The Pepper King

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The Pepper King

Pepper King

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Pepper King

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The Pepper King A ghost story

by RS Harding

Monster Books

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The Creake Castle series is dedicated to Major Francis Budd, otherwise known as ‘Grandpa’

The Pepper King (LA&CS Ltd 3233613. Monster Books) Originally published in Great Britain by Monster Books The Old Smithy, Henley-on-Thames, OXON RG9 2AR All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information storage retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers.

The right of RS Harding to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

Text copyright RS Harding Illustrations copyright Rob Rayevsky This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser ISBN 0-9532261-2-2 soft cover A catalogue record of this book is available from the British Library Printed in Great Britain by Anthony Rowe

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The moon shone down, carpeting the Great Lawn in silver as it threw long shadows out across the lake and lit the surrounding countryside like a negative. An owl floated ever so lightly over the tops of the trees by the Back of Beyond and the ancient Grandfather Clock, standing at the foot of the stairs, struck twelve times.

The Witching Hour had begun...

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Chapter One

Creake Castle and Fred Fred was an unusual boy.

For starters, he lived in an old castle called Creake Castle, high on a green hill, with his parents, Sir and Lady Longshanks. It had been there for centuries, and some of the older people in the village whispered that it had originally been built by a sorcerer, which is a kind of magician; though not the sort you would like to meet at a party.

Secondly, Fred said unusual things. ‘We live in a Sumptuous Mansion,’ he once told a group of people standing at the bus stop. Nobody had anything much to say to this, except an old lady, who tutted.

Fred turned to his mother. ‘I’m a cheeky monkey,’ said Fred.

‘Yes,’ said his mother.

A ‘Sumptuous Mansion’ was not, strictly speaking, that accurate. Although Creake Castle was certainly quite large, and the grounds particularly elegant, had the grass been mown once in a while, the Longshanks family were in fact very, very poor. ‘Crumbling Pile’ was probably a better description. Nor was Fred unusual just for living somewhere that was built before plumbing was invented, or for 1

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occasionally saying irritating things to people in public places. When he was about two, Fred’s mother had wandered into the playroom to find all Fred’s toys piled on top of the cupboard. Lady Longshanks was surprised. The cupboard was at least six foot tall and Fred was barely two and a half foot. The following week, on peering into the playroom, she was pleased to see all the toys back in their rightful place, on the floor – but rather unhappy about the fact that they seemed to have swapped places with her son, who was beaming down at her from on top of the cupboard. Since then, both his parents were somewhat relieved that Fred had kept his supernatural activities to a minimum. Once in a while he made something move just by looking at it in a funny way, or saw things that should not be there, as we shall shortly find out for ourselves – but, generally speaking, he didn’t go out of his way to be eccentric. He just couldn’t help himself sometimes.

Anyway, the Longshanks had enough on their plate, which usually means quite the opposite, from a practical point of view. They no longer held grand balls or kept lots of horses. In fact they could barely afford to keep Frodo, Fred’s dog, in real dog food. He was the only vegetarian dog Fred knew. Frodo mainly lived off boiled potatoes and lots of cabbage, much like Fred, who would often go for weeks without being bought anything that was remotely bad for him. ‘Not well orf,’ his cousins would say when they came to 2

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visit. His mother assured him, however, that although they did not have much money, they were very nice. Young Fred understood this completely. His cousins had stacks of money and they were dreadful. Especially when they came to stay, which they did – all too often.

However, despite the cold cabbage and his cousins coming to stay, Fred would not have swapped his Castle for the world, and neither would his parents. This was all very well – but every year it got harder and harder for them to pay the heating bills and stop the roof caving in. Unfortunately, Fred’s father was not very good at sticking to things, apart from by accident. Usually this meant sticking to jobs. In fact, he seemed to lose jobs the same way that people lost their socks; that is to say, about once a month.

So far Fred’s dad (or Sir Longshanks, to give him his proper name) had been a travelling salesman for a heating firm (he didn’t manage to sell a single heater), the local milkman (he drove the milk van into a pond by mistake and nobody had seen it since), a bicycle repair man (Fred’s dad knew even less about bicycles than he did about milk vans, so you can just imagine how long that one lasted), and a parking inspector (he kept letting people off, which was fine if you wanted to win a popularity contest, but eventually the local town got so full of cars parked illegally, they had to call in the army to sort it all out). And that was just the list of jobs he’d managed to lose so far that year. And it was only 3

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July. He sometimes got depressed because of this, and spent a lot of time in his library, high up in one of the towers, where he would talk to no one, not even Fred’s mother, for ages and ages. This was a pity because Fred loved his dad, especially when his dad was cheerful and they were all together as a family doing normal stuff.

In point of fact, the castle was so big you could go for days without seeing anyone, which meant Fred was pretty much used to his own company. Supper was always cooked at 7 o’clock sharp by Mrs. Bee, the housekeeper, and the only other person who lived full time at Creake now. She had been at the castle since she was a little girl, and was an almost completely round person with a red face like an apple in late autumn. If asked, she would have described herself as ‘jolly’, which meant she laughed all the time, even when things just weren’t that funny. But when Fred’s mother said she could, she baked the most enormous strawberry and chocolate cakes you’ve ever seen in your life, and she was very kind to Fred, who didn’t deserve it a lot of the time.

‘I am particularly fond of where we live, mother,’ Fred said one day. ‘If you sell Creake Castle I shall stop eating.’

‘That’s okay,’ said Lady Longshanks. ‘We’ll stop feeding you before we sell the Castle,’ and she smiled to show she was only joking, then sighed heavily. ‘Now here’s a lettuce, Fred, it’s nearly fresh, take it outside please and feed the hedgehogs.’

‘Feed the hedgehogs, that’s all I’m good for,’ said Fred as 4

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he stomped off down the garden, wading through the long tufty bits of uncut grass by the herb garden that they called the Back of Beyond. ‘When I grow up, I’m going to live in a bouncy castle; and hedgehogs will be banned.’

Now over the centuries various owners had built quite literally miles of secret passageways, leading out from the main tower and going in all sorts of weird and wonderful directions. There were lots of good reasons to have tunnels.

Some were used as escape routes in dangerous times and others simply as convenient short cuts. Some of them were extremely old, as old as the castle itself, and some were quite new (which for Creake Castle meant they were carved out of the bedrock about three hundred years ago). However, there was a strong possibility that any of them could collapse at any moment. Fred was forbidden to explore them because of this, and his mother kept a beady eye on some of the hidden entrances to make sure he wasn’t using them when he thought no one was looking. Nevertheless, over the course of the last couple of long summer holidays Fred had found the time to make a few brief trips to some of the more obvious ones.

For example, there was one that went from a trapdoor under his bed in his room down to the library, and another that started in the kitchen behind the old fireplace and came up unexpectedly at the back door. It was a very good way of 5

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keeping out of Mrs. Bee’s way: otherwise she made Fred stand in the kitchen up to his elbows in ice-cold water, peeling big black lumpy potatoes that grew by the ton in the Back of Beyond.

Fred knew that there were plenty of other tunnels leading away from the castle, out into the grounds and down to the Old Woods or the lake. Fred had even discovered one or two coming from behind two large pillars in the cellar.

He had no idea where they went, and he was dying to find out. Really, he had plenty of time for exploring. But Creake had as many grisly stories of the unquiet grave variety as it had secret passages and Fred, though very brave for his age and smart enough not to believe everything he was told by adults, was still a little worried about visiting some of the really old, really deep tunnels on his own.

And that is where Kit comes into the story.

During the summer holidays, when our story is set, Fred’s mother had invited someone to stay from the local children’s home. To keep Fred company. ‘And do our bit,’ as his Mum would put it.

Fred’s mother had issued strict and very precise orders about not asking Kit too many questions. ‘She’s had a terrible time, poor little one,’ she explained to Fred, and left it at that. Fred had just about enough sense not to push the point.

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The day she arrived, Lady Longshanks had told Fred that it was his job to look after her. ‘And if you’re not nice, I’ll feed your ears to the cat. Now,’ she continued rather briskly, standing by the huge oak front door at the foot of the crumbling stone staircase, ‘Talking about the cat, I’m due at the vet’s in half an hour. Frodo ate four whole tubes of toothpaste this morning and he’s looking peculiar. After the vet’s, I’ll have to pop by the shop to replace the toothpaste, so I want you, Fred, to show Kit around. Mrs. Bee will have lunch ready at 12 o’clock sharp, so don’t be late. Bye.’ ‘What?’ said Fred, coming to his senses for the first time.

‘Fred! Will you just try and listen for once? Honestly, you are worse than your father! KIT IS COMING TO VISIT. YOU, FRED, ARE TO LOOK AFTER HER, SHOW HER AROUND, KEEP HER OUT OF TROUBLE, WHICH MAY BE LIKE ASKING MUNGO THE MONSTER NOT TO EAT PEOPLE, BUT I’M ALREADY LATE AND THE VET’S BOOKED UP FOR THE NEXT TWO WEEKS, SO I REALLY DON’T HAVE MUCH CHOICE.’ And with that she disappeared in a flurry of handbag and rummaging and coat.

Kit turned out to be a good deal more fun than his cousins from about the first minute.

She was small, with wispy blond hair, and had two pink ears that peeped out, making her look a bit like an elf (in jeans), Fred thought privately. Once they had her bag stowed 7

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away safely in the room, Fred took her around the castle, showing her to entrances to the passages, telling her interesting stories about his ancestors and generally showing off. Kit seemed to love Creake from the start: she didn’t say anything like ‘Urgh, spiders!’ when they took the Secret Staircase up to the battlements and walked into a thick mat of cobwebs. And although Fred was dying to ask her how she became an orphan, he managed to stop himself, because he had learnt it was rude to ask people personal questions the first time you met them. He asked her instead about the orphanage. Kit shrugged.

‘It’s all right. The staff are very nice and try and make things as cheerful as possible, especially at Christmas when no-one’s got family to go to and we all feel a bit depressed, but the thing about grown-ups is- however kind they try to be- they can’t hide the fact that none of us have parents.

Well, some of us do, but they didn’t want us. Which is worse if you ask me. Mine died in a car crash just after I was born, so I guess I never knew what I was missing. I don’t have any other relatives alive except an uncle who lives in Birmingham, but he told the Social pretty smartish that he didn’t want me and anyway, I didn’t want him either – I don’t know even him, so what’s the point?’ Fred noticed that her eyes had gone shiny, so decided to change the subject.

‘I’ve saved the best until last,’ he announced as they came to a stop.

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They were now down in the cellar area, where there were some of the deepest and oldest tunnels. Some said they were even older than the castle itself, which had been standing on the hillside for nearly 1000 years. ‘Here we are,’ he said cheerfully, ‘this is definitely worth a look,’ and with that Fred pushed against one of the pillars, which swung open with a low moan to reveal a gaping black hole.

Without meaning to, both the children took a step backwards. The passageway before them looked very dark and awfully long. There were no lights except an electric one at the far end of the cellar and from out of the tunnel came a slight wind in their faces, slightly musty, smelling of damp earth and old secrets. Fred turned to Kit with a grin he only half felt. ‘What d’you say we come back later and explore with flashlights?’ Kit shivered briefly, but there was a hint of a grin on her face, and Fred knew that despite the risk she was just as keen to see where it went as he was. Judging by its direction, it seemed to be heading away from Creake, towards the village. Fred wondered if they would get to the end and find themselves in the middle of somewhere interesting, like a sweetshop or bank. If he built a tunnel that’s where he’d go, and he found himself thinking for the second time in an hour how glad he was that Kit had come to stay. Exploring had to be better with company.

