The other apprentices responded with a deafening roar, and there was a furious press forward. The patch of sky above Makepeace shrank as she was half crushed by taller figures. There were battle-cries ahead, and the bellow and yell of men fighting.

'Force the door!' somebody was shouting. 'Give 'im the crowbar!'

'Smash their lights!' came another cry.

When the first shot rang out, Makepeace thought somebody had dropped something heavy on the cobbles. Then a second shot rang out and a third. The crowd convulsed, some pulling back, some charging forward. Makepeace took a knee in the gut, and a careless cudgel jab in the eye.

'Makepeace!' It was Mother's voice again, shrill and desperate, and closer than before.

'Ma!' The crowd around Makepeace was thrashing now, but she fought her way through it towards the sound of her mother's voice. 'I'm here!'

Ahead of her, someone screamed.

It was a harsh, brief sound, and at first Makepeace did not know what it was. She had never heard Mother scream before. But as she elbowed her way forward, she saw a woman lying on the ground at the base of a wall, being stepped on by the blind, surging crowd.

'Ma!'

With Makepeace's help, Mother unsteadily rose to her feet. She was ashen pale, and even in the darkness Makepeace could see inky lines of blood pouring down the left side of her face. She was moving wrong as well, one eyelid drooping and her right arm jerking awkwardly.

'I'll get you home,' whispered Makepeace, her mouth dry. 'I'm sorry, Ma. I'm sorry ...'

Mother stared at Makepeace glassily for a moment, as if she did not know her. Then, her face tensed and contorted.

'No!' she screamed hoarsely, and lashed out, striking Makepeace across the face and then shoving her away. 'Stay away from me! Go away! Go away!'

Caught off balance, Makepeace fell over. She had one last glimpse of Mother's face, still fixed in a fierce and desperate glare, and then took a kick to the face that set her eyes streaming. Somebody else trod on her calf.

'Be ready!' somebody was shouting. 'Here they come!' Gunshots sounded again, as though the stars were exploding.

Then strong hands were hooked under Makepeace's armpits, and she was hauled to her feet. A tall apprentice tucked her over his shoulder without ceremony, and carried her bodily away from the front line, while she struggled and called for Mother. He dumped her in the mouth of an alleyway.

'You run home!' he screamed at Makepeace, red-faced, then plunged back into the fray, hammer raised high.

She never found out who he was, or what happened to him.

Nor did she ever see Mother alive again.

Mother's body was found after the bloodshed and the arrests, after the rioters were thrown into retreat. Nobody was ever quite sure what it was that had struck her in the head, and caused her death. Perhaps a wildly swung poker, perhaps an accidental kick to the head with a hobnailed boot, perhaps a stray bullet that struck her and moved on.

Makepeace did not know, and did not care. The riot had killed Mother, and Makepeace had led her there. It was all Makepeace's fault.

And the people of the parish, who had bought Mother's lace and embroidery when it suited them, decided that their precious churchyard was no place for a woman with a child out of wedlock. The minister, who had always been kind in the street, now stood in the pulpit and said that Margaret Lightfoot had not been one of the Saved.

Mother was buried instead in unconsecrated land on the edge of the Poplar marshes. It was stubbornly brambled, welcoming only the wind and the birds, and as secretive as Margaret Lightfoot herself.

CHAPTER 3

You'll be the death of me.

Makepeace could not forget Mother's words. They were her companion through every daylight moment, every nocturnal hour. She could imagine Mother saying them, but now in a tone steady and cold.

I killed her, Makepeace thought. I ran away and she followed me into danger. It was my fault, and she hated me for it at the end.

Makepeace had thought that now she might find herself sleeping in the same bed as her little cousins, but she was still left to sleep alone on the bolster she had shared with Mother. Perhaps everybody sensed that she was a murderess. Or perhaps Aunt and Uncle were no longer sure what to do with her, now that Mother's lace-making was no longer paying for her keep.

She was alone. The little fence that had run around Makepeace and Mother now ran round only Makepeace, cutting her off from the rest of the world.

Everyone else in the house prayed as usual, but with extra prayers for Mother. Makepeace found she could no longer pray the way she had been taught was right, baring her soul before the Lord. She tried, but her insides seemed to be full of a wild, white emptiness like an October sky, nothing she could put into words. She wondered whether her soul was gone completely.

On the second night, alone in her room, Makepeace tried to force the lid off her feelings. She made herself pray for forgiveness, for Mother's soul and her own. The attempt left her shaking, but not from the cold. She was afraid that God was listening with cold, implacable wrath, looking into every rotten crevice of her soul. And at the same time she was afraid that He was not listening at all, had never listened, would never listen.

The effort wore her out, and afterwards she slept.

Tap. Tap, tap.

Makepeace opened her eyes. She was cold and alone in bed, with no curve of Mother's back beside her. The loss was vaster in the pitch blackness.

Tap, tap, tap.

The sound was coming from the direction of the shutters. Perhaps they were loose. If so, they would rattle all night and keep her awake. Reluctantly she rose from the bed and felt her way to the window, knowing the room too well to need a light. She stroked the latch and found it fastened. And then beneath her fingertips she felt a tremor as something tapped the outside of the shutter again.

From behind the wooden slats, she heard another noise. It was so soft and muffled that it was barely more than a tickle in the ear, but it sounded like a human voice. There was something terribly familiar about its tone. Hairs rose on the back of Makepeace's neck.

There it was again, a smothered sob of sound, close against the other side of the shutter. A single word.

Makepeace.

In a hundred nightmares, Makepeace had battled in vain to keep dream-shutters closed and stop maddened ghosts rushing in to attack her. Her hands shook at the memory, but still her fingers rested on the latch.

The dead are like drowners, Mother had said.

Makepeace imagined her mother drowning in the night air, flailing in slow motion with her black hair floating wide. She imagined her helpless, alone, desperate for something to cling to.

'I'm here,' she whispered aloud. 'It's me—Makepeace.' She pressed her ear to the shutter, and this time thought she could just make out the words of the muted response.

Let me in.

Makepeace's blood chilled, but she told herself not to be afraid. Mother would not be like the other dead things. It was different. Whatever was outside, it would still be Mother. Makepeace could not abandon her—not again.

She unlatched the shutter, and opened it.

Outside a few dim stars glimmered in a charcoal sky. A clammy breeze seeped into the room, tickling her with goosebumps. Makepeace's chest tightened with the certainty that something else had entered with the wind. The darkness had a new texture, and she was no longer alone.

Makepeace was filled suddenly with a terrible fear that she had done something irrevocable. Her skin was tingling. Once again she felt it, the tickle of spider-feet across her mind. The reaching, tentative touch of the dead.

She flinched back from the window, and tried to steel her mental defences. But when she thought of Mother, her private incantations became as useless as nursery rhymes. Makepeace closed her eyes tight, but she found herself remembering Mother's face, looking as she had by candlelight on that first night in the chapel. A strange creature, with an unreadable expression, and no softness in her at all.

There was a wintry draught against her neck, the breath of something breathless. A tickle against her face and ear—an escaped strand of her own hair, it had to be. She froze, breathing shallowly.

'Ma?' she asked, in a whisper so faint it barely grazed the air.

A voice answered. An almost-voice. A molten mess of a sound, an idiot slobber, the consonants broken and spilling like egg yolks. It was so close to her ear, it buzzed.

Makepeace's eyes flew open. There—there!—filling her vision was a swirling, moth-grey, distorted face. Its eyes were holes, its mouth a long, wailing droop. She lurched backwards away from it, until her back hit a wall. She stared and stared and wanted to be wrong, even as it lunged hungrily for her eyes with fingers of smoke.

Makepeace closed her eyes only just in time, and felt a cold touch settle on her eyelids. It was the nightmare, it was all her nightmares, but now she had no hope of waking. She covered her ears, but too slowly to stop herself understanding the soft, horrible sounds.

Let me in ... Let me in ... Makepeace, let me in ...

It felt its way across her mind, her defences. It found the cracks made by her grief, love and memories, and tore at them with cruel, eager fingers. It ripped pieces out of her heart and mind, as it dug its way in. It knew the way past her defences, the path to her softest core.

And with the savagery of terror, Makepeace fought back.

She lashed out with her mind at the thing's smoky softness, and felt it scream as she mangled and tore it. The loose pieces of it flailed senselessly like severed worms, and tried to bury their way into her soul. It grappled and clung and raked at her. It could form no words now, only whines and wails.

Makepeace did not mean to open her eyes again. But she did, just for a mere instant, at the very end. To see whether it was gone.

So she saw what the face had become, and what she had done to it. She saw fear and a rictus of something like hatred on its twisted, vanishing features.

It was barely a face at all. But somehow it was still Mother.

Afterwards, Makepeace did not remember screaming and screaming. The next thing she knew, she was sitting on the floor, blinking in the light from her aunt's taper, and trying to answer the family's questions. The shutter was ajar, and banging slightly in the breeze with a tap-tap-tap noise.

Aunt told Makepeace that she must have fallen out of bed during a nightmare. Makepeace needed her to be right. It was not completely reassuring, since she knew that ghosts battled in dreams were sometimes real. But, please God, not this ghost. This one could not have attacked her, and Makepeace could not have torn it to shreds. The very thought was unbearable.

It had been a dream. Makepeace clung to this idea in desperation.

It was only a week later that rumours spread of a ghost abroad on the marshes. It was said to haunt a particularly lonely stretch, too soggy for the cattle to graze, and striped with stray paths where the footing could be only sometimes trusted.

Some unseen thing startled a wandering pedlar by crashing through the reeds, leaving a mangled path behind it. The local rooks were found to have abandoned their rookery, and the wading birds had fled to other parts of the marshlands. Then the Angel Inn, lurking on the outskirts between town and reedbeds, found itself a haunt of more than just sailors.

'A vengeful spirit,' Aunt called it. 'They say it came at sunset. Whatever it was, it knocked in a door, caused a world of damage and beat some strong men black and blue.'

Makepeace was the only person who heard these rumours with a painful stab of hope as well as fear. Mother's grave was on the edge of the marshlands, not so very far from the Angel. There was a horror in imagining Mother's ghost rampaging maddened, but at least if it was at large, that would mean that Makepeace had not torn it to pieces after all. At least she had not murdered Mother a second time.

I must find her, Makepeace told herself, even as the thought made her sick. I must talk to her. I must save her.

Nobody from Makepeace's church frequented the Angel, except Old William during his lapses. Whenever he had reeled home drunk, the minister made an example of him in the sermon, and asked everyone to strengthen him and pray for him. Taking the rutted lane to the inn, Makepeace felt self-conscious, and wondered whether she would be accused of drunkenness the following Sunday.

The Angel's stone buildings were crooked like an arm, cradling its little stable yard. A heavy-jawed woman in a stained cotton cap was sweeping the step, but looked up as Makepeace approached.

'Hello, poppet!' she called. 'Have you come to bring your father home? Which one is he?'

'No, I ... I want to hear about the ghost.'

The woman did not seem surprised, and gave a curt, business-like nod.

'You'll buy a cup of something if you want a look.'

Makepeace followed her into the darkened inn, and with a pang of guilt spent a coin of Aunt's shopping money on a cup of small beer. Then she was led out through the rear door.

Behind the inn lay a sawdust-covered stretch of bare ground. Makepeace guessed that this was where the inn's entertainments took place when there were enough crowds to merit it—shaven-headed pugilists fighting each other bare-knuckle, cockfights and badger baiting, or less bloody games of quoits, skittles or bowls. Here and there it was blotted dark by old spillages of ale or blood. Beyond this space lay a low wall with a stile in it, and then miles of marshes, the wind-stirred reed-forest shimmering softly in the late afternoon light.

