“So I have to go someplace scary that relates to him personally?”
“Sometimes extreme circumstances or emotions can break the barrier between the living and the dead.” I immediately think of Jaxon’s story about his mother talking to his dead father.
This makes sense. The majority of the time I’ve been in Salem, I was under duress of some kind. “His brother Nathanael has a gravestone in Old Burying Point.” The moment the words leave my mouth I regret them.
“Interesting. Nathanael was his younger brother. And you know how important prestige was to Cotton. Nathanael bested Cotton in learning and attended Harvard at a younger age. I would venture a guess that Cotton had mixed emotions about that. The year after he died, Cotton wrote Memorable Providences.”
“So, what, am I supposed to antagonize him to make him show up?” I like the idea less and less.
“It worked with me when you read Abigail’s letters.”
“Great. I’m going to get a flashlight.” No way I’m making that mistake again.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
* * *
Default to Sarcasm
“Do dead people usually hang out in graveyards?” I ask Elijah as I step through the iron gate into Old Burying Point.
“Are you asking me if spirits spend their free time roaming graveyards with the occasional hope of scaring someone?”
“Point taken.” I shine my flashlight, trying not to walk into any headstones. “Where are you buried?”
He pauses a moment. “My body is gone.”
My eyes widen. “What do you mean gone?”
“I should not have told you. It is nothing you need to concern yourself about. But I believe it was dug up.” He sounds calmer than I am, and it’s his body.
“Dug up! Who would do that?”
“Perhaps grave robbers.”
I shudder. I picture it before I can stop myself. I shine my flashlight on Nathanael Mather’s headstone in the corner of the graveyard under a big tree. I prefer the Cotton conversation to this one. “So this is Cotton’s exceptional brother.”
He nods. I pull out a small blanket from my bag and sit next to the headstone. My skin crawls. I light a candle, and the light flickers across Nathanael’s headstone—which has a flying skull on it. If someone tapped my shoulder right now, I would launch in the air like a cartoon character.
“If you remember it, it might be worth trying the spell you used with the Descendants.”
In some ways, I’m more scared that this’ll work than that it won’t. I close my eyes. “Cotton…I don’t know if you can hear me. Or if you’re bound to me. But I need to know a few things. Namely, who was hanging.” I speak slowly, unsure what words to use. I peek at Elijah.
He nods.
I take a deep breath. I can do this. I have to do this. People will continue dying. My dad could be one of those people. “Cotton, I need you to show me the face of the girl who was hanging. Show me something I can stop. Something I can understand.” I wait.
“Show me what you know about this curse. I mean what I say. I say what I intend. Know my desire and give me clarity.” For a second, everything’s still. The wind stops rustling through the leaves, and my body vibrates. Then, nothing.
Crap. “Listen, Minister. I know you were trying to get Daddy’s approval. It must’ve pissed you off when your little brother turned out to be smarter than you. The year after he died you wrote your book. And then you sit back while people spin lies in Salem, just happy about your fame. Disgusting.” My body vibrates again and the air whooshes out of my lungs.
The force throws me backward, and my eyes open. The graveyard is gone, and I’m in the woods. They’re different from when I was there with the Descendants. The trees are bigger, wilder. There’s a large crowd of people in a clearing. I run toward them, tripping over branches.
A male voice recites a prayer. Nearing the edge of the clearing, I can now see that the voice belongs to a man with a noose around his neck. Young Cotton is on horseback in front of the crowd. I push the people to get through, but they ignore me. Cotton yells to the spectators, “Even the most wicked of creatures can feign the semblance of good. Do not let this man’s words deceive you. For it is his actions you must examine. I ask you. Is he guilty?”
The crowd roars in agreement, and the cart is rolled away. The man falls, struggling against the rope. I push the spectators harder. The moment I break through, the crowd disappears. There’s no one left besides Cotton and the strangled man.
I can’t pull my eyes from the rope. As I watch, the hanging man transforms into the girl I saw at school, her hair obscuring her face. She turns her strained eyes toward me, and her hair moves. It’s Susannah. Cotton dismounts from his horse and lands in front of me. I try to get past him, but he blocks my path.
“Susannah!” I yell as she chokes.
Cotton grabs me by the neck, his strong hand making it impossible to speak.
“You are behind the horse. Focusing on the wrong things,” he spits. The pressure on my neck increases.
I start to lose consciousness and can’t hold on to the vision. I try to pry his hand away, but it’s no use. My eyes shoot open, and Elijah’s shaking me. “Breathe, Samantha!”
I gasp. “Susannah,” I manage. “It was Susannah hanging.” I stand, panting. “We have to go to her house. Do you know where it is?”
“Yes. What did you see, exactly?”
I want to get out of the graveyard. I gather my things and walk as quickly as my body allows. I explain the man’s prayer and the crowd as Elijah and I make our way onto the street. I describe every detail and every word I can remember. He’s particularly interested in the face of the man on the cart.
“George Burroughs,” he concludes as we plod along. “He was the only minister convicted of witchcraft. He was accused of being the ringleader of all the witches in Salem. People said he recited a prayer before he hanged. Witches were thought unable to do such things.”
