by Aaron Galvin
The remaining three form a triangle with their backs shielding Hecate. They speak to one another in a guttural tongue. I gather they try to discern where the assassin is. One of them points to the woods.
A shadow emerges from the wilderness. His face colored with a bloodied handprint overtop it; a seeming Indian painted for war.
Priest…
Slinging a longbow about his back, Priest takes a tomahawk from his belt. He kneels by a still writhing witch. Finishing her with a single strike, he rises with her blood staining his blade.
Hecate laughs scornfully. “You! Oh, you.” She closes her eyes and moans. “I have missed you so. Did you come longing for my sweet embrace again?”
Priest takes a dagger from his belt. He motions both it and his tomahawk’s blade toward his person, ushering her to come closer.
Hecate makes a pouty face. “No? Then I have little use for you.” She pushes her guards toward him. “Kill him.”
Each takes a knife from their belt before rushing him. Priest throws his own dagger at the first and buries it through the assailant’s eye.
The other two are undeterred. They spread out, one to garner Priest’s attention, the other to flank him.
Priest moves with serpent-like speed. He blocks and parries their blows while making deep slashes of his own. Catching the heel of one with his tomahawk, he trips the man. Almost faster than my eye can follow, he rises, swings his dagger upward into the next man’s throat.
It knocks the man off balance, near cleaving his head off.
In a final, sweeping motion of merciless efficiency, Priest brings his tomahawk crashing down upon the tripped guard’s skull. I watch him pluck his weapons free, step over the twitching corpses, and make for Hecate.
She seems to find the deaths of her guards a small matter, for she grins even as he comes on. Kneeling, she takes a fallen torch in one hand and unsheathes her dagger from Father’s chest with the other.
It makes a deep, sucking sound as it emerges; one I know will remain with me all the rest of my days.
“There is little need for this,” she says to Priest.
His face is stone.
“Come…” She slinks toward him, the rubies in her dagger winking in the torchlight. “Throw down your weapons. Serve me as you once did. Mayhap I shall serve you also.” She licks the length of her dagger’s blade.
Priest strikes at her.
Hecate whirls, matching his precision and strength with anticipation and speed. She dodges his blow, slices his cheek.
Priest kicks her in retaliation.
Hecate’s pretenses melt away. She charges at him in a blood lust, raining fire and steel upon him.
Priest will not retreat. He steps forward, snarling at her fury, as he makes new strikes of his own.
I watch their deadly dance. Listening to their blades sing against one another.
I feel a tap on the shoulder. “Come, lass.”
Bishop stands behind me, his face equal parts blood and sweat. With a strong hand, he aids me to stand and leads me from the fray.
“You cannot escape, Sarah Campbell!” Hecate shrieks as Bishop and I run away. “I will find you!”
I glance back a final time. Four torches hurry from deeper within the wood toward Priest.
“Priest…” I say.
Bishop leads me faster. “The lad can take care a hisself. If not, he’ll owe me a pint for havin’ to save his arse.”
We run as one, the sounds of cackling in our ears. I am again surprised Bishop’s limp does not hamper him. I hear the pawing of hoofs nearby and soft whinny of horses. Bishop leads me to his dapple grey, tied beside Priest’s red stallion. Both move with skittish urgency.
Bishop reaches beneath my arms. He heaves me atop the stallion. “Can ye ride, lass?”
I clench my legs over the stallion’s back. “Aye, I believe so.”
“Good.” Bishop unties the horses. “We’ve a long way to go yet, and we must needs leave quickly ere the witches find us.”
“But there were…men.” I recall the terrible faces amongst the circle. “I saw men also.”
“Aye, highwaymen and fur traders.” Bishop spits. “The Devil granted that succubus some unholy power betwixt her legs. I’ll warrant she’s swayed a man or fifty with it.” He looks back the way we came. “Blast it.” He sighs. “Where are ye, ye wee bastard?”
“My father—”
“He’s dead, lass,” Bishop says, not unkindly. “Can’t change that now.”