'Come—look at this.' The woman seemed to take a professional pride in showing Makepeace the damage. The back door's bar was shattered, and one of its panels splintered. A window was broken, the leading bent, several of the little panes frost-white with fractures. A cloth sign had been ripped to tatters, only shreds of the image still visible—a pipe, some drums, a dark bestial shape of some sort. A table had capsized, and two chairs had broken backs.

As she listened, Makepeace's heart began to sink. It occurred to her belatedly that none of the ghosts she had ever encountered had left real damage one could see. They had attacked her mind, but never broken so much as a cup.

Perhaps it was just an ordinary brawl, thought Makepeace. She cast a furtive glance at the landlady's worn, canny face. Perhaps she made the best of the damage, and pretended a ghost caused it, so inquisitive folk would come here and buy drinks.

The landlady led Makepeace over to two men who were grimly sipping from their tankards in the late afternoon air. Both were lanky and leathery from the sun. They were not locals, and Makepeace guessed from the packs at their feet that they were the travelling sort.

'Come to hear about the ghost,' said the woman, jerking her head towards Makepeace. 'You can tell her about that, can't you?'

The two men glanced at each other, and scowled. Evidently this was not a story that put them in good humour.

'Is she buying us a drink?' asked the taller of the two.

The landlady looked at Makepeace with her eyebrows raised. Feeling sick, and even more sure that she was being conned, Makepeace parted with another coin, and the landlady hurried off to fetch more ale.

'It came at us out of the dark. You see this?' The taller man held up his hand, around which was tied a grubby handkerchief dark with spots of blood. 'Ripped my friend's coat—nearly knocked my brains out against the wall—smashed our fiddle too!' The fiddle he brandished looked as if someone had stamped on it. 'Mistress Bell calls it a ghost, but I say devil. Invisible devil.'

His anger seemed genuine enough, but Makepeace still did not know whether to believe him. Everything's invisible if you're blind drunk, she thought.

'Did it say anything?' Makepeace could not help shivering when she remembered the molten voice from her maybe-dream.

'Not to us,' said the shorter of the two. He held out his tankard as the landlady returned with a jug, and let her top it up. 'After it was done pounding us like a pestle, it left that way.' He pointed out towards the marshes. 'Knocked over a post as it went.'

Makepeace finished her drink, and rallied her courage.

'Watch your step out there, poppet!' shouted the landlady as she saw Makepeace climbing over the stile that led to the marshes. 'Some of those paths look fair enough, but slip under your feet. We don't want your ghost coming back here too!'

The rustle and crunch of Makepeace's steps sounded loud as she set off across the marshes, and she realized that she could hear no birdsong. The only other sounds were the dry music of the reeds rasping stem on stem, and the papery ripple of occasional young poplars whose leaves flickered grey-green and silver in the breeze. The quiet seeped into her bones, and with it the fear that, once again, she was making a terrible mistake.

She glanced back nervously, and was chilled to see that the inn was already a fair distance behind her. It was as if she were a little unanchored boat that had drifted unwittingly from the shore.

And as she stood there, Makepeace was unexpectedly struck and overwhelmed by an invisible wave.

A feeling. No, a smell. A reek like blood, autumn woodlands and old damp wool. It was a hot smell. It itched and rasped against her mind like breath. It filled Makepeace's senses, fogging her vision and making her feel sick.

Ghost, was her one helpless thought. A ghost.

But this was nothing like the cold, creeping attacks of the ghosts she remembered. This was not trying to claw its way inside her—it did not know she was there. It blundered against her, hot, terrible and oblivious.

The world swam, and then she barely knew where she was, who she was. She was swallowed by a memory that was not her own.

The sun stung. The reek of the sawdust choked her. There was a terrible pain in her lip, and she could not shape words. Her ears filled with a buzzing drone and a cruel, rhythmic thud. With each thud, something yanked painfully at her mouth. When she tried to flinch away, a red-hot slice of pain cut across her shoulders. She burned with a rage born of agony.

The wave passed, and Makepeace doubled over. Around her, the world still burned with sunlight, beating drums in her head and making her feel sick. Half blind, she took a clumsy step to steady herself, but instead felt her foot slide from beneath her on the moist, uneven ground. She slithered off the path and landed sprawling among the reeds, hardly feeling them scratch her arms and face. Then she leaned over and threw up, retching over and over.

Her head gradually cleared. The strange agony faded. But she could still smell something, she realized, mixed with a choking smell of rot. And she could still hear buzzing.

It was a different sound now, however. Before, it had been a queasy, heart-grating music. Now it settled into a insectile whirr. The buzz of dozens of tiny wings.

Rising unsteadily to her feet, and pushing the reeds aside, Makepeace advanced further down the slope from the path. With each step the ground grew softer and claggier. She was not the only creature to have come this way, she realized. There were broken stems, gouges in the mud ...

And beyond them, something sprawled in an overgrown ditch, half hidden by the reeds. Something dark. Something about the size of a man.

Makepeace felt her stomach somersault. She had been wrong about everything. If that was a body, then the ghost was not Mother at all. Perhaps she had just discovered a murder victim. For all she knew, the murderer might be watching her at this very moment.

Or perhaps this was some traveller struck down by the savage ghost, and in need of help. No, she could not run, even though every nerve in her body told her to.

She drew nearer, feeling mud squelch under her shoes with every step. The thing was dark brown, large and mound-like, and jewelled with the quick green-and-black bodies of flies.

A man in a wool coat?

No.

The shape grew clearer. At last Makepeace could see what it was, and what it was not. For a moment she felt relieved.

Then she felt an awful wave of sadness, stronger than her fear or revulsion, stronger even than the smell. She slithered down to crouch beside it, and used her handkerchief to cover her mouth. Then she very gently stroked her hand over the sodden dark shape.

There was no sign of life. In the mud nearby were gouge-marks, from its weak attempts to drag itself out of the ditch. There were bleeding, yellow-edged sores that looked as if they had been left by chains and shackles. She could hardly bear to look at the torn mouth, the seeping gash and trickle of dark blood.

Now she knew that she did still have a soul. And it was on fire.

Makepeace was muddy and briar-torn by the time she reached the backyard of the Angel, but she did not care. A small, wooden stool was the first thing that came to hand. She scooped it up, too angry to feel its weight.

The two travelling entertainers were murmuring fiercely in a corner, and paid Makepeace no mind. Or at least, they paid her no mind until she swung her stool and hit the tallest in the face.

'Gah! You crazy little wretch!' He stared at her in disbelief, clutching his bloody mouth.

Makepeace did not answer, but hit him again, this time in the gut.

'Leave off! Have you gone mad?' The shorter entertainer grabbed at Makepeace's stool. She kicked him hard in the kneecap.

'You left it to die!' she yelled. 'You beat it, and tortured it, and dragged it about by a chain until its mouth tore! And then when it couldn't stand any more, you threw it down in that ditch!'

'What's come over you?' The landlady was beside Makepeace now, a strong arm around her, trying to restrain her. 'What are you talking about?'

'THE BEAR!' bellowed Makepeace.

'A bear?' Mistress Bell looked at the strangers in bafflement. 'Oh! Mercy. Did your dancing bear die, then?'

'Yes, and how we'll make a living now, I don't know!' snapped the shorter man. 'This place is cursed—nothing but bad luck, invisible devils, crazy girls—'

The taller man spat bloodily into his hand. 'That little trull knocked my tooth out!' he exclaimed incredulously, and gave Makepeace a murderous glare.

'You didn't even wait for it to die before you ripped the ring out of its muzzle!' screamed Makepeace. Her head was singing. Any moment now, one of these men would take a swing at her, but she did not care. 'No wonder it came back! No wonder it's raging! I hope you never escape it! I hope it kills you both!'

Both men were shouting, and the landlady was trying to calm everybody down at the top of her voice. But Makepeace could hear nothing over the green-black buzz of anger in her brain.

Makepeace tugged hard at the stool, and the short man yanked back. She yielded to the motion, guiding the stool upwards so that it smacked into his nose. He gave a squawk of pure rage, and let go of the stool, lunging for an oaken walking stick that rested against his pack. The landlady sprinted away, screaming for help, and Makepeace found herself facing two men with bleeding faces and fury in their eyes.

Their wrath was nothing, however, compared to that of the Bear as it charged out of the marshlands.

Makepeace was looking the right way to see it, or almost see it. The Bear was a dark, smoky pucker in the world, four-legged and hump-backed, larger than it had been in life. It galloped towards the trio with frightful speed. Translucent holes marked its eyes and its gaping maw.

The impact knocked Makepeace off her feet. She lay on the ground stunned. The darkness that was the Bear towered over her. It took her a moment to realize that she was staring up at its great, shadowy back. It stood between her and her enemies, as if she were its cub.

Through its murky outline, she could still see her two foes, stepping forward, one raising his stick to strike at her. They could not see the Bear. They could not guess why the downward strike fell awry, batted to one side by the swipe of a great, shadowy paw.

Only Makepeace could see it. Only she could see how the Bear's rage was burning it away, how it spent itself in every motion. It bled wisps as it roared its silent roar. Its flanks seemed to steam.

It was losing itself, and it did not even know it.

Makepeace pulled herself up on to her knees, dizzy with the bear-reek and the song of its rage in her blood. Reflexively she put out both her arms, encircling the raging shadow. All she wanted in that moment was to stop the wisps escaping, to hold the Bear together and stop it melting into nothing.

Her arms closed on darkness, and she fell into it.

CHAPTER 4

'She's been this way for days now,' said Aunt's voice.

Makepeace did not know where she was, or why. Her head throbbed, and was too heavy to lift. Something was trapping her limbs. The world around her was phantom-vague, and voices seemed to float to her from a great distance.

'We cannot go on like this!' said the Uncle-voice. 'Half the time she's lying there like one dead, and the other half of the time ... Well, you've seen her! Grief's turned her wits. We need to think of our children! They're not safe with her here.'

It was the first time Makepeace had heard him sound frightened.

'What will folk think of us if we cast out our own blood?' asked Aunt. 'She's our cross to bear!'

'We're not her only kin,' said Uncle.

There was a pause, then Aunt gave a great huff of a sigh. Makepeace felt Aunt's warm, worn hands gently grip her face.

'Makepeace, child, are you listening? Your father—what's his name? Margaret never told us, but surely you know, don't you?'

Makepeace shook her head.

'Grizehayes,' she whispered huskily. 'Lives ... at Grizehayes.'

'I knew it,' whispered the Aunt-voice, sounding awed but triumphant. 'That Sir Peter! I knew it!'

'Will he do anything for her?' asked Uncle.

'He won't, but his family will if they don't want their name dragged through the dirt!' said Aunt firmly. 'It wouldn't look good to have someone with their fancy bloodline put in Bedlam, would it? I'll tell them that's where she's bound if they do nothing.'

But the words were just sounds again, and Makepeace sank into a dark place.

The next few days swam by indistinctly, like pike through murky water. Most of the time the family kept Makepeace bound up in a blanket like a swaddled babe. Whenever she was lucid enough they unwrapped her, but she could not follow what they said, or help with anything. She tottered and stumbled, and dropped everything she tried to pick up.

The smell of cooking pies from the kitchen, usually homely and familiar, now made her feel sick. The scents of the lard, the blood of the meat, the herbs—they were too much, they were blinding. But all the while, it was the smell of the Bear that haunted her. She could not scrub away the dank, warm reek of its mind.

She tried to recall what had happened after she reached for the Bear and the blackness swallowed her, but her memories were a dark swirl. She thought she remembered seeing the two travelling men, though. She had a murky image of them bellowing, their pale faces striped with blood.

Beasts did not have ghosts—at least that is what she had always thought. But evidently they did, now and then. By now it had probably burned itself away into nothingness in its quest for vengeance. She hoped it had been happy with that bargain. Why had it left her so sick? Perhaps, she thought hazily, mad ghost-brutes could infect you with fever.

