Season of the Witch

by Charlee Jacob

  Speaking of animals, that white dog of hers had growled as Walch interrogated her. It laid its ears back, moved like it might spring for the captain’s throat. He’d readied to shoot the cur. But she glanced its way and it shut up, laid its jaw back upon its forepaws, and went to sleep.

  That morning, Walch felt contrite about the brutality. Never before had he laid a coarse hand upon a female. How could she be involved? His men were simply winter-bound and cabin-feverish, restless to return to battle’s business. Perhaps this was also his own trouble, and there was nothing beyond the pale.

  He’d have apologized had she turned to face him. She hadn’t, keeping busy with the hearth. He’d said nothing, kinder words sticking in his throat and at least a few in his craw.

  He’d heard the tolling bell again, clear in the crisp air. He’d sat up, dressed, gone without a ‘good morning’ to her. Not even an are you all right?

  She with her mysterious cronies.

  Our enemies!

  But more than just enemies to England and lawful king.

  Enemies to all! Beyond the pale, they are!

  Pale, white as snow. No…white as bone, more the truth of it.

  Walch stared at part of a low wall, fifteen feet thick. The stones were lichen-encrusted, pitted from centuries of weather. Part of a battlement. Considering the thickness, this one wall might have been two—or even three—layers to further protect those within from siege.

  He squatted to examine the area between the stones. He took his knife and prized out a few rounded bits from the mortar. They were human teeth.

  Here and there a knuckle bone, the puzzle-fitting exactness of a vertebra.

  This hadn’t been a part of town before.

  …before…

  …before sometime last night.

  Nor had the bell tower he saw risen from the middle of the square. He thought it resembled part of a church, original Gothic; not part of the newfangled Gothic revival in England—especially writers and artists—which currently favored its haunting style. Could there have been a real church in this blighted place? That would indicate a parsonage. Religious leaders. And, Catholic or Protestant, religious leaders were male. Hereabouts, there were nothing but women. Nor were there signs of previous male habitation. Except in these teeth, fingerbones, vertebrae—used in the mortar that made up part of this ancient… out of place and time… wall.

  Walch should know. He’d had his soldiers search meticulously to locate elusive rebels.

  The tower sat alone, at least forty feet high, its instrument clanging steadily with none to draw its ropes.

  For whom did it toll? For those doomed, if he didn’t soon decide upon a course of action.

  ««—»»

  Renae woke from her nap on the sofa, hazy from her dream. Looked at the clock. Almost midnight. She sighed.

  Eddie straggled in a few minutes after—exhausted, suit wrinkled like it was made from Shar-Pei skin, eyes dark and hollow as his haunted namesake.

  She’d made herself a drink when he shuffled through the door. He hesitated, dragging up one limp arm to peek at his watch. I’m so late. He took a wary appraisal, deciding she wouldn’t throw the vodka bottle at him.

  “I’m sorry, sweetie,” Eddie said, lopsided smile crinkled in dimples which he seemed to create and make disappear on whim. “I promised we’d go out. It honestly couldn’t be helped. The guy who fingered Spunk was carved this afternoon.”

  Renae handed him her drink, turning to fix herself another.

  “Only got here myself a half hour ago,” she lied. “I was afraid you’d be tuxed, doused with Tuscany, and pacing the floor.”

  Relieved, Eddie downed the drink in two gulps. He grinned at the citrus flavor. A Screwdriver. Not a Bloody Mary, no more hot sauce ice cubes. Renae’d sworn off.

  “We’ll do it later. On my honor as a Gestapo pig and gentleman,” he promised.

  Eddie eased out of his suit coat and draped it over a chair. It slid to the floor. He debated picking it up and decided against it. He adjusted throw pillows on the couch, then folded himself over them. He groaned as his spinal column protested.

  “Did you find who did it?” Renae asked, handing him a second Sunny Vitamin C and Mosovskaya Osobaya muscle relaxant. Eddie saluted her with the glass and a wink.

  “Not yet. Spunk’s estranged partner visited the vic prior to, but I doubt she knows anything. Tom and I ’ll talk to her again tomorrow, see if she remembers any lurkers. She was strung out when we arrived. Watching In The Vein as they interviewed Miss Triple-X Herself.”