I trip on the uneven sidewalk. “The crowd seemed affected. I mean, until Cotton convinced them he was guilty, anyway. So what I saw really happened during the Trials?”
“I do not know. I need to locate the story’s origin.”
“What do you think he meant by I’m focusing on the wrong things?” I ask.
“Probably just that. But it begs the question, what are the right things?” Elijah stops walking. “Susannah’s house.” He points up a small stone walkway to a forest green door.
I walk toward her stoop. Why was Cotton so angry? Was it what I said about him, or is he really mad that I’m missing something? I raise my hand to knock, but the door opens before my hand touches the wood. Susannah stands on the other side, looking worried.
“Sus—”
“Shhh. Keep your voice down,” she warns. “It’s not a good time, Samantha.” Her eyes are puffy from tears.
“I know. I’m sorry. I wouldn’t have come, but it’s important. Remember when we were in the woods the first time?”
She nods and glances over her shoulder.
“That guy we saw crushed under the piece of metal must’ve been John.”
“I didn’t see anyone get crushed.” Her frown deepens.
Wait, she didn’t see that? We talked about it. Actually, no, Alice told everyone to shut up, and then we only discussed the blurred faces. I just assumed the other girls saw it, too. “Oh man. Well, I did see that. I didn’t know what it meant, until after John died.”
“Why didn’t you say anything? We could have stopped it.” Her voice is now full volume.
Susannah’s mother comes to the door just as she finishes her sentence. “Susannah, no visitors.” Apparently, she knows who I am.
“I didn’t know this was gonna happen. I swear. I didn’t know it would be John,” I say before Susannah’s mother pulls her away. “But I had another vision—”
At the mention of John’s name, Susannah’s mother turns angry. “Get off my property, or I will call the pol
ice!”
I have to tell her. “Please, Susannah, you’ve got to listen. I saw you hanging in my vision. I think you’re next!” I yell. The door slams in my face.
That was really bad. “I’m an idiot.”
Elijah follows me toward my house. “You told the truth. You would never have forgiven yourself if you did not warn her.” He’s trying to be nice, but we both know I screwed up.
“I highly doubt Susannah’s mother will let her anywhere near me now.”
“Well, that is fairly certain.”
“I’ll try to explain in school tomorrow.” I sigh. “Do you think she believed me about the vision?”
“It is difficult to tell. I think it best you explain it when your emotions have calmed.”
I agree. “Elijah, what am I missing? What’s the thing I’m not looking at that Cotton was talking about? We need to find that story about George Burroughs and see if there’s a clue in it.”
“Yes.”
“Susannah’s ancestor recited prayers like Burroughs, didn’t she? Also, you said Susannah got the rash the worst, right? And now I saw her hanging. They must be related.”
Elijah pauses. “I will do some digging.”
“Great.” Now I need to make sense of that passage Cotton quoted in my dream. He said people don’t believe in witches because they’ve never seen one. Could he mean me not really believing in all of these things I’m seeing?
We walk to my house, deep in thought. If that’s what he’s saying, then I need to stop being skeptical and embrace this weirdness. Resisting it has gotten me exactly nowhere. My dad always says that you don’t get to choose what happens in the world, only how you react to it.
There isn’t much time left. But if Cotton’s bound to me, the answer is here. I should be able to figure out whatever he knows. I open the door to my house and lock it behind me.
“I just got off the phone with Susannah’s mother,” Vivian says, waving the phone in her hand. “She said you threatened her daughter. What were you thinking, Sam, after what happened today?”
I don’t acknowledge her, and she doesn’t try to stop me as I go upstairs. I shake Vivian’s comment off and close the door to my bedroom. Things were never easy socially in NYC. There were times I begged my dad to let me change schools. But this is by far the worst situation I’ve ever been in.
I take off my jacket and slump down on my bed. “I’m scared, Elijah. I’m scared I won’t figure this out in time. That I’m not strong enough. Tomorrow’s Friday, four days from when we first saw the blurred faces, and I don’t feel like I’m any closer to solving this curse.”
“There is something I want to show you. It may help in that regard.”
“What?”
“I was not certain until yesterday.”
I sit up. “Certain of what?”
He walks to my armoire and pulls Abigail’s letters down from the recess in the top. He removes one letter from the bundle and puts the rest back. I perk up.
“One of Abigail’s letters?” They were in my room the whole time.
Elijah sits down on my bed. “This is not one of her letters from William. This one, she wrote to me. I found it the morning she passed away.”
I take the envelope from him and touch it lightly with my fingertips. It’s yellowed with age and has his name beautifully written in calligraphy on the front. It smells like old books, musty and comforting.
With great care, I pull out the heavy stationery. The crease in the middle suggests it has been folded and unfolded many times. There is a hand-drawn black-eyed Susan in the corner.
My dearest Elijah,
I know the great unhappiness you beare, and I am truely sorry. I do not mean for you to worry about me. Please understand that it is not William I grieve for these past days. He hath created a crack in my heart, but it is all those families upon which it broke. Those men and women ripped away from the ones they love and who love them in turn. It is the greatest evil of all, to separate people who love each other. I weep for all of us. Their barnish fear has kept them from compassion.
