Frankie
I will be the first to admit my plan was not very well thought-out.
I don’t think I even had a plan, which is part of the problem. I acted emotionally, with my heart instead of my head. I saw Haley hurting Ash, and
my only thought was, Get him out of there.
Big mistake. I, more than anyone, should have known better. I know how groupthink—the desire for cohesive harmony in a group—can
lead to dysfunctional, even disastrous decisions.
And when those group members are vulnerable young adults who have been fed inaccurate information and are too hungry—for both
food and the approval of their leader—to think objectively for themselves, the outcome can be a thousand times worse.
Still, I couldn’t just stand there and let them kill him any more than I planned on killing him myself.
Tightening my grip on Ash—he weighs a ton and seems as incapable of operating his limbs as he does his mouth—I warn, “I’ve
called the police, and they’re on their way. So unless you all want to get arrested, I recommend you leave here immediately.”
Haley only laughs at this warning.
“Leave?” She looks back at her followers, all of whom are smiling. None of them seem the least bit worried, maybe because
Haley herself doesn’t seem worried. “Why would we leave? What can the police do to us?”
“Arrest you for kidnapping and assault? And that’s just for starters. Destruction of private property? Camping without a permit?
Starting fires in a nature preserve? Stealing?”
Ash adds something, but because his tongue still isn’t working properly, it comes out as Umma Bye Bell, so I ignore him.
“But I’m happy to talk to the police for you when they get here,” I go on, using my kindest, most professional manner. “I’m
sure I can make them understand that—”
“The police aren’t coming,” Haley interrupts coldly, holding up her hand. A small round object is nestled in her fingers.
The girls all stare up at, rapturously. “We are protected from the laws of man and their enforcers by this.”
On the word this, Haley unfolds her fingers, revealing what appears to be a thin, white twig, barely an inch long.
But the way the girls react to the sight of it lets me know this is no ordinary twig. Their eyes wide, they gasp and sink
to their knees once again. A few audibly murmur, “Hail Hecate.”
This is weird enough. But even more weirdly, the bonfires and the flames on the torches the girls are holding seem to leap
at the exact same time, suddenly burning more brightly, almost as if some unseen wind—or invisible mystical force—is at work.
“Oh, Hecate,” Haley intones, holding the object high.
She’s got her back to the flames. She hasn’t noticed them.
“We thank you for this reminder that death is nothing to fear, for when we are stripped of our flesh, what remains is bone, like this one. From this bone of a humble cat, we can still channel the magic of the ancient ones—”
“Sorry,” I hear myself saying. In the sudden burst of light, I got a good look at the object in Haley’s hand and finally recognized
it for what it is. “But that’s a chicken bone.”
Haley doesn’t even glance my way. “This is the bone of a black cat. It was placed here by Gaia over a thousand—”
“Excuse me,” I interrupt again. “But that is very clearly a chicken wing. And it is not a thousand years old. Maybe if we
lived in a dry, arid climate like Arizona, a bone that small could last a thousand years. But there’s no way that a chicken
wing buried in the moist, bacteria-rich soil of Connecticut could last any more than a few weeks before decomposing—”
“This is not a chicken wing!” Haley whirls toward me to scream. I see several of her followers’ heads pop up from their prayerful position
to watch our exchange. “It’s Gaia’s witch’s bone! We spent weeks looking for it, and Hecate was finally able to guide us to
it!”
“Okay.” I’m aware that all the girls are now looking at me. This is good. I want them looking at me and not Haley. “But my
brother-in-law is a park ranger, so I can tell you that littering at Satan’s Seat is a real problem, and that bone looks like
it came directly from a bucket of KFC—”
“Silence!” Haley screams and points up at me. The flames leap once again, and this time, everyone notices . . . including her.
“You see!” Haley cries triumphantly. “Hecate is waking! She knows . . . she knows I have Gaia’s bone, and soon she’ll join
us for my ascension!”
I’ve really had about as much as I can take from this girl.
“That was the wind,” I say. “Not Hecate.”