The thought of Father’s body, swaying in wait, returns to unnerve me. Bile rises in my throat ere I can fight it down. I vomit to the side.
I hear Bishop curse.
The stallion moves beneath me.
I dizzily sway to the side. Then fall into blackness.
***
I stand alone at the base of the earthen mound. Gaze to its peak where the polished table lay before the blaze. I am alone here, all the torches and followers gone with Hecate.
The fire still blazes.
Atop the earthen peak, I witness the ram’s head slowly turn upon the pike, of its own accord. It lingers on me. Watching.
My feet step forward, called by an unheard voice that bids me walk up the stony steps. The vat at the first landing gurgles and slops dark liquid over its edges. The Devil’s drink smells both sweet and decaying at once. I turn away from it, fearing what ingredients may bubble to the surface.
I am willed to the next landing where Charlotte yet lies upon the table. Now close, I see elliptical runes engraved upon it. Stone-carved, hooded serpents snake around the legs, their hoods and mouths open, fangs ready to strike.
Charlotte looks peaceful in death. Her limbs no longer twitch, nor does she mar her face by picking at it. She lies unbound, save for a black ribbon keeping back her hair. A necklace with a wooden cross is draped upside down upon her chest.
I reach forward to right it in the proper holy position. A frigid trap grabs my wrist. Yanks me to the table.
Charlotte’s eyes flutter open. “They have me, Sarah,” she says. “Yet I fear for you most of all.”
I struggle to free myself.
“He has marked you.” Charlotte tightens her grip. She laughs cruelly at hearing my bones snap. “Desires you”—her voice becomes deeper, craggier—“needs you!”
“Who?” I can barely ask the question.
Charlotte cackles. Her free hand palms the top of my head, forces me to look directly above her. “The Devil…” she whispers in my ear. “He sends His daughter to fetch you.”
I pull away as far as Charlotte will allow. A wet, slippery sound draws my attention. I look up.
The ram’s head oozes down the pike.
Transfixed by some evil magic, I am bound to remain until its bloodied nose touches mine. Fiery warmth spreads instantly through me, like its nose were flint and mine the striker. It holds me there, bids me stare into its dead eyes and watch its horns spiral out into the night.
“Awaken,” it bays.
***
Soft candlelight hovers above me from the timber rafters in my room. “Wh…wh—”
“Sarah…”
Mother? I try to rise. Pain shoots up my left wrist. I scream.
“No, child,” Mother says. I turn and see her worn, tired face. Her cheeks flushed with sorrow. “It is sprained. Lie back now.”
I obey. “How did I come here?”
She strokes my hair. “Mr. Bishop brought you. He carried you in...” her voice breaks. “Sarah…y-your Father—”
“I-I saw it Mother.”
Sobbing, she leans in to kiss my forehead. “Oh, my Sarah…Praise God you are still here.”
“I am, Mother.” I comfort her, though I too am weeping. Her back trembles at my touch. “I am still here.”
-11-
The untouched grits before me have long since grown cold.
Like Father in the woods, the dark of my conscience speaks.
I have no tears left to weep. No
strength to fight the voice away. I lent all to Mother last eve, and, for that, she will not scold me to finish my breakfast now.
She rolls dough beside me on the table, the commonness of daily routine taking hold of her. The lump in her apron is Father’s Bible. A talisman to ward off the accursed witches who killed Father.
I wish I heard all Bishop said to her. She would speak naught of it this morning, and I cannot bring myself to ask. Not that I wish to relive what I saw to her.
Rebecca plays with poppets in the corner. I gather she, too, uses them to shield her from a horror no young mind should ever face.
Our cabin door opens with a loud creak. Mother automatically reaches for her apron. From it, she draws a knife.
I once heard it said some women oft keep blades secreted away, for one never knows when Indians will attack. A hidden blade would not be enough to fight off the savages entirely. It would serve to open one’s own veins and keep the Indians from their prize. Seeing only George at the door, she tucks it away and resumes her rolling of dough.
