The Priest Hole Read online

  “Nykolas Freeman will die,” I tell her. “Of that fact, you must have no doubt at all.”

  With that, I turn and head out of the church, out into the cold night air. With just the moon above to guide me, I make my way quickly across the field, filled with a great sense of purpose. When I get to the far side and am about to enter the forest, I look back at the church and think of Kate still in there. I still find it hard to believe that everything she told me was true, but once I have killed Freeman I shall come back here and find her again, and then one way or another I can try to learn more about the people she claims to protect.

  About the war, though, she must be wrong. It is simply impossible that this land could ever fall into such a terrible conflict.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Laura

  Somewhere in the distance, a woman is screaming.

  Sitting up suddenly, I hit my head against a set of metal bars and for a moment the whole world seems to swing around wildly. I try turning, only to find that I'm packed into a space so tight that I can barely even move. When I look down, I see the floor a good twenty feet below and I realize I'm hanging high up in a cramped, spinning metal cage. I hold still for a moment and the spinning slows, until finally I'm able to look around and see that there are several other cages nearby, all of them hanging, like this one, by chains that hold them to the ceiling. The room is dark, with the only light coming from cracks in the ceiling.

  The scream continues in the distance. The same scream that woke me.

  Struggling to make sense of what's happening, I turn and look back over my shoulder and then I take hold of the thick black metal bars. A sharp pain runs across my breastbone, and when I check for a wound I find that thick blood has dried all over my chest, soaking into my shirt and causing the fabric to stick to my flesh. My fingers brush against the torn flesh and I realize the last thing I remember is Freeman's ax swinging toward me. When I pull the tattered edges of torn fabric aside, I see a thick wound in my shoulder, as if a heavy blade gouged out chunks of flesh and damaged the bone. There's pain, but it's more of a dull ache.

  “Where am I?” I whisper finally, starting to panic. “Where am I?” I shout, causing the cage to rock slightly. “Let me out of here!”

  In the next cage, a woman is groaning.

  Further away, in another part of the building, another woman is still screaming.

  “You'll be next,” says a voice nearby.

  I turn and look across the room, and after a moment I realize that the voice came from the figure in the next cage along, hanging a little closer to the wall.

  “This is how he always does it,” she continues. “He brings a new one in, and then he finishes up one of the old ones, so the whole place is filled with screams. Then he takes the new one through for the first session. You'll be next, you'll see.”

  “No,” I stammer, trying to turn around in the narrow confines of my cage. “I have to get out of here. I have to go home.”

  “I wasn't sure you'd ever wake up, to be honest,” she adds. “It's been a while now. Sometimes they don't wake up, you know. Sometimes he shoves them in a cage and they just die. Like that one, over there.”

  Turning, I see a figure slumped in one of the other cages. It takes a moment before I'm able to make out a dry, withered face with bulging eyeballs almost coming out of the sockets.

  “No,” I whisper, looking at my hands and seeing that they're caked in blood. “Why am I still here? Why haven't I woken up yet?”

  The other woman laughs as I try to force open the door to my cage. There's a thick lock on the bars and sets of chains all around; besides, even if I got loose I'd never be able to survive the jump. I could climb up the chain that's holding me to the ceiling, but my shoulder is far too badly damaged and I'm certain I'd fall. Turning again, I keep telling myself that this can't last, that I'll wake up at any moment back at the house, but deep down I know that these visions never usually last this long. What if somehow I'm stuck here this time? What if I never manage to get back?

  “I heard them talking earlier,” the woman in the next cage says after a moment. “Freeman thinks you're special, he says you're one of the strongest witches he's ever seen. I think you're going to get a lot of attention.”

  I turn to her, but all I can see is her silhouette.

  “I'm not a witch!” I hiss.

  She laughs. “Neither are the rest of us, dear. We're just people who happened to look at him wrong while he was passing in the street.”

  “This can't be allowed to happen,” I continue. “Someone has to call the police!”

  “The police? What's the police?”

  “There has to be a law against this!” I shout. “He can't just go around doing this to people!”

  She laughs again. “Round here,” she says after a moment, “Nykolas Freeman is the law. On the King's word, no less. You need to face it, girl, there's no-one coming to rescue you. You're going to die, just like the rest of us are going to die, and you should just accept that fact and hope Freeman hurries up with you. Me, I've been here for weeks now, I'm starting to think he's forgotten me. I don't get much food and water, either. I reckon one day soon even that'll stop, and I'll just be left to starve in this thing.” She puts her hands on the bars of her cage, and in the low light I can just about make out her skeletal fingers. “I've heard starving's a really slow way to go. Really painful. I hope he comes and cuts me in half instead, or drowns me. At least that'd be quick.”

  Grabbing the bars of my cage, I try once again to get the door open, but nothing seems to be working. The more I struggle, the more the cage swings and the more the other woman laughs, and a few seconds later another woman joins in from the next cage along. As the laughter grows all around me, I turn and try to find some other way out of here, and panic starts to spread its wings in my chest until all I can do is start pulling desperately on the bars in the vain hope that somehow they'll come loose. The cage is swinging violently now, enough to make me dizzy, but I can't stop pulling at the bars as tears run down my face.