“That was Hecate!” Haley yells back. “She’s rising!”
And the flames leap again, more violently this time—violently enough that one of the girls below shrieks and drops her torch
in alarm. The leaves on the ground are still so wet from the fog and rain that they don’t immediately catch fire, but a smoke
plume begins to rise from the forest floor. It’s only a matter of time before the entire island goes up in flames.
“You see?” Haley shouts. “She’s heard us! She’s coming to join the fight against Gaia!”
Ash looks alarmed—but not as alarmed as I am. We’re standing on a rock formation six feet above the ground, he’s leaning hard
against me, and I can barely support him. It’s going to be a rough landing for both of us if I lose my balance, and that doesn’t
even include what these girls might do if they get their hands on us.
“Can you walk?” I whisper to him. “We need to get out of here—”
But all Ash says to me in reply is, “Umma Bye Bell.” His whole body is tense—which is understandable, given what he’s just been through and the fact that we’re seconds away
from death.
“Umma Bye Bell,” Ash says urgently again. Only this time, he repeats himself, enunciating carefully. “Emma Bridle.”
Finally I understand.
“Is there an Emma Bridle here?” I ask, my gaze sweeping the many forms in white robes beneath me, some still kneeling in prayer,
but others on their feet and dancing around, trying to stomp out the flames. “Emma?”
One of the smallest girls—and the one with the most absurdly short dark hair—raises her hand, looking timid.
“Th-that’s me,” she stammers.
I recognize her then. All of the dirt and bug bites can’t hide those fine-boned features and absurdly smooth skin.
“This man is your cousin,” I say, placing a hand on Ash’s chest. “He’s been working with your parents to help find you.”
“My . . . my parents?” Emma looks stunned, though it’s hard to tell if it’s due to the revelation that her parents are looking
for her, or the fact that she has a long-lost cousin who she was just about to help murder.
“Yes.” Ash is finally able to speak. Not well, but he’s mostly understandable. He looks down at Emma, and says, slowly, “Your
parents are sorry for not understanding how much your spirituality means to you—”
“Because they only want you to believe what they believe!” An angry-looking Haley is pushing her way toward Emma. She’s not
going to let any of her followers hear the truth if she can help it. “Which is nothing. They’re spiritually bankrupt, just like him!” She thrusts an accusing finger at Ash. “Don’t listen to a word he says! He
doesn’t care about you. He’s Gaia’s grandson!”
I’m so over Haley, I’m ready to climb down from this rock and punch her in the face, which is not the most empathetic response
for a therapist.
“What about you, Haley?” I demand. “Do you care?” I look down at the girls below us and speak directly to them. “Do any of you know, or even care, what happened to
your friend Meg? She’s currently being hospitalized for exposure and malnutrition.”
I see shock on some of the girls’ faces as they hear this, but fury on Haley’s.
“See?” She turns to the other girls. “See what happens when you disobey Hecate?”
Emma is the only one who asks, “Is . . . is Meg going to be all right?”
“Meg’s going to be fine,” Ash says. “But you can see why your parents are so worried about you—”
“Only because they’ve invested so much money in your education!” Haley screams at the girls. “They can’t just let you go;
they want to see a return on their investment—”
“Haley would know about that,” Ash says. “Wouldn’t you, Haley? You asked Emma to share the password and login for her college
fund—”
“Oh, please.” Haley rolls her eyes. “I ask the same of all the girls. They know it’s only a test of their loyalty.”
The other girls around her nod solemnly. They don’t seem to think this “loyalty test” is at all odd.
“Except,” Ash says to Haley, “you used that information to withdraw thirty-five thousand dollars from Emma’s college fund,
then transferred it to your own offshore bank account—”
Haley’s face darkens with fury. “That money is for our future,” she insists to the girls. “I’m making sure we’ll be taken
care of in Hecate’s new era!”
“Oh, like the money you’re demanding from my grandmother for my safe return?” Ash asks. “Do your followers know that you care
more about cash than you do about their safety? All you’ve ever wanted is the money you can squeeze out of their loved ones . . .
and mine.”