‘I’ll go, if you will,’ she said.

‘Done!’ Fred replied.

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And after that they went to lunch. The rest of the day was gloriously sunny. The occasional cloud floated past Creake Castle, high up in the clear blue sky, making unlikely shapes as it was pushed and bullied along by the wind. Fred and Kit lay on their backs in the long cool grass and pulled faces up at them.

Fred then found the rocking horse upstairs in the attic and put it in the poppy field behind the house. Kit found a red velvet curtain and put it over the horse’s back. With an old sword borrowed from the library, and a rusty helmet with faded red feathers on top, they had a warhorse and equipment for a knight. Fred practised saving Kit from attackers.

And then Kit made him swap so that she could do the same. And everything seemed perfect, as it occasionally does.

Towards teatime Kit, who was lounging about in the long grass by the driveway, reading a book, noticed a car coming up the drive. It was small and rather rusty. At that distance she could not see whether it was blue or grey. She decided that it must have been blue at first, and then gradually turned grey. Whatever it was, though, there was something about it that made her uncomfortable.

The car stopped with a sort of pop, then a shudder, and a man in a brown trench coat got out and looked around. He was holding a clipboard. ‘Looks like we’ve got visitors,’ said 10

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Fred, looking up from what he was doing. ‘Stupid ones,’ he added, as the man, squinting up at the tower at the Northern Keep of Creake, failed to notice Fred’s bike on the gravel. He tripped and fell headfirst into the moat.

‘Yes, my name is Scar, Mr. Scar. I’m from the, er, Social Services,’ said the man in the brown trench coat, standing in the hall dripping water on the floor. He had little brown eyes and his hair was brown. He also had brown shoes on. Wet brown shoes, very wet. ‘I’m here in response to a number of, er, complaints,’ he continued.

‘Complaints?’ said Fred’s mother, looking worried.

‘Who’s complained? And what have they complained about?’

‘Well, I’m afraid I can’t be more detailed. But, er, apparently you have your, er, son living on these premises.’

‘Yes, of course we do,’ said Lady Longshanks shortly. ‘Are you suggesting we should put him in the barn?’

‘Well, er, ha, ha, a joke.’ He licked his lips nervously. ‘We have reason to believe that these premises may be unfit for a child of his age. Damp, dangerous and….’ he looked around and then down at his shoes, ‘damp.’

He looked quickly over his shoulder, as if to check no-one was following him, and continued. ‘Would it be possible then to inspect the inside and meet the boy? If it is not too inconvenient,’ he added.

‘But I don’t really understand what this is all about,’ said 11

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Fred’s mother, looking even more worried.

Mr. Scar licked his thin lips. ‘Well, it’s just a simple procedure at this stage. If I could look around and fill in a report, you will hear from us shortly. Nothing to worry about at this stage, except perhaps we may have to take away your son – for safekeeping, you understand, just a procedure.

The report will take two weeks.’

‘Oh!’ gasped Lady Longshanks, but before she could say anything he slipped past her and started poking a long bony finger at the walls.

‘Mmm… dry rot, mmm. Those stairs look a bit rickety.

Ah, you must be Fred,’ he said as Fred came down the stairs.

He leapt forward with his clipboard. ‘Er, boy, aged 11,’ he said to himself whilst scribbling on his pad. ‘Shoelaces, mmm, undone, socks, dirty, hair, messy, runny nose. Tell me, when did you last wash your ears?’

‘Mind your own business,’ said Fred.

‘Mmm, ah. Behavioural problems,’ he said. He looked around. ‘Lady Longshanks?’

‘Yes?’ said Fred’s mother, looking more and more as though she was going to cry with every passing moment.

‘I have seen quite enough. And I feel that it is my duty to er, advise you that my report will recommend that Creake be closed down, or the boy,’ and he turned to Fred with a glint, ‘go somewhere safer – perhaps to a relative.’ He gave a nasty smile. ‘His cousins, perhaps?’

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‘But you can’t do that.’

‘Yes I can,’ he said firmly. ‘Good day.’ And with that he shot out of the door, like a weasel, just as Lady Longshanks fainted.

Twenty minutes later, they were in the kitchen, with Mrs Bee fussing over Fred’s mother. She was drinking a cup of strong tea. ‘Oh dear,’ she kept saying, ‘oh dear.’ Fred’s father had been called from his study. He was also drinking strong tea, or so he said.

‘Don’t worry yet, darling,’ he was saying, ‘that chap’s got to write his report first. Then we’ll see.’

‘Yes, but he said they were going to take Creake and put Fred somewhere more ‘appropriate’. He even suggested that your sister could have him.’ Kit clearly saw Fred shudder.

‘Not unless they give her lots of money,’ said Sir Longshanks, who didn’t get on with his sister any more than Fred liked his cousins. All they could talk about was money.

‘Well, nothing is going to happen for ten days. Then I’ll take the report to Messrs. Inne & Junction. They’ve been the family solicitors for years. I am sure they can sort it all out.

Don’t worry,’ he said again, and gave Fred’s mother a smile and one of his rare hugs.

Later on that evening at supper, Fred’s father came down and, to cheer everyone up, was very funny and made everyone laugh with stories about rubbish jobs (most of 13

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them his) and stories about Creake Castle that Fred had heard about a million times.

After they had eaten, Fred and Kit exchanged looks.

Despite everything, they were both still thinking about exploring the tunnels when everyone had gone to bed.

Anyway, it seemed the best way to take their minds off things. Somewhere in the woods an owl hooted, and after a few more stories and some jokes from Sir Longshanks, Fred’s mother clapped her hands and said: ‘Right, you two, you’ve both had a long day, off to bed.’ There was a scraping of chairs and, before Fred knew it, he was being frogmarched up the cold stone steps with Kit walking beside him.

Her bedroom wasn’t quite next door to his, but further along the corridor, so just as he was about to open the door to his room he said quietly to her, ‘I’ll see you in about an hour, you’ll hear the church bell in the village strike eleven times and I’ll knock on your door.’

‘Okay,’ Kit mouthed silently back, and trotted along to her room.

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Chapter Two

Passageways The passageway seemed, if anything, to have got even darker and more creepy since they’d been down there that morning. There was the faint ‘plop’ of water trickling off the walls into puddles, as warm currents of air blew up their noses. ‘Ready?’ whispered Fred to Kit. ‘Ready as I’ll ever be,’ she replied, and turned her torch to face down the tunnel. For a while they crept along in silence, lost in their own thoughts. After about five minutes Kit cleared her throat nervously and pointed at the tunnel walls.

‘Look at the way the stone is crumbling. I’d say this tunnel is much older than Creake Castle itself.’ They carried on again in silence. It was darker down there than anything Fred or Kit had seen in their lives. Not a bit like nighttime outdoors, where the moon or the stars can light your way. Deep under the castle it was just inky black. Like a grave.

‘Look at that!’ said Fred, aiming his torch at the floor.

The earth along the passageway abruptly seemed to have changed. It was neater here, almost as if it had been kept clean by someone. Kit shrugged at first, and then she looked closer, to where her own torch was pointing and there, in a dusty corner, was a footprint. Fred saw it too. They both shuddered without thinking.

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There was nothing to do, so they carried on walking, their steps echoing off the walls, and their hair catching in spiders’ webs.

‘Probably made years ago,’ said Fred eventually, but not very convincingly.

‘Yes,’ replied Kit, nodding a bit too hard. However, it didn’t look much like an old footprint: it looked like a very new footprint. For the past hundred yards, the tunnel had gradually begun to head downwards, like a ski ramp, until the slope was quite steep, almost making Kit jog to keep up with Fred, whose eyes were now glinting in the torchlight.

‘It was probably a tunnel that belonged to the first Castle here,’ he said between deep breaths.

‘There used to be another castle?’ asked Kit. ‘Yes. Creake was built on the old foundations but no-one knows much about it, except that it was probably much larger than Creake. An official came around from some museum in London wanting to dig up bits of the Castle, he even offered money but Dad wouldn’t let him. He said it was because he was worried about the foundations caving in and the Castle falling down. The man from the museum was quite nice actually, and told him that it would be done professionally and that there was no chance of that happening. But it was funny, you know.’

‘What was?’ asked Kit, glad to have something to take her mind off the footprint, letting her torch play absentmindedly 16

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on a particularly large cobweb with a large dead spider curled up in the corner.

‘Well, Dad got a bit shifty and refused to talk about it, even when the man offered him more money. Mum tried to get him to accept – heaven knows we need the cash – but he wouldn’t even discuss it. He even got a bit cross, which he never normally does.’ Kit wrinkled her nose.

‘I thought that because you lived in such a big house you must be very rich?’

‘No,’ said Fred flatly. ‘Mum says we probably won’t be here next summer if we don’t get some money soon.’

‘Achoo!’

‘Bless you.’

‘Bless me what?’ said Kit. ‘Bless you,’ said Fred. ‘You sneezed, so I said, ‘bless you’ and you’re meant to reply ‘Thank you’; it’s polite.’

‘I didn’t sneeze. You sneezed.’

‘I didn’t sneeze. I was busy talking,’ said Fred. Kit was now giving him a funny look.

‘You were talking,’ she said, slowly, ‘and I didn’t sneeze.

And we’re alone. Or at least we’re meant to be alone.’ Fred was beginning to see what she was getting at. He felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up one by one, and suddenly his feet felt terribly cold.

‘So who did sneeze?’ he whispered and just then it came again, only slightly louder.

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‘Achoo!’ sounded a strange little noise from the end of the passageway, around a corner.

‘Hello hello!’ cried Fred, as Kit tried to put her hand over his mouth.

‘Don’t let it know we’re here!’ she hissed urgently.

‘Whatever it is must already know where we are, we’ve been yomping around in here for the last fifteen minutes like a small herd of rhino. And it’s done nothing worse yet than sneeze at us.’ There was a sudden movement that sounded like the movement of clothes and feet further down the tunnel.

‘Quick!’ said Fred, ‘after it!’

‘Are you mad?!’

‘Come on, it’s getting away!’

‘Yes, he must be mad,’ thought Kit, ‘and so must I be,’ she thought, running after him. ‘It could be anything.’ But somehow with Fred it felt safer. Although only a bit. ‘But anyway,’ she thought as she panted to keep up, ‘he’s right, a monster that sneezes then runs off doesn’t somehow sound very dangerous.’ They turned down a new passageway and, as they went, Fred couldn’t help noticing how the tunnel changed all the more. It got even wider and cleaner. Then, abruptly, the path they were following split into two. Up until then, they had heard the slight rustling of clothes and a light footstep, like someone wearing slippers, and that was what they had been following.

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Now, suddenly, there was nothing: just the occasional moan of wind along the walls – as if whatever it was had vanished into thin air, leaving Fred and Kit pointing their torches at just darkness and silence. ‘Where did it go?’ asked Fred, hoping Kit had seen something.

‘Dunno,’ said Kit and frowned; her torch was beginning to run out. Trust Fred not to remember to put new batteries in. Fred’s was beginning to fade too, going quickly from bright white to yellow to a dull orange glow they could only just see by. Kit was sure about one thing. She didn’t want to be down there in the dark with no torches. ‘We’d better go back,’ said Kit, ‘before the light runs out and we’re left down here until we’re nothing but dry bones.’