She thought herself feverish indeed when, one day, she was brought into the main room and found a stranger standing by the hearth. He was tall, and wore a dark blue coat. His beaky face was topped by a shock of white hair. It was the man she had chased like a will-o'-the-wisp on the evening of the riot.

Makepeace stared at him, and felt her eyes fill with tears.

'This is Master Crowe,' Aunt told her slowly and carefully. 'He's come to take you to Grizehayes.'

'My ...' Makepeace's voice was still rusty. 'My father ...'

Aunt unexpectedly wrapped her arms around Makepeace, and gave her a brisk, tight squeeze.

'He's dead, child,' she whispered. 'But his family have said they'll take you in, and the Fellmottes will look after you better than I could.' Then she hurried off to gather Makepeace's belongings, teary with tenderness, anxiety and relief.

'We've been keeping her bundled up in the blanket,' Uncle was murmuring to Mr Crowe. 'You'll want to do the same when she's wild. Whatever those rogues at the inn did to her, I think they knocked the wits out of her before someone chased them away.'

Makepeace was going to Grizehayes. That was what she had told Mother she was going to do, on that last fatal day. Perhaps she should feel happy, or at least feel something.

Instead, Makepeace felt broken and empty, like a scooped-out eggshell. The hunt for Mother's ghost had led her to a dead bear. And now, Mr Crowe, who had seemed the key to finding her father, had only led her to another grave.

For years the minister had talked of the end of the world, and now it had come. Makepeace knew it, she felt it. As the carriage bore her out through Poplar, she wondered in her dazzled way why the earth did not quake, nor the stars drop like ripe figs, and why she could not see angels or the shining woman from Nanny Susan's visions. Instead she saw clothes drying, and barrows rattling, and steps being scrubbed as if nothing had happened. Somehow that was worse than anything.

As the carriage lumbered north-west, Makepeace tried to understand what she had been told.

Her father had been Sir Peter Fellmotte, and he was dead. His was an old, old family, and they had agreed to take her in. It sounded like a bittersweet ending from a ballad, but Makepeace felt numb. Why had Mother refused to talk about him?

She remembered Mother's warning. You have no idea what I saved you from! If I had stayed in Grizehayes ...

It was a mistake to think of Mother. Makepeace's head filled with the memory of the nightmare ghost with Mother's features. The malformed voice and the grey face in tatters ... Makepeace's brain went to the dark place again.

When she came back from it, she felt sick and exhausted once more. She was still sitting in the carriage, but wrapped tightly in a sheepskin blanket so that it pinned her arms. A rope was bound around her, holding it in place.

'Are you calmer now?' Mr Crowe asked her levelly as she blinked in confusion.

Hesitantly Makepeace nodded. Calmer than what? There was a new bruise swelling on her jaw. There was also a bruise in her memory, an indistinct shadowy feeling that she had done something she shouldn't. She was in trouble somehow.

'I cannot have you jumping out of the carriage,' said Mr Crowe.

The sheepskin blanket was thick and warm, but rough with an animal smell. She clung to that smell. It was something she understood. Mr Crowe said nothing more to her, and she was grateful for that.

The landscape slowly changed over the long, damp ride. The first day it made sense to Makepeace, with its misty meadows and thriving, pale green cornfields. During the second day, the low hills raised their hackles. By the third, the fields had yielded to moorland, over which lean, black-faced sheep scrambled.

At last she wakened from a doze to find that the carriage was splashing along a rising road turned to soup by the rain. On either side lay bare fields and pastureland, the horizons guarded by a line of sombre hills. Ahead, behind a small coven of dark, twisting yews, stood a grey-faced house, graceless and vast. Two towers rose above its facade like misshapen horns.

It was Grizehayes. Although Makepeace had never seen it before, she felt an instant recognition, like a great bell tolling deep in her soul.

By the time they arrived, Makepeace was cold, exhausted and hungry. She was unbound and unswaddled, then handed over to a red-haired servant woman with a tired face.

'His lordship will want to see her,' said Crowe, and left Makepeace in her care.

The woman changed her clothes, wiped her face and brushed her hair. She was not unkind, but not kind either. Makepeace knew that she was being tidied for company, not cosseted. The woman tutted over Makepeace's nails, which were ravaged and torn. Makepeace could not remember how or why.

When Makepeace was almost presentable, the woman led her down a dark passageway, silently waved her through an oaken door, then closed it behind her. Makepeace found herself in a great warm chamber with the biggest, fiercest hearth she had ever seen. The walls were covered with hunting tapestries, where stags rolled their eyes as embroidered blood ran from their sides. A very old man was propped up in a four-poster bed.

She stared at him with fear and awe, as her scrambled mind tried to remember what she had been told. This could only be Obadiah Fellmotte, the head of the family—Lord Fellmotte himself.

He was in earnest conversation with white-haired Mr Crowe. Neither seemed to have noticed her entrance. Feeling self-conscious and daunted, Makepeace hung back by the door. Nonetheless their low voices reached her.

'So ... those that accused us will accuse no more?' Obadiah's voice was a low, rasping creak.

'One killed himself after his ships sank and his fortune was lost,' Mr Crowe said calmly. 'Another was exiled after his letters to the Spanish King were discovered. The third's romances became common gossip, and he was killed in a duel by his mistress's husband.'

'Good,' said Obadiah. 'Very good.' He narrowed his eyes. 'Are there still rumours about us?'

'It is difficult to kill a whisper, my lord,' Crowe said carefully 'Particularly one that involves witchcraft.'

Witchcraft? Makepeace felt a thrill of superstitious terror. Had she really heard that word aright? The minister in Poplar had sometimes spoken of witches—twisted, corrupted men and women who secretly bargained with the Devil for unholy powers. They could put the Evil Eye on you. They could make your hand wither, your crops fail, your baby sicken and die. Causing harm by witchcraft was illegal, of course, and when witches were caught they were arrested and tried, and sometimes even hanged.

'If we cannot stop the King hearing such rumours,' the old aristocrat said slowly, 'then we must stop him acting on them. We must make ourselves useful to him—too useful to lose. And we will need a hold over him, so that he dares not denounce us. He is desperate to borrow money from us, is he not? I am sure we can make some kind of bargain.'

Makepeace continued to stand by the door, tongue-tied, the heat from the hearth tingling over her face. She did not understand everything she had heard, but she was fairly certain that such words and thoughts should never, ever have fallen upon her ears.

Then the old lord looked across and noticed her. He scowled slightly.

'Crowe, what is that child doing in my chamber?'

'Margaret Lightfoot's daughter,' Crowe said quietly.

'Oh, the by-blow.' Obadiah's brow cleared a little. 'Let us see her, then.' He beckoned Makepeace over.

Makepeace's last faint hopes of a warm welcome collapsed. She approached slowly, and halted at his bedside. There was costly lace on Obadiah's nightgown and the cap that drooped over his brow, and Makepeace started helplessly calculating how many weeks it would have taken her mother to make it. But she realized that she was staring, and dropped her gaze quickly. Looking at the rich and powerful was dangerous, like peering into the sun.

Instead, she watched him from under her lashes. She fixed her gaze on his hands, which were loaded with rings. He frightened her. She could see the blue blood in his bunched veins.

'Ah yes, she's one of Peter's,' murmured Obadiah. 'Look at that cleft in her chin! And those pale eyes! But you say she's mad?'

'Meek but slow most of the time, and frantic when the fits take her,' said Crowe. 'The family say it's grief, and a blow to the head.'

'If the senses have been knocked out of her, knock them back in again,' Obadiah snapped. 'No point in sparing the rod with children or lunatics. They're much alike—savages if left unchecked. The only cure is discipline. You! Girl! Can you talk?'

Makepeace gave a start, and nodded.

'We hear you have nightmares, child,' said Obadiah. 'Tell us about them.'

Makepeace had promised Mother never to talk about her dreams. But Mother was not Mother any more, and promises no longer seemed to matter very much. So she stammered a few broken sentences about the black room, the whispers and the swooping faces.

Obadiah gave a small, satisfied noise in his throat.

'The creatures that come in your nightmares, do you know what they are?' he asked.

Makepeace swallowed, and nodded.

'Dead things,' she said.

'Broken dead things,' the old lord said, as if this were an important distinction. 'Weak things—too weak to hold themselves together without a body. They want your body ... and you know that, do you not? But they will not reach you here. They are vermin, and we destroy them like rats.'

The memory of a molten, vindictive face swooped into Makepeace's mind. A weak, dead, broken thing. Vermin to be destroyed. She slammed the door on that thought, but it would not stay shut. Makepeace started to shake. She could not help it.

'Are they damned?' she blurted out. Is Mother going to Hell? Did I send her to Hell? 'The minister said—'

'Oh, pox on the minister!' snapped Obadiah. 'You've been raised by a nest of Puritans, you stupid girl. A crop-headed, preachy bunch of ranters and ravers. That minister is going to Hell some day, and dragging his raggle-taggle flock with him. And unless you forget every crazy notion they crammed into your head, you'll go the same way. Did they even christen you?' He gave a little grunt of approval when Makepeace nodded. 'Ah, well, that is one thing at least.

'Those creatures—the ones that want to burrow into your head. Did any of them ever get in?'

'No,' Makepeace said, with an involuntary shudder. 'They tried, but I ... I fought ...'

'We must be certain. Come here! Let me look at you.' When Makepeace ventured nervously within reach, the old man reached out and gripped her chin with surprising strength.

Startled, Makepeace met his gaze. At once she smelt wrongness like smoke.

His map-wrinkled face was dull, but his eyes were not. They were cloudy amber and cold. She did not understand what it meant, but she knew that there was something very wrong with Obadiah. She did not want to be near him. She was in danger.

His features crinkled and puckered very slightly, as if his face were holding a conversation with itself. Then he half closed his ancient eyes, and examined Makepeace through the gleaming slivers.

Something was happening. Something was touching the sore places in her soul, exploring, probing. She gave a croak of protest, and tried to squirm out of Obadiah's grip, but his hold was painfully firm. For a moment it was as if she were back in the nightmare, in her own darkened room, with the molten voice in her ear, and the ruthless spirit clawing at her mind ...

She gave a short, sharp scream, and reached for her soldiers of the mind. As she lashed out in thought, she felt the probing presence flinch back. Obadiah's hand released her chin. Makepeace lurched backwards, falling to the floor. She curled into a ball, eyes clenched shut, fists over her ears.

'Ha!' Obadiah's exhalation sounded like a laugh. 'Maybe you did fight them off, after all. Oh, stop your whimpering, child! I shall believe you for now, but understand this—if one of those dead vermin has made a nest in your brain, you are the one in danger. You cannot scour them out without our help.'

Makepeace's heart was hammering, and she found it hard to breathe. Just for a moment, she had locked gazes with something wrong. She had seen it, and it had seen her. And something had touched her mind the way the dead things did.

But Obadiah was not dead, was he? Makepeace had seen him breathing. She must have been mistaken. Perhaps all aristocrats were just as terrifying.

'Understand this,' he said, without warmth. 'Nobody wants you. Not even your mother's kin. What will happen to you out in the world, I wonder? Will you be thrown into Bedlam? If not, I suppose you will starve, or freeze to death, or be murdered for the few rags you wear ... if the dead vermin do not find you first.'

There was a pause, and then the old man spoke again, his voice impatient.

'Look at the trembling, damp-eyed thing! Put her somewhere where she cannot break anything. Girl—you must show some gratitude and obedience, and cease these fits, or we will throw you out on the moors. And then nobody will protect you when the vermin come for you. They will eat out your brain like the meat of an egg.'

CHAPTER 5

A lean, young manservant led Makepeace up stairway after stairway, and showed her into a narrow little room with a flock bed in it, and a chamber pot. There were bars on the window, but painted birds on the walls, and Makepeace wondered whether it had once been a nursery. The young servant was barely out of boyhood, and his features were beaky, like the white-haired Mr Crowe. Makepeace wondered blearily whether they were related.

