The Giant Key, page 1
For Marisa and Luna
– who made all my nightmares come true.
Contents
1 Trick or Treat
2 An Early Grave
3 The Witch-Hobble Lending Library
4 A Trick in the Book
5 The Witching Hour Again
6 The Melting Witch
7 Cat and Mouse
8 Into The Woods
9 Blood Magic
10 A Change of Heart
11 Old Friends
12 The Dead of Night
13 Feet of Fire
14 The Old Wood
15 Witch Hunt
16 On the Shoulders of Giants
17 A Stitch in Time
18 Ever After
Acknowledgements
About the Author
Copyright Page
1
TRICK OR TREAT
‘LET ME TELL YOU A STORY,’ SAID MAX.
Anna’s eyes blinked open, her head bumping against the car door as she sat up. She had been dreaming of a garden filled with flowers and bees: a forest where the trees stretched up to impossible heights. But she wasn’t in a forest. Anna stared drowsily out the window, trying to make sense of the roadside as it flashed past. The world was dark.
‘It’s a good one,’ said Max. ‘I’ve been planning it for hours.’ He leant across the back seat, raising his eyebrows. ‘It’s very scary.’
Anna shook her head, wishing the dream had stayed with her a little longer. She turned towards Max, peering at his face in the gloomy light.
‘A story,’ she repeated slowly. ‘A scary story. What’s it about?’
‘You’ll have to wait and see,’ said Max. ‘Do you want to hear it or not?’
Anna sighed as rain began to tap against the window.
‘All right,’ she said. ‘I’m listening.’
It was a black and bitter night in America. Spindly trees grew in clumps along the roadside, ushering the car through straggling townships. Halloween decorations leered out from fences and front gardens: skeletons waving their bony arms, plastic pumpkins rattling in the wind. A swarm of bats flew overhead, leathery wings dipping through the chimney smoke, disappearing into the clouds.
Anna reached into her backpack as Max cleared his throat, pulling out a sheaf of letters. She had already read them all on this trip – once at the airport, twice on the plane, and three times so far inside the car – but she couldn’t resist holding them again now, smiling as she hid the papers in her lap. She slyly opened an envelope as Max began his story.
‘Right,’ said Max, puffing out his cheeks. ‘Once upon a time, there was a girl named Anna, who had just turned twelve. Anna thought she was brave, but she was a bit of a scaredy-cat, really. She had a brother, who was nine, and he was really brave, even though he was littler. He wasn’t afraid of anything.’
Anna rolled her eyes. She slid out the contents of the first envelope: a handmade birthday card with a tall, crumbling castle drawn on the front. On the castle battlements stood two girls. The first girl had dark, curly hair, and a moon-shaped scar on her cheek. The second girl had brown hair, and was holding something tightly in her hand: a small knife, its blade as white as bone.
Anna opened the card, squinting to read the message inside.
Dear Anna,
Happy Birthday!
I really, really wish I could be there to celebrate with you. Grandma says if enough people stay at the inn these holidays I might be able to fly over for a visit. Do you think the Professor would let me stay?
No sign of any more vampires here. Please write back immediately if anything else weird has happened to you and Max.
Lots of love,
Isabella
Beside the message was a picture of a vampire eating a birthday cake. Anna grinned, remembering with a shiver the time she had spent in Romania with Isabella Dalca. The vampire she had met that night hadn’t looked half as friendly.
‘Well,’ said Max, continuing his story. ‘One day Anna and her brother were in a car with their dad, the Professor, who had taken them away on a work trip. They were driving down a spooky road in the middle of the night, with dark clouds blocking out all the stars. And then …’ Max paused dramatically. ‘Their car broke down!’
The car rattled noisily over a bump in the road. Max looked up in alarm, glaring at the driver’s seat. The Professor raised a hand in apology.
‘Sorry about that,’ he said. ‘These headlights aren’t very bright.’ He peered out at the road, the windscreen wipers swishing back and forth. ‘I do hope I haven’t missed our turn.’