‘Very cheery,’ said Fred, but even he had to agree, reluctantly, that they had best call off the chase and get back before they got lost in the tunnel.

Slowly they made their way back up the passageway, in silence, the darkness gradually seeping in around them, making the back of Fred’s neck prickle. It was strange down there: some of the passageways seemed all right, but others were distinctly creepy, as if things they didn’t know about on the outside had been going on inside for years. They had just got to the foot of the cellar steps, at the mouth of the secret tunnel, when Fred heard the village clock strike once in the cold night air. ‘One o’clock!’ he said to Kit. ‘We’ve been 19

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down there nearly an hour and a half. Next time we’ll bring spare batteries.’

‘Next time?’ asked Kit. Fred did his best to look innocent. ‘Yes,’ he said eventually, as casually as possible. ‘Don’t you want to know what that was?’

‘Not particularly. And anyway, what if your parents catch us?’

‘Then I’ll say I followed you…um… sleep walking.’

‘Oh yeah, they’re really going to believe that.’

‘We’ll think of something,’ said Fred happily, climbing the stairs and putting out his torch so as not to disturb Frodo, who might bark and wake his parents. ‘Who knows?’ he said dreamily. ‘It might even be goblins, or a ghost of one of my ancestors.’

‘Goblins don’t exist,’ said Kit, scoffing.

‘My Great Uncle Percy said they lived in the attic.’

‘Did he?’ said Kit, not really believing a word Fred was saying, but not able to resist a good story.

‘Yes,’ said Fred, ‘but he also claimed that Australia was a country on the Moon. So I wouldn’t get excited.’

‘Are all your relations mad?’ Kit said, eyeing Fred suspiciously.

‘Almost all,’ said Fred cheerfully. ‘It’s this place, I’m sure.

It was built a long time ago and my Dad says it still contains a lot of the Old Magic and there are plenty of ghosts, people 20

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are always seeing them.’

‘I don’t believe in ghosts or magic,’ said Kit sternly. Fred looked startled.

‘What do you believe in then?’

‘I’m an orphan,’ she said quickly. ‘I believe in myself.’

‘That’s sad,’ said Fred quietly. ‘You should get out more.’

As soon as he said it, Fred wished he hadn’t and Kit suddenly felt extremely angry. Perhaps she was just tired, or maybe it was because seeing the footprint and hearing the sneeze had scared her more than she usually liked to admit.

Anyway, there they were, standing at the top of the stairs near Kit’s bedroom. She went very red. How dare he, she thought to herself.

‘All the rest is nonsense,’ she said, putting her face close to Fred’s. ‘What we saw, or at least heard down there was probably one of your tricks, and no! I don’t think I’ll be going down the tunnel with you and yes! I wish I’d stayed the summer at the bloody home and no! I don’t think all this is fun, before you ask, and now, Mr. High and Mighty, Lord of the Whatsit, I’m going to bed!’ And with that, she turned around and slammed her door, leaving Fred alone in the corridor, wondering, not for the last time in his life, what he had said that was so bad.

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Chapter Three

The next day The next day Kit hardly spoke to Fred at breakfast. In fact she didn’t really speak to anyone. Lady Longshanks, sensing that something was wrong, sent them both down to the village, to buy bread and hopefully sort out their differences on the way.

It was another lovely morning, boiling hot already, with an occasional summer flurry of cool air that made the beech leaves crackle. As they strolled along the lane that wound down to the village through the thick trees, Fred glanced up at Kit, who had almost stopped scowling and was beginning to look a bit more cheerful, walking along a little ahead of him. She caught him looking at her, and smiled slightly, for the first time that morning. She sighed. ‘Sorry I snapped at you,’ she said. ‘I have to keep everything as real as possible, you know. Look at it from my point of view. I’m an orphan who finds herself in a castle filled with weird things, you included.’ She scowled at Fred, who just grinned. ‘It’s just so corny – I could be a character in a children’s story! In a few weeks’ time, I’ve got to go back to the Home and face up to reality. If I get swept up with it all, I’ll end up turning into one of those kids you see all the time from where I’m from.

The ones who think they’re special just ‘cos their parents are 23

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dead or too rubbish to look after them, so they pretend they’re a bit barmy. I bet they see things in tunnels under castles too. Anyway, I’ve seen it before, they never last, and they always end up getting in more and more trouble, until they get too old for it to be cute anymore and they get sent somewhere worse than the Home. Anyway, that’s why I’ve got to keep a sensible head on my shoulders.’ She stopped and looked at her hands. ‘But I’m still sorry I was rude to you, and it might make you feel better if I said I suppose I must have been a little bit tired after all that rushing about in the tunnel.’

After a pause, Fred decided to take a chance. ‘There was definitely something down there.’

‘Oh! Fred!’

In fact, he had thought of nothing else for the past few hours, and had spent the night twisting his mind and body through dreams of being lost in tunnels, surrounded by strange rustling footsteps and the occasional sneeze.

‘I’m not sure,’ Kit sighed. ‘It was very dark and we were both tired. It could have been our imaginations.’

Fred decided not to argue. Instead he asked: ‘If we didn’t really see anything, then it can’t be dangerous, so does that mean you don’t mind coming down again tonight?’

Kit did nothing for a whole minute except look at her feet as she walked along the road. Everything told her to be sensible, to enjoy her summer without getting into trouble, 24

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and to go back to the Home with a good report from Sir and Lady Longshanks, and maybe to come again next year and the year after that if she didn’t find a family to adopt her. But although she still wasn’t convinced there really had been something in the tunnel last night, there was definitely something mysterious about Creake Castle, and maybe even a bit of magic in Fred, but the type that seemed not to destroy itself but to get things done. And also (she made up one of those excuses) she couldn’t possibly let him go down by himself and get lost. What’s more, he seemed to trust her, and she knew enough about trust to see that it had to come from two sides to work properly.

‘All right,’ she said quietly, suddenly feeling much better, and laughed lightly, as she turned back to look at the Castle that stood, old and strange, on top of the hill, with its many hundreds of windows reflecting the blue sky and gun-puff clouds in the early morning sunlight.

So that night they got more batteries from a stock that Fred’s father kept in the downstairs cupboard and prepared themselves. Fred even drew a rough map of the part of the tunnel that they had managed to explore.

Supper came, was eaten in a flurry, and the plates cleared away by Fred and Kit. The washing up was done only once a day, when Mrs Bee had heated a pan of water. Nobody could turn on the boiler, since Lady Longshanks had found 26

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a family of rooks nesting above the immersion heater and had forbidden its use until the chicks had moved on. Very soon afterwards, Fred and Kit climbed the stairs to bed, and waited until the clock struck half past eleven eerily through the chilly night air and off they went.

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Chapter Four

The Pepper King The moon shone down, carpeting the Great Lawn in silver as it threw long shadows out across the lake and lit the surrounding countryside like a negative. An owl floated, ever so lightly, over the tops of the trees by the Back of Beyond and the ancient Grandfather Clock, standing at the foot of the stairs, struck twelve times.

The Witching Hour had begun.

As is the way with nearly all tunnels, these didn’t have electricity. They were very damp too, and deep. Really deep, to the very roots of the hill. These were tunnels that opened into echoing vaults and chambers the size of cathedrals; riveted by flying buttresses and attended by statues and gargoyles with strange and somewhat terrifying faces. These were the long-forgotten replicas of the old monsters, carved by an ancient people who should have known better.

By now, like all children in all the best stories, they were hopelessly, utterly lost.

Time passed and neither of them said anything: Kit because she was lost in thoughts of claw-like hands snaking out from around dark recesses and corners and grabbing her, and Fred because he was trying to eat a toffee without Kit 29

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noticing. Then, from far off down a tunnel, they heard the sneezes again that echoed through the halls. They followed them to a place they hadn’t been before.

‘Ommph!’

‘Ouch!’ they both said at something roughly like the same time. There was a clatter of torches and suddenly Fred stopped. He’d sat down on the dusty floor in a flumf of dust.

‘Why have you stopped?’ gasped Kit, leaning against a wall, panting, in an effort to keep calm.

‘Because you trod on my toe and bonked my head with the torch! That was a horrible thing to do.’

‘Well, it’s not like I did it on purpose, but why did you stop in the first place?’ expanded Kit a little crossly, rubbing her own head, which already felt as if it had a bump the size of a largish grapefruit swelling up under the skin.

‘Because I couldn’t go any further. I ran into a wall. On second thoughts, it’s just as likely that the wall ran into me…… This place is creepy. Have you seen the size of the rat footprints? I know grown-ups with smaller feet. And now I have a damaged nose and feet. I’ll probably need plastic surgery because of you.’ The tunnel they were in smelt of dead leaves, and cobwebs hung off the walls, like the thick curtains you find in deserted houses. Just then, the wind moaned along the dark corridors as Fred’s torch flickered, went a horrible shade of orange and eventually went out altogether.

‘Achoo!’ something sneezed.

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Both children froze.

‘Achoo!’ it sneezed again. This time with emphasis.

‘There it is again!’ exclaimed Kit, who was trying but failing miserably to stop her voice from wobbling. There was a familiar rustle of heavy-sounding material, and Kit started frantically pointing her torch in all directions. The air had gone icy cold.

‘Who is it?’ said Fred in a shaky torch sort of voice too.

Nobody had come down there in centuries, and they should have been alone. As the light from Kit’s torch played around the walls, it actually began to look as if they were in a room, not a passageway anymore. Something else he had only just noticed was that the room was neatly swept, seemed quite dry, and even had bits of furniture here and there. One piece of furniture, which they discovered placed squarely in the middle of the room, looked suspiciously like a throne to the two children.

And to prove it, seated upon the miniature throne was a very small, very white-looking man, with an enormous crown on his head and a small but very red nose.

There was an uncomfortable silence in the room for a while as the man blinked at them, and they blinked back.

‘Bless me,’ he said eventually, in a dry crackly sort of voice.

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Chapter Five

Conversation Nothing changed. Even the air was still in the room with the two children and the strange, seemingly faded man.

‘Bless me,’ he said again, with emphasis, and the two children stared at him.

The man stared back, with apparent interest. His hair was fluffy and snow-white, almost like wisps of cloud floating on top of his head, and his eyes, which seemed to be the kind sort, were pale blue and very round, like an owl’s, as if he had been staring hard at something for too long and his eyelids had got stuck. His clothes, which must once have been luxurious and expensive, were ragged. Kit looked at him and certainly wasn’t afraid anymore. It was Fred, though, who found his voice first. ‘Who are you?’ he said, as politely as he could. The little old man jumped as though he had been stung by a bee. He blinked twice, rapidly, and then drew himself up to his full height on the chair, which was about four foot.

‘I am,’ he said, ‘Theopholus…….Theopholus Aardvark the Third, ahem. Otherwise known as the Pepper King,’ he added in his cracked and faraway voice. The sound of it reminded Kit of the sound of someone stepping slowly over 33

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old china plates.

Fred stepped forward and peered at him with her torch, ‘You’re a King?’ he said, almost, but not quite, as if he didn’t believe him.

He looked strangely at Fred and said: ‘Of course I am, child. I’ve got a crown on and I’m sitting on a throne.’