'Count your blessings, and calm your antics,' he said, as he set down a jug of small beer and a bowl of pottage on the floor for her. 'No more shrieking and lunging at folks, do you hear? We've a stick for tricks like that.'

The door closed behind him, and a key turned in the lock. Makepeace was left alone with her bewilderment. Lunging? When had she done that? She did not know anything any more.

As she ate the food, Makepeace stared out through the bars at the grey sky, the courtyard, and the fields and moors beyond its surrounding wall. Would this be her home forever, this tower-room prison? Would she grow old here, tucked out of sight and mischief, as the Fellmottes' pet madwoman?

Makepeace could not settle. Her mind was too full. She found herself pacing the little room. Sometimes she realized that she was murmuring to herself, or that the murmur had sunk into her throat and become a guttural noise.

The walls spun as she lurched and turned, their paper peeling like silver birch bark. She was arguing with the heat and noise in her brain. There was somebody else in the room, and they were being unreasonable. But they were never there when she turned.

At last her knees gave, and she tumbled to the floor and lay there. She felt too vast and heavy ever to move again, a thing of mountains and plains. Aches and itches edged across her landscape like travellers. She noted them with disinterest as slumber swallowed her.

And in her dreams she was walking through a forest, but could only take ten steps in any direction before a tree trunk rose up and bruised her. Birds of every sort perched on the boughs, trilling and mocking her. The sky gleamed grey-black like a jackdaw's wing, and her throat was sore from roaring.

Makepeace woke groggily in the early twilight. She stared numbly through the barred window at the violet sky, with its greasy rags of cloud. A bat fleet-fluttered across them for a moment like a dark thought.

She was lying on the floor, not the bed, and she hurt.

Makepeace sat up gingerly, supporting herself on one hand, and winced. She ached all over. Even her hands stung. Peering at them, she noticed dark grazes on the knuckles. Previously some of her nails had been broken, but now several were torn to the quick. There was a tender swelling on her left temple and right cheek, and her exploring fingers found bruises on her arms and hip.

'What happened to me?' she asked herself aloud.

Perhaps she really had fallen into a fit. She could think of no other explanation. The manservant might have threatened her with a stick, but she thought she would have noticed if he had come in and used it.

I must have injured myself. There is nobody here but me.

As if to mock that very thought, she heard a noise behind her.

Makepeace spun round, looking for the source of the sound. Nothing. Only the empty room, and the stretching diamond of light from the window.

Her heart hammered. The noise had been so shockingly clear, like breath against her neck, sending a tingle deep into her inner ear. And yet a moment later she could not have described it.

Gruff. A brute sound. That was all she knew.

And then she smelt something. A reek like hot blood, an autumn woodland, a wet horsey-doggy smell, musky and potent. She recognized it at once.

She was not alone.

That's impossible! It was burning itself out! And we're three days' ride from Poplar! How would it find me? And they destroy ghosts here—how would it get into Grizehayes without anyone noticing it?

But it had. There was no mistaking that reek. Somehow, impossibly, the Bear was in the room with her.

Makepeace backed towards the door, even though she knew it was pointless. Her eyes flicked around the darkening room. There were too many shadows. She could not tell if they were wisping or warping. She could not tell where the translucent eyes were watching her.

Why? Why had it followed her? Makepeace felt frightened and betrayed. It had come after its two torturers for revenge, but she had not harmed it at all! In fact ... back at the Angel, she had even imagined that they had felt a moment of sympathy, of shared pain and rage, and that it had stepped in to rescue her ...

But it's a ghost. And ghosts only want to claw their way into your head. And it's a beast, and it owes you nothing. Idiot! Did you really think that it was your friend?

And now she was locked in with it. There was no running. No escape.

There was a sudden rough gust of sound at her ear. Red hot. Deafening. Closer than close.

Too close.

Makepeace panicked. She gave a shriek, and fled to the door, hammering it with her fists.

'Let me out!' she yelled. 'You have to let me out! There's something in here! There's a ghost in here!'

Oh please, please let the family have left a guard outside my door! Please, please, let someone hear me out in the courtyard!

She ran to the window. She tried to squeeze her face between the bars.

'Help!' she screamed at the top of her lungs. 'Help me!'

The cold of the bars burned against her face. They pressed against her right temple and left cheek, exactly on the bruises. The sensation shocked her into memory. A hazy recollection of a similar moment, forcing her head between the bars. Trying to force her way through, towards freedom and the fair sky.

Makepeace heard her own yell become more guttural, a long, open-throated roar. And now her face was pressing against the bars with bruising force, squirming, trying to force its way through. Her vision was marked by black spots. She could feel her hands scrabbling uselessly against the stonework, the skin scraping painfully from her fingertips ...

Stop! she told herself. Stop! What am I doing?

The truth hit her like a falling star.

Oh God. Oh God in Heaven. I am such a fool.

Of course the Bear was able to enter Grizehayes. Of course it's here.

It's inside me.

A blind, angry, desperate ghost was inside her. Her worst fear had happened, after all. And now the Bear would blunder around in her, and smash her mind to pieces. It would bloody and break her body in its frenzy to leave the turret room ...

Stop!

Terrified, she called up her long-dormant defences again, her angels of the mind. They rallied and raged, and she heard the Bear growl. With a superhuman effort of will she closed her eyes, trapping both herself and the Bear in darkness. It was a night full of silent noise, for her mind was roaring with as much panic as the Bear.

Something happened. A sudden blow shuddered her mind to the core. For a fleeting moment she felt her soul buckle and struggle to right itself. Memories bled, thoughts ripped. The Bear had struck out at her.

And yet it was that blow that shocked Makepeace out of her panic.

Frightened. It's frightened.

She imagined it, a great Bear lost in darkness, friendless and trapped as it had been for so long. It could not understand where it was, or why its body was so strange and weak. All it knew was that it was under attack, just as it had always been under attack ...

Gently but firmly Makepeace took control over her breathing. She drew in breath after calm breath, trying to slow her heartbeat, trying to banish the fear that the Bear would tear her apart from within.

Hush, she whispered to it with her mind.

She pictured the Bear again, but now imagined herself standing beside it, arms outstretched, as she had stood in that moment when they had tried to protect each other.

Hush. Hush, Bear. It's me.

The silent roaring subsided to an intermittent, silent growl. Perhaps it knew her, just a little. Perhaps it understood that nothing was attacking it now.

I am your friend, she told it. And then, I am your cave.

Cave. It did not understand words, but Makepeace felt it gingerly take hold of the idea, like an apple in its jaws. Maybe it had never been wild, but had been reared at a chain's end since it was a cub. But it was still a bear, and deep in its soul it knew what a cave was. Cave was not prison. Cave was home.

As it calmed down, Makepeace wondered how she had failed to notice it in her head. Perhaps her feeling of sickness and strangeness had been the result of contracting her mind to make room for it.

It was big, if one could use such a word to describe something spectral. Makepeace could now sense its unthinking power. It could probably crush her mind, as easily as one of its paws might have taken out her throat if they had met in life. But it was calmer now, and she felt its control over her body loosen a little. Now she could at least swallow, relax her shoulders, move her fingers.

Makepeace took a few more moments to muster her courage, then dared to open her eyes. She made sure she was facing away from the window. Bars might mean prison to the Bear, and she did not want to drive it into a frenzy again. Instead, she dropped her gaze to her own hands.

She let the Bear see them, and slowly flexed the fingers so that it knew that these were the only paws it had now. She let it see the ravaged nails, then the bloodied fingertips. No claws, Bear. Sorry.

A small, dark ripple of emotion passed through the Bear. Then it lowered Makepeace's head, and licked at the wounded fingers with her tongue.

It was an animal, and owed her nothing. It was a ghost, and could not be depended upon. Perhaps the Bear was simply attending to its own injuries. But the licking was very gentle, as if the wounds belonged to an injured cub.

By the time the young manservant arrived with a switch, to beat Makepeace for 'howling like a heathen and raising Cain', she had made a decision. She would not betray Bear.

Lord Fellmotte had told her that it was dangerous to have a rogue ghost in her head, and perhaps he was telling the truth. But she did not like Obadiah. His gaze made her feel like a mouse in owl country. If she told him about Bear, he would tear Bear out of her somehow and destroy him.

It was risky, keeping secrets from a man like that. If he ever found out that Makepeace was hiding something like this, she suspected that he would be terribly angry. Perhaps he would throw her out on the moors as he threatened, or have her sent to Bedlam to be chained and whipped.

But she was glad that nobody had come running to her rescue when she had screamed. Bear had never been given a fair chance in life. She was all Bear had. And Bear was all she had.

So she said nothing as the switch landed a half-dozen solid thwacks across her shoulders and back. They stung, and Makepeace knew they would leave welts. She kept her eyes clenched shut, and did her best to soothe Bear in her mind. If she lost control and lashed out, as she suspected she had before, then sooner or later somebody might suspect that she had a ghostly passenger.

'I don't enjoy this, you know,' said the young man piously, and Makepeace thought that he probably even believed his own words. 'It's for your own good.' She suspected he had never had this much power over someone before.

After he had left, Makepeace's eyes watered, and it felt as if red-hot bars were being pressed against the flesh of her back. The feeling brought back memories, but they were not her own.

The music of guitar and tabor throbbed in her bones, and stirred a recollection of hot coals thrown under her tender, half-grown paws to force her to dance. She tottered, and tried to drop to all fours, only to receive a stinging blow across her soft muzzle.

It was Bear's early memories of being trained as a cub, she realized. She felt a flood of anger on his behalf, and hugged herself because it was the only way to hug him.

They understood something together at that moment, Makepeace and Bear. Sometimes you had to be patient through pain, or people gave you more pain. Sometimes you had to weather everything and take your bruises. If you were lucky, and if everyone thought you were tamed and trained ... there might come a time when you could strike.

CHAPTER 6

Makepeace was woken by a faint tink-tink-tink sound. For a moment she was confused by her surroundings, until the ache of her bruises reminded her where she was. She had not been trusted with a candle or rushlight, so the only light came from the window.

She was startled to realize that there was a head at the window, silhouetted against the deep violet evening sky. As she stared, a hand was raised to tap again at the bars. Tink, tink, tink.

'Hey!' came a whisper.

Makepeace stood unsteadily, and limped over to the window. To her surprise, she found that a lanky boy about fourteen years old was clinging to the wall outside. He seemed to be precariously perched on some sort of shallow ledge, one hand gripping the bars to steady himself. He had chestnut hair, and a pleasant, ugly, wilful face, and he seemed unfazed by the four-storey drop beneath him. His clothes were better than hers, almost too good for a servant.

'Who are you?' she demanded.

'James Winnersh,' he answered, as if that explained everything.

'What do you want?' she hissed. She was certain that he was not supposed to be there. She had also heard that folks sometimes visited Bedlam to laugh at the lunatics, and she was in no mood for gawpers or gigglers.

'I came to see you!' he replied, still in a whisper. 'Come over here! I want to talk to you!'

Reluctantly she approached the window. She could tell that Bear did not like being too close to people, and she did not want him to lose control. As the light fell on her face, the boy outside gave a little laugh that sounded half jubilant, half incredulous.

'So it is true. You've got the same chin as me.' He touched a cleft in his own chin, just like hers. 'Yes,' he said, in answer to her wide-eyed look. 'It's our little legacy. Sir Peter's signature.'

Blood rushed to Makepeace's face as she realized what he meant. She was not Sir Peter's only child out of wedlock. Deep down, Makepeace had wanted to believe that her parents had been in love, so that her own existence would mean something. But no, Mother must have been a dalliance, nothing more.

'I don't believe you!' Makepeace hissed, even though she did. 'Take it back!' She could not bear it. In the strange, white heat of the moment, she wanted to pull out the bars by their roots and hit him with them.

