Yes, I think I’ll quite enjoy being a spy, he thought to himself.
After breakfast he went down to the Waiting Room. As usual, Lucky had arrived before him. To his surprise, Lick was also there. She gestured for Crafty to sit down, and he settled himself next to Lucky.
‘Extra chess lessons?’ he joked.
Lick had started joining them for lunch and, in addition to draughts, there was now a chess set on the table. While they ate, Lick had been teaching them how to play. She always won because she knew so many different methods of attack and defence. She could also remember every move in games that had been played years ago. But Crafty was slowly improving. He was very determined. One day he would beat her!
He liked learning how to play chess. It was interesting, and somehow seemed to mirror life. For example, there were pawns, the least powerful pieces on the board. Risks were taken with them – they could sometimes be sacrificed to gain an advantage later. So pawns were like gate grubs.
His favourite chess piece was the knight, because it moved across the board in a strange diagonal manner, and players who weren’t concentrating could be taken by surprise. Crafty was going to be like a knight. He was going to surprise those people who wanted to hold on to their secrets.
The queen was the most powerful piece on the board – so that was obviously Bertha. But maybe they had two of them in their fight against the Shole. Lick was their secret queen.
And as for the chess piece called the king – that had to be the Duke. If your king was trapped, you lost the game. If the Shole engulfed the castle, the Duke would be hard to protect.
‘Wake up, Crafty, and stop dreaming!’ Lick commanded with a smile. ‘We’re going to change our routine. From now on we’re going to start each morning with a fifteen-minute briefing. Bit by bit, I’m going to tell you what I know about the Shole.’
‘So you’re going to train us,’ Lucky said, beaming at her.
‘Inform rather than train. It’s the Duke’s idea. He thinks it will help you do your job better, and I agree. It won’t be formal – just a short question-and-answer session, so go ahead and ask me something. It doesn’t matter how stupid!’ she said, grinning at Crafty. ‘I’ll do my very best to answer.’
Crafty smiled back, and without even thinking asked his first question.
‘Is there any way to predict when the Shole will surge again, or is it always going to take us by surprise?’
‘That’s a good first question. It’s something we’re studying very carefully, Crafty. As yet we’ve no way of predicting a big surge, but we have just come up with a new theory. It seems that they take place each time a new aberration is created. Somehow the two events are linked. The surge that swallowed your house happened at the same time as the bog and the Bog Queen came into existence. If that’s the case, then it’s very worrying because aberrations and surges are definitely occurring more frequently.’
Crafty was stunned. That new information about his house hit him like a blow. He suddenly felt very sad. He owed a lot to Bertha, but she had come into existence because of something that had ruined his life forever – for that surge had changed his mother and led to the deaths of his brothers.
‘What about the latest surge – the one that engulfed the canal?’ Lucky asked next.
‘I was coming to that. We’re pretty sure that it was caused by a new, very strong aberration – the one that came through the gate into the castle. It’s already killed two mancers …’
Earlier in the week, whatever killed poor Humperton had struck again. Doon said that it had seized the replacement gate mancer, chewed him up into tiny pieces and spat them out all over his desk.
‘And those two deaths are probably only the start,’ Lick continued. ‘If it’s anything like the previous aberration, the bog, it will grow in size and power. We have to investigate and deal with it somehow before it strikes again.’
‘It could be Viper,’ Crafty suggested. He had already told them about seeing Viper in the orphanage; about the difference he’d seen in him: unlike the other aberrations he’d seemed aware and motivated by something other than blood-lust. If it really was Viper, then Crafty was responsible for this new development. But he pushed away any sense of guilt. He had been fighting for survival – for Lick’s life as well as his own.
‘It’s a possibility,’ Lick admitted, ‘though some boffins have speculated that it might be a witch brought back to life by the Shole. We know that it’s something more dangerous than anything we’ve encountered, and we need to find out exactly what it is.’
Just then the far door opened and the Chief Mancer appeared.
