by Aaron Galvin
There is no reply.
I remind my legs to move, and step closer to Mother’s corpse. She cannot hurt me now, I tell them. For a moment, I believe I will have to move her body to search amongst the hay. Fear of what I might discover keeps me back. “Rebecca, answer me,” I say. “Pray, tell me you are hiding.”
My sister answers, but not from the hay.
“Sarah!”
Her voice calls from behind me…outside the barn...
I limp toward the hayloft opening. Bishop halts me ere I keep going and pitch over the side. Below us, I see at least twenty in Hecate’s army still live. Torches light their angry faces, their dark mistress…and my sister.
Rebecca struggles in Hecate’s grip. “Sarah!”
Hecate holds the dagger at Rebecca’s neck close. She grins up at me. “Come down, Sarah. We mean to do you a great honor.”
Even in the dark, I feel her penetrating gaze.
“If not—” Hecate raises the dagger to Rebecca’s scalp. “I make good on the promise I made last eve.”
“Sarah…” Rebecca cries.
Hecate’s minions laugh at my expense. Their humor is short-lived, however.
“The tongue of the Devil’s daughter?” Bishop yells. “Sounds like a right fine prize to me!”
He casts me roughly aside into my brother’s arms. Dropping his rifle, he turns upon the ledge with surprising dexterity. Then, he descends the sole remaining ladder.
“Wait!” George cries.
Bishop does not heed him.
I crawl to the edge of the barn just as Bishop reaches the bottom.
He strides unflinchingly toward Hecate. Loosens a dagger and tomahawk from his belt. “Unhand her, ye spiteful wench!”
“I know your voice.” Hecate laughs. “Patrick Glover, is it? How did you come to join this ragged lot?”
“Don’t matter.” Bishop answers. “Ye won’t live to tell the tale, unless ye be preachin’ to the Devil hisself. So, come on with ye,” He waves her toward him. “For it’s Hell I mean to send ye too.”
Hecate shoves my sister into the care of another. “Very well. Tell my Lord Father I said hello.”
Without warning, Hecate takes a torch from a witch and flings it at Bishop.
Bishop spins to dodge it. He raises his dagger upon completing the revolution and only barely deflects her dagger from slicing his skull. Bishop dips his blade, pitching Hecate forward. He catches her in the face with an elbow.
Hecate stumbles.
I watch Bishop press his advantage, but the witches move to block him. They step in front of their fallen leader and beat Bishop with the flats of their daggers. He swings wildly to force them back. They relent, but their distraction gives Hecate time to find her feet.
“Clever, old man,” she says. “But have you any more tricks?”
Bishop hacks and spits. “I’ve the luck a the Irish on me side. And an Irishman ne’er has need for trickery, unlike blatherin’ wenches.”
“Shall I show you the power of wenches, sir?” Hecate turns her hateful stare on me, then her followers. “Bring her to me.”
As one, a group of Hecate’s witches and highwaymen rush the ladders to climb.
George pulls me back from the ledge. He and Andrew form a human shield in front of me.
“What are you two doing?” I say. “Ready the rifles!”
“We are out of powder,” Andrew says.
So this is our last stand. Clenching Priest’s dagger, I push my two protectors aside to stand between them.
George nods at me. Andrew swings his axe in practice.
“Up, up, up!” I hear Hecate urge. “Back on your feet, old man!”
I see and hear the tops of the ladders shake as our attackers climb. My heart quivers with each tap of the wood. I look at the dagger in my hand. It has already served me well this night. I pray it serves a bit longer.
“Remember what Bishop said,” George says. “Keep back from the ledge, else they pitch us down.”
I do not have time to answer. The first group of witches seems to fly up and over the edge, even as several men swing down from the roof. Then I am rushing forward, screaming at them as they scream back at me. The battle is a nightmare come alive. I see a witch’s blackened teeth ere I bury the blade in her chest and yank it free.
Beside me, George ducks a blow meant for his head. He sweeps his attacker behind the knee and brings his foe to the floor. With a vicious kick, my brother smashes his foe’s temple like an overripe melon.
