Suddenly the writing on the walls seems way worse. And the crying I heard when I touched the carved feather. My brain is on overload. Why was my name there, and what is that place used for now?
“Elijah, maybe the stories about the evil old woman that lived there with birds were about your fiancée, not the crow woman…” My voice trails off as I try to figure out how the crow woman and Elijah’s fiancée could be different people. I can’t.
“I did not associate the word ‘crow’ with my fiancée. I am frustrated that I did not make this connection sooner. There was something about your grandmother’s drawing that struck me as familiar. The way the woman’s hair fell. The way she held her body. I just could not put my finger on what it was until now.”
My heart races. “Why would my grandmother draw your fiancée?”
“And why would Cotton show you a crow in a dream?” He sounds as anxious as I feel.
Elijah’s fiancée is the crow woman. There’s only one thing that explains this. “She’s wrapped up in the curse. She must be.”
“I just never imagined…” He doesn’t finish.
He told me several times she was one of the main accusers of witches. It makes sense she would be involved in the curse. “She helped start the hysteria.”
“Yes. And if she is involved, I do not believe myself exempt from this situation, as I once did,” Elijah says.
“Are you suggesting you’re part of the curse, too?”
“Indeed. It is possible. I was the one who disapproved of her actions at the time. Then I killed myself because of the Trials, and left her alone. And here I am again, helping you attempt to stop the curse. She has every reason to seek revenge.”
“If you’re tied to this and we figure it out, what will happen to you?” I always thought he was stuck here because of his suicide, not the curse.
“Are you inquiring whether I will remain a spirit?”
I nod at him.
“I cannot say.”
A tightness forms in my chest. For the first time since I learned about the curse, the idea of solving it doesn’t feel like a relief. “Do you want to stop being a spirit?”
His face is unreadable, but he maintains eye contact. “I have often wished it.”
The tightness spreads. “Of course.”
“In truth, I have not enjoyed these years. I have loathed many of them. And returning to Salem only increased my suffering. Then…”
As he talks, it becomes increasingly hard to breathe. “Then what?” I whisper.
“I recalled the reason I was in pain. Loss of beauty, of connection. Abigail’s singing while I painted. How we laughed so when no one was watching. And how finding a black-eyed Susan tucked into my business contracts reminded me of why I was doing that business in the first place. To really care for another is a reason to live. When that beauty was blotted out of my world, I no longer wanted to be in it.”
I understand him completely. Without my dad, I don’t know who I am.
“You reminded me of that beauty again. Not in one minute of my death have I wished for my life back, until I met you.”
Under the vines, on that little bench, I stare into his gray eyes. Before I can consider what I’m doing, I lean forward until I’m only inches from his face. He gently brushes my hair behind my ear. “Samantha, I—”
“I don’t care,” I whisper.
He doesn’t argue with me. Instead, he leans forward and presses his lips to mine. Softly at first, then with pressure. The coolness of his mouth warms against my own. Everything about him feels alive and hungry. His hand moves under my hair to my neck and pulls me toward him.
His tongue slips into my mouth, and my body tingles from my lips to my thighs. I want this, you, all of it. I don’t care if it doesn’t make sense. I reach out, entwining my fingers in his clothes and pulling him closer. He holds me tightly, the tips of his fingers pressing into my back. Then, like flipping a switch, he stops kissing me.
I look at him, confused. There’s a pause before I release my hands from his body. “What?”
He shakes his head and stands. “This cannot be, Samantha. You are living.”
CHAPTER FORTY
* * *
Midnight Mission
The clock on my bedside table reads 2:27 a.m. I snuggle farther into my down comforter. With the crap sleep I’ve gotten recently, I should have passed out hours ago. But all the details of the curse won’t leave my head, and it’s driving me crazy that I can’t connect them. How much time do I have left?
There is a soft tapping on my window, and I launch myself from my bed in a tangle of blankets. I squint at the crouched silhouette on my roof and can just make out the shape of a bun. “Susannah?”
“Sorry,” she says, but her voice is muffled by the glass.
I kneel on the window seat and open the window.
“How did you get on my roof?” I peer behind her just to make sure she’s alone.
She slides into my room and closes the window. “I climbed the latticework and jumped up.”
She scaled my house?
I flip my bedside lamp on. She’s wearing green plaid pajamas and a fluffy white winter coat. Okay, so she’s not wearing black, she’s a mini ninja, and she’s on a midnight mission. What else don’t I know about this girl?
“Everything’s a mess, Samantha,” she says, and sits down on my window seat.
“Yeah, I know,” I say. I’m not sure how to process this visit. I’m partly relieved and partly suspicious, especially after Lizzie’s hateful speech.
“No, I mean it’s gotten worse. I need to know—have you had any more visions?” she says, and I can hear the fear in her voice.
“You mean other than the one of you?” I wish I had phrased that better.
“Yeah. Anyone else? Even someone you don’t know?”
I recognize the look on her face. I’ve worn it myself. “Your sister…”
Her eyes widen.
“No, I mean, I didn’t see your sister. But did something happen to her?”