‘Sorry to cut your first briefing short, but this is urgent,’ he announced, his face grim. ‘One of our couriers has just crawled out of the Shole. He was in a very bad way, and before he died he was able to tell us a little of what happened. It could well be that he was attacked by the killer we’re looking for. Proudfoot, you will come with me. You, Benson, will work with Miss Crompton-Smythe.’
They quickly got to their feet, and Crafty followed Lick down to her room. His mouth was dry and his heart was beating rapidly, so he took a few deep breaths to try and control his fear as he sat down in front of the silver gate.
This was what they did, he told himself. Their work would continue. Their priority was to hunt down and destroy that killer – the new aberration. They must find out what it was, and how it was getting through the silver gates. But above all, they had to be ready for when the Shole finally engulfed the castle.
That’s when the fight would truly begin.
Glossary
Aberrations
The generic name given to creatures that dwell within the Shole. The majority evolved from creatures (including humans) who were engulfed and, instead of dying, changed their shape and adapted to life in that new environment.
Black gates
A type of gate that is believed to be under development by the boffins who work within Lancaster Castle. If successful, it would enable mancers and gate grubs to access the world of the damned dead as easily as they do the Shole.
Boffins
Highly skilled theorists, researchers and technicians who develop new methods to combat the effects of the Shole.
Bowland Fells
A range of hills south of Lancaster. Although enveloped by the Shole, most of the green summits rise above it into the Daylight World.
Canal
This runs from Preston to Kendal, passing through Lancaster. It is used by horse-drawn barges carrying all manner of wares. A large portion to the south has now been engulfed and only the northern section between north Lancaster and Kendal is still viable.
Castle Corpus
The collective name for the people who work from Lancaster Castle to learn how to counter the threat from the Shole.
Chair jobs
A task that is carried out from the chair facing the gate. The grub is often strapped in to minimize the danger of being dragged into the Shole by one of the aberrations.
Combined field operation
Where two or more gate grubs pass through their respective gates and work together in the Shole.
Courier craft
The skills used by couriers to protect themselves when travelling through the Shole. Some are magical, others technological. For example, a triangle of three candles can be used to ward off aberrations, while the use of silver alloy is applied science.
Couriers
These are recruited from the Fey and thus largely immune to the effects of the Shole. They carry messages and sometimes medicines to the Daylight Islands encircled by the Shole. They also make regular patrols, noting areas of change and danger, and are skilled in map-making. They are also skilled in the use of courier craft.
Daylight Islands
Pockets of the Daylight World cut off and surrounded by the Shole after a sudden surge. Why they are untouched by the Shole remains a mystery.
Daylight World
The ordinary world, as yet untouched by the Shole.
Duke of Lancaster
The ruler of the Palatine of Lancashire, answerable only to the King. He has the power of life and death over the county’s inhabitants.
Fey
The Fey are humans with potential magical ability which may or may not manifest itself as they grow up. Some have a single ability while others have several. Couriers and gate grubs are traditionally recruited from the Fey. Mancers (from the managerial staff of the Castle Corpus) are not recruited from the Fey, who are sometimes thought to be reckless and unreliable. They are considered to be a necessary evil – except for the few with extremely high academic ability, who become boffins.
Field operations
These are jobs involving a gate grub passing through a silver gate to carry out some task in the Shole.
Fixed locations
Only gate grubs can find new locations within the Shole, but subsequently they can be revisited by mancers using the ratchet-dial on the side of the gate. They are then termed ‘fixed locations’.
Forensics Room
Those who work here apply magical theory and practical technology to the study of deaths and changes in the Shole. Any samples are routinely handed over to the Relic Room within seven days unless the Chief Mancer authorizes an extension.
Gate grubs
Fey humans who are able to venture into the Shole without fear of either dying or changing. Using a silver gate, they also have the ability, using sympathetic magic, to find aberrations, locations and objects within it. Most gate grubs do not survive much longer than a few months.
