by Aaron Galvin
It sparks, catches aflame.
A line of fire zooms across the ground bound directly for our cabin.
I see George and Andrew leap to their feet. Both hurry for the barn.
Too late, Hecate gathers what happens. I see her mouth open to scream, but it is not heard. She dives toward the trough.
In a single moment, the cabin Father built explodes in a giant fireball. The percussion of it rocks even our barn. Most raiding the cabin are sent flying to their deaths. Wood and brick shrapnel cut down the others.
The powder kegs Bishop brought with him this morning…This is what they were for! He has saved us!
“Ah-ha!” Bishop rises. “Take that ye spiteful harpies!”
Then I hear Hecate’s scream even above her minions in the throes of death.
She rises from behind the trough, her royal garb stained in slop and pig manure. She glares up at us.
A shiver runs down my spine.
Mr. Greene takes a shot at her. He misses, fumbles to reload.
Hecate vanishes to the opposite side of the barn and out of our sights.
I hear a banging in the floor behind me.
“Don’t shoot!” George calls from below. “It is only us!”
I hurry to the trapdoor. “Move away,” I say to Mrs. Greene and Emma. “Let them up. Let them up!”
I push her and Emma away and open the door. My brother grins at me from the ladder. “I did that for Father.”
I move out of the way so he might climb it. Andrew is not far behind him. I move to close the door the moment they reach our landing, and see Hecate reach the ladder.
She climbs.
I slam the door closed and stand upon it. “Quickly!” I say. “We must bar this door with something heav—”
Hecate pounds upon the wood I stand upon. “Curse you!” she screams, her voice muffled as she strikes the door again.
“Sarah, move!” Emma says.
I look at my feet at the sound of sawing. Hecate’s blade juts up and down between the small bits of plank like a needle moves through thread. I step aside to watch the blade’s movement. It moves in a pattern of elimination through the cracks. I anticipate the next one. As soon as the blade emerges, I kick the side of it, breaking it from the hilt.
Hecate shrieks. She uses her inhuman strength to raise the door I stand upon an inch in the air. To my surprise, Emma jabs at Hecate’s face with the pitchfork.
“Die, die!” Emma screams with her eyes closed.
Hecate wilts beneath the sudden attack. The door falls back into place.
I hear gunfire.
Mr. Greene, Bishop, and Wesley taking turns with their shots at the hayloft opening.
“Sarah!” George calls. He and Andrew work together to roll a hay bale the size of Hickory toward me. I move out of the way as they tip it end over end on top of the trapdoor. “There,” he says. “Now they cannot lift it. Stay here!”
George snatches the rifle out of my hand.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
He does not stop to answer. Both he and Andrew run to the other men. In quick exchanges, my brother and his friend reload the rifles, then hand them to Bishop and Wesley to fire.
Outside the hayloft opening, I see the larger army of torches and riders not far from the barn. I hear drums pounding, war cries, and witches cackling, all amidst the constant firing line of my defenders.
Emma’s face is pale. Her white knuckles cling to the pitchfork’s handle. “Sarah! You are alive.”
“Aye,” I say. “Thanks to you.”
“Come out, Chosen One!” Hecate screams rise below us. “Come out, Sarah Campbell! Come crawling to me on your knees and belly!”
Emma yelps.
I place my hands about her cheeks. “Emma.” I stare into her terrified face. “We will fend them off! Stay here, as George said. I go to take my rifle back. I will return!”
Emma nods at me. Already, she is on the verge of tears.
I leave her side and run to the wall.
“Arrows!” Bishop calls.
All of them turn from the opening. I too throw myself against the wall in time to hear the volley whizz by, the arrows thudding behind me in the wooden beams. I peek through the slats.
A caravan of witches has arrived, accompanied by more highwaymen. All rush our barn.
I notice several carry long ladders.
“We’ll be overrun!” Mr. Greene shouts above the din.
Bishop kicks the first of them away. “Quit yer wailin’ and shove ’em off!”
