The Witching Hours, page 1
Kensington Books by Heather Graham
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Witness to Death
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CONTENTS
Kensington Books by Heather Graham
Title
Copyright
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Epilogue
CHAPTER 1
Usually, Skye McMahon just saw things.
And in those images that appeared before her eyes or within her mind, it was as if history itself had been captured on a video hard drive and could appear before her clearly as if events had been caught for the viewer to enjoy exactly as they had taken place, over and over, in Technicolor on a life-sized screen.
Good things!
And bad things. Very bad things.
That was history.
And that was life. And she had learned long ago as a child, that it was possible to maintain her sanity by knowing that what she was seeing wasn’t real—not at the time, at any rate—just like seeing events on a movie screen wasn’t real.
But something was different that day. And it was strange, because she had been to Salem, Massachusetts, many times when growing up. And while she had seen and sensed the past before, there was something new …
And this wasn’t why she was here! The real world, the one they were living in now.
She wasn’t just seeing what had taken place. She wasn’t just hearing everything that was being said.
She was feeling it.
It was a bizarrely beautiful day and a breeze was stirring. She could smell the grass and the trees, see buildings in the far background, small wooden homes and farms that were far spread. In the distance, she could see a town center, and yet they were away from that center because …
People were gathered on the outskirts of town. And she quickly saw why. There were prisoners there.
Prisoners lined up to die.
She could feel such a mix of emotions. Fear. Horrible fear. Faltering faith … indignation, and a mix of anger and terror and a determination from one of the condemned that they would die well. Because soon, bodies would fall from the ropes strung high on the hanging tree.
She heard a sniffle of fear, a young woman, surely still stunned and confused, because of course …
None of them were really witches! No one was in league with the devil.
If the condemned had really had any kind of the power it was suggested they possessed, they’d have broken their bonds; if they’d been in league with a devil, surely that devil would have jumped out of his fiery pit to save them.
More …
Those who watched.
Many with relief to see what they’d been told was evil get its due! Shouting out that justice was being served …
Some were looking on with confusion clear on their faces. Puritan life was hard, and everyone knew the devil could walk on earth with man, that evil was real in the darkness of the forests, but these were their neighbors! People they lived among.
The accusers were there, of course. Any little wrong could be avenged. A cow had died. It had been cursed! By a witch!
Some indeed thought that justice was being done.
But others, no matter how pious, good people at heart in any age, had not expected the horror of hearing whimpers or sobs and seeing the way the feet of those hanged began to twitch so horribly …
Along with the strange and agonizing sense of the past, Skye felt a taunt from her childhood enter the stream of words that surrounded her.
Ding-dong! The witch is dead. Which old witch? The wicked witch!
In her mind, she also loathed herself for thinking of the song from the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz.
But it went with the flow of consciousness from those around her, a tangle of arguments in her head that became pure torture. A cacophony in her mind.
There were so many thoughts from those watching!
And the thoughts of those watching were torn.
This is all such a horrid lie! She’s not a witch! They just want her property confiscated. I need to protest to stand up … and if I do, I’ll die as a witch, too.
I thank Thee, great Lord in Heaven, for taking her; that witch might have cursed my family! Look at the children! Tituba started this, and she told the girls stories about things done in her land. And she said herself that others were involved.
But if she hadn’t, if she hadn’t confessed … she’d be ripe for the gallows, too!
No, no, no … this can’t be happening. People are just afraid of the dark, falling for the ridiculous pranks of spoiled children!
Good riddance!
“Skye!”
She blinked, startled back to reality.
The voice that said her name was real. Yes. Current. In the real world, where she was living at the current date.
Her vision ended as if blacked out.
And she was jolted back to the reality of the here and now.
The visions of the past were gone and were replaced by a pleasant day, and beautiful foliage surrounded them; the majesty of the earth was rich here with greenery.
