Blood Creek Witch Read online

  Caleb shook his head, still not looking up to face Sean. “The police didn’t know she was missing. I called to find out, and it took ‘em days before they found the body. I reckon they wouldn’t have knowed it was her if I ain’t called ‘em. Then they thought I’d killt my own sister, on account of me calling them like I did. But everybody knowed I hadn’t left town, and then they found those boys.”

  “So you did what she asked you. You helped the police find out she’d been murdered, and who had done it.”

  Caleb looked up briefly, shaking his head, and then looked back at the porch floor. “I thought so. But a year later, she came back. Halloween night, same night she died. Right in my room. Said the same thing, that I needed to find out what happened to her. I told her that I done that, and that she’d been murdered by them three boys, and that she should cross over to the other side and go to Jesus. Then she said the strangest thing. She said, ‘Well, that don’t seem right. That don’t make no kind of sense.’ And then she disappeared again, just like before. I ain’t never seen her again. But Annie did.”

  “Who is Annie?”

  “Annabelle Rose. Folks say she was a witch, like her mama, Grandma Norton. She used to live up yonder in the hill.” He pointed up a slope, thick with trees. “She and Debbie were best friends growing up. Sometimes it seemed like Debbie was more kin to them than us.”

  “Where does Annabelle live now?”

  “She’s gone now, too. Died about five years back. She used to live in a house up yonder, about a mile up past the Casto’s farm.” He waved towards the mountains. “Debbie lived there near half the time, too. Annie’s daughter Hattie lives close, though. First house up the road that goes behind the church.”

  Sean’s hopes had been raised and crushed several times during the conversation. He tried not to let his disappointment show as he said, “Well, thank you Mr. Arnot. I’ll check in on Hattie, then. I appreciate your time.”

  Caleb glanced back at him once more, and nodded. Sean stepped off the porch. Caleb started to go inside, but stopped. “Hey, kid,” he said.

  Sean turned. “Yes, sir?”

  “If you see Debbie again… tell her I’m sorry.”

  “I will,” he said, for lack of anything else to say. That seemed to satisfy Caleb. The older man nodded, went back into the house, and closed the door.

  Sean walked back down toward the main road. He hoped more than anything he’d get the chance to fulfill that promise, even as he consciously doubted he’d ever see Debbie again.

  He made his way along the dirt roads in the direction that Caleb had pointed, and found himself nearing what Evelyn had called “downtown Maple Bend.” The parking lots at Hap’s and the church were full of a surprising number of vehicles, including a police car and a white SUV bearing government license plates. Evelyn stood in front of the church, speaking with two police officers and a sweating, slightly overweight man in a khaki-and-green outfit. As Sean drew closer, Evelyn concluded her business. The officers thanked her. The sweating government employee turned toward the SUV with a vacant look. He made it to his vehicle and turned toward Evelyn. He raised his hand as if he was about to ask her a question. Then he smiled, as if he’d received his answer, entered the SUV and drove away.

  Evelyn turned, spotted Sean as he approached, and her face transformed into a friendly smile. “Good morning, Sean. I hope you found breakfast okay. I know it wasn’t much.”

  “Uh, it was fine. Thank you. What’s going on?”

  “A young man about your age was killed last night. Mauled by a wild animal. They were just concluding the investigation.” Her voice was light, more thoughtful than concerned, as if she were discussing something she’d seen on TV not a real tragedy.

  “Does that happen a lot around here?”

  “No idea. That’s the second death in just over a week.”

  “Why were the cops talking to you?”

  Evelyn shrugged. “They were just asking questions. They hoped I knew something, I guess. So did you find the Arnots?”

  Sean knew she was changing the subject, but didn’t want to push his host. “Yes. Now I’m looking for someone named Hattie Rose.”

  An icy look flicked across her face. “Oh? What do you want to bother poor ol’ Hattie with this morning?”

  “Caleb Arnot mentioned her.”

  “Should I expect you back by dinner time?”

  “I don’t know. And I don’t mean to impose. I appreciate you giving me a place to stay.”