George and Andrew jump in to help. For every ladder they repel, I see more landing. There is a clatter liken to horses galloping above me. The wrens and owls in the rafters leave their perches, all rushing to escape in a flurry of feathers and screeches.
I look upward. Faintly feel dust settling upon my cheeks.
“Bishop!” I yell. “They are on the roof!”
Moses and Hickory whinny and kick at the wooden doors of their stables below us. The cows bang against the side of their pen in hopes of finding an exit. And always, the witches cackle at our plight whilst the men shout victory cries.
Emma screams. I turn to see the trapdoor rising and falling, even with the added weight. All whilst she and Mrs. Greene swat and stab at every face that appears. I mean to run for them.
Wesley halts me. “No,” he says. “Stay beside me!”
Without warning, three shadows swing inside the barn from the rooftop. One of them comes between Wesley and me, kicking me to the ground. The musky smell reeks of unwashed man.
I roll to my side.
Wesley struggles with the screaming warrior atop him. His face turns purple.
The brave stabs at him with a bone-hilted dagger.
Even with both hands wrapped around the brave’s wrist, I see Wesley losing.
I reach for the long dagger Priest gave me and spring forward. With my good hand, I sheathe its blade through the brave’s neck.
He jerks at the blow. His elbow catches the side of my face, knocking me astray.
I hurry to find my feet. It matters little.
The brave twitches in death not inches from me.
“Sarah,” Wesley sputters blood. His face is covered in it, and I cannot discern whether it is his own, or the brave I slew.
Chaos surrounds me.
I see Mr. Greene and Bishop, both locked in their own battles with white men. Bishop ducks a swipe meant to cleave his neck and kicks his opponent out the hayloft opening with surprising ferocity for a man as old as he.
Our individual battles have given the attackers outside the barn time to regroup. I hear more ladders upon the hayloft opening.
George and Andrew hurry toward each new one, both hacking at the oncomers—George with a scythe, Andrew with his axe.
A rifle fires near my ear. My head rings with the sound. For a moment, I fear I’m made deaf by it. I turn to see Wesley’s rifle smoking.
He shot the witch fighting his father in the head.
Mr. Greene lies on the floor, gasping for air.
Bishop limps back into the fray. He pulls Mr. Greene up by the lapels of his shirt. “On yer feet! We don’t stop till they do!”
Wesley leaves my side to aid his father. He screams at the sight of another witch climbing a ladder and slams the butt of his rifle into her chest. Kicking the ladder away, Wesley turns his rifle to shoot down at the massing crowd.
“There ye are, lad,” Bishop says. “Use the anger!”
“Arrows!” George yells. He ducks over to the wall even as they soar past.
This second volley is different…these arrows are aflame.
-19-
Most of the arrows land amongst the boards and are easily stamped out. A few strike home amidst the hay bales and catch aflame with a whooshing sound. The heat from them hits me in a blazing wave.
Black smoke fills the air.
Vaguely, I see George and Andrew rush about to throw buckets of water that Bishop ha
d the foresight to store away. I wave my hands about in an attempt to clear the smoke. Again, I hear the scurrying of feet above me on the roof.
“Sarah!”
Rebecca! Oh, but where is she?
“I am here!” I call out in answer to her cries. I drop to my knees below the smoke line and crawl toward the direction of her voice.
“They’re inside!” George shouts. “We can’t hold them!”
The sounds of struggling and battle entrap me. I see the trapdoor flung open, the hay bale securing it now burned away. Emma is on her back. Her pitchfork out of reach, she kicks at a man dressed in animal pelts to keep him from reaching our level.
Mrs. Greene shouts and swings her shovel at his head. The shout gives her away though. The man ducks it at the last. He grabs hold of the shovel. With a sharp yank, he pulls it and her toward the opening. Mrs. Greene pitches forward.
Helpless, I watch her fall through the opening and the man with her.
“Noooooo!” her cry echoes down the thirty-foot shaft of air.
“Frances!” I hear Mr. Greene yell.
I scramble forward to help Emma fend off any others who might make the climb. Mr. Greene and I reach the opening at the same time.