'You've got a temper,' he said, with a hint of surprise. Makepeace was surprised too—nobody had ever said such a thing of her before, let alone with a hint of approval. 'You are like me. Hush—don't go waking the house.'

'What are you doing here?' asked Makepeace, lowering her voice again.

'All the other servants were talking about you,' the boy said promptly. 'Young Crowe said you were mad, but I didn't believe him.' Makepeace guessed that the beaky-faced manservant who had beaten her must have been 'Young Crowe'. 'There's another window on the other side of the tower, so I climbed out of that, then worked my way round, feet on the ledge.' He grinned at his own ingenuity.

'What if you're wrong? What if I'm crazy, and I push you to your death?' Makepeace still felt unreasonably angry and cornered. Why were there always people, living or dead, wanting something from her? Why could she not be left alone with Bear?

'You don't look mad to me,' James said, with annoying confidence, 'and I don't think you've got the strength. What's your name?'

'Makepeace.'

'Makepeace? Oh. I forgot you were a Puritan.'

'I'm not!' retorted Makepeace, turning red. The godly in Poplar had never called themselves Puritans, and when Obadiah had described them that way she had sensed that the word was not a compliment.

'Does everyone have a name like that where you come from?' asked James. 'I hear they're all called Fight-the-Good-Fight, Spit-in-the-Eye-of-the-Devil, Sorry-for-Sin, Miserable-Sinners-Are-We-All and things like that.'

Makepeace did not answer. She wasn't sure whether she was being mocked, and the congregation in Poplar had included one Sorry-for-Sin, usually shortened to 'Sorry'.

'Go away!' she said instead.

'I'm not surprised they locked you up.' James chuckled. 'They don't like spirit. Listen, I will find a way to get you out of there. Sir Thomas will be back at Grizehayes soon. He's Obadiah's heir—Sir Peter's older brother. He likes me. I'll see if I can put in a word for you.'

'Why?' asked Makepeace, perplexed.

James stared back at her with just as much incomprehension.

'Because you're my little sister,' he said.

Afterwards, Makepeace could not forget those words. She had a brother, it seemed. But what did that really mean? After all, if what James had said was true, then Lord Obadiah was her grandfather, and she had seen no kindness or kinship in the old man's eyes. Just because you shared blood with somebody, that didn't mean that you could share secrets.

And yet James seemed blithely confident that he and Makepeace were on the same side.

However, days passed and James did not come back. Makepeace began to fear that she had been too hostile. Soon she would have done anything to see a friendly face.

Young Crowe was not just her warden, he was her judge. If she argued, cried out or was sullenly silent, this was a sign of her melancholy madness. The punishment was a few sharp blows on the shins or arms with his stick.

It was all Makepeace could do to stop Bear striking back, as her vision darkened and his rage threatened to swallow them both. After Young Crowe's visits, Bear would keep her pacing to and fro for hours, sometimes giving a wordless bellow with her voice. There were moments of rapport where he seemed to understand her, and she could soothe him. At other times it was like reasoning with a thundercloud. He did not understand the bars, or Makepeace's limits, or the need to use a chamber pot.

After Bear flung their bowl across the room and broke it, Makepeace's ankles were put in shackles. In the following days, she was held down each morning so that a reddish concoction that smelt of beetroots could be squirted into her nose to cool 'the cauls of her brain'. A little later she was caught weeping and she was given a broth that made her vomit, to rid her of the 'black bile' that caused her 'melancholia'.

Bear was strange and dangerous, and made everything worse. Yet she clung to him. She had a secret friend, and because of this she could hold off despair. She had somebody that she wanted to protect, and who silently raged to protect her. When she slept, it seemed to her that she was curled around something like a small, rounded cub, but also as though something vast and warm had encircled her to shield her from the world.

One day, Young Crowe had her bound to a stretcher, her face covered with a cloth. She was carried, jolted and tilted down stairway after stairway, then into a room that was blisteringly hot and full of the rich, kitchen smells of smoke, meat-blood, spices and onion.

'Sweep out the embers, the bricks are hot enough without them. Help me—we need her head just within the oven ...'

Makepeace struggled, but her bonds held. She felt every jolt as the stretcher was manoeuvred into place, then the searing heat of the oven against her face, even through the cloth. It was hard to breathe, the hot, smoky air burning her lungs. Her skin started to scald and sting, and she cried out in panic, fearing that her eyes would start to fry like eggs ...

'What are you doing, Crowe?' asked an unfamiliar voice.

'Sir Thomas!' Young Crowe sounded rather taken aback. 'We are treating the Lightfoot girl for melancholia. The heat of the oven causes her head to sweat out all the disordered fantasies. It is a tried-and-tested practice—there is a picture in this book—'

'And what were you planning to do after that? Serve her with radishes and a mustard sauce? Take the girl out of the oven, Crowe. I have a mind to speak with her, and I cannot do that while she is being baked.'

A few minutes later, her eyes still blurry with smoke and tears, Makepeace found herself sitting alone in a little room with Sir Thomas Fellmotte, Obadiah's heir.

He had bright, brown eyes, a bluff manner, and a voice that belonged to the outdoors. On second glance she noticed the grey in his long, aristocratically curled hair and the sorrowful-looking lines that scored his cheeks, and guessed that he was not young. His chin had a familiar vertical dent. Belatedly Makepeace remembered that Sir Thomas had been her father's brother.

To her great relief, he did not fill her with same chill dread as Obadiah. As he looked at her, his gaze was warm, human and a little wistful.

'Ah,' he said quietly. 'You do have my brother's eyes. But there is a good deal more of Margaret in you, I think.' For a while he stared at her, as if her face were a scrying glass in which he could see the faces of the dead shimmering.

'Makepeace, is it?' he asked, recovering his brisk tone. 'A preachy name, but rather a pretty one. Tell me, Makepeace, are you a good, hard-working girl? James says you're sane as noontide, and not afraid to earn your keep. Is that true?'

Hardly daring to hope, Makepeace nodded vigorously.

'Then I am sure we can find you a place amongst the servants.' He gave her a warm, pensive smile. 'What can you do?'

Anything, Makepeace almost said. I will do anything if you save me from the Bird Chamber and Young Crowe. But at the last moment she thought of Obadiah's deathly eyes. Anything that does not involve waiting on his lordship ...

'I can cook!' she said quickly, as inspiration struck. 'I can churn butter, and bake pies, and make bread and soups, and pluck pigeons ...' Her first encounter with the Grizehayes kitchen had not been a happy one, but if she worked there she could avoid Obadiah.

'Then I shall arrange something,' declared Sir Thomas. He strode to the door, then hesitated. 'I ... often thought about your mother after she ran away from Grizehayes. She was so young to be alone in the world—barely fifteen, and expecting a child, of course.' He frowned, and twisted one of his buttons. 'Was she ... happy with the life she found?'

Makepeace did not know how to answer. Right now, her memories of Mother were too painful to handle, like shards of glass.

'Sometimes,' she said at last.

'I suppose,' said Sir Thomas softly, 'that is all that any of us can ask.'

CHAPTER 7

That same afternoon, Makepeace found herself in clean clothes, being introduced to a curious gaggle of other servants. After the darkness and isolation, everything seemed very loud and bright. Everyone was looming and unfamiliar, and Makepeace kept forgetting their names.

The other servant women were wary at first, then beleaguered her with questions, about her name, London and the dangerous world away from Grizehayes. None of them asked about her family, however, and Makepeace guessed that her parentage was already household gossip.

They all seemed sure that Makepeace must be very glad and grateful to have been 'rescued' from her previous home. They also agreed that another hand in the kitchen would be welcome.

'Kitchen's the best place for her, I say,' one woman remarked bluntly. 'She's scarcely handsome enough to wait on the family, is she? Look at her, the little spotted cat!'

'There's a French cook,' another woman told Makepeace, 'but don't you mind him, he's just for show. French cooks come and go like apple blossom. It's Mistress Gotely you'll need to please.'

Makepeace was duly set to work in the kitchen, which seemed vast as a cavern, its ceiling black with generations of smoke. The hearth was so huge that six Makepeaces could have stood in it, side by side. Herbs dangled in bunches from the rafters, and ranks of pewter plates gleamed. Ever since Bear had become her secret passenger, Makepeace's sense of smell had become keener. The kitchen scents hit her with maddening force—heady herbs and spices, charred meat, wine, gravy and smoke. She could feel Bear stirring, confused by the smells and hungry.

Mistress Gotely was in theory just an under-cook, but in practice the queen of the kitchen. She was a tall woman with a strong jaw, a gouty leg, and no patience for fools. And of course Makepeace did seem a fool, clumsy and slow-witted with nerves. She was desperate to prove her worth, so that she wouldn't be sent back to the Bird Chamber. This would have been hard enough without a ghost bear in her head. He did not like the heat, darkness or clatter. The aroma of blood maddened him, and half her mind was busy calming him.

After a baffling, whirlwind introduction to the intricacies of the kitchen, scullery, buttery, ewery and cellar, Mistress Gotely took Makepeace out into the courtyard to see the pump, granary and woodpile.

Grizehayes looked different in sunshine, the grey walls almost golden in places with blots of lichen. Makepeace could see details that made it look more lived in and less like a ghost castle. Rugs dangled from windows to be beaten, smoke trailed from the great, red chimneys. It was a hodgepodge house, old craggy stone alternating with neat grey blocks, slate roofs mingling with turrets and church-like arches.

It's a real house, Makepeace told herself. People live here. I could live here.

She blinked up at the sunny walls, then shivered despite herself. It was like watching someone smile with their mouth and not their eyes. Somehow, the house made even the daylight cold.

A seven-foot stone wall surrounded the house, stables and stone-flagged courtyard. Three great mastiffs were chained to the wall. When she drew close they exploded into motion, running to the full extent of their chain, then leaping and snarling at her unfamiliar scent. She jumped back, her heart banging. She could feel Bear's fear as well, like a crimson fog, uncertain whether to lash out or flee the bared teeth.

One grand gate was set in the wall, wide enough for a coach-and-four. Through it she could see only open fields, then drear tufted moorland. She remembered Obadiah threatening to throw her out on to the moors, to freeze or have her brain eaten by wandering ghosts.

Count your blessings, she told herself, repeating Young Crowe's words. Better to be working in the kitchen here, than chained up in the Bird Chamber. And the Bird Chamber was better than the real Bedlam would have been. And even Bedlam would be better than starving out in the cold, and having my brain eaten by mad ghosts.

She inhaled a deep breath of the fresh air, and blinked up at the high, heavy sunlit walls. I am lucky, she told herself. Better in here than out there. Grizehayes was strange and frightening, but it was a fortress. It could keep the darkness out. Even as she tried to convince herself, however, she was wondering why her mother had fled the house, and remembering her words.

You have no idea what I saved you from! If I had stayed in Grizehayes ...

Makepeace made heroic efforts to impress Mistress Gotely throughout the day. And then, during the rush to cook dinner, she ruined everything.

Next to the hearth, a little turnspit dog ran in a wooden wheel fixed to the wall, turning it to revolve the great roasting spit over the fire. The ugly little dog's tail was a stump, its muzzle cracked with heat and age, and it wheezed in the smoke. However, it was Mistress Gotely's habit of tossing embers at its feet to make it run faster that was more than Makepeace could bear.

Vivid in her mind were Bear's memories of his own cubhood, and the coals thrown under his feet to force him to dance. Each time a glowing fragment bounced off the turnspit wheel, showering sparks, she remembered—felt—the searing pain under her paws ...

'Stop it!' she exploded at last. 'Leave him alone!'

Mistress Gotely stared at her astonished, and Makepeace was taken aback by her own outburst. But she was too full of rage to apologize. She could only stand in front of the wheel, shaking with anger.

'What did you say to me?' The under-cook gave her a meaty cuff about the head, and knocked Makepeace to the ground.

