The Spook's Sacrifice
First edition cover
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| Author | Joseph Delaney |
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| Country | Great Britain |
| Language | English |
| Series | The Last Apprentice - America |
| Genre | Children's fiction |
| Publisher | The Bodley Head, an imprint of Random House Children's Books |
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Publication date
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25 August 2009 - UK |
| Pages | 360 |
| Preceded by | The Spook's Mistake |
| Followed by | The Spook's Nightmare |
The Spook's Sacrifice is the second installment in the Wardstone Chronicles series by Joseph Delaney. Its release date is August 25, 2009. In the U.S. it is titled The Last Apprentice: Clash of the Demons.
After being attacked in the middle of the night by a maenad (follower of the Old Goddess known as the Ordeen), Tom visits his family’s farm and is asked by his mother to accompany her back to Greece to fight the Ordeen. The Ordeen is unique among the Old Gods in that she can come into this world without the need of human intervention. Previously, her power was held in check by priests who built monasteries on the cliffs surrounding the plains of Megara, where she manifests. But with the Fiend loose in the world, the Dark is now better organized; many vaengir (flying lamia witches) have been sent to the Ordeen to counter the power of the few remaining priests. When the Ordeen appears this time, the priests will be overwhelmed and the Ordeen free to go anywhere. The Ordeen will then go to the County to kill the children of her greatest enemy: Tom’s own mother (Mam).
Tom is forced to choose between his master the Spook, who forbids him to go because he would have to ally himself with the Pendle witches, and his Mam. He decides to do what his Mam asks, setting off for the coast while the Spook heads back to Chipenden.
Tom is told Grimalkin wishes to speak with him before he leaves and sets out to meet her. As he walks there, he runs into the witch Mab Mouldheel and her two sisters Beth and Jannet. She initially uses glamour on him; however he overcomes it by focusing on her less appealing characteristics. She tells Tom that she scryed Alice's death at the hands of a feral lamia, being dragged into its lair to have her blood sucked out.
Grimalkin reminds Tom that she had promised to give him something on Walpurgis Night following his fourteenth birthday, but the Spook had refused to let Tom make his promised meeting with the witch assassin. She gives him a dark wish, so named because no one can foresee how it will be used and a special knife capable of hurting denizens of the dark.
Alice tells Tom that she still has the blood jar, a jar that contains the blood of one of the Fiend's daughters (Tom already knows it is Alice’s blood). If mixed with Tom’s blood it could prevent the Fiend from coming near him. As Tom is all that stands between victory for the Fiend and his potential permanent death, he is eager to corrupt Tom, unable to directly use his vast power to kill Tom due to being hobbled by Tom’s Mam: if the Fiend kills Tom, he will rule for only a century; if he turns Tom to the Dark, he will rule forever; if Tom fails to stop him, he will rule, but the length of time won't be fixed by fate.
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