Witch-Child
(Salem's Refuge, Book One)
© 2013 by Gerilyn Marin
Original Title: Buried
Revised Edition released 2019
All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced, in any form, without express permission of the author.
Cover Art Credits:
Superimposition: Zodiac Wheel © nevarpp
Background: Spooky Forest Concept © grandeduc
Woman: Grow it Long and Strong © PeopleImages
All images @istockphoto.com
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either entirely fictitious, or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is coincidental.
Dedication:
For Daniel. I dare say, I think you're my number one fan.
Acknowledgments:
Mary Harris for teaching me so much about editing and polishing, Jessa Russo for proofing this mess. Alisa Gus & Eugene Teplitsky for encouraging me to bring this story to life, and helping to get it into readers' hands, respectively. Though fate saw to us going our separate ways, I'm still so happy for the time I spent with Curiosity Quills, and this book certainly would not exist without it. I wish you all the best in the future.
Author's Notes:
This work was originally published under the title Buried on March 18, 2013 through publisher Curiosity Quills Press.
The name of the town in which the story takes place has been changed from Fane's Cove to Drake's Cove. By coincidence, the original name was uncomfortably close to a town in a book series by a fellow author, so I didn't feel right reworking this story without changing that.
An Apology to the readers of Buried
I know readers of the original version of this story were waiting six years (six years, yup, and omg) for its sequel Broken back when and probably just gave up on me and this story. But I wasn't satisfied with a lot of things to do with the original version of Buried. As stated in my acknowledgments, yes, I'm happy for the time I'd spent with my publisher, and Alisa had talked me into bringing this story to life, however, it still stands that there were things about the final product of the work, itself, with which I was unhappy. But my hands were tied to do anything more about it at the time. That dissatisfaction and lack of control made me kind of fall out of love with the story, and when a writer is working on a story they don't love, they're not going to do their best work, because it's not a labor of love anymore, it's a chore. It's my belief that stories are organic, living things. They can change and evolve, and they deserve the love of their writer, just as readers deserve to get a story that was created out of a drive to bring the best possible version of that tale to life.
Getting back control of this work, rebranding it so to speak, creating the new cover, rereading the story and getting to fix things that 'could've been stated better/a little more like this character might put it,' or getting to add little extra bits here and there, brought that spark back.
And so, I would like to express my sincerest apologies to those of you who were waiting for so long to return to Cadence & Grey's story. As of the time of this re-release, writing of the sequel (Devil-Child) is underway.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
One: Drake's Cove "Normal"
Two: Early Morning Spookiness
Three: Connectivity
Four: My Favorite Gossip Mongers
Five: An Ill-Fated Chat
Six: Dropping Masks
Seven: The Cemetery Song
Eight: Folklore
Nine: Fears That Aren't Mine
Ten: The Walking Phantom
Eleven: A Reluctant Partnership
Twelve: Pants on Fire
Thirteen: Jumping Black Flash
Fourteen: Startling
Fifteen: Lurky-Lurky
Sixteen: The Sibling Bond
Seventeen: A Forgotten History
Eighteen: Timelining
Nineteen: Intrusion
Twenty: Day Tripping
Twenty-One: Devilish Truths
Twenty-Two: Sneaky-Sneaky
Twenty-Three: Pretense
Twenty-Four: Downtime
Twenty-Five: Halloween
Twenty-Six: Break
DEVIL-CHILD Preview Chapter
About the Author
CHAPTER ONE
Drake's Cove "Normal"
I tap my pen against my notebook impatiently, unable to stop staring, all but boring holes into the back of his head as we wait for class to start. The noise I make with my fidgeting is lost in the shuffle and buzz of everyone else filing into the room and chattering as they settle down. Just about every other girl in the class is looking at him, too, but that's okay by me—we're not looking for the same reason.
What's more is that I know he knows my intent is different, because with all the girls making lovey puppy-dog eyes at him—at Grey, I mean, really, who names their kid that—he turns and looks at me, the one girl who's glaring at him suspiciously. And it has nothing to do with my appearance, either. Not like I'm supermodel material, more that I have an old-time movie starlet thing going on—long, wavy auburn hair, big, almond-shaped, dark green eyes, little ski-slope nose, and what Mom calls Cupid's Bow lips. I hear all the time that I'm the spitting image of my grandmother, who was an actress, incidentally, and a psychic, whose gilt-framed pictures are all over my mom's living room.
There's a curiosity behind the look as he pins me with those bright, blue-green eyes of his.
I can tell he expects me to have the good grace to back down, to seem abashed and drop my gaze now that he's caught me looking at him in such an unkind manner, but I don't.
I can't. It's that simple.
He's a puzzle; one I haven't the faintest clue how to solve, and that bothers me. I've always been fascinated with puzzles, even the ones I'm not very good at. He's the first resident of Drake's Cove who wasn't born here or doesn't have ancestry here . . . and that just doesn't happen. Not in this town, not in well over a hundred and something years. No one just up and chooses to live here. People move away, their kids or grandkids move back, but that's about it. Maybe he's just trying to have a miserable time for his senior year.