Bear was raging, and Makepeace's cheek stung. It would be so easy to give in and go to the dark place, let Bear take care of the blind rampage ... She swallowed, and struggled to clear her mind.

'He'll run better,' she said thickly, 'if his paws aren't covered in burns and blisters! Let me have charge of him, I'll have him running faster than you ever did.'

Mistress Gotely hauled her to her feet by her collar.

'I don't care how that wilful mother of yours brought you up,' growled the under-cook. 'This is my kitchen. I do the yelling here, nobody else.' She gave Makepeace a couple of hard, hasty knocks around the head and shoulders, then gave an impatient snort. 'All right, the dog's your problem now. If he's slow, you take his place and turn the spit for him. No whining about the heat!'

To Makepeace's relief and surprise, the old cook seemed in no hurry to report her, or have her chained up again. If anything, afterwards they were a little more at ease with each other, in their own surly, reserved way. They had found the edges of each other's temper, like jagged rocks under a placid skin of water.

When the pair of them finally had their own dinner before the great hearth, the grumpy silence was almost companionable. The cook chewed away at a hunk of the tough, dark bread Makepeace had eaten all her life. To Makepeace's surprise, however, Mistress Gotely handed her a piece of golden-crusted white bread, of the sort the rich ate.

'Don't just stare at it,' the cook told her curtly. 'Eat it. Lord Fellmotte's orders.' Makepeace bit into it gingerly, marvelling at its sweetness, and the way it yielded under her teeth. 'Be grateful, and don't ask questions.'

Makepeace chewed, wondering at this strange show of kindness from the frosty Obadiah. Then she asked questions anyway.

'You said my mother was wilful,' she managed through a mouthful. 'Did you know her?'

'A little,' admitted Mistress Gotely, 'though she mostly worked upstairs.' She said 'upstairs' as if it were as far away as France.

'Is it true she ran away? Or did they throw her out for being with child?' Makepeace knew that such things sometimes happened.

'No,' said Mistress Gotely curtly. 'Oh no, they wouldn't have turned her away. She ran off one night of her own free will, without saying a word to anyone.'

'Why?'

'How should I know? She was a secretive creature. Did she never tell you?'

'She never told me anything,' Makepeace said flatly. 'I didn't even know who my father was until after she was gone.'

'And ... you know now?' asked the old cook, giving her a sharp, sideways look.

Makepeace hesitated, then nodded.

'Well, you would have found out sooner or later anyway.' The cook nodded slowly. 'Everybody here knows—it's as plain as the chin on your face. But ... I wouldn't go talking about it too freely. The family might think you were being impudent and making claims for yourself. Be grateful for what you have, and cause no trouble, and you'll get by.'

'Can you tell me what he was like, then?' Makepeace asked.

The old cook sighed, then rubbed her leg, looking affectionate and wistful.

'Ah, poor Sir Peter! Have you met James Winnersh? He was a lot like James. James is a reckless rascal, but he has a good heart. He makes mistakes, but he makes them honestly.'

Makepeace began to understand why Sir Thomas might be fond of James, if he reminded him of his dead brother.

'What happened to Sir Peter?' she asked.

'He tried to leap a hedge too high, on a horse that was worn out,' the cook answered with a sigh. 'The horse went down, and rolled on him. He was so young—barely past his twentieth summer.'

'Why was his horse so tired?' Makepeace could not help asking.

'There's no asking him now, is there?' Mistress Gotely told her sharply. 'But ... some said that he rode himself ragged looking for your mother. It was two months after she disappeared, you see.' She glanced at Makepeace, and frowned slightly.

'You were a mistake, girl,' she said simply, 'but a mistake honestly meant.'

.....

That evening Makepeace learned that, as the lowliest and youngest person working in the kitchen, she would not be sharing a bed with the other servingwomen. Instead, she would now sleep on a straw pallet under the great kitchen table each night, and make sure the fire did not go out. She was not alone. The turnspit dog and two of the huge mastiffs slept by the fire as well.

Bear was not happy with the nearness of the dogs, but at least he seemed used to the smell. Dogs had loud mouths, cruel mouths, but they were a fact of life. Dog-smell in the markets, dog-smell at night by the campfires.

In the dead of night, Makepeace was jolted awake by a long, rumbling growl, close to her head. One of the great dogs was awake. For a moment she was afraid that it had smelt her and decided that she was a trespasser. Then she heard a faint scuff of footsteps, too light and cautious to be those of the old cook. Someone was coming.

'Come on out!' murmured James's voice. 'Nero won't bite now—unless I tell him to.' He grinned as Makepeace wriggled out. 'I told you I would get you out of there!'

'Thank you,' Makepeace said hesitantly, still maintaining her distance. She was starting to get a sense of how far Bear liked to keep from people when he was not used to them. Even now she could feel his unease, his desire to pull himself up to his full height and snort a threat to scare off the stranger. But she was already standing as tall as she could, and had no more height in reserve.

'You did well getting a job in the kitchen,' said James, settling cross-legged on the great table. 'It's perfect. We can help each other now. I'll keep an eye out for you, and teach you how everything works. And you can tell me anything you overhear. Fetch me things from the kitchen when nobody's looking—'

'You want me to steal for you?' Makepeace glared at him, wondering if this was why he had helped her in the first place. 'If anything goes missing, they'll know it's me! I'll be thrown out of Grizehayes!'

James looked at her for a long moment, then very slowly shook his head.

'No,' he said. 'You won't.'

'But—'

'I mean it. They'd punish you. They'd beat you. Maybe they'd even chain you up in the Bird Chamber again. But they wouldn't throw you out. Not even if you begged them to.'

'What are you talking about?'

'I've been trying to run away for five years,' said James. 'Over and over again. And they chase me down and bring me back here, every time.'

Makepeace stared at him. Was it unusual for rich men to chase down runaway servants? She had heard of rewards put out for runaway apprentices, but she guessed that was different.

'You had nightmares, didn't you?' asked James suddenly, throwing Makepeace off balance. 'Dreams so bad you woke up screaming. Ghosts clawing their way into your head ...'

Makepeace shuffled away from him a few inches, and watched him with a seethe of distrust and uncertainty.

'I had dreams like that too,' James continued. 'They started five years ago, when I was nine. And not long after that, the Fellmottes sent men to collect me. My mother argued at first. Then they paid her, and she stopped arguing.' He gave a small, bitter smile. 'The Fellmottes don't care about wild oats like us, unless we start having those nightmares. Then they care. Then they harvest us, and bring us here. They heard about your dreams, and fetched you here too, didn't they?'

'Why?' asked Makepeace, intrigued. It was true, Obadiah had seemed more interested in her nightmares than anything else about her. 'Why would they care about our dreams?'

'I don't know,' admitted James. 'But we're not the only ones. Lord Fellmotte's cousins visit sometimes, and all of them seem to have a servant or two with that Fellmotte look. I think all the Fellmottes collect their by-blows when they turn out to be dreamers.

'They collect us, and they don't let us go again. I found that out when I tried to run off home. I wouldn't try to go back there now—that woman would just sell me to the Fellmottes again.' He scowled, evidently embarrassed.

'By night,' he continued, 'the main doors are made fast with a great bar and chains, and the hall-boy sleeps in front of them. The gate is locked and there are dogs loose in the courtyard. So I slipped out by daylight. But there are bare fields beyond the walls for three miles—I stood out like blood on snow.

'On my second try I got farther—right out on to the moorland. Bitter bleak it was out there, miles of moors and woods. Winds so cold my fingers started to turn black. I stumbled into a village half frozen, and little good it did me. The farmers there took one look at this –' he tapped his chin—'then collared me, and brought me back here. They knew what I was, and who wanted me, and they looked frightened.

'Last year, I thought I'd got clean away. Fifty miles, across three rivers, all the way to Braybridge in the next county.' James shook his head again, and grimaced. 'They sent White Crowe after me. You met him, he brought you here. The family use him for important things they need done quietly. He's their shadow hand. And everybody fell over themselves to help him find me—even powerful men. The Fellmottes aren't just a great family. Everybody's afraid of them.'

Makepeace bit her cheek and said nothing. He was probably boasting like the Poplar apprentices did, making much of his adventures, but his words opened up little cracks of unease in her mind.

'But don't you see, now you can help!' James continued. 'They're wise to me, but they won't suspect you. You can act as lookout! Or put aside things that we'll need for our escape—provisions, beer, candles—'

'I can't run away!' exclaimed Makepeace. 'I don't have anywhere else to go! If I lose my place here, I'll be starved or frozen to death before Whit Sunday! Or murdered!'

'I'll protect you!' insisted James.

'How? The country is going all to pieces—everyone says so, and I've seen it! You can't protect me from ... from mobs gone mad, or bullets! Or ghosts that want to eat my brain! Here I have a bed and food, and that's more than I'll get on the moors! I even ate white bread today!'

'Our father's blood buys a few blessings,' James admitted. 'My food's always been a touch better than what the rest of the servants get. I even have lessons sometimes, in between my duties. Reading. Languages. Riding. Maybe you will too. The other servants don't raise an eyebrow. They know whose bastard I am, even if they don't say so.'

'Then why are you trying to run away?'

'Have you seen old Obadiah?' James asked sharply.

'Yes,' said Makepeace slowly, and could not quite keep a wobble out of the word. 'He's ...'

There was a long pause.

'You can see it too, can't you?' whispered James. He looked stunned but relieved.

Makepeace hesitated, peering into his face. She suddenly wondered whether all of this was a test set up by Obadiah. If she said something disrespectful now, perhaps James would report it, and maybe then she would be turned out of the house or chained up in the Bird Chamber again.

You couldn't trust people. Dogs snarled before they bit you, but people often smiled.

James had a sunburnt face and far-apart eyes. However, it was his scab-knuckled hands that Makepeace noticed most of all. They were the hands of someone reckless, a scuffler and scrapper, but they were also honest hands. The sight of them made a difference somehow. Makepeace allowed herself a grain of trust.

'I don't know what it means!' she whispered. 'But there's something ...'

'... wrong with him,' finished James.

'It feels ... when I look into his eyes ... it's like when the dead things in my nightmares ...'

'I know.'

'But he's alive!'

'Yes! And yet he makes your skin crawl and your thumbs prick? Nobody else sees it but us, or if they do they don't talk about it. And –' James leaned forward to whisper in her ear—'Obadiah's not the only one. The older Fellmottes are all like that.'

'Sir Thomas is not!' Makepeace remembered the heir's bright brown eyes.

'No, not yet,' James said earnestly. 'They don't start that way. It's only when they inherit and come into their land and titles that something happens. They change. It's as if their blood turns cold overnight. Even other folks know there's something different about them. The servants call them the "Elders and Betters". They're too fast. Too clever. They know too much that they shouldn't. And you can't lie to them. They see right through you.

'That's why we must leave! This house is a ... roost for devils! We're not servants, we're prisoners! They won't even tell us why!'

Makepeace chewed her lip, tormented by indecision. There was something wrong with Obadiah, all her instincts said so. Mother had fled Grizehayes, and taken every pain to make sure that the Fellmottes could not find her. And there was Bear to consider—Bear who might be torn out of her and destroyed if Obadiah worked out that he was there.

But these were all uncertain terrors. The fear of being chained up and beaten again, or cast out to become a starving, ghost-maddened vagrant, was so solid she could touch it. There was also the tormenting thought that perhaps Mother's crazed, tattered ghost was still out there somewhere beyond Grizehayes's protective walls, roaming and looking for Makepeace. The very thought was white-hot with hope and dread, and her mind flinched from it.

'I'm sorry,' Makepeace said quietly. 'I can't run with you. I need a home, even if it's this one.'

'I don't blame you for being frightened,' said James, gently enough. 'But I'll wager my neck we have more to fear here than anywhere else. I hope you change your mind. I hope you change it soon enough to come with me.'

