The Patriot Witch

by C. C. Finlay

  “Next to my father,” Deborah answered.

  Proctor thought about the two empty holes nearby, where the assassins had been raised. He glanced across the table at Alexandra, her face drawn and tired. She had been tending constantly to Magdalena, who lay on the bed against the wall. He saw the same discomfort in Alexandra's expression that he felt in his heart.

  “I don't mean to argue,” he said. “But that ground, it don't seem fit for good folk anymore.”

  “It's where she'd want to be,” Deborah said. “Next to my father.”

  “We could move him,” Alexandra offered softly.

  Proctor took another bite to cover up his frown, figuring that he'd be the one doing any moving. And he didn't think he could dig up a grave again without adding to his nightmares.

  “We'll reconsecrate the ground when we bury her,” Deborah said. Pushing her plate of uneaten food aside, she rose and went to stand on the porch, leaving Proctor and Alexandra alone.

  Spoons clinked against crockery. After a few moments, Alexandra said, “Do you know how to consecrate anything?”

  Proctor didn't look up from his plate. “Do I much resemble a minister to you?”

  “Not much, no,” she admitted. “But then I wouldn't have taken you for a sorcerer either, and you defeated a powerful magic the other night.”

  “That wasn't sorcery,” he said, rising, plate in hand. Some of the leftover milk splashed on the table, and he smeared it up with his other palm. “That was butchery.”

  He wiped his plate clean with a rag and stepped outside to look for Deborah, but she was nowhere to be seen. He walked by the charred pile of the bonfire and picked up the shovel where he'd dropped it the other night. Deborah wasn't in the barn either, but he grabbed the pick and spade, and headed toward the orchard.

  The ax rested on the ground by the second grave, wet mud already eating at its smooth finish. He shuddered at the memory of using it, then cursed himself for being lazy. He'd have to sand the blade down later to keep it from rusting, but the task at hand was refilling both graves. He jabbed the shovel into the ground and started. Sometimes simple work was an act of consecration.

  He was done sooner than he expected. That left one new hole to dig. He chose a spot on the hillside near Jedediah's grave under the shade of an apple tree. He kicked the spade in the ground. The work had its own logic, demanding a level of attention that kept his thoughts from spinning too far or too fast. By the time he finished, muddy and sweaty, the sun burned down on him with the promise of summer. As he climbed out of the hole, Alexandra and Deborah arrived, carrying Elizabeth's body wrapped in its shroud.

  Proctor tried to brush the mud from his hands, so he could help them without dirtying the white sheet. But Deborah marched right past him, and on the count of three, they swung the body over the grave. Deborah tried to lower it, but the sheet slipped from Alexandra's hand and the body thumped into the mud.

  “Friends,” Deborah said, and she met each of their eyes as if the word were more than just a figure of speech, “we are gathered here to remember Elizabeth Walcott.”

  Proctor looked at Alexandra; she gave him only a grim shake of her head that told him not to argue with Deborah this morning.

  “Elizabeth Walcott was a friend to all who knew her,” Deborah said. “And those who knew her stretched from one end of the colonies to the other—”

  “I'm sorry,” Proctor interrupted. “But—”

  “Yes?” Her mouth was a thin, tight line.

  “I'd like to clean up,” he said. When she stared at him as if he needed to offer further explanation, he added, “Out of respect to your mother and all that she did for folks.”

  “My mother had great respect for the honest work that men and women do with their hands,” Deborah said. “And there is no more honest labor than the work you just did for her. I am sure she would be satisfied with you in your present condition, even pleased.”

  Alexandra lifted her eyebrows, as if to say to Proctor, I told you so.

  It didn't feel right to Proctor, so he had to try one last time. “It won't take me long to wash up, just my face and hands.”

  Deborah's mouth grew even tighter, if that were possible. “We face a terrible enemy. They may be satisfied with the damage already done, and, indeed, they may think us all dead, not expecting that anyone should escape the terrible creatures they loosed upon us, but I don't think we should rely on that.”

