The Witch's Throne (Thea Drake Mystery Book 1) (Thea Drake Mysteries)

by Stacey Anderson Laatsch

  “What is it?” asks Lydia.

  “Allerton. It was right here in my notebook all along. She didn’t know any details because they weren’t here. She only knew the name.”

  “So, what does it mean?”

  “It means that bitch read my journal.”

  JOURNAL OF THEA DRAKE | JUNE 1

  One last thing, George. I’ve been thinking about Allerton lately. It was the only time you were wrong. The only time you’ve ever believed. Think about this case...the Witch’s Throne, the curse. Maybe it’s all true. Like Allerton.

  Allerton was the one time you couldn’t find the truth, wasn’t it? Allerton was the one time you questioned your skepticism.

  Allerton made you, even for a short amount of time, a believer.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE | OCTOBER 31

  “Who’s a bitch?” Lydia drops the quilt, snatches the journal and flips through it.

  “Beverly Donneville. She read my journal. That’s how she knew about Sosie, about George not writing, the argument, Allerton. Everything.”

  “The psychic lady?” Juliet asks.

  “How did she get it?” asks Lydia.

  “I have an idea. Go get packed.”

  “Packed?”

  I’m already dialing the phone.

  She waves the journal at me. “What is going on?”

  I turn away. Jeremy answers on the first ring.

  “Hello?”

  “What were you trying to tell me?”

  “Thea?”

  “Was it about my journal? About how Beverly got her hands on it?”

  He hesitates. “I wanted to tell you. I was trying to tell you, then all that shit happened with Uncle Martin and—”

  “Save it. You’re going to tell everyone. Every single person gathered out at that goddamn dead tree. And I’m going to be there.”

  “Here?”

  “I’m leaving for the airport as soon as I can. I’ll be in Portico tonight.”

  I explain, in detail, exactly what I want him to do.

  “I’ll text when we land. Be ready.”

  As I disconnect, I turn to find Lydia still watching me.

  “Why aren’t you packing? Hurry!” I grab Juliet by the hand and rush down the hall.

  “What the hell is going on?” Lydia shouts, following us into my bedroom.

  “We have to go. It’s day three!”

  Halloween. Portico is crowded with tourists for the All Hallows’ Eve Festival. At sunset, most of them have gathered at the Old North Church, the cemetery, and the Witch’s Throne.

  A steady rain has been falling for the past twenty-four hours, and Fisher’s lane is closed. Police tape stretched between two metal stakes blocks the entrance.

  We walk—Mitch and Rita, the girls and I—a quarter of a mile down the road to the Witch’s Throne.

  “Let her see you,” Rita advises as we approach the crowd, squelching through the muddy, trampled ground to the Throne.

  “I know.”

  I had called her from the airport that afternoon to pick us up. Stunned but willing, she and Mitch arrived and drove us back to Portico while I explained everything I knew: Allerton, Jeremy Fisher’s lie, and what most likely had happened to George.

  “She’ll want to see you. She’ll want it on film.”

  “I know.”

  Behind me, Juliet gasps. “Is that it?”

  The sharp, reaching branches of the Throne appear in the gray sky as we turn the corner at the crossroads and cross the bridge. Rain has not deterred the crowd. Indeed, it seems larger; more than a hundred people are gathered around the Donneville’s film crew, watching Beverly.

  “It’s just a tree,” says Lydia. When I look back, I see she’s taken Juliet’s hand. We leave the road and squish our way over the muddy, trampled ground. People are standing as far back as the bridge, watching the Donnevilles. As the five of us shove our way forward, I begin to hear murmurs of my name, George’s name, harsh whispers cutting the quiet.

  Beverly turns to the sound.

  “Wait here,” I tell the others.

  Facing the Throne, Beverly raises her arms in the air and cries, “Spirits, hear me! I bring a message from the living. We understand the sanctity of this site. We praise it. We vow to no longer violate it but to adhere to the commands set by example here through your power.”