‘Sorry,’ said Fred, ‘just checking.’ ‘.....And people call me ‘Your Most Royal Majesty’,’ the odd little King said. ‘At least they used to, when there were any people about. ‘ His voice trailed off, and his eyes started to focus on something far off in the distance.

‘What are you doing down here?’ asked Kit. ‘Sitting,’ replied the King, ‘on my throne.’

‘Why?’ ‘Why not?…… Achoo! Oh! Hasn’t anybody got a hanky?’

‘Er, no,’ said Kit moving forward and curtseying rather clumsily in her dressing gown and slippers. But the Pepper King wasn’t really listening.

‘If you ask me, it’s him that’s gone,’ whispered Kit out of the corner of her mouth to Fred. ‘Nutty as a fruit cake. He’s probably some tramp who’s wandered in here during the winter to get out of the cold. He might even be dangerous.’

‘No,’ said Fred, who had just had a strange thought. The old man seemed somehow familiar. The King was now muttering quietly to himself, ignoring the children, so Fred carried on. ‘There’s something going on here. Look at his 34

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robes, they’re too old and odd-looking. And he’s so pale, almost see-through. And I’ve heard Dad talk about the Pepper King too. He owned the castle that stood here long before Creake, when this area was its own Kingdom, called something like Mercier, just like Britain or France only smaller. There’s something about a curse, too. Only,’ he frowned as if to himself, ‘I can’t really remember, and anyway Dad went into one of his ‘change the subject’ routines.’

‘You’re not seriously trying to tell me this man has been down here all this time? Tcha!’ said Kit, rolling her eyes. ‘You must be bananas.’ She stepped forward. ‘Why do they call you the Pepper King, if that’s not really your name?’ she asked, standing in front of the King, who seemed to have fallen into a dream. He didn’t move. ‘Excuse me,’ said Kit, ‘it’s very rude not to answer when you’re spoken to.’

She glared at him, but something odd seemed to be happening. The old man seemed to have got paler. Kit noticed, with a shock, that she could even see the wall behind the King’s head. Actually through his head. And when she shone her torch directly at him, his robes had gone almost completely transparent, so that she could see the chair behind him. He was slowly vanishing before their eyes. The room started to go cold again, as if someone had left the window open.

‘Wait,’ she said, feeling a little silly talking to thin air. ‘I 35

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need to ask you a question.’ But the King had faded completely, with a barely whispered, ‘Gone,’ that hung in the air like the sound of wind far away, leaving the two children looking at one another, not quite sure of what they had just seen.

‘Come on,’ said Fred after a bit. ‘I’m getting cold, let’s go back.’

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Chapter Six

Attic THUMP! THUMP,

THUMP,

SCRAPE…pause….THUMP,

THUMP,

CLUNK, CLUNK,

SCRAPE…pause………rattle. was the very first thing Kit heard when she opened her eyes the next morning. She squinted at the alarm clock by her bed. It said 6.30 a.m., but with lack of sleep the night before it felt like about 4.30 in the morning. Through a gap in the bedroom curtains she could just make out the dawn light inching over the trees. The day looked misty. ………………THUMP,

THUMP,

CLUNK,

SCRAPE…………

‘What was that?’ The sound seemed to be coming closer, because it was definitely getting louder, but try as she could, she had no idea where it was coming from.

THUMP,

THUMP,

SCRAPE…pause….THUMP, 37

THUMP,

CLUNK, CLUNK,

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SCRAPE…pause…..etc.

It sounded as though what ever it was was close, very close, right behind her bed in fact. Kit looked around nervously at a blank wall.

THUMP,

THUMP,

SCRAPE…pause….THUMP,

THUMP,

CLUNK, CLUNK,

SCRAPE…pause.

The noise seemed to have moved around to the other side of the room, at the foot of her bed. Kit pulled the duvet up closer around her neck. There was a terrible scraping noise.

SCRAPE. A picture on the wall, of a man with a long nose, sitting on a horse with an even longer nose, swung open ever so slowly and painfully. Kit’s eyes went wide as dinner plates.

‘BEWARE,’ boomed the voice in the iron mask. The figure raised a chain mail glove and pointed at Kit, as she shrank back in terror. ‘BEWARE, I say, of wearing stupid pyjamas with pictures of fluffy sheep and pointless daisies!’

‘But…’ she started to say, and then noticed something about the mysterious figure in armour that had just appeared 38

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in her bedroom from a secret passageway. She noticed it wore blue slippers. Kit’s eyes narrowed as she made a grab for one of the heavy pillows on the floor.

‘Fred!!!! How could you? You scared the living daylights out of me!!’ She threw the pillow at him. Unfortunately Fred was already laughing too much to notice. Inside the old armour, he sounded like a tin of biscuits being shaken.

Unfortunately for the children, but especially for Fred, the pillow hit him on the head and he swayed backwards; then, very slowly, he swayed forwards as he tried to regain his balance, but promptly lost it and fell headfirst into the room, bouncing off the bed and onto the floor with an enormous crash of antique iron.

Kit was scared at first that he might have hurt himself, but after a pause he opened the visor, grinning from ear to ear.

‘Fred! What are you playing at?’

‘What’s going on up there?!’ The two children froze as Fred’s mother’s voice came up the stairs. ‘If you’ve broken anything precious, Fred, I’ll have you adopted.’

‘It’s, er, okay, Lady Longshanks, I knocked over something in my room, but it, er, didn’t break, sorry if I woke you.’

‘Are you sure you’re okay? Nothing broken on you, I hope, my dear?’

‘No I’m fine, thank you, er, sorry again.’

‘That’s all right,’ Fred’s mother replied. ‘I just thought it 39

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was young Fred smashing lumps off his inheritance as usual.’

‘Fred! Ha ha, gosh no, what would Fred be doing clunking around at half past six in the morning? I can’t imagine, ha ha,’ she laughed weakly, as Fred, still grinning like a Cheshire cat, peeled off the last of the armour and pushed it under the bed.

‘Hmm, you obviously don’t know him as well as I do.

Anyway, I’ll see you down at breakfast in an hour or so, be careful.’

‘Thanks, I will.’

‘What’s all that racket?’ came Sir Longshanks’s voice.

‘Don’t worry, dear,’ answered his wife, ‘it was just Kit having a morning mishap, go back to bed.’

‘Mishap? It sounded like we were being attacked. I hope she’s all right.’

‘She’s fine.’

‘I’m fine.’

‘I bet Fred’s involved.’

‘I bet he’s involved too,’ agreed Lady Longshanks, ‘but Kit’s far too good-natured to squeal on him.’

‘I, er,’ started Kit. ‘Come on, I think it’s time we got out of here,’ whispered Fred, grabbing Kit’s arm and half dragging her out of bed.

‘Where are we going?’ asked Kit, as Fred made towards the open passageway, behind the picture of the man on the 40

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ugly horse.

‘You’ll see, it’s a surprise.’

Kit had just enough time to pull on some slippers before she and Fred hopped up onto the ledge that was part of the secret passageway and closed the picture door quickly behind them.

The passage itself was quite light, and seemed to be mainly rickety, wormy wooden stairs. Quite unlike the one in the cellar. No cobwebs for one thing. Up and up they went, until Kit was almost completely out of breath.

‘I almost killed myself trying to get down the stairs with all that heavy armour on,’ said Fred, reading her mind.

‘I’m not surprised. Are you still not going to tell me where we’re going? First you scare me half to death, and then you try and kill me by making me climb about fifty thousand stairs.’ They came to a trap door, which Fred pushed open.

‘It’s okay,’ he said, ‘we’re here.’ And he disappeared through the hole, leaving Kit alone in the gloom.

‘Wait,’ she called out, and jumped up after him. Straight into another world.

Early morning light streamed through hundreds of skylights running the entire length of the castle’s attic. Here and there, gaps in the roof had let leaves fly in and gather in small reddish piles. The currents of air coming through the same gaps, high up in the castle, moved the dead leaves and 41

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the golden, sun- drenched beams of dusty light.

Kit let out a gasp, despite herself, and forgot all about being cross with Fred. It was the most beautiful and strange thing she had ever seen. Anywhere. Ever. In all directions there were boxes, some closed, some spilling out their contents: stacks of books, paintings, richly coloured clothes and faded furniture. She hoisted herself up and took a few careful steps across the floorboards to where Fred was standing, watching her reaction. The air smelt clean and dry.

‘Welcome to the castle’s attic,’ he said proudly. ‘You could spend a month up here exploring, but it’s best on sunny days, as you can see. Come over here.’ He took Kit over to one of the skylights and they both stood on tiptoe to peer out. The view was dazzling. Kit and Fred squinted through the fresh sunlight and saw what looked like the whole of England, rolled out like a large green carpet before them. Abruptly Kit had never felt so happy in her entire life.

‘It’s beautiful, ‘ she murmured half to herself. ‘What’s over there?’ she said, pirouetting and pointing at the same time at a trunk lying half open.

‘Clothes, mainly costumes.’

‘Costumes?’

‘Yes. My grandfather thought he was a bit of an actor, so every Christmas he would get all the important people in the village to come and act in his pantomime, which he wrote and directed, of course.’

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‘Probably starred in as well.’

‘Yes, actually, one of my first memories is of seeing him playing the Genie in Aladdin. He was quite good. Anyway, I was convinced. When he died shortly after, I spent all week rubbing pots around the castle, expecting him to pop out.’

‘Fred! That’s an awful story.’

‘It’s not a story, it’s perfectly, absolutely true. Look,’ he said jumping up so suddenly from an old armchair that he seemed to explode and then quickly reappear in a cloud of dust. ‘It’s the feather dress from one of Grandpa’s plays. It used to be a ballet, but he changed it into a play, because dancing would have been too difficult. It’s called ‘One Leg’ or something, all about a bird king who falls in love with another bird, sorry, I mean girl, but a feathered one, then he decides that actually he’s not in love with her, and she dies of a broken heart, which all seemed a bit over the top to me.’

Kit rolled her eyes and sighed.

‘It’s not over the top, it’s a beautiful story, and it’s a very famous one. It’s called ‘Swan Lake’ not ‘One Leg’; good grief, Fred, don’t you ever get out? Anyway, let me have a look at that.’ She took the feathered garment by the collar and let the folds fall to the floor. A perfect white gown of feathers spread out like a snowy blanket.

‘Try it on,’ said Fred.

‘No, I can’t,’ said Kit, blushing.

‘No, try it on, you know you want to.’

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‘No.’ She suddenly felt terribly shy. ‘It’s far too big anyway.’

‘Rubbish, try it on. I promise I won’t laugh, or even smirk and bit.’

‘Well…’

‘Go on.’

‘Oh...’ She gingerly put one arm through a sleeve. She felt the satin lining brush over her hands, like water running through her fingers, and turned to put the other arm on. The material was so light, it hardly felt as if it was there at all, until she looked in the dusty mirror standing in the corner and caught a glimpse of something that seemed to make time stop up there in the old attic.

‘Now you really look the part,’ said Fred. ‘Kit, I said it looks great, I’m not joking. Kit?’ She turned to follow the reflection in the mirror of something behind her, as Fred turned too, following the sweep of her gaze.

Resting against a wall, upside down, was a picture.

The frame was broken and turned upside down, and the ink had faded, but the person represented could still be made out. ‘Golly,’ was all that Fred could manage, as he stepped forward and turned the picture the right way up. And so they stared, open-mouthed, at the ancient portrait of a small man in robes, wearing a crown, at least two sizes too big, with a dusty yet still visible red nose. And underneath were written the words: 44

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‘Theopholus III. Badde Kyng.’