Most important, I do not want you thinking that you could have saved me, because you could not. It is my time. There is nothing you could have done to change this. Change the world, sweet brother. They need you, just as I have needed you all these years. It will be a long time before you understand this, but please let me go now with love.
When change cometh, she will bring peace at her back. She will not bend to your will; you must bend to hers. Help her.
With love and fare thee well,
Abigail
I read it slowly, working out the elaborate handwriting and the sentence structure as I go. “She was wonderful, wasn’t she?”
“More than you know.”
I stare at the letter, imagining how he felt reading this. My heart aches for him.
“I spent a great deal of time considering that last paragraph,” he says. “She means you.”
He’s so intently focused on me that I almost forget how to speak. “What do you mean?”
“We were meant to meet. You are change, Samantha.”
I’m not convinced, but I want to be. “She wrote this three hundred years ago.”
“My sister was special like you are. She did not see spirits, but she had premonitions. Our parents forbade her to speak of it. But, I assure you, Samantha, she was always right.”
Was I really meant to meet Elijah? “What makes you think this is about me, though? I’m not change. I can’t even change my own situation.”
“You changed me.”
“How could I possibly change you? You’re so stubborn.”
He smiles. “You are the first person I have wanted to talk to in three centuries.”
I want that to be true.
“And I believe that you can break this curse, that you can change your fate and those of the Descendants. You are the true reason I came back to Salem. I was unconsciously seeking you.”
I don’t know if I’m what Abigail meant when she left this goodbye letter. I don’t know how to be change or even how to have a civil conversation sometimes. But I want to break the curse more than I’ve ever wanted anything in my life.
Overwhelmed, I default to sarcasm. “Abigail was right about one thing, though. I’m definitely everyone’s first pick at peace.”
I steal a glance at my dad’s picture. I promise you, if there is a way to stop this, I will. I’ll do whatever it takes, however nutty.
“You have more power than you know, Samantha. You just have to be brave enough to realize it.”
“Easy for you to say. All you have to do is bend to my will.”
He smiles, and his dimples reappear. “Do not get ahead of yourself.”
I smile now, too. “But that was my favorite part.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
* * *
How to Hang a Witch
I step into the chilly morning air and close the door behind me, happy to avoid an awkward conversation with Vivian about her driving me to school. This isn’t the longest we’ve gone without speaking, but it’s the worst fight we’ve ever had. It’s not even a fight; it’s something more. It’s like my world is collapsing. For as long as I can remember, my dad and Vivian were my only people.
I can barely keep my eyes open as I jiggle the key in the lock. I got three hours of sleep, and my drowsiness is giving me a sick feeling. I turn around and almost collide with a male chest. I scream and look up to see Jaxon’s worried face.
After all the effort to get out quietly, I’m screaming, “Don’t do that!” I speed-walk toward school.
“Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you.” Jaxon slips my bag off my shoulder, and I’m too tired to protest. “I thought I might walk with you.”
He’s walked me home, but never to school before. “You’re checking up on me?”
“Maybe.” He doesn’t make eye contact. I’ve never seen Jaxon unsure of himself, and it doesn’t feel natural.
He probably thinks I’m still a mess from yesterday. Which I am. But his treating me like I’m unstable only reminds me of how messed up things are and agitates me more. “I don’t need you to.”
Jaxon keeps up with my pace. He pushes his hair out of his face. “Sam, I wanted to talk—”
“Sick people need to be checked on. I’m not sick.” Whatever he wants to talk about, I’m not sure I can handle it right now. I’m not in the best control of myself.
“You saw someone die in front of you. It’s not like you’re going to be normal, either.” His tone is serious, and I tense.
My whole life, people have told me I’m not normal and need help, and Jaxon’s joining them makes me feel like I’m drowning. “I don’t want to talk right now, Jaxon.”
“Why? Because I won’t say that I believe you had a vision about John? Or that I think people are going to die?”
My cheeks redden, and I move faster. We’re almost to school. “I don’t want to defend myself to you. I already have to do that with everyone else.” I take my bag back from him, and he catches the strap before I can put it on my shoulder.
He searches my face. “Since when do I make you defend yourself? All I want is for you to talk to me. I want—”
“Let go.” I pull on my bag, and his lips tighten. He nods and releases his grip. I push through the door to the school, but he doesn’t follow. The second I’m inside, I regret my words. I do want to talk to Jaxon. But how could I ever explain Elijah and the curse? He would never believe me.
In the hallway, the few early students greet me with ugly looks. Insults are spoken just loud enough for me to hear. I clench my jaw to keep from crying.
As I turn the corner, a nondescript door opens. I can just make out Elijah’s angled face in the shadow. I head straight for it and slip inside. The door clicks shut. It’s pitch black, and my shoe hits something hard. I grab on to Elijah. He flicks on the light switch.
It’s a custodial closet with barely enough room for both of us. Our chests are only inches apart.
How to Hang a Witch Page 19