  I push through the crowd and up to Beverly. She sees me and drops her arms. The cameraman glances at Charles who signals him to continue filming.

  I stand next to Beverly and turn to the crowd. I see Jeremy in front, right where he promised he would be.

  “I’m Thea.” Faces scowl back at me. “Thea Drake. Most of you probably know that.”

  I can’t see my girls. I can’t see Mitch or Rita.

  “Three days ago, I was here. I sat on the Witch’s Throne. Some of you probably saw it. As you can see, I’m still here. I’m still alive.”

  The crowd shifts. I see Sosie. A cold wind blows her black hair across her pale face. Strands of it stick to her red lipstick.

  “I was married to George Drake. He didn’t sit on this dead tree stump to embarrass or harass Beverly Donneville. He did it because he didn’t believe in curses or witchcraft or spirits or psychics.

  “He was arrogant and stubborn and possibly an alcoholic, but he didn't mislead people. He didn't manipulate them. He listened. No matter how crazy an idea sounded, he never judged. He searched for the truth, no matter how strange or horrifying or complicated or inconvenient. He wanted to help people think for themselves.

  “But then he died. Right here. So now Beverly Donneville has the opportunity to take those two events—George sitting on this tree and George dying in the same spot—and connect them. She wants people to believe her point of view, the same as my husband.

  “The problem is, she’s putting words into George’s mouth. She’s speaking for him in death. She claims to know things only he would know. But she only knows these details because of this.”

  I reach into my bag and hold up my red notebook.

  “This is the journal in which I write notes to George. This is how I would help him with his cases and research. But I would write other things, details that only he and I discussed. No one else read this journal but George.”

  I signal to Jeremy with a nod, and he slowly breaks away from the crowd and joins me.

  Charles Donneville signals the camera operator, makes a slashing motion at his throat to cut filming. I nod to Jeremy to continue.

  “I stole it,” he says, looking at me with his sad eyes.

  “Louder.”

  He turns to the crowd. “I stole Thea Drake’s journal and made a copy. Every page of it. George was at my uncle’s house earlier that day. He was drunk. He showed it to me. It had everything, all the details of his investigation. I knew the Donnevilles would pay, because they were already paying my uncle thousands of dollars just to be on his land. I stole it, copied it at the print shop in town, and sold it to Charles Donneville later that same day. I snuck the journal back into George’s rental car when I saw it at the Corner.”

  The crowd erupts into a wave of murmurs breaking into shouts. Beverly raises her arms, and they quiet.

  “This is how the spirit world must act in the realm of the living. This is how George chose to bring his information to me. Through this written account. There is no deception here.”

  “You’re wrong.” I walk up to her, face to face. “George tricked you. Again. He let Jeremy steal the journal. He wanted you to see it. Because he put a trap in it for you.”

  Her arms drop.

  “Allerton. I didn’t write that entry. I didn’t even know it existed until I found this journal yesterday. I hadn’t opened it since I left it for George. The day he died. That morning.”

  She’s watching me. The whole crowd is silent.

  “George wrote the entry about Allerton, and then he took the journal to Martin Fisher’s house and waved it around, reading from it, guessing that Fis
her would pass on the information to you and getting lucky that Jeremy here stole it and actually made copies. George knew, once you started talking about Allerton, he’d be able prove you were lying.”

  “Enough!” bellows Charles Donneville, stepping forward. “I’ll not have you stand here and call my wife a liar.”

  Beverly stops him with a gentle hand on his arm. “Let her speak.”

  “George also called a friend and reminded him about Allerton. It was a joke they played in college, a Halloween story.”

  I turn to Mitch and he nods.

  “Allerton is completely made up,” I say. “George made it up.”

  She shakes her head slowly. “There is no use debating my powers once again. I have my believers and my detractors. But there is no denying that George’s death was unnatural. Something led him out here unprepared.”

  “He was found without shoes or a shirt or a jacket or any equipment because he didn’t come here to work. He came here that night to meet someone. To meet a woman. Sosie Powell.”