Fred took the picture in both hands and blew the dust off.

‘It’s him, isn’t it?’ Kit said. But Fred didn’t reply. ‘Look, there’s something stuck to the back!’ He turned the portrait frame around and, sure enough, stuck to the wood behind the frame, sealed in heavy red wax, was an envelope.

Theopholus III of Mercier in the Year 345 after the Crucifixion of Our Lord did Willfulie and completely bankrupt his Kingdom in pursuit of the eville Spice.

Failed to protect his loyal subjects from the ravages of hungure, enemies, sicknesses and all manner of dreadful plagues.

Did kill his wife - the Queene.

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Chapter Seven

The Truth That night they found the Pepper King wandering along one of the passageways just past the Throne Room. This time he almost looked pleased to see them. ‘Hello you two,’ he said brightly, bobbing off a short bow, and then turned abruptly down a corridor they hadn’t seen before. Kit and Fred looked at each other and followed; his faded slippers hardly made a sound compared to the slip slap of the children’s trainers. After five minutes of walking in silence, the King mumbled something and took a set of keys from his pocket. ‘Here we are,’ he said cheerfully as they peered over his shoulder. There was nothing there, except brown earth, until the King stretched out his thin hand and touched the wall in front of them, and Fred was surprised to see a hazy door appear in the half-light, accompanied by a rusty lock, into which he inserted one of the longer keys. There was no sound as the door swung open on its invisible hinges, to reveal a room piled high with sacks smelling strongly of something Kit found very familiar, stretching far away into the distance. Their feet echoed in there. It was cold, and the children could see their breath, cut by the torch’s beam. The King motioned for them to sit on one of the sacks whilst he 47

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perched on another nearby.

‘We’ve been reading about you,’ said Fred. The Pepper King just blinked, and fiddled with a large ring on his middle finger.

‘We found a portrait of you in the attic, at the top of the castle,’ Kit added. ‘On the back of it there was a letter.’ Still the little King said nothing. Fred decided to press on regardless. ‘The portrait looked like you and anyway, it had your name on it. But it said that you were a bad King and then gave some pretty good reasons. Whoever wrote it seemed to know what they were talking about. Although I don’t think much of their spelling,’ he added. The King’s eyes scanned the room, avoiding the children’s faces. As Kit’s eyes grew accustomed to the darkness, she saw that all around there were sacks piled on top of one another. There was still a strong smell of something she could not place.

‘Do you like apples?’ he said quite suddenly. ‘I like apples.’

He smiled at the children, and his smile seemed to Kit the saddest thing she had ever seen.

‘It was you, wasn’t it.’ It was more of a statement, this time. But she said it as gently as she knew how. The room about them was still, and Kit wondered just how deep below the hill they really were. As if he read her mind the King said: ‘No wind has passed through these halls in over 1000 years – no rain, for that matter, no sunlight, no living soul.

What’s in here is more precious to me than all that. Yes, the 48

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portrait was mine,’ he added.

And it was there that he told them everything.

‘It was the year 523 AD, achoo! and I was a young man when I came to the throne as Theopholus III. We were a happy Kingdom. I had a beautiful wife, the Queen Alicia, who had the longest hair of any person in the Kingdom, and a wonderful laugh. In fact, I thought I had everything I could possibly want. Our country was not so small as to be poor and not so big as to make our neighbours jealous of us.

My palace was above where we are now.’

‘Creake!’ Fred blurted out.

‘Shhhh,’ said Kit, ‘don’t interrupt.’ She was afraid he might get upset and disappear as he had the last time. But she needn’t have worried. He looked puzzled for a moment, and then smiled.

‘That may be what they call it now, young man, that may be so, dear me. But then the Kingdom was called Mercier and my palace, which stood proudly on the hill, Pagan’s Tor, was where we all lived. My friends and family, and our servants, who looked after the horses, and a few soldiers, who should have been guarding the walls but who actually spent most of the day sleeping in the sun and playing games with the children. It always seemed to be sunny then. And I haven’t seen the sun for so long.’ His small pinched face 49

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seemed to fade slightly before the children’s eyes.

‘Ahem!’ said Fred.

‘Oh,’ said the King, starting suddenly and coming back into focus, ‘where was I?’ ‘You were just crowned King,’ said Kit a little dryly.

‘Was I? Great! Fantastic, let’s have a banquet!’ Kit and Fred looked at each other.

‘Uh, oh!’ Fred mouthed.

‘No,’ Kit explained patiently to the King, ‘you were telling us a story.’ The Pepper King blinked twice and rubbed a chapped hand across his pale cheek. His hand shook slightly, but Fred wasn’t sure if it was from the cold.

‘Ah yes, achoo! ‘ he said eventually, ‘so I was, so I was, dear me…dear me. Well, so everything I wanted I had, a wonderful place to live, surrounded by the people I loved, and loyal subjects who loved me because I was their King. I thought I was the happiest person alive.

Until one cold night it all went wrong. It was just before Christmas. I was having my dinner by the fire in my private apartments and a merchant was brought to me. I was a little cross at having my favourite supper of roast venison and blackcurrant stuffing disturbed, but my Introducer of Guests in Chief told me that this merchant had something very special that no-one else in the whole of England had ever seen that he wanted to show me, and so I agreed to see him. When he entered, what struck me first about him was 50

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his clothes. I had never seen a stranger-looking person in all my life. He had a long pointed beard and red velvet shoes that curled at the end like seahorses’ tails. He had pitch black eyes, which I remember finding a little frightening. They never once met mine, as if they were hiding some secret, and I remember how they reflected in the candlelight, like a cat’s eyes.

And then the smell. It was tangy and sharp and like nothing I had ever smelt before, sort of prickly, and it made me think strangely, I don’t know why, of magic. Unknowable magic, from far-off places. Well, the merchant bowed low and offered me a silver box encrusted with jewels. I held out my hand and took the box with a nod of my head. When I opened it I smelt the same smell, except much stronger this time. Close up, it smelt wonderful! Exquisite. Like everything in the world that was fun and interesting. The merchant, or magician, as I now think he was, motioned for me to try some.

‘What is it?’ I asked, not sure if he was trying to poison me. He looked at me with his black eyes and licked his lips, like a snake. Then he made a dabbing motion, like you do when tasting anything powdery. And then he smiled, and I recall his teeth were very white and very sharp. So I dipped my finger in and put some on my tongue. From that moment I was hooked. Nothing would or could ever taste the same again. From that cold night I swore that I would dedicate my life to collecting more of this strange spice. ‘What is it 51

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called?!’ I cried. The merchant bowed again as I handed him two gold pieces. Up until now he had not said a word: he had just watched me with those strange, cat-like eyes.

‘Peppargh,’ he said shortly and with that he was gone, out of the Great Hall and out of my life. But not so the Spice.

From that day on, I went mad.

The first thing I did was to have ships built, carved golden prows with white sails, which I sent out across the world in search of more Peppargh (or Pepper, as we now called it at the Royal Court). After a few years they came back, their storage chambers full of the spice. Meanwhile, I had been spending most of the palace gold on buying more pepper from traders who passed through the Kingdom. The gold ran out, so I had land and jewels sold to pay for more ships and more traders and soon, at first by children and then everyone, I became known far and wide as The Pepper King, and we all walked around all day sneezing with the smell of my beloved spice in our delicate royal noses.’

‘What did you do with all the pepper?’ asked Fred.

Do?’ cried The Pepper King, waving his arms, and it seemed suddenly, and just for the briefest of heartbeats, to Kit that he was the type of adult who would suddenly lose their temper and then regret it afterwards. ‘I didn’t do anything with it. It was much too precious to me. I kept it stored safely and dry, under the palace.’ He waved his arm around. ‘Here!’ And as Fred looked into the gloom properly 52

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for the first time, he could make out the dark shape of hundreds of sacks, most of them piled one on top of the other, some of them lying on their sides, the contents spilling out on the floor. And Kit finally understood what the strange smell was. Pepper. One thousand year old spice!

‘But even if you didn’t do anything with it, it wasn’t hurting anyone,’ she said, looking up at the King.

‘Oh but my child, I was indeed hurting people.’ It seemed to Fred that he was fading again. ‘I had spent all the palace money, and people were beginning to starve. It’s a King’s job to look after his subjects. When he doesn’t or when he can’t, he can no longer be called their King. They must find another: it’s The Lore, you know. It’s older than anything, The Lore, older than me, than this hill, even older than magic, some say. But I didn’t care. The only thing I cared about was my Pepper. And then my wife got ill, dear me. We sent for doctors, but I couldn’t pay for them so they went away again. She got worse as the winter went on, and my advisers told me to sell some of the Pepper to pay for better doctors from across the sea. But I wouldn’t hear of it, saying that she would probably get better in the spring when the weather got warmer. I refused to sell even a grain of Pepper to save my queen’s life, oh!’ He was very faint now but tears were streaming down his face. ‘All the time I thought she was getting better. And she never complained – not once. ‘I know that you will look after me,’ she would say, in a smaller voice 53

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every day, ‘and really, I’m not that ill at all. I’m just making a fuss, you’re right, I probably will get better in the spring,’ she would say. And, in a way, I was ill too, with a different kind of sickness; but it had infected the whole palace by now, as surely as any disease, and was killing it. And yet, I suppose that’s too much for you to believe, I was too selfish to see that she was dying, slowly, in front of all of us, and she loved me too much to believe that I would just let her get worse and worse.

But before the first daffodils in April, I was called to her room late one evening. ‘I am dying,’ she said at last, and she looked at me as I had never seen anyone look at me before.

She had finally realised that I loved the spice more than her.

‘And it is your fault,’ she whispered. ‘I curse you!’ she cried with her dying breath, ‘to live in this castle for an eternity!

Never more will you see the sunlight and evermore will you be cursed to smell pepper wherever you walk!’ He had nearly faded to nothing now.

‘Why?’ cried Fred, ‘why did she curse you?’ The Pepper King’s voice was very faint as if coming from far off across water.

‘Oh, she cursed me because I was a wicked King and because I killed her by forgetting her. It wasn’t the fever that finished her off. You see, she died the worst way possible: I know that now, after being down here for over 1000 years.’

Kit looked up.

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‘How did she die?’

But the King was now crying too much to hear. ‘After that I became ill, and the palace began to crumble into dust. My subjects left to find food and shelter elsewhere. Others that stayed starved to death. Even the little children.’ And Kit found that she was now crying too.

‘Barbarians and armed vagabonds came the very next winter. They built war engines and smashed the walls of the castle, burned the Keep and disappeared into the Great Forest. And finally I was left alone with nothing but the remaining passageways under the hill, my pepper and my curse, never to die and always to be here.’

‘But how did Queen Alicia die?’ Fred repeated. The King’s reply, when it eventually came, was barely a whisper, hanging by an invisible thread in the dry air.

‘She died of a broken heart.’

And with that he had gone again.

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Chapter Nine

The Curse Fred and Kit made their way back out of the room and through the tunnel into the main part of the castle. Neither of them said a word for a long time.

Finally, on the stairs, Kit turned to Fred and asked: ‘Is he a ghost?’ Fred stopped and looked at Kit; he chewed his lip thoughtfully.