  “You think we should do something about this enemy immediately?” Proctor said.

  “I do, and I also believe it is what my mother would want. She would not be content to let such an evil magic go unopposed. I would like to finish here and start that work.”

  She was right. Proctor released his reluctance and nodded.

  Deborah held out her hands. Alexandra took hold of one, and Proctor gripped the other in his own muddy fist. The sun pressed down on them while birds jumped from branch to branch in the nearby trees, calling out to one another. After a moment of silence, Deborah lifted her head.

  “I'll miss her,” she said, choked. Looking at her father's grave, she said, “I'll miss them both.”

  “I didn't get the chance to know either one of them as well as I'd've liked, but they were good to me,” Alexandra said. “Your mother taught me more about my talent, and about helping people, than I ever dreamed of knowing.”

  Deborah responded to that with a firm nod.

  “I liked your mother too,” Proctor said. “She didn't make me work as hard as your father did, and she fed me better.”

  Deborah hiccupped a laugh in spite of herself. When the tears flowed after that, they were happier tears than they might have been. She squeezed his hand hard. She must have done the same to Alexandra, who also smiled.

  “May the light of God always shine on this ground as bright as the sun shines today,” Deborah said. Letting go of their hands, she picked up the shovel. She tossed the first shovelful in. The dirt pattered across the shroud.

  “Here, let me finish that,” Proctor said, taking the shovel from her hand. The two women stood there quietly, holding hands, while he filled the grave. When he finished, he looked at Deborah. “So is that all then?”

  “No,” she said, letting go of Alexandra's hand. “Now it's time to wash up and get to work. Meet me back at the house.”

  Alexandra met Proctor's gaze with another See, I told you so, then followed Deborah.

  “Well, that's good,” Proctor said aloud to himself, looking up at the afternoon sun. “Because I haven't done enough work to satisfy myself yet today.”

  He gathered up the tools and carried them back to the barn, taking time to clean them thoroughly before putting them away. When the tools were clean, he washed himself.

  Inside, bowls of vegetables and berries were spread on the table. Alexandra slouched sleepily in a chair, picking at a plate of greens. Deborah moved like a hummingbird in a flower garden, flitting from one corner of the room to the other and back again, cleaning, scrubbing, and putting away.

  Proctor spooned himself a bowl of strawberries and poured the rest of the warm milk on it. Alexandra looked up from her plate, so he nodded toward Deborah and said, “I'm tired just watching her.”

  Deborah heard his voice and finally noticed him. “Oh, good, you're here.” She put down her rag and wash bucket and came to join them.

  “You're allowed to slow down,” he said. “It's all right if you need to grieve.”

  She made a plate of greens and then methodically cut them into smaller and smaller pieces. “There will be time enough for grief later,” she said.

  “If I could get my hands on Miss Cecily Hoity-toity, I'd give her grief enough for all of us,” Alexandra said.

  “I should never have been fooled by her,” Deborah said.

  Alexandra nodded. “I knew there was something wrong with her from the very beginning.”

  “How?” Proctor asked. He would have liked to have said he felt the same way, but he hadn't no
ticed anything evil about her, not beyond her use of the slave woman.

  “She always held her light under a bushel,” Deborah said. “Never letting her real power shine through, no matter how often my mother tried to help her unblock it. But it was all an act.”

  “I noticed just the opposite,” Alexandra said. “I felt her draw on my power the very first day I was here.”

  “Really?” Deborah asked.

  “Yeah, it made me feel weak and sickly. I got so I avoided her as much as I could.”

  “I thought that was because of her sharp tongue,” Deborah said.

  Alexandra shrugged. “Well, yeah, that too.”

  “If you felt that way, why didn't you say anything about it?”

  “I was too scared to say anything.”

  “You? Scared?” Deborah asked.