Makepeace was not used to kindness, and it was almost more than she could bear. Since Mother's death, there had been a vast, aching hole in her world, and she was desperate for somebody to fill it. For a moment, Makepeace hovered on the brink of telling James about Bear.

But she bit her tongue and the moment passed. It was too big a secret for somebody she knew so slightly. James might betray her. He might not understand. He might be frightened of her, or decide she was mad after all. Her friendship with him was too new and fragile, and she needed it.

CHAPTER 8

Weeks passed, and Makepeace won the under-cook's grudging approval by being a hard worker and quick learner. She was bottom of the pecking order, so she was always first out of bed, the early morning water-fetcher, ember-carrier, chicken-feeder and kindling-bringer. The work was exhausting, and the heat and smoke still alarmed Bear, but she was starting to learn the tricks of the turnspit wheel, the beehive oven, the dripping pans and the chimney crane for the kettle. She no longer panicked when told to run to the saltbox, the sugar loaf or the meat safe.

Mistress Gotely sometimes saw Makepeace sneaking scraps to the dogs who slept in the kitchen, or letting them lick gravy from her hands.

'Soft-headed little doddypoll,' she muttered, and shook her head. 'They'll eat you bones and all if you let them.' But the gravy had already begun to cast its slow, savoury spell over the dogs' loyalties. None of them growled at her in the night now. In fact, sometimes she slept in a heap with them, their breathing and warmth soothing her dreamless mind, the ugly little turnspit dog nestled in her arms.

As Makepeace hoped, the dogs' friendliness lowered Bear's hackles too. In his head, all beasts, whether human or otherwise, seemed to be divided into 'safe' and 'probably dangerous'. Familiar, safe animals were allowed to get close to him. Unfamiliar, suspicious creatures needed to be scared off with coughs and menaces.

What a frightened cub you are, thought Makepeace.

She had far more trouble with her writing lessons. Once a week, late at night after a long day's work, she was tutored alongside James by Young Crowe, her jailer during her time in the Bird Chamber. To judge by his self-congratulatory smirk, he considered his 'treatments' to have cured her so-called madness.

Makepeace now knew that there was a whole family of Crowes serving the Fellmottes. The other servants, in their blunt, practical way, gave them nicknames to tell them apart. Young Crowe's father, the steward of Grizehayes, was Old Crowe. As James had already told her, the white-haired man who had fetched Makepeace to Grizehayes was White Crowe.

Makepeace had only ever learned to make an 'M' as her 'mark'. She had seen people read, their gaze floating down the lines like a leaf on a stream-current. But when she stared at the letters, they stared back, insect-splats of bulges and splayed legs. Her untrained hand could not shape them. It made her feel stupid. It did not help that she was usually too tired at the end of the day to think straight.

Young Crowe was condescendingly philosophical about Makepeace's lack of learning.

'Do you know what a young bear looks like, when it is fresh out of its mother's womb?' he said. 'Naught but a shapeless mass. She has to lick it for hours until it is cub-shaped, gives it a snout, ears, dainty paws, everything it will need for the rest of its life.

'You are sadly unformed, for one of your years. Like a blob of fat. But we will lick you into shape.'

Makepeace smiled despite herself. She wondered whether Bear had been licked into shape by his mother, in some happy time before all the cruelty. She was charmed by the idea of the little cub gaining its eyes, and blinking up at a big, maternal bear-tongue. Young Crowe noticed the smile, and dug out bestiaries, so that she could read and copy the words. Makepeace was a lot happier writing about animals.

The Toad and Spider are most poisonous enemies and will fight each other to Destruction, she learned. The Pelican suckles her Young with her Heart's Blood. The Badger's Legs are longer on one side than the other so that it runs faster on Sloping Ground.

Makepeace was gradually getting a better sense of Bear's ways. He was not always awake in her mind. A lot of the time he was asleep, and then it was as if he were not there at all. He was more likely to be awake and restless during the grey times of early morning and twilight, but he could not be predicted. Sometimes Bear would surface without warning. His emotions would giddily spill into hers. Her senses would be flooded with his. Bear generally seemed to live in the present, but he carried his memories like forgotten bruises. Now and then he would knock against one of them, and tumble bemused into an abyss of pain.

He was curious and patient, but his fear could whip-crack into rage in an instant. Makepeace lived in fear of that rage. For now the pair of them were safe, but they were one good rampage away from the Fellmottes deciding Makepeace was mad or, worse still, realizing she was haunted.

She was settling in at Grizehayes, and yet she was always unsettled. Even the little signs of preferment—the lessons, the extra spoonful of pottage at lunch—made her uneasy. It reminded her of the geese and swans she was helping to fatten up for the table, and made her wonder whether some hidden knife was waiting for her too.

.....

In the early autumn, the household was thrown into enthusiastic confusion when two long-absent members of the Fellmotte family returned to Grizehayes. One was Sir Marmaduke, a well-connected second cousin of Lord Fellmotte, who had his own grand estate in the Welsh marches. The other was Symond, Sir Thomas's eldest son and heir.

Symond's late mother had done her duty and obligingly turned out eight children before dying of a fever. Four of them were still breathing. The two adult daughters had been advantageously married off. Their nine-year-old sister was in the care of a cousin, and had been quietly promised in marriage to a baronet's son. Symond was the only surviving son.

Symond and Sir Marmaduke had come straight from the court in London, so the whole household was agog to hear the latest news from the capital. In exchange for a few mugs of beer down in the courtyard, the coachman was glad to satisfy his inquisitive audience.

'Earl of Stafford's dead,' he said. 'Parliament arrested 'im for treason. Now 'is 'ead's stuck up on Traitor's Gate.'

There were gasps of dismay.

'The poor Earl!' muttered Mistress Gotely. 'After all he'd done, fighting for the King! What is Parliament playing at?'

'They want more power for themselves, that's all,' said Young Crowe. 'They're robbing the King of his friends and allies, one by one. Not all of Parliament is rotten, but there's a poisonous little hive of Puritans in there, stirring the rest up. Those are the real traitors—and frothing mad, every one.'

'All Puritans is mad,' muttered Long Alys, the red-haired laundry maid. 'Oh, I mean no harm by that, Makepeace, but it is true!'

Makepeace had given up trying to tell everyone that she was not a Puritan. Her outlandish, preachy name set her apart. In some respects, she welcomed the distance it put between her and others. It was dangerous to get too close to anyone.

Besides, Makepeace no longer knew who was right, or which way was up. Listening to the Grizehayes folk discuss the news made her feel as though her brain were being turned inside out. Back in Poplar, everyone had known that the King was being led astray by evil advisers and Catholic plots, and that Parliament was full of brave, honest, clear-sighted men who wanted the best for everybody. It had been so obvious! It had been common sense! Right now, the Poplar folk would probably be celebrating the death of the wicked Earl. Praise the Lord, Black Tom Tyrant is dead!

But here in Grizehayes, it was just as obvious to everybody that a power-hungry Parliament driven to frenzy by crazy Puritans was trying to steal power from the rightful King. Neither side seemed to be stupid, and both were equally certain.

Was I raised by Puritans? I believed what they believed back then. Were we all frothing mad? Or was I right then, and am I mad now?

'But this is news the masters could send by a letter!' said Mistress Gotely. 'Why have they come here in person, so sudden?'

'They were bringing something home,' said the coachman, with a mysterious air. 'I had my eye on it for only a second, but it looked to be a parchment, with a wax seal on it the size of your palm.' He dropped his voice to a whisper, despite the dozen listening ears arrayed around him. 'The King's own seal, if I had to guess.'

.....

'It's a royal charter,' James told Makepeace later that day, when they had a chance to talk privately. 'I had the truth of it from Master Symond.'

'Are you and Master Symond friends?' asked Makepeace in surprise.

She had caught a glimpse of Symond, dismounting in the courtyard from a fine grey mare. He was only about nineteen years old, but lavishly dressed in lace and sky-coloured velvets. With his ice-blond hair, and air of courtly elegance, he seemed rare and expensive, like the icing swans Mistress Gotely sometimes made for important guests. He was smooth-featured, and quite unlike Sir Thomas, apart from the little dint in his chin.

To tell the truth, she was rather impressed that James was on close terms with such an exotic creature. She could see James preening himself and wanting to say yes, but his honesty triumphed.

'Sometimes,' he said instead. 'I was his companion when he was growing up here ... and sometimes we were friends. He gave me these clothes, and these good shoes—they were all his once. He also gave me this.' James pushed up his hair, and Makepeace could see a white scar nicking his hairline over his left temple.

'We were out on a hunt together once, and our horses were a pair of fine-fettled girls. We leaped a hedge, and I took it more cleanly than he did. I knew it, and he knew it. I could see him looking at me like thunder. So just as we were coming to the next hedge, out of the sight of the others, he leaned over and hit me across the face with his whip. I slipped in the saddle, my horse stopped in surprise, and over its head I went, into the hedge!' James laughed, and seemed to find it much funnier than Makepeace did.

'You might have broken your neck!' she exclaimed.

'I'm sturdier than that,' said James calmly. 'But it taught me a lesson. He may look like milk and honey, but there's a lord's pride and temper underneath. He told me afterwards that I'd left him no choice—that he needed to be the best. I suppose that's as near as he could get to saying sorry.'

Makepeace thought that this was not near enough, by any means.

'He went away to university at Oxford, and since then Sir Marmaduke has been introducing him at court. Each time he comes back, he's lofty as a cloud at first, and hardly seems to know me. But as soon as we're talking alone, it's like old times ... for a while.'

Makepeace felt a twinge of jealousy at the thought of James having confidential conversations with somebody else. She had no right to feel that way, and she knew it.

James had become her closest living friend and confidant. She trusted him more than any other human, and yet she had still not told him about Bear. The longer she left it, the harder it was to admit to James that she had hidden something so important from him. After three months, it no longer seemed possible to tell him. She felt guilty about it, and a little sad sometimes, as if she had missed a boat and been stranded forever on a lonely shore.

'So what is this charter?' she asked. 'Did Master Symond say?'

'He hasn't read it,' said James, 'nor does he know what's in it. He says it's deadly secret. He also says the King didn't like it at all, and Sir Marmaduke had great trouble getting him to sign it. His Majesty agreed in the end, but only because the Fellmottes are lending him a fortune, and Sir Marmaduke is helping him sell some of the royal jewels.'

Makepeace frowned. All of this was stirring a murky, ominous memory from her first day at Grizehayes.

'Is the King desperate for money?' She recalled Lord Fellmotte saying those very words.

'I suppose he must be.' James shrugged.

'What do royal charters do?' asked Makepeace.

'They're ... royal declarations.' James sounded a bit uncertain. 'They give you permission to do things. Like ... building battlements on your house. Or ... selling pepper. Or attacking foreign ships.'

'So what's the point of a secret declaration, then?' demanded Makepeace. 'If the King gave you permission to do something, why wouldn't you want everyone to know?'

'Hmm. That is odd.' James frowned thoughtfully. 'But the charter definitely gives the Fellmottes permission for something. Master Symond said he overheard Sir Marmaduke saying something about "our ancient customs and practices of inheritance".'

'James,' Makepeace said slowly. 'The evening I first came to this house, I overheard his lordship and White Crowe talking about something. White Crowe was saying that there were people at court accusing the Fellmottes of witchcraft.'

'Witchcraft!' James's eyebrows shot up. 'Why didn't you tell me?'

'I was half mad with fever that day! It's like remembering a nightmare. I've scarce thought about it since.'

'But you're sure they said witchcraft?'

'I think so. Lord Fellmotte said they couldn't stop the King hearing rumours like that, so they needed to stop him acting on them. They needed a hold on him. And then they talked about how the King was desperate for money, and how they might be able to arrange something.'

James scowled at nothing for a while.