‘I don’t know. I don’t think so. Sort of halfway in between, I suppose. Whatever – I think he needs our help,’ he added, almost to himself. ‘See you,’ he then said vaguely and closed the door to his room.

Kit agreed with Fred, whatever he was and whatever mistakes the Pepper King had made long ago in the past, he had more than made up for them now, though she had no idea what Fred was planning to do. To be honest she didn’t like to think about it.

In any case, she didn’t have to wait long to find out. The next day she woke up early to find a note from Fred on her pillow ‘Gon two librery’ She scratched her head and squinted at the note. ‘Blimey,’ she thought to herself. He really did have terrible 56

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handwriting, and his spelling was the worst she had ever seen. She got up and put on her clothes from the day before and went downstairs. After a few wrong turns, she found Fred in a musty old room surrounded by books. He looked cross and frustrated. ‘Curses,’ he muttered, his forehead wrinkling with the concentration of it all. ‘Where is it?’

‘What’s where?’ asked Kit. ‘The book on curses. There used to be a lot of them around these parts. Something to do with lines of magic running across the country, rather like invisible telephone wires, Dad says.

‘They’re called Laylines, Fred.’

‘Anyway, I remember him showing me a book on witches that one of my relatives wrote, and in it there was a whole chapter on curses. It had a picture at the start of the chapter of a man being cursed by a witch. His hair was standing on end and he looked like this.’ Fred poked his tongue out and rolled his eyes.

‘Urgh!’

‘You bet. Anyway, I can’t find it now.’ Kit shook her head sadly and took a long look around the room. There must have been hundreds of shelves, stacked with thousands upon thousands of books. But they were neat, although grubby, and obviously in some sort of order.

‘That’s because you’re not looking properly,’ and within a few minutes, and covered with dust from the old books that 57

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hadn’t been touched for years, she emerged glowing triumphantly, with a large leather volume in her hand. ‘Is this it?’ she said smiling.

‘Yes, ‘said Fred, genuinely impressed. ‘How did you do that?’ Kit looked pleased with herself.

‘The Home has got a library. That’s one of the good things about it. It gets boring watching television with thirty other kids all talking at once, so I go there some of the time.’

She blushed and looked sheepish. ‘Well, a lot of the time actually.’

‘Right, then lets see what we’ve got,’ Fred said, ignoring her embarrassment, the glint back in his eye, his forehead smooth again. He sat down with a thump on a window seat and he blew on the front cover. There was a cloud of dust.

‘Gnargh!’

‘Yuk!’ they both said as a small spider escaped from the spine of the book and hid behind a curtain. ‘Witches and Warlocks’ said the faded gold lettering on the front, ‘by Tarquin Postewaithe-Smythe Psmith’.

‘What’s a warlock?’ asked Kit. ‘It’s the same as a witch,’ said Fred knowledgeably, ‘except they fight battles and things,’ and with that he opened the volume with Kit peering over his shoulder and they began to read down the index....

‘A. Aardvarks 58

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Anteaters Arachnids Awful things ...’ he ran his finger down the page ‘B Beasts Boils Bunions Burnings... ..

Cakes (What?)

Caskets Claws ...Curses, Bloody Curses!’ Fred cried.

‘Don’t swear,’ said Kit sternly, ‘just be patient.’

‘No,’ said Fred, ‘this is it. ‘Bloody Curses’, it’s what’s written here.’ He showed her the page.

‘Oh,’ said Kit, ‘sorry.’

And so they turned to the correct page and started to read.

Kit had to flick through the chapter twice, and they had two or three arguments over who was in charge of holding the book up to the light, before they found what they were looking for. There was a small heading, underlined neatly in gold, and what looked like a rhyme or song written underneath in black and red lettering. And it went like this: 59

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GHOSTS OF CREAKE and his relative had written at the top: ‘If thou hast a ghost or phantom that troubleth or giveth the foul annoyance this is what you may do to be ridde of it,’ Kit looked up at Fred sharply, ‘What’s this about getting ‘ridde’ of ghosts? The Pepper King isn’t a ghost, you said so yourself, and he may be a bit potty, but he’s not foul or anything. I rather like him actually. You can’t just kill him, even if he’s already dead.’

‘I like him too. Anyway, that’s a bit rich – you were accusing him of being just a tramp only yesterday.’

‘Well...’ Kit mumbled.

‘I still don’t really think he is a ghost,’ Fred went on, ‘not a real ghost, just sort of there though he shouldn’t be. It’s the curse that’s keeping him trapped in the tunnels below Creake, like a prisoner. You know what I think?’

‘What?’ asked Kit, fearing the worst.

‘I think that a lot of ghosts you hear about may be in the same situation. Kind of trapped in a house or a cellar, not there on purpose. What people usually say is silly, really, when you think about it. Imagine hanging around for hundreds of years with only dead spiders for company, in the 60

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dark, just to scare the willies off someone you’ve never met, when they turn the lights on.’ Fred blinked. ‘Come to think of it, I feel quite sorry for them.’

‘Hmm, you may be right,’ said Kit after a pause. ‘Anyway, it’s the only chance we’ve found of any help in the whole book. What does the rhyme say?’

‘Okay, I’ll read it,’ Fred replied. ‘My great-great-uncle did everything in rhymes apparently, even notes to the milkman, which probably explains why they still won’t deliver.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Here goes...

On Midsummer Night, when the barn owl calls A warrior must climb these castle walls And when midnight gongs its heavy note Cast a penny in the moat If you do not quake or quail The family honour will not fail And then you’ll get what you want the most Creake Castle – minus Ghost!’ and the bottom Fred’s great-great-uncle had written in neat copperplate the following words: ‘This inscription was found by excavators at Creake Castle, carved on a wall at the foot of some ancient battlements.

It is recorded here as part of the Creake curse but actually is probably a lot older than Creake Castle itself.’

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‘That’s it!’ shouted Fred and jumped up so fast the big book fell off his lap and landed on Kit’s toe.

‘Ow!’ she cried indignantly.

‘Wow, I know,’ said Fred grinning at her.

‘No, I said ‘ow!’ You idiot, you dropped the book on my foot!’

‘Oh, sorry,’ said Fred, waving his hand vaguely in her direction, not sounding a bit sorry at all. ‘But I still think that’s the answer!’

‘Well,’ said Kit still a little uncertainly, ‘just so long as we’re not going to hurt him or anything.’

‘Of course not,’ said Fred, conjuring up his usual certainty. ‘Look at it like we’re releasing him from prison. It’s the best thing we can do. I’m positive.’

Just then, there was the sound of footsteps and the two children heard Fred’s father’s voice talking to his mother in the study. The door was open and they could hear everything quite clearly. ‘I’ve just had the estimate for the roof repairs, my dear,’ he said gloomily.

‘Oh,’ said Fred’s mother, ‘is it very bad?’ There was a pause. The children could hear paper being shuffled.

‘Yes it is. Much worse than expected I’m afraid. The builder doesn’t think that the wood is going to last another heavy frost, like last year. He says that the whole lot could come crashing down anytime. But the whole job is going to cost thousands. Not to mention all the other bills, like heating and pest control. I’m afraid that we are going to have 62

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to accept the council’s offer and move out to a flat in town.

And I’m afraid the castle will have to be sold and most probably demolished.’

‘What do you mean, demolished?’

‘I’ve had an offer, just a couple of days ago, from Bauer & Co., the local property developers.’

‘I know them,’ said Fred’s mother. Fred was shocked. Her voice had suddenly gone hard, with a flinty edge to it. ‘His son was in prison, wasn’t he, for robbing old ladies of their savings? And his father only got away with the same thing because they had no evidence he was involved. Didn’t he persuade them that they needed lots of work done on their homes when they didn’t need it, and then charge them a fortune for doing a terrible job?’ Sir Longshanks sighed.

‘Yes, you’re right, and I do think that the son probably put him up to it. But theirs is the best offer we’ve had and the only one that will clear all the debts. Also, he wrote to me again this morning, giving us a week to accept, otherwise he will lower the offer again.’

‘But that’s blackmail! Is there really no other way, dear?’ asked Fred’s mother, her voice shaking a little.

‘No, we have nothing left to sell. And I simply refuse to put you and Fred at any sort of risk. I don’t need to say that you two are what is most important, not some old castle – even if it has been in the family for over eight hundred years.’

‘Oh dear, I’m sorry,’ Fred’s mother sniffed.

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There was a long pause as they heard Fred’s parents move off down the corridor. Fred looked at Kit. Kit looked at Fred.

‘We can’t go now,’ she said eventually. ‘Your poor parents have got better things to worry about than having to take you off to hospital because you’ve fallen off the stupid old roof.’

Fred looked strangely at Kit. ‘I don’t know, somehow things aren’t going right for us, and the Pepper King being down in the cellar, gradually getting paler and more sorry for himself, it all seems somehow connected. I know that sounds silly.’

‘Silly or not, it sounds dangerous,’ said Kit firmly.

‘I’ve never heard anyone say that everything was always going to be easy,’ replied Fred. Kit stared at the paper.

‘So let me get this straight. You want to climb the castle walls at midnight, throw a penny into the moat and then climb down again. All in the pitch darkness, with no proper ropes or anything?’

‘Absolutely,’ said Fred.

‘And I suppose you think that this will help.’

‘I would have thought that was obvious,’ Fred replied.

‘You are absolutely bonkers, Fred!’ Kit said fiercely, really losing her temper with him. ‘As mad as a hatter, just like your ancestors! What’s all this about curses, from some old book?

And anyway the roof is dangerous. It could cave in at any moment!’

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But Kit stopped abruptly. All of a sudden Fred looked lost, a little like the Pepper King, she thought vaguely. She had never seen him like that before. There was a short silence in which they both managed to look embarrassed and cross at the same time.

‘Does that mean you’re not going to help me?’ he asked quietly. There was a longer pause this time. Kit bit her lip and looked around at the old library, at the books, the suits of armour and the long swords hanging up amongst the vases and the old pictures. There was no doubt about it: Creake really had a lot of junk in it. But there was something else behind all the stuff in corners and hanging on the walls besides dust and cobwebs- she could feel it in her bones: it had a funny feel, she had felt it before. Magic, that word again, was the only word she could think of, but she put it out of her head. Orphans weren’t supposed to believe in such things. And yet she couldn’t help it. Even Fred, who was as much a part of the castle as the walls themselves, was a oneoff. She had never met anyone quite like him before. And she strongly doubted she would do again.

She also suspected that not everyone could see the Pepper King, even if he was real enough to them. Obviously she hadn’t had a chance to try this bit of her theory out, but she was almost sure she was right. Fred seeing a ghost was, to him, perfectly normal – ‘and that’s one of the reasons he is so special,’ she thought to herself. ‘He doesn’t know he’s 65

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different.’ But, most importantly, some of whatever it was that was vaguely supernatural about him seemed to be rubbing off on her. She could see the Pepper King and talk to him, and this made her feel special, perhaps for the first time in her life. Definitely for the first time in her life. That was the whole point and the reason why – she knew there and then – that she was going to agree to his stupid plan.

‘Obviously he really believes that it is going to work,’ she thought to herself, ‘and even if I don’t, it doesn’t mean that I can’t help him. Anyway, he’s going to go ahead and do it anyway, so I might as well make sure he doesn’t kill himself.

At least with two of us, if something happened, one of us could always go for help.’