  “Yes.” Alexandra leaned forward on the table. “I didn't know how things were supposed to work here. One week, I'm accused of witchcraft, the minister saying I cursed the wife of another man and made her die, with people working themselves up for my own blood. The next week I'm here, must be a thousand miles from the only home I ever knew. And every woman here is a witch fit to turn my blood to ice if I make so much as a misstep.”

  Deborah reached across the table and took her hand. “I should have thought of that. I forget how intimidating my mother can be.” After a pause, she amended herself, “Could be.”

  Alexandra lightly squeezed her fingers. Proctor smiled, because he was sure it wasn't Elizabeth who was most intimidating to Alexandra. “I think you're both walking backward when you ought to be running forward,” he said.

  The women let go of each other's hands. Deborah picked up her knife and fork again. “What do you mean?”

  “The last couple of things I heard you say were could have, should haves. It's like my father told me when I miscut a piece of wood, there's no going back to do it over. You have to set the bad piece aside and do it better.”

  “My daddy always told me, measure twice, cut once, so I wouldn't have that problem,” Alexandra said.

  The corner of Deborah's mouth twitched up. Given the past few days, it made Proctor glad to see any kind of cheerfulness.

  “Well, your daddy's a smart man,” he said. “It seems like it's time to take a second measure of Miss Cecily, and then decide how we're going to cut her down to size. For one thing, I'd like to know what the real connection between her and Lydia was. Lydia tried to warn me twice, once that Miss Cecily couldn't be trusted, and once that we were all in danger. But I didn't know enough to hear what she was saying.”

  Alexandra nodded. “She took me aside a couple of times and told me to think about going home to my folks. I didn't listen to her because she didn't have any real authority here.”

  “I've been thinking about this a lot,” Deborah said. “I think Cecily was using Lydia as a kind of familiar, channeling much of the magic through her in order to stay undetected. We all could feel powerful magic in Lydia, but we thought it was her experience as a slave holding her back. Now I think it was Cecily, using her as a channel.”

  “Poor Lydia,” Alexandra said.

  “Normally, when witches form a circle, even a circle of two, the magic is open to flowing both directions. When the widow drew on you, Proctor, you could've drawn back, if you were powerful enough. I never dreamed that Lydia would let Cecily draw on her without drawing back, but maybe she couldn't.”

  “That makes sense,” Proctor said.

  “Well, that's just it,” Deborah said. “It doesn't make sense. Cecily sought us out almost a year ago, telling us that her magic was blocked, trying to get Mother to teach her to release it.”

  “All right,” he said.

  “It's not all right.” She reached out and rested her hand on Alexandra's arm. “Most women who have come here over the years are like Alexandra here, who need to learn to control their talents—I'm sorry, dear, but it's true.”

  “No, I see that now,” Alexandra said.

  “Or they're like Magdalena over there. Magdalena was sent to my grandmother when she was a young girl, about Alexandra's age. She's come back a few times, usually to try to learn something new. There's never been anyone come here like Cecily before. My mother was so flattered.”

  “But why did she come? To spy on Elizabeth?”

  “Maybe, yes.”

  “But that doesn't make any sense,” he said. He started rearranging cutlery on the table, thinking of tactics he learned in the militia. “If you already have Cecily here, why do you need to send the widow, or those Indians? Or was Cecily the mastermind?”

  Alexandra sneered. “She's no mastermind.”

  “I think she reported to the widow, whoever she is,” Deborah said. “That night the widow came, she only wanted to meet with Cecily.”

  “Lydia was the one who sounded the alarm,” Alexandra said.

  “Yes. She was trying to warn us even then.” She slammed her hand on the table, startling Magdalena. “How could I have been so stupid?”

  “Run forward,” Proctor said. “The rest is obvious. Cecily was meeting with her superior. Lydia tried to warn us. Your mother surprised them, and the widow defended herself. But there was never any plan to kill you until that moment.”

  “Maybe,” Deborah said.

  “No, think about it—if Nance, or whoever is behind this, wanted you dead, or wanted Elizabeth dead, then Cecily could've killed you at any time. She could've poisoned your mother while she treated her burns.”