  The crowd shifts, turning, parting from the figure of Sosie Powell revealed to be standing about ten feet away. Tears shine on her cheeks.

  “He was fine when I left,” she says. “I swear. I picked him up in town. We drove to the hidden path, parked. But George saw a light in the trees near the Throne. He thought someone was out here. He pulled his jeans on and—”

  She stops, glancing at me.

  “Go on,” I say.

  “He ran off, no shoes, shirt, jacket, nothing.”

  “And you?”

  “I…I left. I went home.”

  “You left him there, without a car, chasing someone into the woods.”

  “I thought it was Martin Fisher. He was always searching the woods for trespassers. He’s insane about trespassers. You know that. But I didn’t know…I didn’t know he’d killed people. None of us did! I was sure he’d call the cops when he saw George, and I…I didn’t want to get caught.”

  She approaches me, sobbing. “Thea, nothing happened between George and me. I know it sounds bad, but I swear. I don’t know exactly what I was doing out there, why I was meeting him, but nothing happened between us. He was drunk…we both were…and he was upset. We got a little caught up, but he ran into the woods before…before anything happened.”

  “Evidence shows that witchcraft was being practiced there that night,” says Beverly. “Our film crew found totems around George.”

  “My uncle,” says Jeremy. “He had some at his junkyard. He’s been making them for years, leaving them out there from time to time for people to discover, to keep the stories going. He could have left them there any time that day.”

  I turn away from Beverly and face the crowd.

  “I can believe George was the victim of a two-hundred-year-old witch’s curse. Or, I can believe that someone hated him enough to want to cause him harm. That some person was capable of bashing his head, ending his life, to stop him from saying what he wanted to say. Or, I can believe my husband was drunk and died in the stupidest way possible, for no reason at all.”

  “Which belief should I hold on to? Which is more helpful? Does it matter whether a belief is true or not? Not all beliefs help us. Not all beliefs are worth holding on to.

  “I would rather believe that George’s death wasn’t meaningless. I would rather believe he died for a reason, died fighting an evil presence out to get him. I would rather believe that my husband of twenty years was killed by a two-hundred-year-old supernatural entity that was out to get him than believe he was an alcoholic who got so drunk one night that he wondered out to the cemetery, tripped, and caused his own death. I mean…can you think of a stupider way to die? Can you think of anything more random or meaningless? How am I supposed to go on living with that kind of randomness? What am I supposed to tell my daughters?”

  I am weeping openly now as I ramble. The crowd stares, and finally Jeremy Fisher steps forward and guides me away from the camera.

  We have the same room at the Apple made more crowded with the inclusion of Lydia and Juliet, but the inn is overflowing and noisy with revelers from All Hallows’ Eve, and I’m done with witchcraft for the evening. We stay in the room.

  Mrs. Lowry brings up cots for the girls, and we make it work. She also brings a pot of chili and an entire apple pie.

  After we eat, Mitch opens his laptop and shows Lydia how to edit a photo to create a double exposure effect—a ghost photo. Rita poses Juliet at the bay window, and they set about creating ghostly images of her.

  She is a beautiful ghost. I watch over Lydia’s shoulder as she scrolls through the photos on Mitch’s computer. Juliet’s transparent form floats an inch above the floor, and she gazes out the window, wrapped in a silver aura. The ends of her long hair are lifted by an unseen wind, and her nightgown glows white against the dark curtains.

  I can no longer hear the other guests.

  “I think I’ll go outside.”

  Only Rita looks at me. “It’s late.”

  “I’ll only be a minute.”

  “At least take my jacket,” says Mitch, tossing it to me.

  “Let’s do a scary one now,” says Juliet, tugging at Rita’s shirt. While they’re all preoccupied, I duck out and sneak down the stairs and through the kitchen to the side door that opens into the alley.

  I lean back against the building and close my eyes.

