The Crowfield Demon by Pat Walsh Page A

not harm you.”
    William had seen enough of magic these last few months to be cautious of it. The thought of actually using it made him feel very apprehensive.
    The hob settled himself beside the fire again, curling his tail around his body and closing his eyes. “What has the one-eyed brother man made for dinner today?” he called sleepily as William reached the door.
    â€œA delicious thick pease pottage with bread warm from the oven and sweetmeats of honey and ground almonds to follow.”
    The hob opened an eye. “He has?”
    â€œNo,” William said with a sigh. “It’s the last of yesterday’s vegetable pottage with a few extra leeks and a handful of barley thrown in. And no sweetmeats.”
    The hob made a disgusted noise and closed his eyes again. “Then you need not bother hurrying back.”
    William walked back through the vegetable garden. Brother Snail had gone back to the abbey to wash his hands before none, the service before dinner. Peter was turning the wet, muddy earth with his shovel, preparing the ground for the spring planting. He smiled at William as he passed by and gave a small wave.
    William reached the garden gate and glanced up at the church tower. He put a hand to the stone around his neck and had an unsettling thought. What would he see if he looked at the church through the holey stone? Would it show him what was lurking inside? He glanced over his shoulder at Peter, but the lay brother was busy with his digging and had his back to him. William pushed open the gate and walked through the monks’ graveyard, around to the north side of the church. He stared up at the cracked wall and slowly pulled the stone from beneath his shirt, then hesitated, wondering whether he really should be doing this. If the abbey is in danger , he told himself, we need to know what we’re up against . He took a deep breath, closed one eye, and peered through the hole.
    At first all he could see was darkness, but as he watched, a light wavered into view. The abbey walls had gone. The light picked out the deeply cragged bark of an oak tree. He moved the stone to see more of the scene before him. The light was coming from a burning brand of wood, wrapped around with rags, carried by a woman with long gray hair. She was old, but her deeply lined face was fierce and her eyes wide and dark. In spite of the cold, her skinny arms were bare. Gold bracelets on her wrists gleamed in the torchlight, and there was a glint of gold at her throat. Other figures, indistinct in the darkness, followed her as she slowly walked around the oak tree. Hanging from a low branch of the tree was a dark shape that glistened wetly in the flaring light. To his horror, William realized it was the remains of a deer, its throat slashed. Broken ribs bristled from a dark hole in its chest, and a bloody bowl on the ground held the animal’s heart.
    With a yell, William let go of the stone and stumbled backward. He tripped on a hummock and went sprawling across the waterlogged grass. Cold water soaked the back of his hose and tunic, and he struggled quickly to his feet, his whole body shaking with terror. He stared around, but there was no trace left of what he had just seen. He quickly pushed the stone down the neck of his undershirt and hurried, slipping and stumbling, back around the end wall of the church.
    When he reached the path through the garden, he slowed his pace. Gradually his breathing steadied, and he thought about what he had just witnessed. He was sure the deer had been a sacrifice, and a memory stirred at the back of his mind. The hob had once told him about a tree called the Hunter’s Oak, growing in a sacred grove, where many years ago people had made offerings to some now-forgotten god. Was that what he had just seen, William wondered, a ghostly shadow of what had once existed where the abbey now stood? Last winter, Shadlok had said Dame Alys’s ancestors were the guardians