  “No, you aren’t imposing at all. It’s nice having someone else in the house. Besides, I’d like to hear all about what you talk to Hattie about.” She narrowed her eyebrows. “I’d just avoid exploring these woods alone if I were you. They aren’t safe.”

  “Thanks. I won’t,” he said. He waved as he made his way to the road behind the church. His eyes kept drifting up the tree-carpeted mountain. Caleb had indicated that Annabelle Rose had lived there, and she’d encountered Debbie’s ghost several times. In life, it sounded as though Annabelle and Debbie had been inseparable. If Sean wanted any chance of seeing Debbie again, it made sense it would be in Annabelle’s old home. He wouldn’t leave Maple Bend until he tried to find it, wild animals or not.

  When Jack returned to his house, his mother still lay snoring on the couch in front of the television. Even though he knew little would wake her, he crept past her to the hall closet. Inside, boxes of Christmas decorations poorly hid his father’s shotgun in the back corner. Jack found only twelve shells, but he thought it would be enough. If he couldn’t kill the creature that killed Sam in three or four shots, then it probably wouldn’t matter.

  He took the long way to Hattie’s home, avoiding the church. A police car had been among the vehicles he’d seen arriving this morning on his way home, and he didn’t want to risk being seen toting his father’s shotgun around. Nobody in town cared, but police could be touchy about a minor carrying a gun, even someone only weeks away from turning eighteen. Best to avoid the trouble.

  What he did know was all the official-looking cars meant Sam’s death had caught a lot of attention, and that meant the snallygaster would be found and killed before nightfall. By morning it would be in the news. And maybe when everyone learned about the snallygaster, they’d finally believe him about the giant. Jack felt guilty being excited to receive validation after all these years, especially when Sam had to die for it.

  Maybe that’s why he wanted to be the one to kill the monster. He could get revenge for Sam’s death, which would even things up a little bit. Sam was a jerk sometimes, but they’d been friends once. The vision of Sam being jolted, screaming, into the air wouldn’t leave his brain. Even as he slept on Hattie’s little couch during the night, the scene replayed in every dream, to the point where he now remembered little details that he wasn’t sure really happened or not.

  The one thing he was sure of was that he wouldn’t let it happen again if he could help it. Most creatures that hunted at night slept during the day, and the morning was half over. After last night, he knew two girls who could help. Jenny had the power to hold the creature at bay. Jessabelle had eyes like a hawk. She’d seen the snallygaster coming before anyone else, twice. Maybe she could find where it hid during the day.

  Jessabelle, coming up the road from the church, met Jack just before he reached Hattie’s trailer. She motioned toward his shotgun. “Going hunting?”

  “Maybe.” Jack kept his eyes set on the path before him. “I figure everyone in town is going to be going after that thing that killt Sam. I am, too.”

  “Nope. Ain’t happening. Nobody’s going after it.”

  “What? Why not? What did Hattie say to everyone?”

  “Nothing. She left for Branton to pick up supplies right after you left this morning. I reckon she was avoiding the cops. Folks were all worked up when they got here, but now nobody’s doing jack… I mean, squat. The government people are supposed to be catching a bear, and everyone’s just gonna go home and
wait for the funeral. Except that government guy left without doing anything and nobody cares. But I don’t think anyone is going after the snallygaster.”

  Jack chewed on her information as they drew closer to the trailer. He stopped short. “What about Hattie? Can she blow it up with magic or anything?”

  “No. I don’t think she can do much against it. She ain’t that kind of witch.”

  Jack’s mouth set, and he looked up at Hattie’s trailer. “Maybe Jenny is.”

  Jessabelle put herself between Jack and the trailer. “No. No you ain’t. You ain’t taking my cousin out to get her killt by the snallygaster. No way.”

  “You said yourself that nobody is going after it. You want to just wait around until it kills someone else?”

  “No, I don’t, but going after it is crazy.”

  “Is it? You saw what Jenny did last night.”

  “I also saw what the snallygaster did to Sam Colton last night. Besides, Jenny scared it off. Maybe it won’t come back.”