Geographical aberrations
These types of aberration consist of local changes in the landscape of the Shole rather than to a human or an aberration.
Grey Hoods
This is a cult that worships the Shole. Its members believe that one day it will engulf the whole world and they will then live forever. They actively work to undermine the efforts of the Castle Corpus.
Grey Library
This contains the cumulative knowledge gathered about the Shole over a period of almost seventy years. The name refers firstly to the Shole, which is grey and murky; and secondly to the books in the library, all of which have grey jackets. Thirdly, metaphorically speaking, it refers to the understanding that the facts about the Shole are neither black nor white. All is uncertain and in a state of change – the known facts are grey.
Guillotine
A sharp blade suspended above the area between the chair of a gate grub and the silver gate itself. It slides down between two vertical poles. A gate mancer controls it, by means of a foot pedal, to kill any aberration attempting to enter the Daylight World through the gate. Unfortunately, gate grubs are sometimes killed or maimed by the blade. For them, it is the second most likely cause of death. (The first is failure to return from the Shole after a field operation, when the precise cause of death is usually unknown.)
Lancaster
The chief city of Lancashire, lying on the river Lune. At its centre is Lancaster Castle, which is the focus of attempts to contain the threat from the Shole.
Lancaster Castle
This castle is very old and was once the centre of the county’s judiciary and military. Now it is the centre for research into the Shole and home to the mancers and other experts who hope one day to reverse or destroy it. It also has its own guard, a quasi-military force which is responsible for the security of the castle and for policing the city. They also patrol the boundaries of the Shole to prevent its aberrations entering the Daylight World.
Lure
This is an illusion with which a mancer entices an aberration towards a gate so that a gate grub may snatch it.
Mancers
Specialized mages who have magical and technological power within just one field of expertise. Their magical abilities are developed over time using discipline and meditation, whereas Fey magic is innate and chaotic, and potentially much more powerful. Gate mancers are one of many such categories; necromancers are another. The Chief Mancer manages and has authority over all types of mancer.
Menagerie
This is where live specimens from the Shole are kept for study and experimentation.
Ouroborus
This is a great serpent sometimes called the Earth Dragon. It is a symbol of rebirth as its head is joined to its tail. It was important to ancient tribes like the Segantii and was often represented on their weapons and amulets.
Porter magic
This is used to transmit objects over a distance. It is the means by which many of the Daylight Islands are fed. But the Shole waxes and wanes in strength, and sometimes porter magic does not work.
Preston
A market town on the river Ribble about thirty miles south of Lancaster where the phenomenon known as the Shole first began. At first it merely covered a terraced house in a small street called Water Lane, which is next to a busy thoroughfare called Fylde Road.
Relic Room
This is where artefacts taken from the Shole are stored by its curators. They jealously guard its contents, sometimes undertaking further study of the items without sharing their findings with the Forensics Room.
Samples
Items from the flora or fauna of the Shole, removed to be studied in the castle. Samples may be large and active, or small, or even dead. All or a piece of them is taken for further study.
Segantii
An ancient warlike tribe inhabiting Lancashire before the invasion of the Romans. Some believe that they had a port on the west bank of the river Wyre.
Shade
This is an alternative term for the Shole which is in popular use. Another variant is the Shadow. Mancers always use the term Shole.
Sheol
This is one of the ancient names for Hell. Some believe that the word Shole was derived from it.
Shole
This first manifested near the centre of Preston, in a house in Water Lane, close to a busy thoroughfare called Fylde Road. It gradually expanded to cover most of the town centre. After seventy years of sporadic growth it has extended thirty miles north and now threatens the heart of Lancaster. The Shole changes or kills most creatures within it, including humans (except the Fey). The changed are termed aberrations and they are at their most dangerous after dark.
Silver gates
These are mediums resembling circular framed windows through which a gate grub may access the Shole.
Snatches
When performing a snatch, a gate grub (secured in his or her seat by restraining straps) seeks to drag an aberration out of the Shole into the Daylight World for the purposes of research.
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