I feel the skin around my eyes tighten, my gaze narrowing of its own volition as I stare back. The increasing sourness of my expression makes him lift a brow, tip his head to one side. I can feel the hum of chatter around me, the vibes running beneath the words. I can tell the other girls are at it again, a combination of wondering why her—not in a nasty way, but simply why me and not them—envying how lucky I am to have his undivided attention like this and thinking that there must be something so wrong with me to always be giving him mean looks.
"Hey!" Wendi snaps in a low tone behind me, making me jump in my seat.
Grey smirks a little and faces forward again as I whirl around to face my best friend's accusatory stare.
"What?" I whisper harshly.
"You're at it again."
My gaze darts from one of her dark eyes to the other. "Yeah, and?"
She eases up from her seat and leans forward over her desk, about to murmur in my ear, but that's when the teacher walks in. Groaning under her breath and rolling her eyes, Wendi sinks back down.
I turn around, knowing that class is only sparing me from another talk for about forty-five minutes, because then we get dismissed, and I'll be at her mercy as we walk home. But I guess that's just the disadvantage of living next door to my best friend.
This time she drags it out, making me wait as we stroll down the scenic, tree-lined sidewalks, past storefronts that haven't changed in decades and rusted wrought iron fences. The next street we cross onto bears a white sign declarin
g Welcome to Drake's Cove, Est. 1648 in sprawling, dark-silver script.
I've always been a little astounded that there's so much inherent history tied to our itty-bitty town, just knowing it's been around that long, so much longer than other historic places in America. And yet . . . our town's past is a mystery. Well, not entirely; we have a vague grasp of basic events, but beyond that? Nope, just a huge, gaping blank spot in our community's collective memory.
And that's not even the weird part.
"Okay, say it already." I blurt out the words, stopping in front of the ice cream shop across from the aforementioned sign and pivoting on a heel to face her.
She levels those huge dark eyes of hers at me, one arched platinum eyebrow lifting as she rakes her fingers through her pale, pixie-cut hair. "Huh, I'm sorry, what am I supposed to be saying, exactly?"
I simply stare back at her, shifting my weight from one foot to the other as I fold my arms under my breasts and suck my teeth loudly—a habit I know she can't stand.
"Okay, fine," she says with a cringe. "You are . . . becoming obsessed with that guy."
I can't help scoffing at that—sounding like a kitten hacking up a hairball, I imagine—and start walking again. "That is so not what this is."
Wendi doesn't fall into step beside me, so I pause and turn just enough to look at her over my shoulder. She's shaking her head and pressing the tips of her index fingers against her temples like I'm giving her a migraine. I wish; maybe then she'd stop badgering me about this, or at least stop acting like I'm the nutty one.
"Cadence, sweetie." Her eyes squeeze shut for a moment as she says my name, and I find myself really hoping for the migraine thing. "You spend every class we have with him drilling holes in the back of his head."
I blink a few times in rapid succession, my mouth dropping to hang open for a second. "Now, that is just not true."
To her look of disbelief, I tack on, "In some classes, he sits behind me."
She rolls her eyes and walks, reaching to grab my hand, forcefully—though I know she'd prefer me to think of it as merrily—swinging our arms as we go. "It's not just classes. You stare as you guys pass each other in the hall, and God forbid he sits anywhere in your eye-line during lunch."
Scratching at my scalp with my free hand, I offer her an exhausted shrug. Really, how many times should one person have to explain the same thing? "I've already told you why. There's something about that guy that's just plain weird. That no one else sees it but me is actually kind of annoying."
Wendi makes an odd snuffling sound when she laughs; a Wendi Carter trademark noise. "Yeah, what's weird about it is that an über-hot guy like Grey would want to live in a cruddy, creepy little town like this. And trust me, sweetie, everyone sees that."
"Okay, see, that's what I'm talking about." She gives me the uh-huh look, so I hurry on. "Not the über-hot thing—the why would anyone want to live here thing."
There's nothing really wrong with our town from an on-the-surface, outside-looking-in perspective, but once a person gets here, it becomes a different story. Something about Drake's Cove just . . . unsettles people, but all in a very nondescript, can't-put-their-finger-on-it sort of way. I'd never really been aware of it. This feeling of being creeped out for no obvious reason was explained to me when I was about twelve by a girl I met at the corner store. Her family was passing through on the way to somewhere else. Anywhere else, I would think.
The story of our lives.
We don't really notice this inherent spookiness—the locals, I mean.
Maybe we're numb to the feeling, dealing with it all the time, but the town has just been this way for as long as anyone can remember. Things happen here. Things that would have anyone else screaming that the town's been overrun by poltergeists or some other such nonsense. Us? We just kinda shrug and either deal with it—usually with a here we go again air—or we ignore it until whatever strange happening stops acting up.
Depends on the situation, really.