Anna opened her next envelope as Max stared crossly at the Professor. A second birthday card dropped into her lap: a card bought from a shop, with a photo of a barn owl on the front. Anna opened it up, sneakily reading the message.
Happy Birthday Anna!
Many happy returns from everyone in England—that’s Lizzie and Billy and mum and Mr Collins too.
Lots of good birds around lately. Yesterday I saw a fieldfare and two waxwings—wicked! I haven’t seen any more trolls though (v. lucky). Have you met any new fairies lately?
Say hi to Max for me.
From Jamie.
Anna couldn’t imagine what a waxwing looked like, but Jamie Sparrow always made birdwatching sound exciting. Watching birds certainly sounded much better than fighting a bridge troll, which is what had happened when Anna and Max had visited England. Anna shivered again, the memory settling uncomfortably in her head.
‘Well, yes, the car broke down,’ said Max hurriedly. ‘Right in the middle of nowhere. The Professor had to stay with the car so no-one would steal it, so he sent Anna and her brother to find a mechanic. The only path back to town was through some deep, dark woods, where the trees looked like monsters. All of the branches were like twisting arms, waiting to snatch the children up.’ Max looked rather impressed with himself. ‘But really, the children should never have entered the forest.’
‘Oh?’ said Anna. ‘Why was that?’
‘Because of the witches!’ cried Max. He kicked the back of the passenger seat in glee, startling the Professor; Anna flinched as the car skittered across the road, splashing through a puddle. ‘Yes, a whole club of witches, each one as ugly as the next. They had matted black hair, and horrible red eyes, and nasty sharp teeth. And everyone who lived near the forest knew that all those witches ever wanted was to eat children for dinner!’
‘I think you mean coven,’ said Anna. ‘A group of witches is called a coven, not a club.’
‘Well, these ones were a club,’ said Max crossly. ‘You’re missing the point. They wanted to eat Anna alive.’
He looked at Anna expectantly. Anna tried her best to look scared.
‘Oh no,’ she said. ‘I hope nothing bad happens to the children.’
She didn’t sound very convincing, but Max seemed pleased. She reached into her backpack again as he thought of his next line, lifting out two small bundles wrapped in newspaper. Jamie and Isabella had only sent cards for her birthday – but two of her other friends had sent very strange gifts indeed. Anna’s fingers trembled as she unwrapped the first bundle, still unable to believe what lay within.
It had been a long time since Anna had seen her friend Caspar. She and Max had met the boy in Iran, in a dusty desert beside a sparkling blue lake – although calling Caspar a ‘boy’ wasn’t entirely accurate. Caspar was something else: a friend who looked like a boy, but who was really a genie, a fairy with magic fire bubbling beneath his skin. Anna had fretted about how she could keep in contact with Caspar after leaving Iran, and had even considered addressing a letter to the middle of the desert. However, upon arriving home, it had turned out that sending messages to Caspar was easier than she had expected. The first note from the genie had appeared beside their fireplace the very next morning, on a roll of paper covered in soot.
Anna and Max had been astonished. After that, they had often dropped letters to Caspar into the fireplace, sometimes poking them into cold ashes, other times plunging them directly into the flames. Caspar didn’t reply often, but his messages were always friendly, commenting on a sunset he had seen, or teasing Max about the fight they’d once had. His correspondence was always written on tiny paper scrolls – until Anna’s birthday.
Anna finished unwrapping the newspaper. She stared in awe at the treasure she had found in the fireplace on her birthday: a statue, carved from a piece of white stone, of a girl with a knife standing on the edge of an island. Anna remembered the moment well. She shuddered as she thought about battling the witch Cassandra atop that crest of pale rock, remembering how the genies had severed a finger from Cassandra’s wicked hand. As beautiful as the statue was, the gift was not entirely pleasant.
But the statue still wasn’t the strangest gift she had received. Anna wrinkled her nose slightly, listening as Max continued his tale.