They were still in a field. Jackson Crow had stopped for a minute so that she could get a good concept of the area where the old Bolton house stood. They were a small distance from the center of the city, not that far from the main streets and the tourist and historical attractions that had come into being from the past. They were near a rocky tor that was known as Proctor’s Ledge and an area known in the past as “the crevice”—where bodies had once been tossed and discarded, more than buried—now a memorial to those executed there on three different occasions.
Skye had seen the past.
And it had been painful. Different times, different beliefs—and still, human beings were always as conflicted as ever, and where it seemed there was always the suffering of the innocent …
There were things that were horrific and tragic, no matter the time and place in the history of the earth and humanity.
She gave herself a firm mental shake.
Thankfully, she was back to the present!
Well, hopefully, she w
Salem today, of course, was so very, very different!
Today they could take a short drive—or walk—and reach the modern commercial area, places like the Peabody Essex Museum; the Old Burying Point, or Charter Street Cemetery, the memorial there to those who had died; the Salem Witch Museum and so much more. There were many, many shops that now featured “potions” and other such paraphernalia that were needed by a practitioner of the modern-day wiccan belief.
“Skye!” Jackson repeated.
“Yeah!” She smiled at Jackson, who was the SAC, or special agent in charge, of the Special Circumstances Unit of the FBI, called the “Krewe of Hunters” by some, since their first case was in the city of New Orleans, or … well, the “Ghostbuster Unit” by a few as well.
On paper, they dealt with cults, with unusual circumstances, and those killers who thought they had legendary or mystic powers—or just wanted to pretend they did.
“Are you all right?” Jackson asked softly.
His hand was resting gently on her shoulder. Near him, Angela, Jackson’s wife, and also a special agent with the Bureau’s Krewe of Hunters, was watching her with concern.
They knew. They understood she could see the past replay before her in all its Technicolor glory.
Not many people did, of course. They would be convinced she was—partially at least—crazy, and it was all in her mind. Well, in a way, it was in her mind, but …
Angela was looking at Jackson, and while Skye didn’t read minds, she knew what Angela was thinking.
Angela is worried that it had been a mistake. A mistake to bring me here. It was cruel to make someone witness that much tragedy and pain.
But it wasn’t a mistake, Skye thought. She’d learned her weird ability to see the past could be helpful.
Painful, but helpful. Sometimes she just brought justice to victims. Sometimes she was able to save them. And that made whatever discomfort she experienced worth every minute.
It had been incredibly difficult, of course, because she couldn’t tell her co-workers just what helped her see the truth so often.
Which was what was so amazing about today. Jackson and Angela knew! Unbeknownst to her … they’d been watching her.
She had known about the Krewe, and she’d considered trying to transfer; but it was almost a hands-off operation, even when it came to the highest circles with the Bureau. They were an “elite” unit, both here and in Europe.
And now that she had been interviewed and knew what the Krewe of Hunters was about, she understood why they accepted the weirdness that was her.
Skye gave herself a serious mental shake. She forced a smile to her lips.
“I’m fine—I mean, as fine as anyone can be here, wondering how on earth we—as human beings—ever believed that pacts could be made with the devil, and witches could curse their neighbors!”
“Sadly, this wasn’t the only occasion in the colonies,” Jackson said, looking toward the ridge. “In 1636, the Plymouth Colony made it illegal to ‘form a solemn covenant with the devil by way of witchcraft.’” He shook his head, looking back at Skye. “The first so-called witch executed in the colonies was in 1647, in Hartford, Connecticut, Alse Young. In Massachusetts, the first recorded event was in 1648, when Margaret Jones was executed in Boston. Cotton Mather, a truly respected theologian, believed in the power of the devil and that people could make a pact with him—he was influential in all that happened.”
“Wow, you’re, um … up on all this!” Skye murmured.
