“That would be my guess,” Hannah agreed. “There were whispers that they were practicing black magic. A couple local girls went missing and the rumor was that they were sacrificing the girls for the crops.”
“I wonder if that’s true,” Tyler mused. “I mean ... is there a sort of magic where you can sacrifice people for corn?”
Hannah shrugged. “You’re asking the wrong person. I’m magic ignorant.”
Cooper chuckled. “I prefer to think of it as you’re still learning. As for the sort of magic you’re theorizing about, it’s possible. I know from listening to Astra and Abigail talk. They had really long discussions about it. I only half-listened, but I remember a lot of what was said. It’s called blood magic, and it’s powerful.”
“I’m assuming blood magic is performed by dark witches,” Hannah said.
“I don’t have statistics on it but that would be my guess, too,” Cooper agreed. “Keep going with the story.”
Hannah ate two bites of steak before continuing. “After five years without a crop failure, when those around them had lost at least two crops in the same amount of time, the rumors got to be too much and they packed up and moved away. They sold their farm for a lot of money — to a local rich guy who believed he would be able to turn the magic soil into endless food — and the property never yielded a good crop again. There’s a notation here about it and everything.”
“We don’t know that the land never had another good crop,” Cooper cautioned. “What year was that book written?”
“Good point,” Hannah acknowledged. “It doesn’t say. I would guess the book was written less than a hundred years after the events being mentioned ... although I have no proof of that. It’s just a feeling.”
“That’s good enough for me.” Cooper winked. “Keep telling the story, Ms. Hickok. I’m actually fairly interested in it.”
“You can go back to calling me baby. I’m no longer mad.”
“Good to know.”
Hannah focused on the text. “So, they moved here — back then twenty miles was a lot farther away than it is now — and even though a few rumors followed them, most of the locals in the area thought it was nonsense because they were such a nice family.
“By that time, they had three-year-old twins,” she continued. “Amelia and Bettina.”
“Does it say which one was which? I mean ... one was supposed to be a dark witch and the other a white witch. It would be easier if we could figure out which one was which witch.”
“Amelia is described as fair and pale. Bettina as dark and brooding.”
“I’m guessing there wasn’t a lot of character layering back then,” Tyler offered, opening the container that held the deep-fried onion. “Plus, if Cooper is right about it being a fable, I’m willing to bet a lot of the story was enhanced — or maybe even bent a little bit — to match a specific narrative.”
“That makes sense,” Hannah agreed, grabbing a piece of the onion. “Maybe the story is enhanced and not completely true. That’s going to make sussing out the truth all the harder.”
“It will, but it’s a place to start,” Cooper noted. “We’re still not certain how all of this fits together. We’re going to have to weed it out piece by piece. That starts with the story.”
“Pretty much,” Hannah agreed, grabbing another onion piece.
“Baby, can you lay off the onions?” Cooper asked in his nicest voice. “If you’re going to punish me later, the onions and garlic are going to be overwhelming.”
Hannah popped the onion into her mouth despite his request. “Or you could just eat some onion, too. Then we’ll both stink and not be able to smell it.”
“That sounds like backwards logic to me.”
“I’m eating the onion.”
His lips quirked. “Fine. I guess I can put up with it ... for love.”
“Aw, so sweet,” Tyler cooed. “Go back to the story. I’m going to puke if I have to watch another second of this schmaltz.”
“Fine.” Hannah grabbed another hunk of onion for good measure and went back to the book. “They lived on top of a mountain, built a homestead and turned the land, that shouldn’t have been able to yield a crop, lush and green.”
Cooper dipped a hunk of steak in his mashed potatoes. “More magic.”
“It sounds like they were walking a dangerous line,” Hannah noted. “One of the few things Jackie stressed to me when talking about magic was karma. Everything you put out in the world comes back to you threefold. So, if they were constantly using magic for personal gain, there had to be a limit of some sort.”