  “She's too much of a coward,” Alexandra said. “Face-to-face with anyone, she tries to please them.”

  “And there's no way anyone could slip an herb or poison past my mother,” Deborah said. “No one in the colonies knows—knew—as much as she did.”

  “But that brings us back to—what did they want?” Proctor asked.

  “I think I know the answer to that,” Deborah said. “My father was a strong supporter of the patriot cause, and I have lent my talents to the Reverend Emerson and Mister Revere and other patriots. If Nance is British—”

  “I just bet Cecily's a secret Tory,” Alexandra interjected.

  “And those three Indians,” Proctor said, “they were rangers or scouts who served with the British regulars during the French wars or I'm a monkey.”

  “Right. So if they're supporters of the royal governor, and are using magic in their cause, then they would suspect us of doing the same. The widow came to see Cecily just days after the battles at Concord and Lexington. Something must have happened there to frighten them.”

  The three of them fell silent. Deborah and Alexandra appeared to be thoughtful, examining all they knew about Cecily and the widow for a clue to the event.

  Proctor cleared his throat. “I know what happened.”

  He expected it to be hard to confess, that they would blame him for what had happened to them. In a rush of words, spilled too quickly for them to interrupt him, he told them about his chance encounter with Pitcairn in Boston, about the protective medallion, and about the way he broke the spell during the battle at Lexington. When he was done, he felt like a burden had been lifted from his shoulders, whether they blamed him or not.

  “Now I know why you weren't afraid,” Alexandra said. “When those men attacked us, or when … when the other thing happened. I was so scared.”

  “Believe me, I was plenty scared too,” Proctor said. “I just did what I had to do, is all.”

  Deborah had dropped her head and was shaking it sadly. “So that's why,” she said.

  “That's why what?”

  “That's why you were so eager to follow the widow and speak to her. You weren't trying to help her. You had just encountered magic—real sorcery—for the very first time, and you needed someone to help you understand it. And no one else was available.”

  “That's about the size of it. I had no idea anything like The Farm existed. I never knew that witches met with one another and shared their knowledge. All I knew was the fe
ar and shame my mother taught me.”

  “I grew up around this, and it's so easy to forget that it's not that way for everyone.”

  “Vater, please, some vater.”

  Magdalena stirred on her cot. Alexandra rose to give her water while Deborah fetched her a cup of broth and induced her to sip it to regain her strength. Proctor stood behind them, feeling his body tense; the poor old woman's face was battered so black and blue she could barely speak or swallow liquid. Deborah sat at her side, saying a spell for healing, until Magdalena finally drifted back to sleep. The three of them returned to their seats at the table.

  “She looks like she's improving,” Proctor said.

  “If she is, it's because of her power, not mine,” Deborah said. “That's one mighty woman.”

  “What exactly did she find that upset her so much she ran outside?”

  Alexandra wrapped her arms across her chest and turned away. Deborah licked her lips. “Cecily killed two of the farm cats, probably for a focus to animate the corpses. She left their bodies in front of the hearth, on an altar made out of a table—”

  “That one I saw outside?”

  She nodded. “She wrote curses against all of us with their blood, calling for our deaths. The longest curse was written against my mother. We were just lucky the corpse didn't come to kill you first.”

  “I created a protection spell that night,” Proctor said, and he explained how he had surrounded the barn with ashes, and how the corpse had stopped when it reached the line. Deborah stopped him several times to ask him specifics about the spell, and nodded at his explanations.

  “The thing I don't understand is, why didn't any of your mother's protection spells work?”

  “That's easy,” Deborah said. “Cecily insinuated herself into all of Elizabeth's routines. She revealed the enchantment that hides The Farm from casual travelers, and she must have gone around undoing the protective spells.”

  “Now that you mention it, I saw her trying to ruin the spell where we called the spirits of those dead men.”

  “What?” Deborah asked.