I watch George carry the milk pails, sloshing a bit on the floorboards as he walks too fast. “Move, Rebecca,” he says in a commanding tone reminiscent of Father. His voice has not yet made the change, however, and it breaks with a higher pitch.
Rebecca will not budge.
George makes sport he will kick her. “Move!”
“I am waiting for Father,” she replies.
“Father is dead.”
I wait for Mother to clap George for speaking so.
She feigns the same deafness to his claim Rebecca does.
With no reproach, George looks at my sister squarely. “The witches killed him. He’s never coming back. Now, move!”
Rebecca shrugs his comments away. “I am waiting for Father,” she reiterates, stroking her poppet’s horsehair.
“George,” I say. “Leave her be, or I’ll knock you down with my good hand.”
George sets his pail upon the table.
I see in his face he means to test me. But there is a growing seed of doubt also. I water it by rising, standing between he and Rebecca.
His gaze flickers to my left arm, slung from a strip of cloth and wrapped in a poultice. “She needs to hear the truth, and face it. That is what Father would say.”
“Father would tell you to leave her be.”
His face reddens at my retort, but he has no reply. He knows my argument is sound. His hand quivers like wishes to strike me, an inferior female, for speaking back to him. The largest part of him is still a boy struggling with his own fears though.
I leave him to it.
Surprisingly, George walks round the table and sits opposite me. Only then do I realize he is alone. “Where is Andrew?” I ask.
“Mr. Bishop took him, after he carried you into the house near daybreak and set your arm. He bade Andrew lead him to his homestead that they might gather up his family. I-I wanted to go,” George stutters as if he fears I would mock him for a coward. “Mr. Bishop bid me stay. He said I was a man now”—I notice his stance and shoulders straighten.—“and a man’s duty is to protect his family. He bid me shoot anyone dead who approached our home, save for he or his companion. ‘If God himself rides on your home, you shoot Him, lad.’ That is what he told me.”
On any other day, I might chuckle. I can hear the old man’s voice as clear as Rebecca speaking soft words to her poppets.
“They have not yet returned.” George quiets his tone. “I fear they never will. And why should they when Father rebuked them?”
“They will,” I reply. My thoughts drift back to the ferocity with which Priest fought against Hecate and her minions. A nervous fear courses through me. George said nothing of Priest…only that Bishop returned. “Was the younger man, Priest...was he with Mr. Bishop?”
George shakes his head.
I think back on the torches running toward him. There were too many.
It seems I have a few tears left within me after all.
“Sarah,” George says, more quietly still. “Is Father truly dead?”
He senses the weaning time has ended yet is still wanton of the teat.
My answer is not to come. The sounds of fast-running hooves echoes through the door George left open. I run to the window to see who comes.
Two riders approach the end of our drive, one of them leading a riderless horse alongside their own.
A rifle cocks beside me.
George opens the window with its barrel. He balances the end upon the ledge as he takes the first rider in his sights.
For a moment, I think to take it from him. I have seen him miss twice now. It may well be I have the truer aim between us. My thoughts vanish when I see the barrel slowly turn as George follows the first rider’s movement. I see his finger massage the trigger. I cover my ears to shield them from the deafening blast to come.
George removes the barrel from the window. He grins. “It’s them.”
My heart races at Priest’s safe return. I think on what I might say. How to properly thank him. I freeze upon seeing Mother.
She has moved from the table to sit behind Rebecca. Her right hand tucked into her apron, her fingers knead beneath at that which I cannot rightly see. I think it no coincidence she sits so near her youngest and Father’s beloved.
She means to do it. My conscience warns. To keep those who stole her husband from taking any more of her family.
“Rebecca,” I say. “Come to me.”
“I am waiting for Father.”
I go to her, lift her with my good arm. She screams and kicks as one possessed, but I will not give up. I carry her outside and away from Mother. We sit upon the frost-covered grass where I promise to hold her in my lap until she tires of fighting or her body gives out.
Rebecca stops only when the horses draw near.
I think she believes it may be Father.