  “Let me out of here!” I scream. “I want to wake up!”

  “Quiet in here!” a voice shouts suddenly from far below.

  Looking down, I see that a figure has entered the room. I watch as Connaught walks over to the wall and starts loosening a chain that's wound around a metal peg, and a moment later I feel my cage shudder as it's lowered down toward the floor.

  “Told you you'd be next!” the woman shouts after me. “Tell him not to forget me! Tell him I'll give him anything he wants, so long as he kills me before sundown!” With that, she starts laughing wildly.

  Before I can reply, my cage bangs against the stone floor and I turn to see Connaught walking over. He leans down and turns a key in the lock, and then he pulls the door open and steps aside.

  “Out,” he says firmly.

  I stare at the open door, suddenly worried that this is a trap.

  “Get out,” he continues, “or so help me God I'll throw a pail of boiling water in there to get you moving.”

  Cautiously, I start to crawl out, even though my whole body is trembling with pain. Once I've made it through the door, I start getting to my feet, only to be shoved back down with a boot to the nape of my neck.

  “I didn't tell you to stand,” Connaught mutters. “Sorry about this, it's on Freeman's orders. He doesn't want you running away, now does he?”

  I look up at him. “What do you -” Before I can finish, I see that he's holding a hammer; he quickly puts a hand on the side of my face and turns my head away, and then I feel him slamming the hammer down against my right ankle, breaking the bone instantly. I let out a cry of pain, but a second later he does the same thing to my other ankle and all I can manage is to slump down against the stone floor and sob. The pain is immeasurable, throbbing through my body as if it's about to burst through my mind.

  “Move,” Connaught says firmly, using the tip of his boot to nudge my arm. “Through that door.”<
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  I try to sit up, but the pain in my ankles is too extreme. Tears are rolling down my face, but I manage to turn and look at him, and I see a hint of regret in his eyes. Behind him, a dribble of liquid is running down from one of the other cages.

  “Please,” I whisper, “I just want to go home...”

  “You don't have a home,” he replies, “not anymore.” Reaching down, he grabs my arm, causing a flash of pain to run through my damaged, infected shoulder. “If you won't try to crawl, I guess I'll just have to drag you.”

  Before I can reply, he starts pulling me across the cobbled floor. My broken ankles rattle over the stones, sending sparks of agony through my body and causing me to cry out once again, while my shoulder feels as if it's about to get torn loose. I try to get free of his grip, but he's holding me too firmly and finally I start focusing on trying to keep my ankles from banging so hard against the floor. By the time he drags me into the next room and shoves me down, I've been holding my breath for several seconds and I have to let out a pained gasp. I close my eyes tight, hoping against hope that when I open them again I'll find I've gone home.

  This has to end.

  Suddenly there's a loud scream nearby. Opening my eyes, I turn and see to my horror that a naked woman is tied to one of the tables and that Freeman is on the other side, slowly turning a wheel that's stretching the woman's body. Her head is tilted back and she's sobbing, and finally I hear a sound like splitting fabric. I want to turn away and close my eyes, but for some reason I just keep staring until, with no further warning, a huge tear opens up around the woman's waist and she's ripped in half, with her guts slopping out onto the table and torrents of blood washing down to the floor, splashing against my face. Unable to stop watching, I realize that she's still screaming, but the sound fades to a gurgle after a moment as her torso starts shuddering.

  Feeling something wet against my fingertips, I look down and see that her blood has run between the cracks of the cobbles. I pull back, wiping as much of the blood off as possible.

  “It's still not to my liking,” Freeman mutters as he walks around the side of the table and examines one of the wheels. “I'll have to make adjustments before I use it again.”

  “Did you get the truth from her?” Connaught asks, making his way over to the table and watching as blood continues to flow down onto the floor.

  “She wasn't a witch,” Freeman replies calmly, stepping over the pool of blood and making his way toward me. “Still, she affected a tone and a way of talking that aroused my suspicions, and for that she only has herself to blame. There was nothing good about her, nothing worth keeping alive. I hardly think the world will miss another stinking whore.” Stopping next to me, he stares down into my eyes. “This one, on the other hand, interests me greatly. I have no doubt whatsoever that she possesses at least limited powers.” He gestures for me to get up. “On your feet.”

  “Please,” I whisper, turning and looking toward the door on the far side of the room, “I don't belong here, I just -”

  “On your feet!” Freeman shouts, grabbing me by the shoulders and hauling me up.

  Before I can react, he lets go and forces me to put my weight on my broken ankles. I let out a cry of pain as I feel the damaged bones slicing through my skin, and I quickly drop back down in a heap of sobbing agony. When I lean on my damaged shoulder, another burst of pain hits me and I roll down onto my other side.

  “You will stand!” Freeman sneers, pulling me up yet again. This time he holds me for a moment longer, as if he's giving me a chance to steady myself, but when he lets go of me the same thing happens: I feel as if there are razor blades packed between my shattered bones and I slump down, although this time my scream is more like an agonized grunt. There's no room in my head for thoughts; there's only pain.