Far below, I see Mrs. Greene’s limbs contorted and broken. She lies atop the now dead man that yanked her below, moaning. “Da—vid…”
Several hooded witches reach her. One of them looks up at us expectantly. “Time to play…” she says with a ragged voice.
The others cackle. All produce long knives from their cloaks.
“Don’t harm her!” Mr. Greene sounds like a wounded animal.
The witches’ shoulders tremble. “Give us Sarah Campbell,” one says. “And your wife goes free.”
“David…” Mrs. Greene says weakly.
“Give us Sarah—” the witch says, digging the point of her blade into Mrs. Greene’s bicep. Mrs. Greene cries out at the sight of her own blood being drawn. “And you all go free!”
The witch raises her knife in anticipation of our answer.
I look into the face of Mr. Greene. See he wrestles with what to do.
He grabs me roughly by the shoulder ere I have the sense to back away.
I shove away from him. Make it a few extra feet from the hole ere he grabs me again.
“No!” I cry. “Please, Mr. Greene—”
He drags me toward the hole.
I kick his shin and am released again. I turn to run.
He grabs me by the hair. Yanks me back.
“No!” I shout.
Mr. Greene lifts me under my arms to keep my feet from the floor and carries me back to the black hole.
I let my body go limp in hope my full weight will burden him till help arrives. It does little good, even when I try to squirm away like a worm upon a hook.
“Wesley!” I yell. “Wesley, help!”
It is too late, though. Wesley cannot hear my shouts above the din.
I look down the hole.
The witches wait for me. Their knives sway as they do.
I only pray the fall kills me before they can.
“I’m sorry, Sarah,” Mr. Greene says. “Truly, I a—Ahh!”
Suddenly, I am released.
The witches scream. I hear a thumping sound, akin to a sack of meal hitting the ground, and then no more from the witches.
Emma hovers over me. She helps me to my feet. “Oh, Sarah…what have I done?”
Below us on the ground floor, Mr. Greene lies dead with Emma’s pitchfork stuck in his back. Two witches lie trapped under his body, crushed by the weight of his fall. Where the other disappeared to, I cannot say.
“Emma…” I say. “Y-you saved me.”
As if unaware of her actions, she hesitates before nodding. “Aye.”
“Well,” a husky voice in the darkness says. “Look who found her courage…”
A shovel swings out of the black. It strikes Emma in the back of the head.
I hear her neck snap with a loud pop.
She crumples to the floor like one of Rebecca’s poppets tossed limply aside.
“Emma!” I scream.
Her killer lets the shovel drop with a clang ere she steps from the shadows.
Charlotte…
Her bloodshot eyes are the last things I see before she pounces. The force of her attack bears me to the ground.
“Sarah!”
Wesley’s voice…he has seen what is happening. If only I can hold her off. “Charlotte…” I say. “We are f-friends.”
“No,” she snarls. “I am a sister of the night!”
Heavy boots run to me. “Get away from her!” Wesley yells.
Charlotte releases her hold on me. She wheels to face her new target.
I see Wesley raise his rifle toward her. “I will kill you, Charlotte Bailey.”
Charlotte cackles. “My moon sister does not believe you.”
“Wha—” he gasps.
I scream as he falls to his knees, a dagger protruding through his chest.
“Wesley!”
A raven-haired girl steps from behind him. “There truly is nothing so delicious as a sister’s kiss in the moonlight,” Ruth says gaily.
Charlotte pulls a bone-hilted dagger from her apron. “Should we kiss him again, sister?”
Wesley breathes wheezily. By the sound of it, Ruth punctured his lung. She kicks him to the ground. Laughs when he attempts to crawl away.
I dive at Ruth without thinking. She raises her blade too late. I grab at it with my good hand. Pound it against the boards until she releases it. I see Charlotte’s approach out of the corner of my eye. I roll away as she aims a kick at my ribs. She instead connects with Ruth.
I climb to my feet as Ruth curls in a ball to catch her breath.