I see my next attacker too late. She raises her dagger then her head whips back as a dog gone to the edge of its leash. A long dagger sprouts from her chest.
I shudder at her gurgling. The hooded witch who did the killing slings her aside.
“Move!”
The witch raises a tomahawk and flings it. I feel the rush of wind as it grazes past my ear before finding a home in the skull of another witch come up behind me. My savior pushes past me, wrenches the tomahawk free only to slay another hooded sister ere she can kill George.
I hear the last attacker die behind me as Andrew wins his own battle.
George crawls backward to escape. He pauses when our savior offers to help him stand. My brother’s face pales. “You…”
The witch removes its hood. His face is blackened with soot. A palm print of blood stretches over his nose, the painted fingers over his eyes and forehead. I understand it now how his enemies would think him a demon.
“Priest…” I say. “How did you—”
Reaching for his ribs, he groans and collapses to a knee. Blood covers his hand when he takes it away. He looks at me and sighs.
“Oh, Priest,” I fall upon him, clinging to his neck, rubbing my cheek against his. “I thought you dead!”
He gently rubs the back of my head. Then, he tugs it. Pulls it taut.
“Ow,” I say. I try to pull away.
He will not permit it.
“You’re hurting me…” I say.
A cold blade presses against the back of my neck. The cut occurs in one quick slice. I fall forward. A wet sensation trickles down my neck. I put my fingers to it. It feels warm and sticky.
Blood…My blood! I wheel about.
Priest holds my long locks in his hand. Wincing, he looks at George, then Andrew. “Keep her safe,” he says gruffly.
He dons his hood anew and strides for the hayloft ledge, still clutching at his ribs.
“Where are you going?” I say.
He reaches the edge. Victoriously raises the fist holding my hair. “YEYEYEYEAH!”
I recoil at how alike he sounds to a savage war cry.
They take up his call.
I watch Priest turn upon the ledge and start his descent.
“No, Sarah!” George restrains me from rushing to Priest. “He said to stay here!”
I shove my brother off. I slink in the shadows toward the hayloft opening. George and Andrew are not far behind. Reaching the wall, I peer between the slats at the battle below.
Hecate has left Bishop to her minions. She stands at the forefront of her now smaller army, awaiting Priest’s return with my presumed scalp.
I see Bishop struggle to keep his feet, even as the circling group darts in and out when Bishop’s back is to them. Witches slice at his legs. Men smack him in the head with their bows. Their combined laughter meant to disorient him.
Bishop jumps as one startled each time they cry out.
“He cannot last much longer,” George whispers.
“Look!” Andrew points.
Priest approaches Hecate. He kneels before her, offers the trophy of my hair.
Hecate motions him to rise.
Priest does so, and stabs her in the stomach.
“Aaaaah!” Hecate wails.
Priest wrenches my sister away from her captor. He pushes Rebecca safely behind him ere drawing the tomahawk with his free hand. He removes his hood and shouts another war cry.
With their mistress dead, the r
emainder of her army flees to the cornfield.
George gasps beside me. “Bishop!”
The few remaining witches have pressed their advantage.
Bishop, forced to a knee, strains to keep his blade locked with one of their axes.
Priest wastes no time. He throws his tomahawk at another witch’s skull, splitting it in two. I watch him rush in. He uses his arms like a club, batting down a third witch’s arm, disarming her. He butts his head into hers.
The witch stumbles away, fleeing for the corn.
“Kill her,” both George and Andrew say at once.
Priest does not. I watch him help Bishop to stand.
It is over. It must be over.
Then I see a shadow rise shakily.
Her movement slow, but sure, Hecate lifts an Indian bow. Fumbles to notch an arrow.
I look ahead to what will be her aim.
Priest…
I push away from the wall. Go deep inside the barn. I halt near the trapdoor and Emma’s body. Ahead of me, the full hunter’s moon brightly shines outside the open hayloft door; a hulking orb meant to light my path.
With sweaty hands, I reach into my apron. My fingers clench over the dagger Captain Alden gifted his son. Gifted Priest.