  “Pathetic,” Freeman mutters, stepping past me and heading over to a nearby bench. “I can only assume that she is not yet in full possession of her powers.”

  “She's young,” Connaught replies, having unstrapped the dead woman from the table. He pulls her top half down, letting it slam onto the floor like an unwanted piece of meat, and then he starts dragging it to the door. “Not like this one. The pigs are gonna have their work cut out for them, chewing through all the gristle on this old bitch.” When he opens the door and drags the woman's top half outside, I realize I can hear pigs nearby.

  “Don't worry,” Freeman says after a moment, turning to me, “you won't become food for those swine. They only get the ones who disappoint me.”

  “I have to get out of here,” I whisper, trying to sit up. Looking round, I focus on the other times I found myself back in the past, and I wrack my brains as I try to think of some common theme, something that seemed to force me to wake up. As pain builds in my ankles and shoulder, however, I can barely think about anything other than the agony I'm enduring right now, and finally I break down in a series of sobs. “I want to go home...”

  “Look at her,” Freeman says as Connaught comes back into the room. “Even now, she pretends to cry, in the hope that we'll spare her.”

  “It's always the way,” Connaught replies, grabbing the dead woman's legs and pulling the lower half of her body toward the door, with the intestines trailing behind and leaving smeared lines of blood. “I don't know what's wrong with the modern world, not one of them ever accepts their fate with dignity. These witches are all the same.”

  “I'm not a witch!” I scream as he heads outside. When I turn to Freeman, I see that there's a smile on his face, as if he finds me amusing.

  “If you're not a witch,” he says calmly, “then you have nothing to worry about, do you? If you're not a witch and you're not a Catholic, God will protect you. If God doesn't protect you, on the other hand, I can only assume that he wants you to suffer the fate that is reserved for all your kind.” Grabbing a knife from the counter, he steps toward me. “I am God's instrument in this sinful world, and the king's too. I perform no act for which I do not have the highest possible authority.”

  “Go to hell!” I shout.

  “Do you not trust God to protect you?” he asks. “Well, I'm not surprised. Your kind never have true faith, do you?”

  Reaching down, he grabs me by the collar and starts pulling me across the room, straight through the puddle of blood left by his last victim. I struggle and try to pull away, but I'm too badly hurt to put up much of a fight and all I can manage is a few faint gasps until finally he throws me down against a metal plate set into the floor. I close my eyes as the pain sears my body, and for a few seconds I feel as if I'm about to pass out. A moment later, I hear the sound of metal glancing against metal, and I open my eyes to see Freeman's shadow on a nearby wall, holding something long and sharp in his hand. I try to turn and look at him, but the pain in my sobbing body is too much. All I can think about is that I want the pain to end, and I don't care how that happens, I just...

  “Suzie,” I whisper, remembering my sister in the church. “I'm not -”

  Suddenly I feel a searing pain in my belly as something is sliced straight through me. I fall forward, but when I look down I see that I'm impaled on a long, burning metal poker that is already singing my flesh. A moment later, the poker is pulled out of me and I slump to one side with blood flowing out onto the floor from a wound just above my left hip. I close my eyes tight and let out a howl of pain, and then despite my damaged ankles I try my best to draw my knees up and crawl into the smallest shape possible. I can hear Freeman stepping around me, but I don't dare look up at him.

  “If you're not a witch,” he continues, “then God will step in and give me a sign, to tell me I must end your punishment. If you are a witch, however, he will permit me to continue. That is the way it has always been. The world is an ordered place, woman, and the rules are clear.”

  I open my mouth to tell him to go to hell, but my lips are trembling so much, I can't get anything out apart from a vague gasp. My whole body is shaking violently, as if I have a fever, and all I
can really manage is to reach toward his boots with my left hand, hoping that I'll be able to push the next attack away.

  This time, he goes for my shoulder.

  The metal poker slices through, striking bone and becoming wedged for a moment before he pushes it again, this time forcing it out just below my neck. With my eyes still closed, I tilt my head back and scream, and as he pulls the poker back out I feel hot blood flowing both inside my tortured body and outside, running down the flesh. I'm shaking more than ever, and my teeth are chattering so much that I can't even hear what Freeman says as he continues to walk around me. I know what's coming, though; that hot poker will strike me again at any moment, and every few seconds I flinch as I think I sense it coming. With my left hand I reach out, trying desperately to stop him even though I know I have no chance. I think he's laughing but, again, I can barely hear anything.

  “Please,” I try to say, even though the words come out as a shivering, sobbing mess, “don't -”

  The third time, he slices the poker straight through my chest, just above my collarbone, and my eyes snap open as I feel an immense pressure in my neck. Gasping, I can barely even breathe as he pulls the poker back out and steps around me once again, and I reach up with my trembling hand and feel that there are small pieces of splintered bone in the wound. Every breath is agony, snatched in desperate, uneven moments. There's blood at the back of my throat, but I can't swallow so it just pools and makes it even harder for me to breathe. I reach up with my left hand, touching the side of my face, and after a moment I realize I can feel my heart desperately pounding in my chest. I just want...

  I want...

  Leaning forward, I open my mouth and let as much blood dribble out as possible. At least by doing that, I'll be able to breathe again.