“Maybe the limit was the earthquake,” Cooper suggested. “The mother was supposedly killed by an earthquake, right?”
“Yeah. Let’s see.” Hannah read a bit further. “Okay, when the girls were eight, they were out in the field when the sky turned red.”
“Red?”
“Helga says it looked like the blood of a million enemies was washing across the sky.”
“She had quite the imagination,” Tyler said on a laugh.
“Thunder followed the red sky, a torrent of rain fell, and the earth began to shake at the same time the girls began fighting with one another,” Hannah related. “Supposedly, up until that point, the girls were inseparable. They wore the same clothes, liked the same foods, and played the same games. That all changed the day the sky turned red.
“Josette ran out to the field to squelch the fight and was caught in the earthquake,” she continued. “The ground shook so hard a fissure opened and she fell inside. Then the rain came and filled the fissure, to the point where it turned into a creek.” She was dumbfounded.
“Wait, is that our creek?” Tyler queried.
“I guess.” Hannah found the story ridiculous, and yet she couldn’t look away. “Clement raced to try and save her, to hold off the water, but he couldn’t because the trees had come alive and were trying to eat his daughters.”
“Wait ... are you saying that trees can come alive?” Tyler looked horrified at the prospect. “That is something I could’ve lived my entire life never knowing.”
“Clement chose to go after his girls, and in the process sacrificed his wife to a hungry earth and an angry sky,” Hannah said. “He took them back to the house, asked what happened, but they refused to tell him. All they would say is that they fought ... and it was something that could never be forgiven on either part.”
“It must’ve been bad then,” Cooper said. “Like ... really bad.”
“Years passed and the girls grew into young women,” Hannah read. “They were no longer close, to the point where their father had to build two separate houses. One night he would stay in Amelia’s house and the next he would move to Bettina’s house.” She wrinkled her nose. “You don’t think they were doing gross stuff, do you?”
Cooper involuntarily shuddered. “Let’s not go there, huh?”
“Yeah, I agree with Cooper.” Tyler focused on his food. “That’s going to give me nightmares.”
“Me, too,” Hannah agreed. “Anyway, the girls reached the age when they could be married and men started calling. They asked Clement for permission to marry his daughters — both of them — but he always declined. Some men even tried to buy the girls because they were reportedly the most beautiful women in the land.”
“What are the odds of that?” Cooper prodded.
“Well, since they were twins, it might not be that hard to swallow,” Hannah pointed out. “The girls reached the age of twenty-two without getting married, which believe it or not, made them spinsters.”
“Oh, that’s so sweet,” Tyler teased. “Over the hill at twenty-two. It’s like a bad teenybopper movie.”
“No joke. Clement grew ill out of nowhere and the girls rallied to his side, both trying to cure him. His illness was short, though, and he died on the mountain. The girls couldn’t agree where he should be buried and split his body in half so they could each bury him how they wanted.”
“T
hey split the body in half?” Tyler blinked at his steak. “Let’s not talk about that when I’m eating.”
“It doesn’t say how they did it, so don’t worry,” Hannah said. “Once Clement was gone, the girls started openly fighting. They attacked mercilessly, not caring if innocent people were hurt in the process.”
Hannah flipped a page, perplexed. “There’s nothing in here about why they were fighting, or how it all worked out. It just says they fought until they killed one another. I don’t understand.”
Cooper reached across the table to snag the book, leaning close so he could peer at the binding. “It looks as if two pages have been removed from this book.”
“What?” Hannah was incensed as she grabbed the book and confirmed what Cooper was saying. “Why would someone remove the pages?”
“My best guess is that there’s something important on those pages,” he replied.
“We need to know what it was.”
“We don’t know that what’s happening now has anything to do with Amelia and Bettina, though,” Tyler argued. “The missing pages might not be important at all. Besides, we don’t know when they were removed. Helga could’ve removed them. It could’ve been Abigail, too. It also might’ve been someone else. We’re talking hundreds of years in the life of a book.”