Charlotte sneers. “You will come with us, Sarah—”
Her gaze set on me, she does not see Wesley still lives, nor his reach for her leg.
“The Warlock means to have you,” Charlotte continues. “If Hecate doesn’t scalp you first.”
Wesley’s hand is an inch from her.
“Neither will have me,” I say defiantly. “Nor will you live to see it.”
Wesley grabs her ankles and pulls. She falls to the floor, her face smacking the boards. I hear her nose shatter in a sickening crunch.
“Sar-ah,” Wesley sputters. “I l-love y-you.”
It is not until this moment I see how close he is to the black hole. Charlotte starts to rise. Blood pours from her now twisted nose.
Before I can say otherwise, Wesley grabs her left leg with both hands. He rolls his body toward the hole and pitches over the side.
His weight drags Charlotte with him. She screams at the realization. Her hands claw at the boards, but find no purchase.
In an instant, both are gone.
“Wesley!”
I know I am too late, even as I crawl toward it.
Please don’t be dead. I pray. Please don’t be dead.
I look down.
Charlotte’s neck is bent unnaturally beneath her body. Thankfully, her bloodied gown covers Wesley’s face. I am not sure I could bear to see him dead too. Not when so many others—
A sudden, searing pain shoots through my arm. I scream.
“You killed my moon sister!”
I feel my own blood flowing freely as Ruth plucks the dagger from my body. I roll away.
Ruth follows. She raises her blade to strike again. Swings it down.
The blow does not fall upon me.
A blade whistles from amidst the smoke and severs her forearm.
Ruth falls, screaming and clutching at the bloodied stump where her hand existed not a moment ago.
Andrew appears with his axe in hand. “For Mother!” He kicks her in the face, and raises the axe again. “And Father!”
I look away ere he swings it, but I cannot shut out her shrieks of pain.
The axe whistles again. “For Henry!” Again it whistles. “And Mary!”
I cannot contain my tears. They sting against my face even more than the pain in my arm. I curl into a ball and rock whilst covering my ears. I am convinced naught will ever still Ruth's cries.
“Andrew!” Ruth shouts. “I am y-your s-sist—”
“No,” Andrew says, his voice shaking. “You are a shade.”
His blade whistles a final time, and silences Ruth forever.
A moment later, I feel the warmth of a human touch. “Sarah,” Andrew says quietly. “Sarah?”
“N-no,” I sputter. I feel his arms about me. I think to shake him loose, but do not. His comforting embraces reminds me of Priest’s upon the road. If only I might stay here…
“Wh-why,” Andrew says, more to himself than me. “Why have the drums stopped?”
I open my eyes and see Andrew bleeds also, an arrow in his shoulder. His jacket is torn, slashed by a savage blade no doubt. Smoke yet lingers. I gather the barn is not afire, else we would be suffocating in it. A few ashes glow near the hayloft opening. A lean figure rushes to stamp them out. George.
“Good lad,” Bishop groans somewhere in the shadows. “Ye done right well.”
Andrew helps me to my feet. Only when I am steadied does he rejoin George by the hayloft opening. Bishop staggers into the moonlight to join them.
Are we few all that remain?
To my right lies Emma’s body. Even in death, her blue eyes look as though she might cry at any moment. My own tears well again. I fight them off. Rather than go to her, I hurry to the trapdoor and close it. Then, I drag her body over top of it. Mayhap her weight will at least slow any new attackers from breaching our landing.
My eyes fall upon a poppet, its hair long since singed away. Rebecca! Where is she? Surely she is with Mother!
I rush to the furthest corner of the barn. There, I find a new horror.
Mother’s face is blank. She does not stir at my approach. It would almost seem she sleeps peacefully. That is if one did not notice her left wrist opened. The hidden dagger she kept is still tightly clenched in her right hand, almost like she fears Indians will steal her away even from death’s grip.
Oddly, I have no tears left to cry. Hate overwhelms me at her cowardice. How could she do this? How, when so many others died this night fighting to live? How could she abandon us?
“R-Rebecca,” I force myself to say. “Rebecca, are you here?”