'So ... what if the Fellmottes' "ancient customs" are something evil?' he said slowly. 'Something that might get them accused of being witches? If the King has signed a charter giving permission for something devilish, then he can't ever arrest them as witches, can he? Because if he does, they'll show everyone that charter, and he'll be accused too.'

'If the Fellmottes fall, so does he.' Makepeace completed the thought. 'It's blackmail.'

'I told you there was something wrong with the Fellmottes!' exclaimed James. 'Their "ancient customs" ... It must be something to do with what happens when they inherit! I told you, they change. Maybe they give up their souls to the Devil!'

'We don't know—' began Makepeace.

'We know that they're witches, or close enough!' retorted James. 'Why won't you run away with me? What will it take for you to change your mind?'

This question was answered the very next day.

CHAPTER 9

The next morning dawned sultry but bright, so a handful of servants were sent with pails and ladders to gather the ripe apples from the little walled orchard at Grizehayes. The trees were lush-leaved and bowed over with fruit, and the air sweet with their smell.

Makepeace happened to be there, picking some ripe quinces for Mistress Gotely, when a loud crash sounded from the other side of the orchard. There were a few screams and cries of alarm.

She sprinted towards the sound. One of the stablehands, Jacob, had clearly fallen out of the tallest tree while picking apples. He had always been a joker, Makepeace thought in a daze, as she stared down at his face. It was still creased, as though mid-laugh. His neck, however, was at a new angle, and made her think of the dead chickens on the kitchen table.

Somebody ran to the house to tell Sir Thomas about the accident. He soon appeared, and organized a stretcher. Then everybody was told to leave the orchard.

For a brief moment, Makepeace thought she saw a faint shimmer above Jacob's body. The air briefly creased and whispered. She gave a small, involuntary gasp, and took a step backwards.

Something brushed against her mind, and she was flooded with a scrambled mess of memories that were not her own.

... Fear, pain, two children laughing, a grass-stain on a woman's cheek, chilblains and hot cider, dappled apples in the sun, lichen slippery under hands ...

Makepeace turned and ran from the orchard, heart banging. It was only when she was back in the kitchen, gasping for breath, that she realized that she had forgotten the basket of quinces she needed for the evening meal.

'Well, go back and get it!' shouted Mistress Gotely. 'Quickly!'

Sick with nerves, Makepeace hurried back. At the gate of the orchard, however, she encountered James, who stopped her.

'Don't go in,' he whispered.

'I just need—'

James shook his head urgently. He put a finger to his lips, and pulled her to stand beside him, peering in through the archway. His face was tense, and Makepeace realized that he was more nervous than she had ever seen him.

The orchard was empty of apple-pickers now. One solitary man stalked between the trees. He was unusually tall and strongly built, yet moved with an unnerving, stealthy grace.

'Sir Marmaduke,' whispered James.

Three sharp-eyed greyhounds milled around Sir Marmaduke's feet, quivering with expectancy and excited tension. A bloodhound snuffled the ground.

'What's he doing?' mouthed Makepeace.

James leaned close to her ear. 'Hunting,' he whispered back.

The bloodhound stiffened, and uttered a low, ominous bark. It seemed to be staring intently at an empty patch of grass.

Sir Marmaduke lifted his head. Even from that distance, Makepeace could see that his features were curiously expressionless, but there was something about them that made her innards flinch. It was the same sense of wrongness and horror that had overwhelmed her upon meeting Lord Fellmotte. Sir Marmaduke put his head on one side, as if listening, with a very slight, calm, predatory smile. He remained that way for a time, perfectly and eerily still.

Something moved infinitesimally, shaking a nettle and knocking a drowsy bee into the air. Briefly Makepeace thought she glimpsed a little twist of smoke amid the dancing shadows.

Jacob.

In that moment, Sir Marmaduke leaped into action.

They're too fast, James had said of the Elders. At last Makepeace understood what he meant. One moment Sir Marmaduke was a statue, the next he was sprinting across the grass with incredible speed. People usually tensed for a moment before they ran, Makepeace realized, but Sir Marmaduke had not. The dogs poured after their master, moving like wolves to flank their invisible prey.

The lone ghost fled them, weaving desperately between the trees. As it drew closer to the archway, Makepeace could see it more clearly. It was bleeding shadow in its panic. It was wounded, terrified, uncoordinated. She could just hear its thin, whispery, undulating wail.

It zigzagged, swerving away from the snapping jaws of the dogs, letting itself be hounded this way and that. It could never outpace Sir Marmaduke, and yet the Elder always slowed when he was a step behind it.

He's toying with it, Makepeace realized in horror. He's hounding it so it burns itself out.

The ghost was faltering and guttering now, like a grey flame almost spent. It disappeared into the dappled shadow of the nearest tree, and Sir Marmaduke pounced on it at last, his curled fingers closing on something in the grass.

He was turned away from Makepeace, but she saw him bow his head, and raise whatever he clutched close to his face.

There was a thistly, rending sound. Something screamed—a faint, impossible scream that still managed to sound human.

Makepeace gave an involuntary intake of breath, and James clapped a hand over her mouth to stop her crying out.

'There's nothing we can do!' he hissed in her ear.

There were more tearing sounds, and Makepeace could not bear any more. She pulled away from James and ran back to the main house. James caught up with her by the door to the kitchen, and hugged her tightly to stop her shaking.

'That was Jacob!' whispered Makepeace. Jacob the jester, always laughing because he was among friends.

'I know,' said James with quiet anger.

'He tore him apart! He ...' She did not know exactly what Sir Marmaduke had done. She was fairly sure you could not bite a ghost, yet she could not help imagining the Elder rending the helpless ghost with his teeth.

Lord Fellmotte had talked about 'destroying vermin', and Makepeace had never let herself think about that too hard. She had just been glad that no rogue ghosts could attack her in Grizehayes. But now she had seen what 'destroying vermin' meant.

Is that what the Fellmottes would do with Bear's spirit if they found out about him? And what if she or James died at Grizehayes? Would they be hounded to shreds too? She had seen Sir Marmaduke smile, as if he were hunting for sport.

'He enjoyed it!' she whispered bitterly in James's ear. 'You were right about everything! This is a roost of devils! Let me come with you!'

.....

The pair of them ran away in the late afternoon. James volunteered to collect kindling. Makepeace arranged to be sent to forage for mushrooms and wild chicory. They met by the old oak, and fled.

As they walked briskly down the lane, trying to look natural, Makepeace thought that her heart would burst from beating too hard. For the first time she wondered if this was why James ran away over and over, so that he could feel this surge of unbearable aliveness. Although James sauntered casually, Makepeace could see his eyes darting from side to side, to see whether they were being observed.

Once the fields yielded to moor, they abandoned the lane and cut across country. Makepeace took out a tiny pinch of pepper she had stolen from Mistress Gotely's treasure chest of spices, and scattered it across the path, to discourage any dog from following their trail.

The undulating moorland path was treacherous. The vivid bracken frequently hid sudden dips, briars, toe-hooking roots and sharp rocks. After they had been slithering and clambering for a few hours, the sun set, and the sky dulled to umber.

'They'll have missed us by now,' said James, 'but I doubt they can track us in the dark.' Makepeace was starting to wonder about the pair's chances of finding their own way once night had fully fallen.

As the light was fading, Makepeace felt Bear wake in her head. He was surprised to find himself free from walls. She felt herself rising on to the balls of her feet and craning her neck upward, as Bear strove to see and smell better.

Her eyes seemed to adjust to the twilight. Not for the first time, Makepeace suspected that Bear's night vision was better than hers. At the same time, she became aware of the scents on the breeze—gorse pollen, rotting berries, sheep dung and distant woodsmoke.

As the wind changed direction, blowing from Grizehayes, she caught another scent. A familiar animal smell, sharp with eagerness and hunger.

'Dogs!' she whispered aloud, her blood running cold. A moment later she caught the distant sound of tumultuous barking. Peering back the way they had come, she could just make out the tiny, bright pinpricks of lanterns.

'James! They're coming!'

The two siblings picked up their pace, ignoring bruised knuckles and scratches, and keeping to the low paths to avoid silhouetting themselves against the sky. They splashed across a stream to confuse the dogs. But still the company of lanterns gained, and showed no sign of being thrown off the scent.

How do they know where we are?

Distant human voices became audible. One deep, commanding bellow was louder than the rest.

'That's Sir Marmaduke!' James's eyes were bright with alarm.

They scrambled on, flayed by briars and bracken. Makepeace knew she was slowing James down. She was growing tired, and was much less agile than he was. As the sky dimmed, though, he seemed to be having more trouble making out the shadowed dips, rises and snagging roots. Makepeace realized that her brother was struggling in the dark.

The barking abruptly stopped. For a moment Makepeace could not understand why. Then, she imagined great dogs released from their leashes, running silently across the rugged ground ...

She froze, and stared around at what was now a wasteland of hopelessness. No tree to climb, no building to hide in. Only a steep incline ahead, which perhaps they could slide down to find cover ...

But before she could voice the thought, a lean, dark, four-legged shape exploded from the undergrowth. It hit James in the chest, knocking him backwards down the slope.

Another dog erupted from the gorse, and Makepeace saw its teeth glisten as it leaped for her face. It was too fast for her, but not for Bear. She watched her arm swing across, clouting the dog away out of the air with a force that shocked her. The dog hit the ground yards away and rolled, then recovered its feet unsteadily.

Beyond it, Makepeace saw two more dogs racing towards her, leaping and zigzagging between the gorse mounds. With a sick sense of unreality, Makepeace saw that they were not alone.

A man was running alongside the dogs, miraculously matching their speed and sure-footedness. A lantern jangled in one of his hands, showing his tall, strongly built figure, plum worsted coat and strangely impassive face.

Makepeace wasted valuable seconds simply staring. Sir Marmaduke's speed was uncanny, impossible. It was like watching rain falling upwards.

She could hear James yelling, amid guttural snarls and rending sounds. She did not know if the dog was tearing his collar or his throat. She had too many enemies, and James ... James ...

'Stop it!' Makepeace screamed. 'Please! Call off the dogs!'

Sir Marmaduke gave a curt whistle, and the sounds of struggle ceased. Makepeace stood there panting, ringed about by dogs, willing Bear not to fight or flee. Rustling steps approached, and lanterns bobbed towards her from several directions. James was hauled out of the ditch by Young Crowe, his collar torn to shreds but his skin unbroken.

Apprehending Makepeace was almost an afterthought. In the darkness, she realized, nobody had seen her hurl a large hound away with suspicious strength. Her secret, at least, had survived.

It was a long, cold walk back to Grizehayes. James stared at the ground as he stumbled along, and for a while Makepeace thought that he might be angry with her for slowing him down. But halfway back, he slipped his hand into hers, and they walked the rest of the way hand in defiant hand.

Next morning in the courtyard, Makepeace watched in anguish as James was given a thrashing so harsh he could hardly stand afterwards. Nobody doubted that he had masterminded the escapade and dragged Makepeace along. After all, he was older than her, and a boy.

Makepeace was beaten too, but less severely, and mostly for the theft of the precious pepper. Mistress Gotely was angry and disappointed.

'Some are hanged for less!' she growled. 'I always wondered when the bad blood in you would show. "Cat will after kind," they say.'

Makepeace returned to her work in the kitchen, doing her best to look like a crestfallen penitent. Her thoughts, however, burned with new force and clarity.

Next time we will need a better way to deal with the dogs. I must try to befriend them all, not just the ones that sleep in the kitchen. And our plan must be flawless, or I will not be the one who suffers most. James is brave and clever, but he does not always think things through.

I have drawn the Elders' attention to me. If they watch me, they will see through me. So I must be beneath their notice. I must be unlovely, unremarkable, boring. I must be careful and patient.

I will find a way to escape from here, even if it takes me years.

As a matter of fact, it did.