“That’s true.” Hannah looked one more time to see if she could find what she was looking for. Of course, it wasn’t there. “I wish Abigail would visit. We need help.”
“Baby, it’s going to be okay.” Cooper rested his hand on top of hers. “We’re going to figure it out. We’re already partially there.”
Hannah could only hope he was right.
10
Ten
Hannah was visited by visions of foggy witches and screamed threats in her dreams again that night. She was restless, tossing and turning, and when Cooper tried to draw her into his arms to soothe her, he found a sweaty mess. He thought about waking her — this couldn’t be good for her, after all — but the possibility that she wouldn’t be able to drift off again bothered him more than her constant murmurs.
Eventually, she quieted enough for him to spoon behind her and slide back into dreamland. He didn’t open his eyes again until he felt her stirring next to him.
“Good morning,” he murmured, dragging his hand through his hair.
“Morning.” Her voice was gravelly enough that Cooper propped himself on his elbow to look down at her.
“Are you sick?” He was genuinely concerned, his hand immediately going to her forehead. While she wasn’t burning up with fever, she was warmer than normal. “Do you want me to call a doctor?”
Amusement flitted through her eyes. “For what?”
“I don’t know.” He felt put on the spot. “I just ... want to make sure you’re okay.”
“I’m fine. Why are you so worried?”
“I ... well ... you had bad dreams again last night.”
She was taken aback. She didn’t remember waking up, but anything was possible she supposed. “I’m sorry I kept you up.”
He immediately started shaking his head. “I don’t care about that.” He was firm. “You were restless, though. You kept rolling around ... and not for the fun reasons we normally roll around.”
That was enough to draw a smile. “I don’t really remember dreaming.”
He wasn’t sure if that was a blessing or a curse. “You were muttering. I couldn’t make out most of what you said. I thought about waking you, but I was afraid you wouldn’t be able to sleep again.”
“Well ... obviously I slept.” She rolled so she was facing him, enjoying the way their bodies fit together. “I wish I could remember the dream. It’s really hazy, though.”
“Maybe it’s best if you don’t remember the dream.”
“Why would you think that?”
“Because maybe something terrible happened in that dream and there’s a reason you’re blocking it out.”
“I guess, but I don’t know what that would be. I mean ... we heard the story. Both of us. It wasn’t as terrible as it could have been.”
“I don’t know, the idea of the earth opening up and eating a woman is pretty frightening to me.”
Hannah chuckled. “I’m sure that’s one of the more fanciful parts of the story that was embellished.”
Actually, he agreed on that front. “Yeah, I think that’s part of the lore. It’s more likely that the mother died because of something the girls did.”
“She was magical. They were magical, too. The story says the father had to choose between his daughters and wife. He made the only choice he could. Children are always going to trump a spouse.”
For some reason — even though he believed the statement on the surface — the notion was uncomfortable to Cooper. “I don’t know. I tend to believe that you shouldn’t have to choose.”
“In an ideal world, yes. I don’t think that’s reality. If you’re in a no-win situation, hard choices have to be made.”
“I don’t believe in a no-win situation.” She laughed, the sound bubbling up and filling him with warmth. “What?”
“I didn’t realize you were Kirk. Does that make Tyler Chekhov or Sulu? Boone is definitely Spock, although I don’t want to be Uhura. All she did was answer the phone.”
Cooper’s forehead wrinkled. “Are you a Trekkie or something?”
“No, I just happen to know about the Kobayashi Maru. My father watched that movie all the time. It was his favorite because his father took him to see it in the theater when he was thirteen or something — I think that’s what he told me — and he was a big Star Trek fan.”
“Well, I can’t say that Star Trek is a favorite or anything.” Cooper methodically scratched his morning stubble, considering. “It’s an interesting conversation. I think we should save it for another time, though.”