I pull it out, thinking back on the stag he killed. How he surprised and killed it without leaving a mark. I sprint forward as fast as my wounded legs can carry me. I never halt. Not even as I approach the edge into nothingness.
George sees me. He leaves the wall to stop me. “Sarah, no!”
My foot touches the edge. I push off, launching into naught but air.
A giddy shiver runs through me. My feet blindly kick in search of anything solid, but find no purchase. Twenty feet from the ground, I look below me.
Hecate has notched her arrow.
At ten feet, I raise the dagger over my head.
Hecate hesitates, seems to sense her demise. She looks over her shoulder at the last. Her fatal mistake is to not turn her gaze toward Heaven.
Earth rushes up to greet me. I blindly swing the dagger down with all the strength I can muster. Pain, far beyond which should be possible for anyone to experience, quakes my entire body. I feel my legs shoot straight up into my chest.
Then my world goes dark.
-20-
My eyes flutter open to sunlight. The scent of trees surrounds me. A fire crackles not far away. A horse whinnies and shuffles. The world spins with light. I raise my arm to shield it. Red pain shoots up to my shoulder. “Oh…” I groan.
“Sarah!”
Two figures rush to me. Their faces are fuzzy, but I recognize my sister’s voice. Rebecca places her warm cheek upon mine, both made wet by our combined tears.
“Sarah,” she says. “You are alive!”
“Aye.” I pull her close and let my lips linger on her forehead. “I would not leave you.”
The figure behind her clears his throat. “Rule number one, lass—”
“Bishop…” I say.
He chuckles good-naturedly. “—Don’t…get…attached. Course I might not be alive if’n ye hadn’t…but then, no.” he reconsiders. “Mayhap I wouldn’t a been there at all if not for ye…blast it, I don’t know.”
My sight clears. I lay in a wagon. Surely the soreness in my back is liken to those strung upon a torturer’s rack. My attempt to sit up does not go well. My right arm, bound and hung in a sling about my neck, will not support me.
Neither will my legs work. At first, I fear my fall has crippled me, yet I feel a deep soreness still resides in them. I toss the quilts covering me aside. Stiff branches, running the length of my legs, tightly prevent me from bending my knees.
“Easy, lass,” Bishop says, rubbing my arm and helping me to a sitting position. He leans heavily on a long stick, I assume a crutch. A black patch covers his right eye. Even it cannot hide all the sliver scars the witches marked him with. Despite it all, he seems happy enough to see me awake.
“Ye won’t be skippin’ about anytime soon. The lads told me what ye did,” he scoffs. “A right brave thing. Mad, to be sure—” His eyebrows raise. “—but brave. Don’t believe the Queen Wench ever saw ye comin’. Plum near took her head off, ye did. Death from Heaven, as it were.” He chuckles. “Why, the story’d only be finer ifn’ a broomstick came down with ye.”
His own joke sends him into a coughing fit. He leans back to hack the phlegm from his throat and spit it away.
His humor is not lost on me, but I cannot share it now. Not with the knowledge so many others died to make it so. With my good hand pulling at the side rail, I slowly scoot to the edge of the wagon.
“She is dead then?” I ask. “Hecate, er, Abigail Will—”
He nods. “Aye. She won’t be risin’ to stir trouble no more. I dare say ye be lucky both yer legs didn’t shoot straight out yer arse when ye landed atop her. They’ll heal in time, but I’ll warrant ye gimp a bit more than I the rest a yer days.”
Strange. I do not feel sated with the news she is dead, nor that I killed her. In fact, I feel nothing. With a heavy sigh, I take in my surroundings.
The wagon I sit in lay at the middle of a small camp. The purplish brown bodies of squirrels and rabbits, stripped of their skin and gutted, rest upon a spit over the fire with Mother’s cookware piled beside it.
Rebecca hops into the wagon with me. “We thought you would die of a fever, Sarah.” She hugs me again, buries her face into my good shoulder. “That is what Mother died of.”
Bishop rests a gloved hand upon my forearm ere I can speak. He shakes his head. “Aye,” he says. “We weren’t wonton of losin’ ye both to ailment.”
