I ran away while I could and went back to Grimsargh, raging at the way Spook Johnson had treated me. Some men were pigs! But the idea of becoming a spook’s apprentice was growing inside my head. I was becoming more set on it.

It would be the ideal job for me. I could see the dead, and no doubt with training I could talk to them as well. I felt sure that my gifts fitted me to become a spook, especially when I learned that the basic qualification to become a spook’s apprentice was to be a seventh son of a seventh son.

My dream suddenly seemed possible. I was the seventh of a seventh too. No doubt spooks had similar gifts to mine. I already knew that they could talk to the dead. So boy or girl, what difference did it make? I knew now that, being a girl, I’d find it hard to get a spook to take me on. But I’d never been one to give up easily; I hated the way men seemed to make up all the rules and decide how the world was run. Things could change, couldn’t they? I would make them change! Then I would have a job that gave me real independence; I could make my own way in the world without having to rely on marriage.

Soon after encountering Spook Johnson, on the night of the full moon, I became aware of a new ability—my fourth gift. I could make myself almost invisible. My success at this depended on conditions. It was much easier in low light, when I cast no sharp shadows. I also had to keep very still; some folk had sharper eyes than others.

Yes, a spook’s apprentice was the trade for me. Johnson hadn’t been right for me, but that didn’t mean all spooks were the same. To my delight, I found out that the best spook in the whole County was based in Chipenden, not more than eight miles or so from where I lived.

His name was John Gregory.

So I went to Chipenden and asked around. His master before him had been called Henry Horrocks, and since his death, John Gregory had been doing the job for more than sixty years. He had lots of experience. He would be a good master, an ideal person to train me.

Then I received a big disappointment, another setback.

He already had an apprentice—a boy called Tom Ward.

For a while my dream faded. I traveled farther in search of the right master and found out that spooks were in short supply. I heard there was one working north of Caster, so I tried him. His name was Judd Brinscall, and I talked to him a couple of times, but he wasn’t much better than Spook Johnson; he got so sick of my pestering that he set his fierce dogs on me.

I’d almost given up when, a few months later, I learned that John Gregory had been killed fighting some witches. It was the talk of the villages. Witches had arrived in the County in large numbers, scaring folk, threatening them and thieving. Eventually there’d been some sort of big battle east of Caster that had put an end to the invasion, but John Gregory had been killed. They said that, although only just turned seventeen, his apprentice, Tom Ward, was now the Chipenden Spook.