She looked up and sighed. ’Let’s do it,’ she said.

And, inside, a lost voice replied: ‘If it all turns out to be a load of rubbish, then I don’t know what I’ll do.’

That night Fred had a dream.

He was running through woods. It was very dark, and the branches of trees kept slapping him wetly in the face. Through the gloom, he could just make out someone else running beside him. He could not see who it was, but out of the corner of his eye he noticed that the person was wearing a dress, so he supposed that it was a girl, or else it was Eccentric Uncle Jack.

He felt the wind pushing his hair back as he dashed along down a path he did not recognise, when suddenly Fred’s stomach 66

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turned upside down. It took him a moment to place the sensation and then he realised what it was. He was falling. First through nothing but air, then his bottom made contact in his dream with something hard and slippery. Before the dream ended, he caught a glimpse of something lying in the leaves.

Something small and shiny. Unfortunately the bump in his dream suddenly felt distinctly like a real bump in real life and he woke up with a start.

On the floor of his bedroom.

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Chapter Ten

Valediction The next day they went down to see the little King, probably for the last time.

He was sitting quietly on his throne, humming a tuneless tune to himself. He was so small his feet didn’t touch the ground; instead they swung to and fro a few inches above the stone floor, like a child on a bench that is too high. And he seemed paler, during the day, hardly more than a shadow.

He turned to the children. ‘How can I leave my Pepper?’

He seemed forlorn, looking at his hands. ‘It’s all I’ve had for all, this time…all this time.’ Fred wondered how he knew about lifting the Curse. Maybe he did haunt the main part of the house and listen in on conversations. Fred did his best to say something reassuring.

‘It doesn’t matter, I’m sure there will be plenty of pepper where you are going. And……… you’ll see your wife again.....’

The King was silent for a moment. Kit couldn’t really tell but he seemed to be making up his mind about something.

‘I hear things upstairs,’ he said eventually, confirming Fred’s earlier thoughts. He turned to the children, and looked them both in the eyes for the first and the only time.

Kit saw kindness and something else, something between age and knowledge.

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‘Are you really a ghost?’ Kit blurted out before she could stop herself. There was a silence and she glanced at Fred, who was looking very intently at the Pepper King. ‘He wants to know just as much as I do,’ she thought, just as the the King said: ‘No.’ ‘What are you then?’ It was Fred’s turn to be impertinent.

‘I am...’ He paused, as if thinking, and continued: ‘I’m a spirit, I think.’

‘What sort of spirit?’ asked Kit, who liked things to be clear.

‘The spirit of remorse.’ A wind blew gently through the throne room and moaned, as if in agreement. ‘Don’t worry, Fred.’ He looked at them with a last wintry smile. ‘I think I can help you.’

That night Fred lay in bed listening to the sounds of the house around him. A coin he had borrowed from his father’s collection of sovereigns sat snugly in the palm of his hand, feeling hot and reassuringly heavy. Gradually things got quieter, until all he could hear was the creaking of the floorboards and the tapping of a stray branch against the window. Even now, he knew he had to do something to help save Creake, he thought to himself – and whatever Kit thought, he knew it all had something to do with lifting the Curse on the Pepper King.

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Eventually, after what seemed like hours, he crept out of bed and opened his door the merest of cracks. At the end of the hall he could see his father’s light was still on in the study, where he was still working. Fred could make out his shadow, thrown onto the wall by the light. Even that looked hunched up and beaten, and at that moment it seemed as if his father reminded him, oddly, of the Pepper King. Fred loved Creake, but he loved his parents more, and at that moment he was sure he was going to sort things out, for them – even if going anywhere near the roof at night was going to be dangerous.

He waited for another twenty minutes, listening to the sound of his breathing, before he heard a scrape of a chair and a click as the light went off, and his father trod slowly upstairs to the second floor of the Castle, in the East Wing, where his parents slept.

A hot summer breeze blew slowly down the chimney and made a low moaning noise, like somebody sobbing, and Fred, although he wasn’t a bit cold, felt his back shiver and his stomach knot up.

Then, abruptly, the wind stopped and Fred heard an owl hoot twice from deep in the woods. ‘That’s it,’ he thought.

‘It’s now or never.’

Screwing up his courage, he slid out of the doorway and made his way down the passageway to Kit’s room. As he opened the door he saw she was waiting for him. Perched on 70

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the end of the bed, in her slippers, looking more like an elf than ever.

‘Is that you, Fred?’ she whispered as he opened the door and tiptoed in.

‘No, it’s the ghost of Gogglenose, coming to eat your ten bare toes,’ he moaned, shining the torch under his chin and pulling a horrible face.

‘Stop mucking around, Fred,’ she hissed. ‘Have you got everything?’

‘Yup.’ ‘Torch?’ she asked doubtfully.

‘Yup.’ ‘Trainers?’

‘Yup.’ ‘Rope?’

‘Yup.’ ‘Gloves?’

‘Yup.’ ‘Sandwiches with cream cheese and the crusts cut off ?’

‘Nope.’

‘Oh dear, then I suppose we’ll have to do without them.’

‘I’ve bought some Mars Bars, though,’ said Fred. ‘And,’ he continued, moving towards the window, ‘I’ve worked it out.

The best way onto the roof is from your balcony. You remember the plan. I’ll lasso one of the gargoyles on the roof and pull myself up. You stay below and whistle if you hear 71

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anyone coming. Like this,’ Fred let out a low whistle, once, twice, then three times, ‘got that?’ he whispered.

‘Yes sir,’ said Kit smartly, pretending to salute; and Fred positively beamed in the dark, despite his recent best intentions.

‘Okay. Once I’m up I’ll flash the torch down and you come up, then we’ll get on with the ceremony if we can.’

‘Right.’

‘Right.’

Together they both moved over to the window and peered out. It was a clear night, and the stars shone like large and small pinpricks in the black blanket of the sky. A thin wisp of cloud drifted slowly across the moon that hung there, fuller and brighter than Kit had ever seen or imagined in her days in the Home.

Fred tugged at the latch and suddenly they were perched out on the balcony, the drive far below them and the warm summer breeze in their faces. Kit surprised herself by feeling a tug of excitement as Fred began to unwind the rope.

Carefully he made a loop and, grinning at Kit, looked up at the roof. Against the black, starry sky they could both see the dark figure of the gargoyle directly above them, leaning over the balcony, as if he was leaning over to peer at the two children below.

‘Here goes nothing,’ said Fred, whispering between his teeth, starting to spin the rope round and round, like a 72

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cowboy catching a wild horse. The rope began to go round faster and faster until it was a blur, and with a heave Fred flung it up into the air towards the parapet.

It missed, came down and landed on his head with a whack. Fred picked himself up off the ground, re-tied the lasso and spun the rope round and round, once again, faster and faster and then let go.

It missed once more, and hit Kit on the head this time. She wasn’t very pleased.

They were both panting like carthorses by now. ‘Okay,’ said Fred, his eye on the gargoyle. Slowly he unwound the rope, twirling it in his fingers very carefully and making the loop of the lasso bigger. As the rope twirled and spun Fred waited for a moment and then released it with all his strength.

As it climbed up in the air, something caught Kit’s eye.

She blinked. Up and up it went and then it tied itself firmly around the head of the gargoyle. Kit thought she saw something move again up in the darkness on the roof, a sort of shadow. ‘Fred,’ she said.

‘Pretty good eh,’ said Fred, ‘I knew I’d get it sooner or later.’ He put the torch in his pocket, tested the rope and started to pull himself up. Kit watched from the balcony, her eyes open very wide.

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than hands and after a couple of tugs he found them getting sore, even through his gloves. Also, it is very hard to pull your own weight, and for every couple of feet he pulled himself up, he slipped down a foot.

Then, all of a sudden, the going seemed to get easier. ‘Oh, well,’ he thought, ‘I must be getting the hang of it; or else I’m stronger than I realized.’

‘Fred,’ Kit called urgently from ten feet below. He turned.

‘Not now. Can’t you see I’m trying to risk my life? The least I can expect is a bit of peace and quiet from you.’

‘Fred!’

‘What?’

‘Look up, Fred.’

‘Why?’ ‘I’m sure I saw…..’ She tried to go on.

‘You did, right over the head of the gargoyle.’ ‘…it move.’

‘Nonsense,’ said Fred, ‘trick of the light.’ He continued climbing.

Kit opened her mouth and bellowed: ‘JUST LOOK UP!’ He turned back and as he did so he felt a tug on the rope, pulling him upwards. The moon came out from the cloud at that instant and Fred saw what he thought was the gargoyle standing up straight and giving the rope a tug. Against the starry night sky he could see, on top of the head of whatever was now pulling him up towards the roof, a thatch of tufty hair.

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Without thinking he let go of the rope. Luckily for Fred he had not climbed more than twelve feet, and luckily for Kit she had the good sense to step out of the way when Fred came crashing down. He landed straight on the edge of the balcony below and then sort of bounced. There was a sickening pause. Before he knew it he was falling again. This time there seemed more air than the first time and his first thought was to wonder what he was going to hit when he got to the bottom. He needn’t have wondered for long. There was a loud splash, as Fred hit the deepest part of the moat, and then everything in his world went dark.

‘Am I dead?’ he thought to himself. He felt floaty, and even with his eyes wide open everything looked decidedly black. ‘If I am then I shouldn’t have this horrible taste in my mouth.’

Fred moved his arms and it certainly felt like water. He coughed and a bit of pondweed floated out of his mouth. He kicked once. Twice. And suddenly he was back out in the night air, his head bobbing just above the surface of the water. There was a lot more coughing and spluttering as he swam to the side through pondweed and lily pads. It really was incredibly cold. Kit was there to meet him, panting and out of breath.

‘Oomf!’

‘What?’

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‘I said ‘Oomf!’ – it’s what you say when you’ve fallen off a roof in the middle of the night,’ said Fred.

‘Are you all right?’

‘No,’ said Fred, ‘actually I’m not. I’m bleeding.’

‘Oh no!’ Kit gasped. ‘Where?’

‘Here,’ said Fred, pointing to his leg.

‘Oh my!’ said Kit. ‘Let me see.’ She put her hand on his leg. ‘It’s sticky, Fred.’

‘Yes,’ he said, ‘that’s the blood congealing.’

‘It can’t be congealing,’ she said, ‘it’s far too soon. Hang on.’ She reached down again and touched his leg with the tip of her finger and sniffed it and then licked it. Fred watched her.

‘That’s disgusting,’ he said, eventually, ‘get your own blood.’

Kit looked at him and laughed. ‘It’s just chocolate. You landed on the Mars Bars when you fell.’

‘That’s a relief,’ said Fred, trying not to look too foolish.

‘Anyway, I’ve done what we set out to do.’

‘What, fall off a rope?’ said Kit sarcastically. Then she felt bad. ‘I’m sorry it didn’t work out. If you like I’ll help you try again, but this time why don’t we get a ladder?’ Fred started chuckling to himself, which made Kit a little cross – she was trying to make him feel better about not lifting the curse, and all he could do was be cheerful. She expected at least sulking.

‘Why are you laughing? You’ve probably got a bump on your head and it’s making you hysterical.’

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‘Not at all,’ Fred replied with a grin. ‘I was holding the coin in my mouth, so when I fell into the moat so did the coin.‘ ‘Where’s the sovereign gone now?’ asked Kit suspiciously.