Haley has gone as pale as the bone she still clutches in her hand. “You entitled piece of shit,” she breathes. “How dare you tell such lies? I’ll kill you! Both of you!”
Her eyes wide with rage, Haley lifts the knife she’s clutching, and races toward the altar we’re still standing on. I tighten my grip, ready to pull Ash to safety if I have to. . . .
But I don’t have to, because Emma reaches out and seizes Haley by the wrist as she shoots past, stopping her in her tracks.
Haley whirls on the other girl.
“What are you doing?” she shouts. “Let me go!”
“No, Haley.” Emma’s voice sounds different than it had just a moment ago. It’s stronger somehow. I watch, amazed by what I
see next. “Is what they’re saying true?”
“Of course not!” Haley tugs on her arm. “How could you believe I’d ever do such a thing? Let me go—”
“Not yet.” Emma continues to clutch Haley’s wrist. “You’re the one who taught us that love and compassion are cornerstones
of Hecate’s teachings. If we can’t show empathy for others, how will we ever learn to show it to ourselves?”
As a therapist, I’m so proud of her. Talk about a breakthrough!
But as a human, I’m still terrified, since Emma’s wise words have no effect on Haley. She wrenches her wrist from Emma’s grasp
with a sneer.
“Empathy is for losers!” Haley shrieks.
She would, I’m certain, have raised the knife toward Emma if she hadn’t been interrupted by an ominous rumble. It’s hard to
tell at first if it’s thunder or something else, but everyone freezes exactly where they’re standing.
Then the earth beneath Satan’s Seat moves. And all hell breaks loose.
“Oh my God,” cries one of the girls. “It’s Hecate!”
But I know from common sense—and sixth grade biology—that it’s not.
“Don’t worry,” I say, tightening my grip on Ash’s hand. “That was only an earthquake. Connecticut has a ton of underground faults, especially
around East Harbor. There’s—”
“That’s no earthquake,” Ash says.
Before I can ask what he means, the earth moves again, this time even more violently—violently enough that Ash and I are thrown
off our feet. The uneven surface of the rock cuts into my knees, but I hardly notice since I’m trying so desperately not to
fall off and onto the hard ground below.
At least I am until Ash wraps his arms around me.
“Get down,” he says into my ear. “This is going to get rough.”
I have no idea what he’s talking about until the stone altar suddenly bucks, and an ear-splitting cracking noise fills the
air. Ash pushes me to the surface of the rock, then covers my body with his, shielding me from a cascade of falling dirt and
stones from the ravine above.
Ash has got his hands over my head, keeping it down, so I can’t see what’s going on around me. But I can still hear. In addition
to the cracking noise, I hear the girls screaming in terror. There’s another violent lurch that would have caused me to go
flying if Ash hadn’t flattened himself over me.
And then I lift my head and see it. It’s difficult to make sense of what I’m looking at because of the fog and drifting smoke
from all the torches the girls dropped in their terror, now smoldering on the forest floor.
But a wildfire is not my biggest concern at the moment. That would be the five-foot-wide fissure that’s opened up in the earth
in front of Satan’s Seat, and the figure—distinctly female-shaped—rising from it.
This is, of course, impossible. Sinkholes and cracks in the earth appear pretty regularly in New England, and cars and sometimes even people and houses fall into them.
Except nothing ever rises out of them. I have to be experiencing yet another hallucination.
But if this is a hallucination, it’s got some truly horrifying special effects. The figure rising slowly from the fissure
is clad entirely in black, shiny, veil-like material that barely covers her feminine curves and definitely covers her face.
You don’t need to see the features beneath the veil, however, to tell this is a woman, and that this woman is not happy. Her
mouth is wide open beneath the thin black film across her face, and the loudest, most piercing scream of all is the one coming
from her.
“What is happening?” I whisper to Ash. His face is only inches away from mine, so he hears me, despite the screaming. I can
feel his heart drumming hard. “Who is that?”
“Hecate,” he whispers back. “Queen of Witches. And I was right: she’s pissed.”