‘So, Anna and her brother were in the woods where the club of witches lived,’ he said. ‘The horrible, ugly, bloodthirsty witches. The children didn’t know the witches lived there, but they could still feel eyes watching them as they tried to follow the path. Anna felt really scared, and her brother had to try and cheer her up. But honestly …’ Max nodded at Anna, clearly considering the next line very generous. ‘He felt a little bit scared as well.’
A burst of lightning flickered on the horizon, illuminating a wooded mountain. The rain fell heavily as thunder rumbled through the trees. There were no more towns. The car sped along the lonely road, beating its own path through
More newspaper crinkled as Anna undid the second bundle. This package smelt like salt: like an ocean breeze on a stormy evening. It was a smell Anna had inhaled every day during their trip to Australia, where she and Max had made their second fairy friend – although in this case, the word ‘friend’ might not have been suitable. Sylvie the mermaid had mesmerised Anna with a magic spell, locked her in a shipwreck, and had even convinced a shark to try to devour her whole. Sylvie’s claim that she and Anna were friends seemed utterly outrageous – and yet Anna often thought fondly of the time she had spent with the mermaid girl, exploring coral grottos under the sea. She didn’t write to Sylvie as often as she wrote to her other friends, but she did occasionally drop a note into the river that flowed through her home town, wondering if it would travel all the way to the Australian coast.
She hadn’t found Sylvie’s package until the day after her birthday. It had been washed up beside the pond in her back garden, wrapped tightly in slimy green seaweed.
A jangling heap fell into Anna’s lap as the newspaper came free. Anna spread the gift across her knees: a necklace, threaded on silver string. Gangly, colourful trinkets sparkled in the dim light of the car: pieces of coral, orange and pink; red-brown shells shaped like turrets and horns; smooth pieces of bleached wood; and, most alarmingly, a row of white spikes that Anna suspected might be bones. She hadn’t worn the necklace – didn’t really even like to touch it – but a part of her felt pleased that Sylvie had remembered her. Maybe the mermaid girl was her friend after all.
‘Hey!’ said Max indignantly. ‘You’re not listening to me. You’re reading your birthday cards again!’
Anna cringed. She quickly covered up the necklace, looking sheepishly at Max.
‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘I was listening. Anna and Max were in the forest, with all the witches. What happens next?’
Max crossed his arms. He turned away from Anna, sticking his nose in the air.
‘Too bad,’ he said. ‘Now I’m not going to tell you the end. And it was really good.’
He didn’t say another word. Anna tried to feel bad, but her mind was buzzing with memories of vanquished foes. In the past, remembering her adventures with the fairies had made her excited. Now, on a lonely back road in the dark American night, Anna didn’t know what to feel. Why were the memories making her so uneasy?
There was one letter left. Anna opened the battered envelope, sliding a neatly written note into her hand. She knew it had travelled far to reach her; had been carried down rickety ladders on the side of an icy mountain. She squinted at the swirling black ink, painted with a tiny brush.
Anna’s pulse quickened as she read the letter again, subconsciously rubbing the gold ring on her finger. More than any of the others, Jie’s message cut to the heart of her anxieties. In China, she had given away the magical white knife that had protected her on all her other adventures – given it back to a sick old dragon before it disappeared. The golden ring was one of the only treasures the dragon had left behind.
The day after her birthday, Anna had rushed into the kitchen while Max caused a distraction, pressing the ring against the raw chicken the Professor was cutting up for dinner. Nothing had happened. Her own blood hadn’t made a difference either, and neither had Max’s. The tingle Anna had felt when she’d first put on the ring had never occurred again.
The knife was gone. The ring was useless. And now, for the first time since her adventure in Romania, Anna was in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of the night, with no magic weapon to keep her safe.
‘Oh, good,’ said the Professor. ‘We’re here.’
The car rattled to a stop. Max jumped up, pressing his face against the glass; Anna looked out her own window, peering through the rain. It was too dark to see anything clearly, but she thought she could spy the outline of something just beyond the roadside – a small stone marker, with a rounded top. There was another stone beside it, and then another one: a whole row of stone markers, standing side by side.