‘I swallowed it,’ he replied. ‘I expect it’ll turn up soon though.’ He winked and grinned again. Kit suddenly felt very happy. She almost hugged Fred, but pulled herself together at the last minute.

‘Anyway, what was that pulling you up onto the roof ?’ she asked. ‘I definitely saw something up there. And so did you, otherwise why let go of the rope like that and nearly get yourself killed?’ Fred looked at her and shrugged.

‘Dad says we’ve got infestations of all sorts of strange things up there, pretending to be gargoyles. He says they leave you alone if you leave them alone. I guess he wasn’t actually joking.’ And with that he marched back into the house, as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened.

Dripping all the way.

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Chapter Eleven

The Moon and Tree The following night they both went in search of the Pepper King.

The first place they went to was the room with the throne in it, where they had first found him, but there was no sign of him there. Just the throne standing alone at the end and faint marks on the dusty floor where their feet had moved, mixed with smaller shallower prints. ‘If it wasn’t for those,’ Kit thought to herself, ‘I might start thinking I dreamt it all.’

It seemed emptier than before, and rather ordinary. Without speaking they made their way through the meandering passageways to the storeroom where the pepper was kept.

That too was empty. He wasn’t there. It was as if he had never been there at all. Fred should have been happy that the Curse really had been lifted, but instead he felt a little sad.

They hadn’t said goodbye.

Kit walked over to the wall and shone her torch on the archway leading to the door. As they both peered at the old stone they made out some faint scratch marks that seemed freshly made.

Thank you was all that was written.

‘He was so weak, really, it must have taken a lot to do that.

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What’s this?’ said Kit, running her hand down the wall.

On the stone, just under the writing was a series of marks. ’It looks like a picture.’ Fred squinted: he could just make out a tree and a half moon rising just above it. It all seemed very familiar, like something he had seen before.

Suddenly everything seemed to go click in his head, as if two things were connecting. The dream, the picture, the moon and the tree.

‘Come on!’ he cried, and grabbed Kit’s hand. They ran down the corridor together.

‘Where are we going?’ said Kit between gasps of air as she tried to keep up.

‘The woods!’ yelled Fred over his shoulder. ‘It was in my dream, the woods!’

‘What was in your dream?’

‘The tree and the moon, like that. It’s like a sort of map. I dreamed it, or at least I think I did. Perhaps the Pepper King put it there in my dream before he went. Come on!’

‘But what’s going to be there?

‘I don’t know, but it’s something important.’ And with that they were out of the cellar, racing up the stairs and, before Kit knew it, bursting across the front lawn, where the moonlight made the grass shine silver, like the surface of a lake.

Kit looked up at the moon. And there it was, rising in the 79

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sky like half a saucer, exactly the same as the Pepper King had scratched on the wall. It was as plain as it could be: he really had drawn a map. But why had he used the last of his strength to scratch a map into the stone? There was only one logical answer. Fred was right; it had to be something important. Her feet began to tingle, then all of her body. The Pepper King had gone, but he’d left them with something worth running around in the middle of the night for. She suddenly felt more alive than she had in ten years at the Home.

‘Yes,’ she shouted, ‘come on!’ and they were both off at a sprint, the blood pounding in their ears.

They raced towards the Back of Beyond. In front of them the Old Wood crouched, dark and dangerous. Fred led the way as they raced along the side of the lake that led down to the Old Wood, through the park. As soon as they passed the first low trees he turned sharply off the track and started pushing through the thick undergrowth.

The going was extremely difficult; the wood was very dark and deadly quiet. Soon, Fred’s world had become nothing more than the sound of his own heartbeat and the Pepper King’s scratched drawing. In his mind’s eye he saw the sickleshaped moon and the tree, standing alone in a clearing deep in the wood, as he rushed through the undergrowth, unseen branches, like jagged fingernails, reaching out and tearing into the flesh of his legs and arms. As he got more tired, his 80

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head ached and dozens of thoughts began to throng in his head, halfway between imagination and remembering: the Pepper King’s white fingers and his sorrowful eyes; Kit’s anger that the only thing she could rely on and believe in was herself, not even Fred, her friend; his father doing his best to put a brave face on everything but just ending up looking tired; and his mother’s tears.

And suddenly it was there! Fred’s head cleared and his heart lifted. The tree from his dream – the same one that was in the Pepper King’s picture. Just as he had expected, in the middle of a clearing, standing there quietly in the dark, like a sentry. It was as if the old Oak had been expecting them.

With one last burst of energy he flung himself forward.

He turned again to see where Kit was and felt his feet catch on a tree root.

Then he was falling and landing hard on the slippery earth, down into what seemed like a deep hole.

In a flash Fred remembered the rest of his dream, just as he felt a strong, dry hand catch him by the ankle, stopping him from falling. Fred blinked and reached his hand out towards something glinting in the moonlight at the bottom of the hole, just as he heard Kit’s breathless voice exclaim, ‘Sir Longshanks, its you!’ and his father’s voice reply: ‘I’ve got him by the ankle. Will you help me pull him up, young lady? Thank you so much.’ Fred was lifted up to the edge of the hole. He stood up; brushing damp leaves off his 81

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clothes and grinned at his father in the dark. Then he lifted his hand up to the light. Between his finger and his thumb something shiny and gold sparkled, in the moonlight, almost on its own. Fred’s father gasped. ‘It’s a gold coin!’ Fred nodded at his astonished father and grinned even more.

‘And there’s pots more down there, by the looks of it.’

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Chapter Twelve

Gold The next morning they all sat down in the kitchen, tucking into an enormous breakfast of bacon, eggs and spitting, sizzling sausages, made by Mrs. Bee, who was still fussing over them about staying up all night and trailing mud all over the kitchen floor. They were tired but marvellously happy. In front of them, on the table, lay a pile of shiny gold coins. There were six hundred and eighty-four. Kit had counted them all, each one getting her more and more excited. ‘Six hundred and eighty-four,’ Fred’s father kept saying, as if he was in some kind of trance, ‘and Fred found them.’

After Fred had been pulled out of the hole, the three of them rushed back to the house to wake Lady Longshanks.

Then they had collected strong flashlights and rope and gone back to the hole, where they spent the rest of the night collecting the gold from the bottom. As dawn had come up and they were sure that they had not missed any, they went back to the house with the treasure in a large wooden trunk.

They all had to help carry it, because it was so heavy.

‘I was working late when I happened to look out of the window. I thought that they were burglars,’ Sir Longshanks 85

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was saying for the hundredth time, ‘so I chased them across the lawn. By the time I realized it was only Fred and Kit I was so out of breath I couldn’t call out, so I just had to keep on chasing them. Six hundred and eighty-four gold sovereigns,’ repeated Sir Longshanks. ‘That’s more than enough to pay the bank and repair the whole building. We’ll even be able to afford a gardener.’

‘And someone part-time to feed the hedgehogs,’ added Fred under his breath.

‘What I still don’t understand is how Fred knew that they were there.’ The question was left hanging in the air as they all turned to look at Fred, who looked at his shoes. Kit noticed something like embarrassment on his face, which was pretty unusual for Fred. There was also something else there, something like puzzlement. ‘It’s got something to do with that last conversation with the Pepper King,’ she thought to herself, ‘and the dream, but there’s something else there and he’s not going to say. I think he might just be growing up.’ Then she thought about her own experiences in the last few days and how she felt about the Longshanks family and, most of all, Fred, and she realised that she’d changed quite a bit too. And although she knew that she was going back to the Home at the end of the holidays, and although nothing specific had been said yet, she knew that she was coming back to Creake Castle, and she felt her heart give an excited little beat of happiness.

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‘Yes dear,’ Fred’s mother was saying to his father, ‘but you’d better calm down now and get some rest.’

A couple of hours later Fred’s father had invited the bank manager and the builder over. He counted out fifteen coins each and handed them over. They both just stood there with their mouths open.

‘There you go, Mr. Clink, that should settle everything; and you, Mr. Wattle, that should be enough for the roof, and perhaps you might like to make a start on the rest of the house when you’ve finished. I know there are some tunnels that need seeing to.’ At which point Kit looked quickly at the sky and Fred started whistling loudly.

When the bank manager had eventually found his tongue, he turned to Fred. ‘The Creake treasure. I remember your grandfather talking about it when I was a boy. We all thought it was a tall story.’ The builder smiled grimly.

‘Ahem,’ said Fred.

‘What is it?’ his father asked.

‘Well, am I still going to have to go into a home until the work is carried out, like Mr Scar the Social Worker said?’

His father smiled down at Fred and winked at his mother.

‘Actually, I think that’s one little problem we were never going to have to deal with. You see I did some detective work after he had gone, and I had a chat with the solicitors. They were suspicious from the start, and I should have known too 87

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that Social Workers don’t behave like that. Real ones anyway.’

‘What do you mean?’ interrupted Kit. ‘Well for starters, they’re not allowed to come barging around without making an appointment, and then they are certainly not allowed to make threats like the ones he did.’

‘So if he wasn’t a Social Worker, then who was he?’ It was Fred’s turn to ask.

‘He was an actor,’ said Fred’s father, ‘and not a particularly good one at that, although, I suppose, in all fairness, he had us fooled for a bit.’

‘Why would an actor go around pretending to be a Social Worker?’ asked Fred again. ‘If I was an actor I could think of much better things to pretend to be, like a bank robber for instance,’ he said, glancing at Mr Clink, who didn’t look pleased.

‘Oh Fred, don’t be thick!’ cried Kit. ‘He was obviously sent to scare you and your mother and father. Mr Scar, Mr Scare – it’s practically the same word.’ Fred’s father smiled.

‘She’s absolutely right, you know. We don’t have any proof but it turns out that this so-called actor had been in jail for fraud and had made friends there with non other than Bill Bauer, son of Jake Bauer of Bauer & Co. Property Development, who wanted to tear this place down to build an out of town DIY and Carpet Emporium.’

‘It would have put me out of business, that Emporium, for 88

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sure,’ interjected Mr Wattle.

‘Anyway, the actor’s done a runner, so we can’t have him interviewed by the police, and we will never get Jake Bauer to admit he got his son’s friend to scare us into selling Creake Castle quickly and most importantly, cheaply, which was what he wanted all along. But I would still give half the gold here to see the look on his face when he finds out about all this.’

‘I imagine you can all stay here as long as you like. The place wouldn’t seem the same without the Longshanks. After all, they’ve been in the castle for over eight hundred years. I propose a toast to Fred.’ They all lifted their cups full of hot chocolate. ‘Three cheers for Fred! Hip hip hooray, hip hip hooray, hip hip hooray!’ Fred looked around at all the smiling faces, winked at Kit and beamed.

‘Right,’ said Fred.

THE END

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THE PEPPER KING A frigid wind will murmur, ‘Fate.’

Dry leaves attend the Moaning Gate, Which drongs and sounds a mournful tune, As shadows rearrange the gloom.

And down and down the echoes groan through the rock and under stone.

So all alone, so all alone, The Darkling Tower lies overgrown.

Awash, awash the Custard Court with lichen, larks and Dragonwort.

Who skivee, dive and trilly sing, ‘Awake, awake! The Pepper King.’

And deep beneath the battered skies, The King he stirs to hear the cries.

He feels the wind of far-off breezes, Shakes his head and loudly sneezes.

Then stirs and sips his morning tea, Smiles quietly now and says, ‘Bless me!’

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