  “I heard about May Huon cutting her own throat!” Renae interjected.

  “Yeah! It’s like Spunk did some funky hypnosis on the reporter. When we arrested her, she swore up and down she wasn’t into devil worship. Now she’s talking sacrifices, altars, and a tradition of fucked-up faithful. Unless it’s metaphor. Crazies do metaphor, don’t they?”

  “She’s unbalanced. She can’t be expected to be consistent.” Renae stuck a finger into her drink and swirled the ice. Then she sucked the finger clean of fruity pulp.

  “Probably her lawyer’s idea. An insanity plea,” Eddie replied, sitting up from the pillows to kick off his shoes.

  “Well, she is sick.”

  Eddie fixed her with a one-eyed squint. He pointed his glass at her. “Basically what Robin Pittman said. Sickness. A bizarre theory…” He massaged his temple one-handed. “Uh, aw, I feel almost as strung out as she was.”

  Renae crossed the room and leaned over him. She set down her glass to massage both of his temples.

  “What did she say?”

  His gaze lingered on her breasts as she bent forward, graceful circles becoming conical, straining against the spongy weave of her black dress. Some women didn’t have to try to be sexy, he thought. It was inherent in every blessed movement.

  “She talked about murder. Claimed it to be a virus leaking from a dream of that old culprit Devil. Said you could see it in the escalation of violent crime. A virulent contagion, replicating and infecting. Spreading exponentially, incubating as people see more graphic come-ons and psychically-disturbing enticements, spawned from symbols inside of them. Finally they reach critical and bleed out. Doing the St. Vitus Dance of uncontainable rage. Running rabid. Cheesy pulp novel stuff, all black death and danse macabre, criminal stats passed on through a gooey sneeze. Same glint in the eye whether they’re ranting or reasonable. And a smell…”

  He lapsed into silent contemplation, watching as frosty ice chips glided as platinum phantoms in liquid.

  “My,” Renae announced. “She said all that?”

  Eddie scratched a damp armpit. “Some of it I added. Though I almost laughed when she fed it to Tom and me. Wait… did I laugh? I hope not. That poor woman.”

  He sat forward a bit. “But what if she’s right? If violence were contagious? People can be exhorted to riot. They get swept away into mob mentality. It only takes one charismatic Hitler to turn decent people into complete assholes. Just the sound of breaking glass, the sight of fire—or whatever its symbol is—haha! The scent of panic ozone in the air, getting the blood up. Induced to join any crowd, slavering for their slice of frontier justice. But it could—only saying could now—be because some psychic germ weaseled its way into a vulnerable area and filled them with poison. Runs the temperature high so fast it destroys brain cells along the way.”

  Eddie’s ramble hit home. Renae considered Lenora. How angry she’d been at her for goading her into that part. Her terrible vision of vengeful beast rape on Lenora. Afterward she couldn’t look her innocent friend in the eye.

  It wasn’t like her to imagine this evil. Even she and Eddie’s kinky picante ride and Vlad the Impaler vision wasn’t as terrifying. Even on the psych ward when she’d have grisly mind-souping flashbacks on her mother’s murder, it was someone else’s violence, a horror not staining her hands.

  The game. Eddie’s game as a detective. Putting oneself in the deviant’s mindframe, the se
rial diva/mass-murdering devotee. To understand what possessed those who committed abominable crimes. That key word: possessed.

  I was possessed.

  But it was no demonic possession. No lurking lightning-quick opportunistic Pazuzu, head creaking, projectile-vomiting green pea sludge. It had been me. ME. Renae near screamed in her head. I commanded Lenora’s bestial attackers to rape and scrape. ME carving fresh orifices into Lenora’s already peeled skin for them to sink to the hilt in. ME summoning the wolves for the final coup.

  Was Eddie’s theory right? Was she possessed by a virus? Dribbled from a toxic industrial waste of a netherworld denizen’s hoary/horny dreamscape? Not gross in its first appearance like some head cold, a blathering waterfall sneeze or pus drippy fingers gonna-rub-on-your-face. Nor venereally deceptive, contracted by meshing mutual parts and blending precious lubricants.

