The Spook's Nightmare Read Online Free Page A

bya safe passage to Mona, the large island that lay out in the Irish Sea, north-west of the County.
    Reluctantly the fisherman agreed to take us. He didn’t want to do it but he was scared of the man with the fierce glittering eyes who confronted him – who now seemed filled with new determination.
    I thought I’d gained my sea legs on the voyage to Greece in the summer. How wrong I was. A small fishing boat was a very different proposition to the three-masted Celeste . Even before we were clear of the bay and out in the open sea, it started pitching and rolling alarmingly, and the dogs were soon whining nervously. Instead of watching the County recede into the distance, I spent the larger part of the voyage with my head over the side of the boat being violently sick.
    ‘Feeling better, lad?’ asked the Spook when I finally stopped vomiting.
    ‘A bit,’ I answered, looking towards Mona, whichwas now a smudge of green on the horizon. ‘Have you ever visited the island before?’
    My master shook his head. ‘Never had any call to. I’ve had more than enough work to keep me busy in the County. But the islanders have their fair share of troubles with the dark. There are at least half a dozen bugganes there . . .’
    ‘What’s a buggane?’ I asked. I vaguely remembered seeing the word in the Spook’s Bestiary but I couldn’t remember anything about them. I knew we didn’t have them in the County now.
    ‘Well, lad, why don’t you look it up and find out?’ said the Spook, pulling the Bestiary from his bag and handing it to me. ‘It’s a type of daemon . . .’
    I opened the Bestiary, flicked through to the section on daemons and quickly found the heading: BUGGANES .
    ‘Read it aloud, Tom!’ Alice insisted. ‘I’d like to know what’s what too.’
    My master frowned at her, probably thinking it was spook’s business and nothing to do with her. But I began to read aloud as she’d asked:
    ‘The buggane is a category of daemon that frequents ruins and usually materializes as a black bull or a hairy man, although other forms are chosen if they suit its purpose. In marshy ground bugganes have been known to shape-shift into wormes.
    ‘The buggane makes two distinctive sounds – either bellowing like an enraged bull to warn off those who venture near its domain or whispering to its victims in a sinister human voice. It tells the afflicted that it is sapping their life force, and their terror lends the daemon even greater strength. Covering one’s ears is no protection – the voice of the buggane is heard right inside the head. Even the profoundly deaf have been known to fall victim to that insidious sound. Those who hear the whisper die within days unless they kill the buggane first. It stores the life force of each person it slays in a labyrinth, which it constructs far underground.
    ‘Bugganes are immune to salt and iron, which makes them hard both to kill and to confine. The only thing they are vulnerable to is a blade made from silver alloy, which must be driven into the heart of the buggane when it has fully materialized.’
    ‘Sounds really scary,’ said Alice.
    ‘Aye, there’s good reason to be both afraid and wary where a buggane is concerned,’ said the Spook. ‘It’s said they have no spooks on Mona, but from what I’ve heard they could certainly do with some. That’s why bugganes flourish there – there’s nobody to keep them in check.’
    It suddenly began to drizzle and my master quickly seized the Bestiary from me, closed it and put it in his bag, out of harm’s way. It was his last book and he didn’t want it damaged any further.
    ‘What are the islanders like?’ I asked.
    ‘They’re a proud, stubborn people. They’re warlike too, with a strong force of paid conscripts called “yeomen”. But a small island like that would have no chance if the enemy looked beyond the County and chose to invade.’
    ‘The islanders ain’t going to welcome us, are they?’ Alice said.
    The