Chapter 37

I will never EVER forget how I felt. How shocked. How bewildered. How terrified.

Revenge? Why revenge? And why me?

“Hundreds of years I have slept,” the Haggfiend hissed. “Hundreds of years of enchanted sleep. Tricked by a witchgirl – Kora Valliant!”

Kora Valliant.

Valliant… Dad’s name.

The Haggfiend stamped closer. Nostrils flaring in her huge hooked nose. “Kora Valliant,” she hissed, stooping down. “So disgustingly brave. So revoltingly good. She tricked me! Plunged me – me, the mighty Haggfiend – deep into enchanted sleep.”

She crouched, huge haunches bristling, stared at me with those pitiless eyes. “I sniffed you out, Florence Skritchett,” she hissed. “I would know the smell of a Valliant anywhere. That ancient witchgirl, Kora Valliant – she lives on through you. And I will have my revenge.”

I shivered. Saw her dark-green mouth stretch out in a smile. A vicious smile. Cold and cruel, stretching right across her huge Haggfiend face.

“How well I planned,” she hissed. “Your mother expected a QUEUE of witches for the great honour of serving Skritchetts. But there was only one.”

She paused. “The other witches,” she hissed – her smile small and sly, “I … dealt with them.”

She leaned closer, eyes filled with hatred staring deep into mine. “I bided my time, Florence Skritchett. Weakened by years of enchanted sleep, I waited for my strength, for my full magic powers, to return,” she hissed. “And then, at last, your mother – gone. Your sister – gone. And your grandmother – your strutting ridiculous grandmother – gone.”

Now the Haggfiend bared rows of pointed yellow teeth. “So now,” she hissed, “it is time. And I will have my revenge. REVENGE on the Valliants! You and I, we shall fly to the Kraggs of Kroke. To the highest of heights. And then – with one little push, I shall watch you fall. Down and down and down, into the Roaring Rapids below.”

No. NO.

I could feel my fists clenching. A tiny clench. A tiny move. But a move all the same. My feet too. Every bit of me was beginning to move.

The Haggfiend’s eyes gleamed. “So … the fear that freezes, the fear that strikes on first sighting the Haggfiend, it dwindles,” she smiled. “But too late for you, Florence Skritchett. Too LATE!”

She leapt up. Towered above me. “I shall eliminate you, Florence Skritchett,” she said coldly, staring down. “Your sister too. And that will be an end of it. An END of the Valliants.”

She started to cackle. Cackles of glee. Cackles of triumph. Harsh cackles, growing louder and louder.

Then she threw back her head, threw her arms in the air. “Creatures of the forest!” she screamed. “Come! Do my BIDDING!”

And – from deep in the trees, deep in the woods – a sound filled the air, cut through the fog. The sound of wings. Huge beating wings…

Out of the swirling fog, the grizzelhumps came. Huge humped creatures, orange wings beating.

Five, ten, fifteen … more. Swooping out of the woods, out of the trees. Swooping towards us.

One by one, they landed. And me, Lily, Kika – we cowered. Surrounded.

Now we could move. Now we could run. But it WAS too late.

The grizzelhumps towered above us, towered all around us. Giant birds, three times our size. With strong black feathers and huge orange wings. Long skinny necks and big bald heads stretching out towards us. Curved red beaks snapping open, then shut.

And those eyes. Those staring staring eyes, glinting and bewitched.

Bewitched by the dark enchantments of the Haggfiend.

“Trapped!” shrieked the Haggfiend, clapping her hands, cackling with glee. “Trapped! What now, Florence Skritchett? What NOW?”

Think, I told myself. Think, think. DO something.

But what could I do? WHAT?

I’d had a plan with the ghouls. And Skritchetts to help – Mum, and Grandma, swooping in to save us. To save me, to save Hetty. But here … I had nothing. No Mum, no Grandma. No Skritchetts to save me.

And Hetty – she would be next. Next to be flown to the Kraggs of Kroke. Sent tumbling into the Roaring Rapids. Just like me.

I had never felt so alone. So small. So scared. So full of utter utter despair.

There was nothing I could do. NOTHING.

No plan. No Skritchetts. No one to help.

Just Lily and Kika, and me.

Me…

And my small stubby wand.