  “I ain’t counting on that.” He sidestepped half-way around her, then stopped and considered Jessabelle. “I was kinda hopin’ you’d come along too. Maybe we can catch it while it’s sleeping during the day.”

  She blinked. “You really are crazy, Jack Parsons! Do you know what I do when I see trouble? I run the other way. Like I ran away from the barn last night.”

  Jack shrugged. “Maybe. But you took the time to rescue me even when you knew that thing was hunting, didn’t you?”

  Jessabelle didn’t answer.

  Jack set his shotgun beside the steps to the front door, and knocked. Jenny called him in. She sat on the sofa where he’d slept the night before, a handful of books stacked on the end-table beside it. Her eyes were red, but she warmed the room with her smile.

  “You learn any new tricks from those books?” he asked.

  Her shoulders drooped. “No. Hattie found a mention of using a seven-pointed star to ward the snallygaster off, but she didn’t find much more. It’s supposed to be enemies with a giant wolf-man called a Dwayyo. You don’t have one of those stashed around this town, do you?”

  “No, I do not. I reckon if we did, we’d have a whole mess of other problems. So did Hattie give you any witching lessons?”

  Jenny snorted, and then covered her mouth with her hand in embarrassment. “No. She found me some notebooks with recipes on how to get rid of bad luck or how to stop a cough, and a couple of books on identifying wild herbs or something. I don’t see how much good that would be against a monster. Monster! I can’t believe I’m even talking about this. Last week, ghosts and monsters were stories. Now, I just wish I could go to sleep and when I wake up find out this has all been a dream. I’ve been wishing that for a long time.”

  “You stood against it last night.”

  “I have no idea what I did last night.”

  Sitting on the couch with hand-sewn upholstery in the daylight of mid-morning, Jenny didn’t seem like a fearsome witch or a dragon-fighter. She seemed like one of any other girls he’d seen at school, a plain old nobody, just like him. But last night, she had stood up against the attacks of a giant creature with wings, teeth, and swinging tails. She’d sent it flying off in defeat.“Do you think you could do it again if you had to?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know. Maybe? I really don’t ever want to find out. Hattie will do something. She knows about this stuff, right?”

  Jack shook his head. “I don’t know. I brought my dad’s old shotgun, though. I’m going after it.”

  “Are you crazy?”

  “That’s what Jessabelle keeps asking. That thing killed Sam. He was a friend of mine once. I reckon between whatever you did up there, and a few good shots with double-aught buckshot, we ought to be able to catch it and kill it.”

  “I’m sure somebody else is going after it.”

  “Not by what Jessabelle told me. Something weird is going on. Folks are suddenly… I don’t know. Uninterested.”

  “Why do it yourself?”

  “Someone has to. I reckon during the day, I might catch it asleep.”

  She met his eyes, and then slowly shook her head. “You really are crazy. What if it catches you?”

  “I’m hoping that if you can do your thing, and if Jessabelle can spot it early, that ain’t going to be a problem.”

  “I’m from the city. I don’t do anything well. I don’t think a few months of jiu jitsu will help me fight that thing. I’d be useless.”

  “That ain’t what I saw last night. You stopped it cold! But it’s okay if you’re scared. It’s dangerous, I know. I hate this place, and I ain’t too fond of a lot of people here. But it’s still my home, and I figure someone’s gotta go make sure that thing won’t kill nobody else.”

  Jenny closed her eyes. “Don’t say that. I’m not afraid. It just seems like it should be somebody else’s job.”

  “Whose? I can’t even tell anybody, because they won’t believe me. They never do. Anyway, I’m losing daylight. I should go.” He shrugged and offered a half-wave, and turned toward the door.

  “Wait.” He turned back, and she looked him in the eyes. “I’ll come with you. Just promise me we’ll be back before dark.”

  Even as he grinned at her, worry gnawed at his insides. Was he going to get her killed, too? No, this would work. What could go wrong, anyway, especially during the day? “We kill that sumbitch, we’ll be back by lunch.”

  That almost brought her smile back. “Okay.” They stood together, and left the trailer.