So he shields her with one of his lies. I rub my sister’s back. Kiss the top of her head. Father may have believed a lie remains such, no matter the goodly intent, but I cannot share the sentiment. Better Rebecca grow believing Mother died of a fever rather than be plagued with the same crippling fear that brought Mother to make her own end.
“How long did the fever hold me?” I ask.
“Nigh on three day now,” Bishop says. “It broke in the night. Thank God for it. We’ve a need to be off soon.”
“Off?”
Wrinkles form upon Bishop’s forehead. “Aye. They’ll be others lookin’ for us. Why do ye think we’re out here in the woods and not yer family’s barn?”
“But you said Hecate—”
“Calm yerself, lass,” he says. “The crows and worms have fed on her rottin’ corpse these past few days.”
“You did not bury her?”
Bishop clucks his tongue. “No…”
I pull Rebecca closer. “But what of the others? Emma? The Greene family, Wes—” His name sticks on my tongue. “Surely, you buried them.”
Bishop shakes his head. “I gave ’em each the Lord’s blessin’ ere we left.”
I lean upon the railing, tears already welling. “How could you…how could you not bury them?”
“It’s a right hard thing to understand,” Bishop says. “But it needed done. Ye’ve no more to fear from Abigail Williams. It’s those set her upon us we’ve to think on now.”
A lump forms in my throat. “The Mathers…”
Bishop nods. “They and others servin’ ‘em most like. The church burnin’, murders at the Bailey and Martin homesteads; those sorta things bring questions. Why, folk from the next town over saw the smoke from yer own house and came to check on ye that very mornin’. We barely had time to cart ye and the supplies away.”
“But the bodies—”
“Stayed where they fell.”
I think to argue my point to him. Then I see him.
He leans against an elm tree, his dark gaze never leaving me. With his arms defiantly crossed, I would almost believe him angry if not for his dimples.
Bishop glances over his shoulder. When he turns to look back at me he grins like a dog discovering a bone. “Come, lass.” He pulls Rebecca out of the wagon. “Let’s rally the lads and check the traps one last time ere
we’re off.”
He lightly sets her upon the ground. Rebecca does not bother to look back as she runs deeper into the woods. Her fearlessness gives me hope our troubles are over, for now, despite Bishop’s claims others may soon hunt for us. I feel a tap upon my leg.
Bishop winks at me. “Don’t have too much fun now.”
He laughs himself into a coughing fit as he stumbles away after my sister. Only when I can no longer hear his laughter does Priest approach me.
My heart quickens. What do I say to him?
His shirt unbuttoned, I see his ribs are bound by black cloth, no doubt torn and bandaged from one of the witch cloaks. Each step makes him wince. Still, he comes on.
I take a deep breath. Truly, what do two people say to one another after both proved themselves willing to die for the other?
Priest sweeps all my concerns away. No sooner does he reach the wagon and I open my mouth to speak, than he places his rough hands about my cheeks. Pulls me close. His grip is firm, lips soft.
I exhale. Wrap my good arm about his neck. Now it is I pulling him closer. I hear him groan, but I care not for his pain. My only thought is to not let this moment go. I run my fingers up the back of his scalp. Scratch at his skin like I mean to scalp him with my nails.
The sudden, glorious movement makes my head swoon so fast I am the first to break away. I open my eyes and stare into his.
“You…” I say. “You are an Alden.”
I regret the words the minute I speak them. This is what I chose to say to him? This man who risked his life for me more than once, and I can only speak to I know his Christian name?
He does not laugh at me, however; only looks upon me with surprising tenderness. He nods.
“What is your name?” I beg of him. “I must know.”
He twirls a lock of my hair on his finger. “Priest,” he says so softly it is almost a whisper.
“No,” I say. “I wish to know the name given you at birth. Not what Bishop named you, nor the natives—”
A shadow crosses his face.
“—I wish to know your true name. The one your mother gave you.”
I may as well have asked the rocks and trees to speak. They would give the same answer. I judge my question makes him wrestle with some inner demon by his harsh gaze, but I do not fear him now in the way I once did during our moonlight ride.