“Well, we’ve been around,” Jackson said. “In Cotton Mather’s book On Witchcraft, which was published in 1692, and another of his books, The Wonders of the Invisible World, published in 1693, he defended his role in the trials. People believed in the devil, and the darkness scared them. Native Americans were different … Still, they estimate that anywhere between sixty and a hundred thousand people were executed in Europe during the craze, so it seems that someone here got a grip of things a little faster.”
“Governor Phips, of the Province of Massachusetts Bay, dissolved the Court of Oyer and Terminer in October of 1692, and when his wife was accused, he really stepped in! By May of 1693, all of the accused had been pardoned,” Angela put in dryly. “He thought that ‘spectral evidence’ was …”
“Bull?” Jackson offered.
“Yeah, that kind of describes it!” Skye said. “But being pardoned didn’t help everyone. You had to pay for prison, for chains if you were bound; some people couldn’t pay, and they rotted and died in prison.”
“So sad,” Angela murmured. “But again, the whole thing was horrible; so many people around the world were accused and—oh!”
She stopped speaking, looking dismayed.
Skye looked at her curiously. They were friends; they’d become so when Jackson had called her in for an interview with himself and Adam Harrison—and naturally, the master of research, fieldwork, and more, Angela.
At that time, Jackson had asked her point-blank about her strange ability to find the truth on many cases, admitting he and Angela and the Krewe had their own strange truths. He was a striking man, a mix of Native American and Northern European heritage, with strong cheekbones, dark hair, and light eyes, a man whose strength was often in his compassion.
And Angela …
Well, she was a beautiful, tall, shapely blonde—and didn’t look like a law enforcement official, one who could take down the worst of the worst.
Which she had often done.
And now …
Now, after the interview, and knowing her, they had called on her because of her “special talent,” her strange ability to see the past. A talent Skye, of course, never usually shared with others, since she knew too well what they might think about what she tried to explain or describe, and she wasn’t fond of the idea of being sent to a mental institution.
“You had a … vision, I imagine,” Jackson said. “Anything—”
“I know,” Skye said. She smiled at him. “I saw one of the days when executions took place. And I could hear people’s thoughts, and it was a lot like it’s been throughout history—people know something is wrong, but they’re afraid to speak up, lest they be persecuted, too.”
“Time passes, but we’re still human beings,” Angela said quietly. “And we can still be very cruel.”
“Nazi Germany,” Jackson murmured. “Many, many people knew that extermination of their neighbors was wrong—but they were terrified of winding up in a concentration camp themselves.”
“Exactly,” Skye murmured. She knew now that Jackson, Angela, and the Krewe of Hunters were capable of seeing—and talking to—the spirits of the dead who, for one reason or another, didn’t move on.
“Were you, um, able to talk to anyone who might have been useful in the current situation?” she asked.
Jackson shook his head. “I wonder … if those who are wrongfully persecuted aren’t … Well, we do believe there is a heaven; and I think maybe those who suffer so much, who have their lives so wrongfully taken, might get … I don’t know.” He glanced at Angela. “We have met those who were killed in wars and who have remained, but in this case … I think they may get to have peace immediately. And anyway …”
He looked at Angela.
“And,” Angela said, “while we’re always aware that history is important—seriously, the poet, essayist, novelist and philosopher George Santayana said it best, ‘Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.’ We can’t live in the past—but we can learn from it. When we let ourselves!
“But history—well, history over which we have no control—is not why we’re here!” Angela continued. “Skye, I’m so sorry. Maybe this was really wrong of us. We don’t mean to be torturing you—”
“No, no! Seriously, no. Sure, thinking about what happened here creates a heavy heart in anyone. But—” Skye began.
“We can’t let ourselves be weighed down in the many, many cruelties of history!” Angela murmured. “Not when we brought you here specifically today for history that occurred yesterday!”
“Right. New history is the reason we’re here,” Jackson said. “Skye, if you’re sure you’re all right with this—”
“Hey! Okay, I’ve never admitted the truth to any of my coworkers or agents or bosses, but I’ve been working in the NYC office for almost three years. I’m good with what I do!” Skye protested.