  Jessabelle waited for them outside. As Jenny and Jack came out of the door together, her eyes widened. “You talked her into it? Y’all are doing this?”

  Jack grabbed the shotgun. “Yep. You comin’?”

  Jessabelle shrugged. “Sure. Hattie’ll just kill me anyway if she hears I let y’all go off without me. Let’s go.”

  By the time Sean arrived at Hattie Rose’s trailer, nobody was home. It probably didn’t matter. Hattie had been a young child when Debbie died, and was unlikely to know much. At best, she might be able to direct him to Annabelle Rose’s old house. Maybe Debbie’s ghost still haunted that place.

  Or maybe he was an idiot for trying. In all his research on ghosts, he hadn’t heard of one haunting two locations at the same time. Sometimes they’d move locations, or follow and haunt a person, but there was no legitimate reason for him to expect to find her there. His justification for going on this quest was to learn more about a girl who had been murdered decades before his birth. That was what he told himself, and anyone asking in his imaginary arguments. He’d done that.

  But, he also learned her ghost had been seen there, after she died, talking with Annabelle Rose. It was a long shot, but that was all that he had left.

  But where to find the house? Caleb had pointed in this general direction. Sean reasoned he’d just hunt around until he found an old road or path that led up the slope. From a distance, the slope Caleb had pointed to didn’t seem that big. As he hiked past the farmhouses, the trees grew larger and the slopes grew steeper. The dirt road he followed never really ended so much as it became indistinguishable from the hillside, surrounded by smaller trees and old stumps. With each step, the cicadas whirred and droned their inescapable, endless song.

  Sean began searching along the tree line for some sort of trail. Twice, his movement disturbed something in the tall grass. Each time, the noise froze his blood. While his hiking boots should’ve protected him from a snakebite, he didn’t want to take his chances in copperhead country. Especially when nobody knew where he was or would even notice his disappearance. As much as he wanted to meet Debbie again, dying in pain in tall grass where his body might never be found was not the way he wanted to go about it.

  Within a few minutes, he found a rough trail that showed signs of recent use. He pulled out his notebook and drew a quick map, taking note of the position of the sun. He promised himself that he’d follow the trail in only one direction until it ended, and wou
ld otherwise keep track of each branch in his notebook, even marking the trees if necessary.

  With preparations and discipline, he stepped forward confidently up the trail.

  An hour later, he was hopelessly lost.

  It flew off in this direction?” Jack asked Jessabelle for the third time. Jenny giggled even before Jessabelle responded.

  “Jack, it was dark. We’ve got the whole mountainside. It could have flown all the way to Kentucky as far as I know. You were the one who thought we could just haul ourselves up the mountain and find it roosting in the trees.”

  “I didn’t say that!”

  “You thought it, though. Admit it!”

  Jenny intervened with what she hoped to be a deft change of subject. “Listen to you two. Is this what having a brother and a sister is like?”

  “How should I know?” Jessabelle threw her hands up in the air. “I’m an only child.”

  Jack glanced over his shoulder at Jenny. “You didn’t find any spell in those books for locating monsters in the forest, did you?”

  “I skimmed over something about finding a lost object, but I don’t think this counts.”

  “You sure?” Jessabelle asked. “Wouldn’t hurt to try. It’d beat wandering around.”

  “I’ve been a witch for all of about twelve hours, guys. If I’m really one at all. I seriously have no clue what happened last night.”

  Jack kicked a clump of weeds. “So one day, when we’re famous monster hunters, we’re gonna tell ‘em all about how we went up into the hills and got lost looking for a snallygaster.”

  Jenny giggled again. She hadn’t giggled or laughed since before her parent’s death, and rarely before that. Now she’d done it twice in one day, probably out of nervousness. Fear and excitement rolled together in one. She’d never even imagined hiking through such beautiful country before. She was on an adventure with two people she didn’t know yesterday who treated her like an old friend today. She had friends. She had family again. The darkness and terror of the night before melted under the warm June sun and the repeating cicada song. Alien or not, something felt like home to her here.