‘You’re kidding,’ said Max. ‘That’s not real.’ He scrunched up his face. ‘Are those Halloween decorations too?’
‘Oh,’ said the Professor. ‘Didn’t I tell you? I’m sure I must have.’ His face turned pale. ‘You see, we’re going to be staying – well, the only place I could find for us was …’
A fork of lightning crashed through the sky. Anna shivered as she looked out at the line of markers – at the row of headstones, their faces grey and craggy, their edges covered in moss and slime.
They were parked in the middle of a graveyard.
2
AN EARLY GRAVE
‘IT WON’T BE THAT BAD,’ PLEADED THE PROFESSOR. ‘The library here is incredibly isolated. I didn’t have a choice.’
Max was refusing to budge. He glared at the Professor, his jaw set.
‘I am not staying in a graveyard,’ he said. ‘That is too much. You’ll have to find somewhere else.’
The Professor looked at Anna helplessly. Anna wasn’t sure what to say. In broad daylight, she wouldn’t have had any problem walking through a graveyard – but right then, with her white knife no longer beside her, the idea of spending the night surrounded by dead bodies was too much to bear. She looked out at the graves, trying to spot a building in the gloom.
‘There’s someone out there,’ she said suddenly.
A figure was standing behind the first row of headstones. They were dressed in a dark grey coat, with a black umbrella held rigidly over their head, the rain falling around them like a curtain. As Anna watched, the figure took a step towards the car, the headlights gleaming off their pale fingers.
‘Let’s go,’ said Max. ‘Lock the doors. Start the car.’
‘I’m sure it’s nothing to worry about,’ said the Professor. ‘We are expected, you know. I’ll just get out and say hello.’
Lightning crashed through the sky.
Max cried out in protest, but the Professor was already opening his door. He stepped outside as the rain roared in, pulling his coat up over his head; then the door slammed shut, and the two children were sitting in silence.
‘I don’t like this,’ said Max.
‘That’s funny,’ said Anna. ‘I was just listening to a story about a boy who wasn’t afraid of anything.’
She watched as the Professor stumbled into the darkness, tripping over the low iron fence that ringed the cemetery. The figure with the umbrella stopped. The Professor raised a hand to his mouth, calling out something Anna couldn’t hear.
‘I’ll forgive you for not listening to my story,’ said Max. ‘But you have to agree with me when Dad gets back. Everywhere we go, we meet horrible monsters. We can’t sleep in a graveyard.’ His voice wavered. ‘I don’t want to meet a zombie!’
Anna looked over at her brother. Max’s face was white, but his hand was even whiter. In Romania, Max had been bitten by a vampire before Anna and Isabella could rescue him, draining his hand of blood and life. Now his hand was clammy and gangrenous, with horrible scabs all over his palm. The fingers still worked, although they weren’t pretty to look at. Anna knew that Max had glued one of his fingernails back on after it had fallen off.
‘The only zombie here is you,’ she said. ‘We don’t know anything yet. Maybe the place we’re staying will be okay. We should get out and have – argh!’
Anna scrambled sideways as a face peered suddenly through her window. A woman was standing beside the car, her eyes wide, a gleaming scar running down the side of her face. A woolly red scarf spooled vividly from her neck, giving the horrible impression of a bloody torrent spurting from her throat. The woman raised a hand, her lips quivering as she ran her fingertips along the windowpane. It looked as if she was trying to smile, but didn’t quite know how.
‘Fine,’ said the Professor’s voice. ‘Just fine.’ He opened the car door, sticking his wet head inside. ‘It’s all sorted,’ he said, smiling. ‘The library’s caretaker, Mrs Stone, has stayed up to meet us. She’s waiting outside.’
‘Yeah,’ said Max weakly. ‘She certainly is.’
It was hard to tell through the rainy glass, but Anna didn’t think Mrs Stone had blinked. She wished the woman would look somewhere else.