And, aside from not noticing the ookie vibes, we know we're not like other towns, that's the worst part. We're not intentionally insular or technologically backward or anything weird like that. We've seen TV shows, we have Internet, we've got a big-ass multiplex movie theater—we've witnessed what life is supposed to be like, seen what's considered paranormal–only thing is, those representations are usually fictitious. We know we're not normal, but what happens here is what's normal for us, if that makes any sense.
Still doesn't explain the lack of new blood. People passing through never seem to be around when the weird stuff happens. No one could ever mistake Drake's Cove for Silent Hill, so it's easy to dismiss. I know I shouldn't be kicking up a fuss about it. After the first week of Grey being here passed and he and his parents hadn't hauled ass outta town, everyone sorta hopes it means whatever this weird thing is about our town that drives people away is finally wearing off.
I just can't buy that it's that simple.
Okay, and maybe there's a chance that Wendi's right in her observation about Grey being über-hot. He's about five-ten, if I had to guess—that irritatingly perfect height where he's not at all close to short, but also not too tall. His hair is the color of milk chocolate, left just a little long so it falls loose, level with his eyes, and he's got a still-fading surfer boy tan, probably a holdover from living in Florida before his parents clearly both received some sort of head trauma and decided to move to the dank Northeastern Seaboard.
Of course, I'm not about to tell Wendi that it has crossed my mind, once or twice, that he is kinda nice to look at—then I'll never hear the end of it.
"Just listen to you," she says in an ear-piercing whine as we round the corner to stop at the Don't Walk signal in front of Mr. Katsulos' pharmacy. "It's like you just want us to be weird forever."
"That also is not what this is. You totally missed it. Yesterday, something happened right in front of him and he acted like it was nothing!"
"What are you even talking about?" She shrugs as she asks, deliberately acting like she doesn't know what I mean, since, if everyone wants to believe the weird feeling is fading away, then wanting the weird things to go away, too, goes right along with that.
A little zinging sensation in the pit of my stomach tells me to stop, so I do—instantly—and I yank the still-walking Wendi back. As she stumbles into me, a pebble whips up from the sidewalk, unassisted, and goes sailing into the pharmacy's window, cracking the glass. The small stone was right in our path; if I hadn't stopped, one of us would have gotten tagged by it.
Forcing a gulp down my throat, I share a wide-eyed glance with Wendi. We turn in unison to look at the door as Mr. Katsulos comes hurrying outside.
"Who did—?" He starts in a yell, but the expression on our faces must speak volumes, because he immediately lets it go and gives a sigh as his shoulders slump. "Let me guess . . . ?"
I nod and offer a sad, humorless little smirk. "There was no one there, Mr. Katsulos."
"Honey!" He shouts as he retreats into the pharmacy. "Call the medium, we need another cleansing!"
Wendi lets out the breath she's apparently been holding in and I just look at her, eyebrows lifted expectantly.
"What are you even talking about?" I can't help that my tone is a little curt as I restate her words from just a few seconds ago.
"All right, all right." She throws her hands up in defeat as I stomp away, then hurries to catch up to me. "Look, though, okay, we act like these things are nothing when they happen. Why should Grey doing the same thing be such a big deal?"
We turn the next corner and the row of attached brick townhouses comes into view. I let out a small sigh of relief; oddly, it's never really occurred to me to wonder that at times like this it's my own best friend who makes me want to run home and hide. Well, at least just until she starts making sense, anyway.
"But that's the whole thing," I say levelly, trying to get my slightly flaring temper back under control. "We act like it's nothing because we'
ve grown up with it. How does a guy who's supposedly normal watch a blackboard eraser throw itself at the teacher and not even bat an eye?"
Her gaze roves around for a second before her step falters and she taps my shoulder with the back of her hand. "Wait, where was I when this happened?"
"Calculus." Math is one of the few classes we don't have together. "Caught Mr. Bell totally off-guard." I can't help giggling as I recount the event. "For a sec there, he screamed like a girl."
Wendi grumbles, kicking half-heartedly at the pavement with the toe of one Converse-clad foot. "I always miss the good stuff."
"'Tis the price of intellectual greatness, my friend," I say with a heavy, mock sympathetic sigh as we part ways at the walk leading up to her house.
As I climb the steps of my own porch, she calls to me across the side-by-side driveways that separate our stoops. "Hey, ya know, there's a real easy way for you to get info on Grey. I mean . . . if that's really all this is about and you don't actually, like, like him or anything."
I frown as I dig my keys out of my pocket and unlock my front door. "That's really all this is about," I echo firmly. I swear, I don't know if she wants me to like him, or wants to assure herself that I don't because maybe she does . . . but I'm pretty sure she has her eye on someone else.
She shrugs and I hear the sound of her front door being unlocked, even though I can't really see it because of the angle of her screen door.
"Ask him out."
This notion seems so contrary—not to mention completely illogical—to how she'd introduced the idea that all I can manage is a very confused, "Huh?"
Another shrug. "Think about it, you can probably weasel more out of him directly from first-date flirting than you could glean from just keeping your eyes glued to him during school like some stalker."
Okay, so the idea did end up making sense, even if the track of the train of thought leading up to it left me scratching my head. "And that has what to do with whether or not I like the guy?"
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