We are both disappointed; it is only Andrew Martin atop Callie, and Bishop upon his mare. The third, our largest draft horse, Hickory, bears no rider. Two wooden kegs hang off either side of Hickory’s back, slung together by a bit of rope.
“Lower yer aim,” Bishop growls. He swings off the mare and removes his rounded hat. The dome of his head is like a halo of bare skin, surrounded by untamed wildness. Wiping his sweaty brow, he dons the hat again. Then he goes to Andrew and pats his leg. “Come down, lad. We’ve work to do, and yer not doin’ any sittin’ on yer arse.”
Andrew dismounts slowly. His face is grimy, blackened with soot, save for two light colored streams down his cheeks that his tears washed clean.
I watch Bishop place his gloved hand beneath Andrew’s chin. “Oi. Ye keep this up now, ye hear me? Ye’ll make yer family right proud tonight.”
Andrew nods and wipes his nose with stained sleeves.
Bishop turns to see me watching. With the slightest of nods, he acknowledges my grief. A second later, he lifts his hat in welcome. “Top a the mornin’ to ye, Mrs. Kelly,” he says brightly. “Have ye any more food in the house?”
Mother stands in the doorway. Her right hand still in her apron. “A-aye,” she says.
“Right, then,” Bishop says. “Lads, get yer bellies full. We’ve a long day’s work ahead and an even longer night, I’ll warrant. Best to work both on a full stomach.”
A strange kinship has formed between George and Andrew. Before, my brother would have begged to hear stories from his friend; ask on the ride with Bishop, learn what they discovered there. Now, he waits for Andrew to make the first move. When Andrew does not, I see George’s face tighten like Father’s oft did when trying to solve a problem.
“Mr. Bishop speaks true,” George says.
He turns back to our home, seemingly without care if Andrew joins him or no. At first, I think him rude. When Andrew trudges after him, I wonder what unspoken message passed between them.
Rebecca is right, I think. Boys are queer.
No sooner do both enter the house, than Bishop looks to Mother and me. “
The Martins are dead,” he says. “Their home burnt to a shell. The lands and them with it.”
“Ruth…” I say.
Bishop’s eyes flash. “Don’t ye cry for her, lass. Yer friend’s not dead.”
“But how can you be sure?”
“’Cause I haven’t killed her yet. And before ye get the weepy eyes on me, know this. That girl, Ruth, and any others ye might know who took the Devil’s powder…they’re not yer friends anymore. They’ll do anything to have more of it. Includin’ killin’ ye if that’s what the Devil’s daughter bids ’em do. They’re slaves to her will now.”
Mother shakes her head in disbelief. “This is madness.”
“Aye, madam,” Bishop says. “And ye’ll witness it firsthand tonight.”
“I don’t understand. Why would they wish to harm us? Why did they kill my husband?”
Bishop strokes his beard. “I don’t like to speak ill a the dead, but yer husband weren’t the pious man he claimed to be.”
Mother’s lip curls. “My husband was every bit the man he said—”
“Did he tell ye his true name…Simon Campbell?” Bishop asks gently. “And that he lived in Salem for a time?”
Mother looks at her feet. “A-aye. I knew him for a Campbell.”
She knew? I cannot contain my rage at all the secrets withheld from me. “Mother! How could you and Father lie to us?”
Mother rubs her temples. “He sought a fresh start, Sarah,” she says weakly. “We both did. I was indentured when first we met. Kidnapped and ransomed by savages. Your father…he paid the debt off. Took me for a wife when I had naught to offer him in dowry but forgiveness.”
She takes me by the shoulders and stares into my eyes that I might believe her words.
“You are a Kelly, Sarah,” she says. “Your father gladly took my maiden name for his own and buried the sins of the man named Campbell. He passed it to you children rather than you be stained by the man he once was. It is why he took the name Paul also; Paul who saw the light of God upon the road to Damascus and changed his ways.”
“Beggin’ yer pardon,” Bishop says. “But a man can’t change who he is, Mrs. Kelly.”