  It’s done. It’s over. I haven’t heard his voice in my head for hours. I don’t feel his presence. I have his memory, and that’s enough. I still ache from his absence, but I don’t have the pain of feeling his presence everywhere. He is still with me, but he’s no longer haunting me.

  My phone vibrates.

  Calvin.

  I need to talk to him, to explain about George. I lift it from my pocket, and the screen lights up.

  George’s face. His phone. Calling me.

  I hit Accept.

  “Thea…”

  George voice. Whispering, far away, but it’s him.

  “Thea...” His voice is raspy, weak. “...Thea, help me.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  I keep the phone to my ear, listening, but the call disconnects. When I lower the phone, the screen is dark again.

  George needs help.

  George is dead.

  I have to go.

  I can’t go alone.

  It’s day three.

  But the curse isn’t real.

  The girls.

  George.

  The keys to the rental car are in Mitch’s jacket. Staying close to the building, I sneak to the parking in back. On the second floor, I see the lighted bay window of our room.

  Juliet the ghost is standing with her back to the glass. Rita appears briefly, gives her an instruction, then backs away.

  I leave without telling them. They would either convince me not to go, or they would all want to go with me.

  And I need them to stay here. I need the girls to stay here where it’s safe, and I need my friends to stay here to watch over them.

  My phone is silent on the drive along the winding road at the edge of the woods. The town is still busy with festival participants, but as I leave town and find the back road to the Throne, not another car is in sight. No other headlights. No signs of life. The sky is black. No moon. Exactly like the night George died.

  I park the car at the edge of woods near the Blue Creek sign and find the hidden path toward the Witch’s Throne, toward the spot where my husband died.

  Because he is dead. I do know that. He is not calling me.

  Ghosts don’t exist.

  Something even more terrifying is happening.

  Someone has his phone. A living, deceiving person. And that person wants my attention. That person wants me out in these woods.

  Why?

  Because it’s day three, and I’m supposed to die.

  The rain is still falling, but lightly. I hold my phone, ready, but I don’t call Officer Tims. Not yet. He’ll forbid
me to come out here, and I have to see.

  I have to see for myself that George isn’t here.

  I use the flashlight app to light the path, and I focus on walking through the mud to get to the spot.

  George was the one to confront these people, not me. I was content to keep my thoughts on paper, in a journal that no one could read but me and him.

  Although I can’t see it, I sense Fisher’s cabin up on the hill. I feel a sense of being watched. My heart pounds. The rain is suddenly like ice chips whipping at my face. I march forward. The Throne is not far, but in the complete blackness, I cannot see it yet.

  Who wants me out here alone?

  Sosie? Was she lying when she said nothing had happened between the two of them? Obviously, they had met in secret, and those meetings went far beyond the purpose of paranormal research.

  Was she trying to convince George to believe in the Throne? Does she need that badly enough to kill him? To kill me?

  Or Beverly? Is she out here with her arms raised, eyes bright, channeling spirits to avenge her after George humiliated her? Exposed her as a fraud?

  I can’t conjure belief in either scenario.

  What about Jeremy? Did he know about his uncle all along? Did he help him? Was he involved in George’s death?

  There, in the clearing, the shadowy bulk of the Witch’s Throne comes into focus. Its outline solidifies in the surrounding blackness. The light from my phone’s screen passes over it, and I see a shadow move.

  I cry out. I can’t control it. The sound is pulled from my lungs before I’m aware of making it. I feel hot tears in my eyes. The rest of my face is freezing cold.

  So, this is what terror feels like. A heightening of every sense, every emotion, every memory. And suddenly, I’m thinking of my children. I’m thinking of how much I love them and how little their faults take away from that love. I’m thinking of my parents, who gave me eighteen years of stability and calm and safety. Because of them, I have never, not until this moment, felt this kind of terror.

  I think of Calvin, just beyond my reach and yet always there.

  And I think of George. His presence so overpowering, I used it as a shield. He was my hiding place. He was afraid of nothing, and I was afraid of everything.