Witch's Skin

by Rik Hunik

  Chapter 2

  Helpless, Suzi watched her hands pull on the leggings like they were leotards, felt them cling to her like a second skin, darker and older than her own. What she thought was a hood was more like a wig and mask, and when her hands pulled it down over her face it moved and stretched on its own to mold tight against her. Suzi felt like she was suffocating but discovered that she couldn’t even scream as the garment closed completely around her torso, squeezing her from every direction.

  Claustrophobic panic gripped her and she couldn’t breathe at all. Just as she was on the verge of blacking out Suzi’s felt her very selfness get pushed aside as something else suffused her mind and took control of her body, clamping down on the panic, relaxing, and sucking in a deep breath.

  Her head cleared and she still felt much confusion, but underlying that was a pride of accomplishment and a great confidence. She wondered who she was and how she got to be here. And where “here” happened to be.

  She saw the clothing laying on the floor and absently, automatically, got dressed, her mind unfamiliar with the jeans and bra but her hands knowing what to do.

  When she looked up from dressing herself she saw the clippings and pictures on the wall and she went closer to examine them. They were taken from an assortment of magazines, newspapers, and tabloids, arranged in chronological order starting from the top left.

  The subject of the articles, a dark haired woman who appeared to be in her early forties in the pictures, looked very familiar, and when she read the captions identifying the woman as Greta Wyman, the name brought a welter of vivid memories of the trial surging up from her subconscious and she knew the name was her own. Suzi, merely a passenger at this point, also had a start; Wyman was her mother’s maiden name, and she had heard rumors that her grandmother was a witch.

  Greta skimmed through the articles, with Suzi reading along. Although the articles overlapped quite a bit each publication put their own spin on the available facts. “Witch On Trial,” screamed the headline from a sensationalistic tabloid, but Greta Wyman had not been on trial for witchcraft, and some of the drier papers never mentioned that word. She had been on trial for murder but she claimed she had been framed and her lawyer went about proving it. The judge ruled that there was insufficient evidence to convict so she was acquitted.

  A religious zealot, related to the victim, shot her in the chest as she faced the press outside the courtroom after the trial. With her last breath she swore vengeance on her killer, her words picked up by the array of microphones. “With my own blood on my lips I swear, when you die, I’ll be there.”

  She looked down at the desk, saw a notebook there. Written on the cover in bold black letters was, “READ THIS.” She opened the cover and read the first page.

  “Dear Greta. Yes, you are Greta and I’m sure you’re confused, but I have written this letter to clarify the situation for you and tell you what you must do. I’m sure you will grasp it quickly, if you haven’t already, for you are, after all, a powerful witch, and I was your humble lover and accomplice.”

  A memory picture of the writer formed out of the swirling chaos in Greta’s mind, a young man named Raymond, handsome, muscular, almost blonde, always eager to please. She had been fond of him and she had used him, and frequently had sex with him, but she had certainly never loved him. She smiled. The fact that she was here to read this was proof of her control over him.

  “The clippings and pictures tell your story and I have included a more detailed explanation after this brief letter, in case your memory has failed and you need a bigger boost to regain your faculties.” Greta unconsciously shook her head. It was all coming back to her now, as if she had never been interrupted by death.

  “Your shooting outside the courtroom was too impulsive to predict but you knew something disastrous could happen in such a volatile situation so you made plans in the event of your death by violence. You sent me a message in a dream the night you were shot. I found the spell book where you had hidden it and I followed your notes. I stole your body from the morgue and I washed it according to the ritual you provided, saving the corpse water exactly as you instructed. Although it pained me I skinned your body and preserved the skin, using the spells and tanning techniques you specified. Then I set up this room, with the command oil on the latch to make the woman who entered take down the box with the money as a lure, thus setting in motion the spell for your takeover of an innocent victim.

  “I was grateful and I wanted with all my heart to bring you back but you didn’t trust me. Even as we made love you were putting binding and compulsion spells on me to keep my love strong and make sure I carried out all your instructions to the letter. I could have forgiven you for that. I already loved you so the spells didn’t bother me. What bothered me was your lack of trust.”

  Greta snorted. Of course she hadn’t trusted the naive fool.

  “As I set up this room with all its spells it became increasingly clear to me that you had left no room for me in your future. I began to doubt that what I was doing was right but I was bound to my course of action. When I discovered that you actually were guilty of the murder, that you had used your magic to modify the key piece of evidence against you, I knew I could not let you get away with it.

  "I couldn’t not do the tasks and spells you set out for me to ensure your resurrection but you had to give me knowledge and power in order to perform those tasks and spells. I used that knowledge to add a few spells of my own.”

  Greta cursed the memory of the handsome man and spit on the floor in contempt. Maybe he wasn’t the fool she had assumed he was, but surely she could overcome any magic he wrought.

  “Your plan was for me to put the house up for sale so you could possess the first unsuspecting woman that came within range of the curiosity and compulsion spells, but I kept the house and lived in it until I died, to ensure that your trap would not be sprung until decades after you expected. I also added a confinement spell all around this room, woven and strengthened with care and patience over many years, to make sure that your soul, waiting so long in this room, can never leave while clothed in flesh.

  "You have two choices: stay where you are until you die of thirst or starvation, or walk through the door now and let the woman you’ve possessed have her body back. It might help you to decide if you know that she is your granddaughter. Either way your soul will be unbound. I understand that starving is a horrible way to die, but you can end your suffering before it begins by walking through the door right away.”

  With a cry of inarticulate rage, Greta tore off the offending page, crumpled it in her fist and hurled it to the floor. Did Raymond really think she cared this was her granddaughter's body? If she needed it, she would take it.

  She calmed herself and explored her cell, quickly determining that the walls and floors were solidly constructed and backed up by the tight weave of Raymond’s spells. The only way out of the room was through the door. Greta stood in front of the doorway and cautiously probed with a forefinger. The tip went numb as it approached the invisible, magical barrier. Raymond had done well; if she walked out through that door all her plans, her revenge, her past and her future, everything that made her who and what she was, would be over.

  Frustrated, Greta pulled back. Raymond’s devious spell was far more powerful than she had expected, but compared to her he was still an amateur. She was sure she would have enough time before she died of thirst to find a way to break his spell, or at least breach it in one spot so she could escape.

  She looked out through the door where she couldn’t go. She saw the opposite wall, stacks of yellow magazines, and the back of a tall bookshelf. Right at eye level, written in chalk, barely discernible on the raw wood, was a single line, the question, “What is your name?”

  Greta knew her name so after she read the line her gaze swept on, scanning the shelves inside the room, looking for anything that might be useful in her counter-spell. Suzi, so long subdued, also read it, but with in
stant comprehension, realizing now that it was a message to her.

  “Suzi.” That was her name. She remembered the entire message on the bookshelf. She knew she could fight, it was her right. She wanted to win at this game and she realized the significance of the final couplet, "Step through the door/to even the score." Before the witch even knew Suzi was fighting back Suzi seized motor-control of her legs while the witch wasn't thinking about them and took one sudden, long step forward, carrying herself right out of the room. As she passed through the doorway there was an agonizing wrench that left every nerve raw, her head felt like a hundred migraines were bouncing around in it, black dots filled her vision and she lost consciousness.