Her panic deflates. She nods. “She was admitted to the hospital not long after I came home from school. She collapsed.” Her voice shakes.
I sit down next to her. “I’m so very sorry. I don’t know what to say.”
“And she’s not the only one. Lizzie’s brother and cousin got in a car accident. Her cousin’s dead and her brother’s in the ICU. And Alice’s uncle, the one who owns The Brew, had a heart attack.”
Lizzie’s brother and cousin? That’s what those purple roses in town were about. It takes all my self-control not to jump up and start pacing. “It’s escalating.”
“I think you might be the key to figuring all this out.”
I’m so nervous, I almost laugh. “You guys have been keeping me in the dark. Why would you do that if you think I can solve the curse?”
“That’s why I’m here. Anything I know that can help you, I’ll tell you.”
I definitely didn’t expect that answer. “What changed?”
She takes a breath. “We did the clarity spell with Lizzie and it didn’t work.”
“Do you mean you didn’t see the blurred faces?”
“Let me back up. Alice, Mary, Lizzie, and I have been friends since we were little. Our mothers were friends, and their mothers. And from the time we were ten or so we were casting. It took us a long time before we could make anything work, and it wasn’t until recently that any of us besides Lizzie could do spells individually. We always needed the circle. We still do, for most things.”
“The circle?”
“Four of us.”
“What about John?”
Susannah hesitates at the mention of his name, and I regret bringing him up. “He wasn’t as interested as we were. When he was there, it was mainly for Lizzie.”
“So everyone knows you do witchcraft—they’re not just spreading rumors?”
“Not exactly. People make guesses, but we never discuss it with anyone outside of ou
rselves. That’s why I didn’t answer when you were asking me questions the day I came to your house.”
I was right. They’re like a secret society. “But you did a spell with me. Isn’t that a violation of your secrecy?”
“Yes and no. The thing is, I get feelings about people. Not everyone, but certain people I just know things about. And as much as Lizzie and Alice kept saying you were the bad thing coming to Salem, I knew the moment I met you that wasn’t true. Alice argued with me, but Lizzie wouldn’t hear it. Eventually, Alice agreed that if I could prove it, she would help me convince Lizzie. That’s when we met you in the garden, and that’s why Alice agreed to do that spell.”
Alice reads bones and Susannah reads people? I’m really not sure which end is up anymore. “You were testing me?”
“Yes. The clarity spell should have told us something about you, brought to light the truth. But those blurred faces were something no one planned on. Nothing like that had ever happened before. When we saw Cotton, Alice and I started arguing all over again. We decided to go back one more time to sort it out before discussing it with Lizzie.”
“But why were you arguing with your friends about me?” What does she see when she reads me?
She places her hand on mine. “Samantha, Alice’s bones kept directing us to you. You are obviously connected to us for better or for worse.”
“And so what happened with Lizzie?”
“We tried the clarity spell in the same spot in the woods, and we didn’t even get a normal reading. We got nothing. It didn’t work at all.”
“Could it be a fluke?” I don’t know how this stuff works, but it sounds like I need to. I look at my dad’s picture.
Susannah shakes her head. “Things like that don’t happen randomly. You made that spell work; I’m sure of it.”
I open my mouth to protest, and shut it again. “Did you ever tell Lizzie?”
Susannah fidgets with the zipper on her coat. “Alice brought you up in the auditorium, right before…everything happened.”
Oh no. That has to be the worst timing ever.
“Lizzie’s not thinking clearly. She’s coming after you. She’s convinced that these deaths and accidents are your fault, and she’s doing everything she can to convince the town of the same thing. And because she’s angry with us, she’s not telling us what she’s planning. But it’s not just gossip. Her family is well connected here.”
“What do I do?”
“Meet us tomorrow in the woods behind Walgreens at midnight. We’ll bring Lizzie, and we’ll sort this thing out. If we can’t work together, then we’re all gonna lose. These divisions are costing us time.”
A chill runs through me. “Okay.”
Susannah pulls out her phone. “I have to run. My parents are expecting me back at the hospital.” She lifts my window and slips through it.
“Susannah, be careful. That vision I had…”
“Just meet us tomorrow,” she says, and closes my window behind her.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
* * *
Becoming a Witch
I rub my eyes against the early morning light as I walk into the kitchen. Coffee’s brewed and everything’s quiet. Vivian’s car isn’t in the driveway. Looks like she’s avoiding me now. Somehow this hurts worse than the anger. She’s the one who sold the apartment and lied to me; she’s the one who slapped me. How is it fair that she’s now mad at me, on top of everything else?
I pull down a mug and fill it with coffee, half-and-half, and a bit of cinnamon. There are new empty wine bottles in the recycling can. Maybe Vivian’s just waiting for my dad to die to get rid of me. I have no family and nowhere to go. Why doesn’t she care about me anymore? I shake my head. I need to stop thinking about this.
“Elijah,” I say as I sit down at the round wooden table in the kitchen.
He blinks in, with an old leather-bound book in his hand. He takes a seat at the table and smiles. “Good. You are awake.”