“Definitely,” Hannah agreed, struggling to a sitting position. When she caught a glimpse of her reflection in the mirror, she was caught off guard. “Wow.”
Cooper, not understanding what drew her attention, offered up a lazy grin. “Yes, you’re unbelievably sexy in the morning. Come over here and I’ll show you another trick Kirk was supposedly good at.”
Hannah ignored him and dragged her hand through her hair, frowning when her fingers snagged. “You weren’t joking about the sweating. Look at this mess. I’m going to have to use an entire bottle of conditioner to get a brush through this rat’s nest.”
“I happen to like it,” Cooper countered. “It makes you look ... rough and tumble.”
She laughed. “I think it makes me look like Medusa, but whatever.”
“Was Medusa hot?” He kissed her bare shoulder.
“She had snakes for hair.”
“Yes, but was she hot?”
Hannah laughed so hard it caught him by surprise. “Oh, I love you.” She threw her arms around his neck.
He smiled into her hair as he held her. “I love you, too.”
“Yeah, but I mean that I really love you.”
“Are you saying that I don’t really love you?” He pulled back far enough to give her a stern look. “If so, we’re going to start the morning with a fight.”
“That’s not what I meant.” She ran her thumb over his cheek. “It’s just ... you’re the only person I know who can make me smile even when there’s a missing teenager out there. I know it can’t last — we absolutely have to find her — but for just a few moments it was exactly what I needed.”
“I always want to give you whatever you need.”
“Me, too.” She rested her forehead against his and basked in his warmth. “Boone is coming for breakfast, right?”
“Yeah. He’ll be here in thirty minutes.”
“We should get in the shower. I’m hungry and I want to tell him what we found.”
Cooper wasn’t certain they’d found anything, but he understood the need to be proactive. “Shower it is. Then I’ll take Jinx out for his morning walk while you get
ready.”
“I can do that. It’s not your responsibility.”
“He and I haven’t had any bonding time this week. I think he misses spending time with me.”
One look at Jinx, who rested in his bed in the corner of the room, told Hannah otherwise. The dog had started showing signs of being jealous regarding her relationship with Cooper. It was nothing overt, but he was often petulant when Cooper ordered him to do something.
“Well, knock yourself out.” She offered up a bright smile. “If you want to bond with him, I’m never going to complain.”
“If you play your cards right, I’ll bond with you in the shower, too.”
“Oh, really?”
He nodded. “You’re going to have to be quick, though.”
“Somehow I think I can manage that.”
BOONE BROUGHT COMFORT FOOD. The box he was unpacking in the saloon as Hannah made her way downstairs included hash browns, toast, sausage, bacon, pancakes, omelets, and biscuits and gravy.
“You went all out I see.” Hannah flashed a smile that he didn’t return. “I’m so sorry about this.”
Boone kept his eyes on the food. “You’re not to blame.”
The fact that he couldn’t meet her gaze said otherwise and the anxiety Hannah had been feeling the previous evening returned with a vengeance. “I suggested the girls spend the day out here. Angel would’ve been safe at your house if I hadn’t. This is on me.”
“No, it’s not.” He shook his head and forced himself to look at her. She reminded him of Lindsey. She was older, more worldly ... and there was that whole witch thing. She tugged on every paternal instinct he had, though. He couldn’t stop himself from wanting to make her feel better.
“We don’t know that whoever took Angel wouldn’t have come to my house to get her,” Boone pointed out, using his most rational tone. “What would’ve happened under those circumstances? Would Lindsey have been expendable? She’s safe right now because of you.”
“Because of Cooper,” Hannah corrected. “He took her in the saloon with him.”
“Only because the storm came out of nowhere. You guys didn’t have a chance to shelter together. If Lindsey had been closer to you and Tyler, she would’ve been with you.”
Dances With Witches (A Hannah Hickok Witchy Mystery Book 5) Page 10