  Had it somehow touched her senses? You had to see, smell, taste, hear it. Make contact. Have the suggestion made. Couldn’t be done with a general curse aimed in mankind’s direction. Then it would take your life in a couple minutes. Or a few years. Depending on how clever you were and how soon the authorities caught you. Not a lingering rot. And look at those you’ll have killed to serve you in the afterlife, she smirked.

  But even her humor couldn’t erase the memory, the sick feeling during the vision. She’d seen sparks, as if fainting. Hot enough to burst a thermometer.

  She’d never had murderous thoughts. Not even in The Cove nor with a boyfriend like Horst. Not even in a family situation like the Hawthornes.

  Still not the same. Not as if she wanted to go do it, or was even able to. A stress reaction. Opposite from catatonic, a dreamy catharsis.

  “Ren?” Eddie whispered. “Are you in there? Slave to goddess. What do I have to do, sacrifice a lamb? Would you prefer a virgin boy?”

  “Sorry,” she mumbled, distracted. “What you said, what she said. Do you believe it’s possible?”

  “Not for a minute. But it would make a super pseudo-science psychobabbly book. Up there with gods from outer space and lost continent theories. The great demonic dream plague conspiracy. Every ditsy talk show’ll want an hour with it.”

  Both drained their drinks.

  “Want the TV on?” she offered.

  He shook his head, pillows shifting under his skull plate.

  “Wanna cuddle?” she suggested. “You could lay your head in my lap and I’ll rub your furry tummy until you fall asleep.”

  He clacked out something too tired for a sincere laugh. Yet his jaw clenched. It hadn’t been a good day.

  “Want to call X-IS-THE-DARK?”

  Suddenly she had his attention by its scruffy, undershorts-linted balls.

  Why do I want to do that twisted shit again?

  Because it was just that: a rushing train, darks and lights flashing by in a mind-numbing roar, unexpected faces pressed to the windows. It hung you upside down by a frayed bungee cord at the top of a big Ferris wheel, seeing what arcane talismans and concealed weapons rolled from your pockets.

  How did THAT get in there?

  (Been there all along. Now you know it; now it’s gone.)

  Because last time, Renae fell asleep, hard and deep, much scavenged pain poppied away. Even after soul-searching whose evil was more reprehensible: Eddie’s little girls or her own impaled thousands—she’d slept. She’d claimed a black chunk of personal terrors as her own— righteous, defendable.

  Eddie opened one eye. “What would we do this time?”

  Renae briefly considered. She took a chocolate-covered confection from a box on the coffee table, nibbling a mysterious piece to discover a whipped black raspberry center. She tossed another at him. It landed on Eddie’s shirt and he ate it.

  “I saw Death See tonight,” she said. “They showed a video by a guy taken in Virginia. He’d surreptitiously filmed a neighbor in her yard. A week later he killed her. It was sad, watching this plain blonde, hair in a tight bun at the back of her head, round as a sebaceous cyst. The woman danced alone, eyes shut, swaying on her feet.” Renae put out her arms, mimicking the woman. “Like she was holding an invisible partner. She seemed just like a lonely old maid, pretending to be with a lover, out of sight of the world. An archaic notion, old maid, as if the only thing to define her is the legal status of her sex life. What do you suppose he thought as he videotaped her through a hedge?” She swayed more in her mock dance. “Was he lonely, too?”

  Eddie coughed. “Jay Ebon Elsworthy. Why do these nutjobs have three names? Oops, Edgar Allan Poe! Anyway, he knocked on her door a week later with a five-dollar grocery store bouquet of daisies, then asked her to dance. When she refused, he blew her head off. She lived in what’s called a shotgun house, all the rooms laid along a central hallway from the porch. Parts of her skull and brains were found all the way to the last, back bedroom.”

  “That’s him.”

  “I call and blah blah, change it up a bit. Wouldn’t want the operator saying Oh, yeah, saw that on TV. Show some originality, Dufus!”

  Renae cut in, excited. “I’ll tell her you’ve been a naughty boy. We’ll wing it like we did last time. See where it takes us.”

  Eddie climbed off the couch, going to the phone. He waited for her to take the stairs to the loft and position herself with the bedroom extension.

  He punched the number.