I immediately blush and look at my coffee. Seeing his dimples just makes me remember the way his lips felt. I shift the conversation to our usual morning topic. “How’s my dad today?”
“Very much the same.”
It’s Saturday, a week since I was at the hospital, and the separation’s panicking me. “I really wish I could go see him.”
Elijah looks sympathetic. “You are helping him more by staying here.”
I’m grateful for the reinforcement. “What’s the book?”
“It is an old spell book. I am using it to figure out what kind of spell is around the house in the woods. It took me all night to locate one that I did not suspect was protected by some enchantment or another.”
“It surprises me that anything can hurt you.” Not that anything makes sense anymore.
“Understand that my existence as a spirit has no guaranteed end date. I would surely hate to spend the next few hundred years suffering over a spell because I was not cautious.”
The idea that objects can hold that kind of power is unsettling. “Could that really happen?”
“Samantha, death reveals that the world is more fantastical than you thought, not less. The veil between possible and impossible is often lifted.”
“I think I need to get on board with this spell stuff, too. I feel like I’ve been on the sidelines.”
“How so?”
“Well, I have that parchment you gave me. Maybe there’s some sort of identity-revealing spell that I can use to figure out who wrote the thing.” On the off chance it does work, it will save me a bunch of time.
Elijah smiles. “Becoming a witch, are we?”
I feign annoyance. “Not funny. So, did you find out what those stones and things at the old house meant?”
“I believe they are some form of binding spell to keep things in or shut things out. I am not positive. They could also be a way of hiding the house from general view. I have not gotten far enough in my research.”
I wonder why Elijah’s using an old spell book to decipher a new spell. I freeze, and my coffee cup only makes it halfway to my mouth. “Elijah, do you think there’s any way your fiancée could still be around?”
His lips tighten. “Yes. I do. It is one of my greatest fears. One of the reasons I did not come back to Salem.”
“But you haven’t seen her? Right? You’d see her if she was here.” All I need is a crazy spirit obsessed with Elijah to make this situation worse.
“My first few days after I returned to Salem, I was on guard for her. When she did not appear, I began to relax a little. Eventually, I assumed she had passed on. It was not until yesterday that my fears about her resurfaced.”
I’m sure that if she knew where his spirit was, these past three hundred years would have been unbearable. “What’s her name? It’s weird to keep calling her your fiancée.”
“As I told you yesterday, names have power. I have been careful not to say it all these years, and I ask that you do not say it, either. But you know her name. She accused Burroughs and Giles Corey….She testified against Susannah Martin….”
I would be lying if I said I hadn’t already been considering this. And these details definitely confirm my suspicion. I bet anything his fiancée was Ann. She was the leader of the girls who claimed to be afflicted by the accused. I nod. “I won’t say her name. Can I see the spell book?”
He hands it to me, and the weight is surprising. The leather cover is old and cracked and has silver accents. I gently open it, and the pages are thick and soft like cloth. The spells are handwritten in the same type of calligraphy Elijah uses. The book has a homey feel to it—the way old houses have a personality.
I skim the titles of the spells. They are about love, protection, growth, and harmony. It must have belonged to a good witch. I almost laugh at the thought.
After some page-flipping, I come across a spell entitled “The Origin of a Spell.” I skim the text. “This says it reveals a witch’s signature, so you know who’s casting against y
ou.”
Elijah’s eyebrows push together. “I do not know, Samantha. If this does work, you risk drawing the witch’s attention. She may sense you searching for her. Someone powerful enough to cast the spell that caused that rash is not someone you want to attract.”
He could be right. But this is our best option. “Maybe. But I think we have to take the risk. Besides, if it’s Lizzie, she already hates me.”
“And if it is not Lizzie?” he asks.
The vision Cotton showed me of Burroughs suggested I have a secret enemy. But it’s only a secret to me, not to my enemy. This is something concrete that might level the playing field. “Then we deal with that as it comes. I’m already in the middle of this….You aren’t thinking it could be your fiancée, though, right?”
“No. The dead cannot conjure.” His voice has finality in it, so much so that I wonder if he has tried magic himself.
At least I can rule her out. I study the required list of ingredients. I don’t recognize all of them, but then again, I’ve never been good with plants. Oh, crap. It specifies that everything must be freshly cut by the spell caster.
Elijah stands behind my shoulder. “How do you plan on getting those ingredients?”
My options are limited without a car and without asking Vivian. I look out the kitchen window. “I can ask Mrs. Meriwether. I’m guessing her huge garden has some, if not all, of these things.” I don’t want to go anywhere near Jaxon right now, but this isn’t about me and my wants. Plus, Mrs. Meriwether loves cooking. I’m sure she could tell me where to get something if she doesn’t have it.
I grab a pen and paper from the kitchen drawer and make a list of ingredients. Elijah frowns. “I do not like this at all.”
“Me neither, but we need to take anything we can get at this point. Susannah stopped by last night and told me about more injuries in Salem. The problem is getting bigger, faster.” Judging by his look, I know he agrees with me.
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