The Last Apprentice: Grimalkin the Witch Assassin (Book 9) by Joseph Delaney

Author:Joseph Delaney [Delaney, Joseph]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2012-04-17T04:00:00+00:00

I dozed for a while, leaving Thorne on watch. I awoke to the murmur of voices and slowly opened one eye.

Thorne and the boy were sitting very close together, almost touching, and talking together softly in an animated way, lost in their own private world. It was the first time I had ever seen Thorne show interest in a boy, but she had reached an age when the right one might hold a fascination for her. They clearly liked each other, and it put me in mind of my first meeting with the Fiend.

I was young, not much more than sixteen, when I first encountered him. Of course, I did not know he was the Fiend. I was passing a ruined chapel—one abandoned by the Church after the local population had dwindled; the bishop had deconsecrated the ground ten years earlier, and it was now a wilderness of empty graves.

A young man was standing in the shadows, watching me. I was annoyed to find myself being stared at, and I prepared to cast a small spell—nothing too severe; one that would have loosened his bowels rather suddenly, or brought vomit up into his throat. But then he did something that pushed all such thoughts from my mind.

He smiled at me.

Never had I been smiled at in such a way, with such warmth and evident liking. He was handsome too, and tall—I have always liked tall men—and before the night was done, we had kissed and lain snugly in each other’s arms.

It was Agnes Sowerbutts who put me wise. I had been in the company of the Devil! She told me. At first I found it hard to believe. Surely he could not be the Fiend! How could this beautiful, kind young man be reconciled with the fearsome beast who appeared in the flames of the bone fire at Halloween? And how could I have been such a fool and fallen so easily for his charms? I was both annoyed and disgusted with myself. I had a bitter hatred of the Fiend and didn’t want to believe what Agnes had told me.

But once I’d finally accepted the truth, I knew what to do: Bear his child, and I could be free of him forever.

I looked at Thorne, talking happily to her new friend. She did not know I was watching her—otherwise she would not have sat so close to him.

Foolish child, don’t you know that most men are devils inside?

But I did not speak the words aloud. We must snatch happiness where we can. I would not begrudge her a few sweet moments.

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