  “X-IS-THE-DARK. Your compulsions are what the night is made of. Do you prefer to provoke shock or would you rather be encouraged?”

  “Let’s shoot for encouragement,” Eddie replied.

  “I’m Claire. What are you feeling inside, baby?”

  “Like I’m gonna explode,” Eddie said, then made a face. Said that last time, idiot. Change it up!

  “Is it built up inside you?” As Nadia had said during their initial scenario. Renae supposed they had certain trained responses, a program of fucked-up rote.

  “Yeah.”

  “What does it feel like?”

  Renae gripped the phone so hard she felt electricity course through the receiver. Impossible, the phone was plastic, nonconductive. Yet sharp pins and needles jolted into her hand and arm. The hair on that arm stood up and vibrated. Almost blue in the dark. A product of pure excitement on her part.

  “A bomb,” Eddie said softly, downstairs. “I am a bomb, in the same explosive dream. Ticking off seconds, milliseconds… increments of time barely measurable. I get closer to midnight, when I know the bomb’s set to go off, my mixture growing unstable. Upset me, and there’s an eventual release of one big shitload of energy. I am a bomb, detonating in waves at midnight, Claire.”

  “Oh, lover, tell me about your bomb.”

  Renae suppressed a giggle, getting explosively wet herself as he continued. “Temps can soar to almost 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit. Pressures pound out 1200 tons per square inch. And the aching thunder races to 18,000 miles per hour. My body sweats saltpeter in white rivers, my soul black as charcoal. Midnight comes and I’m ready for my brimstone bride.” Eddie’s voice was hypnotic, deep. Perhaps men always sounded that way in confession’s grip—even if this was only pretend.

  “Tell me about your brimstone bride, sweetheart,” Claire coaxed.

  Brimstone bride. Renae almost squealed with delight. It sounded like a phrase the original Poe might’ve invented.

  “I’m in a dark place where she is, too. Underground, a cellar or basement. Maybe a cave. I feel the earth’s weight overhead, the press of the world—yeah, tons per square velvetty inch. The planet is fucking heavy. Like being buried alive in a cunt, encasing me, whole as a swallowed shockwave.”

  “Yeah?” murmured Claire. “Cool. Go on, baby. Intense.”

  Renae frowned. Please no young girl trips, Eddie. Horrific to her, it hit her every buzzer for outrage. Still, damn it, she was aroused waiting for what he’d say next, knowing it might be what she hated most—or it could be…worse. Could there be anything worse? With bated breath, she understood a demon was in the apartment with
her, a relentless, sexual, primal force, leaning on laughter as the Creator of Amber Alerts, the god of potent threat to anything female. It was very ancient, as when females—from very young to absolutely ripe—were sacrificed to brides of shadow deities, brides with the ultimate depraved, sexual appetite. Those brides. Those Queens of Darkness.

  Renae felt helpless. The identical helplessness that caused girls to swoon over Dracula, fucking them with phallic symbol fangs, turning them into fawning corpses with no wills of their own. The opposite of the old joke, now old enough to breed, old enough to bleed. A monster preferring those he made turn from blossom to fruit. Was her arousal the knowledge that this went against her controlled self?

  I am a bomb, Renae thought.

  Her fantasy, any woman’s fantasy, about an enticing defenselessness… Was she forfeiting her natural strengths, her feminine spirit, for the temporary illusion that lust is a form of precarious love? Then women like this operator come into play, a cheering section for violent perversion, most often shrifted by males seeking to dominate the sex that they have been guided by history and its religions to hate…

  Eddie’s voice… “There’s a woman moving in the only spot of light in the room.”

  Renae caught on. Instead of a yard and a hedge, he’d switched the scene to a basement.

  “How does she move?” the operator wanted to know.

  “She’s dancing in the light. I’m in the shadows, thinking she’s dancing for me. She pretends she can’t see me.”

  He was inventive. Dangerous passion bubbled just beneath the surface. That ‘controlled self’?

  “Does her dancing turnnn you onnn?” Claire’s n’s pressed against Renae’s own tongue. As if as the operator said it, she was also Frenching Renae. A shudder convulsed between Renae’s breasts, down her belly, into the passage between pale thighs… into the cunt encasing him as a swallowed shockwave.