My drug-addled brain managed one last task before everything went dark, translating the Latin into English.
Tonight, we shall rise again.
As my consciousness slipped away, I knew somehow my already terrible night had just taken a big, fat turn for the worse.
* * *
The chanting woke me.
I came to with a start, gasping awake as air rushed down my throat. My eyelids felt like anvils as I heaved them open, barely capable of getting them to half-mast. A brilliant full moon greeted me, hanging so low in the sky you could almost reach out and take it in your palm. It was bright enough to illuminate the graveyard around me.
Not just any graveyard.
Broad Street Cemetery.
Fear coiled inside my chest, squeezing the air from my lungs. My first sensation wascold. I was freezing. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out why. I was splayed out on top of a stone crypt, much like the one where I’d found Eliza Proctor’s body. And I was totally, completely paralyzed, my limbs unbound but incapable of movement. Somehow, I would’ve preferred ropes or duct tape. The sensation of utter numbness was more terrifying than any physical restraints.
“You’re awake,” a disembodied voice said from my left. “Good. It’s almost time to begin.”
I managed to turn my head a fraction, following the voice. Hetti’s voice. Only, she didn’t really sound like Hetti. There was a melodious cant to her words, a polished flow that I’d never heard before in all the days we’d spent working side by side. Her real voice, I realized with a painful start. And her real face, without the disguise of heavy makeup and goth gear to obscure it.
Tears prickled at my eyes as I stared at her. Betrayal was burning inside me, a raging inferno in my heart. I tried to speak, but my lips were too numb to get out a single word.
“I assume from the way you’re gaping like a fish on dry land that you’re trying to ask me something.” She stepped a bit closer, away from the circle of cloaked, chanting figures that surrounded my crypt on all sides. “You won’t be able to speak or move, not for some time.” She glanced up at the moon. “And I’m afraid you don’t have much time left, Gwendolyn. The lunar eclipse is only moments away.”
My lips parted as I tried again, managing only a faint wheeze. “Whhhh….”
“Why?” Hetti’s brows arched high on her forehead. Her light brown eyes were full of delight… and a dose of total madness. “You know why, Gwendolyn. You put it together yourself. I saw you, just this afternoon, with that map. Clever girl, aren’t you? Nearly spoiled things for us. Couldn’t have that — not after six months, slaving away beside you, making dreadful smalltalk, pretending to care about you and your life.”
I flinched, a lance of pain shooting through my heart.
Goddess, how could I not have seen her true nature?
It was all a lie. All of it. Every shared laugh, every smile. Every moment I’d spent with this woman was a carefully orchestrated act. I felt supremely foolish. But, beneath the surface, a deep current of devastation was making its way through my system, effective as the paralytic powder I’d inhaled.
“I’ll admit, you forced us to move up our timetable a bit.” Hetti smiled at me indulgently, as though I was her pet. “Samhain would’ve been ideal. But the full moon tonight will be suitable enough for the ritual. Coupled with a lunar eclipse and our previous sacrifices, we surely have enough power to proceed.”
I forced out another measly whimper. “Plee….”
“Please?” She shook her head. “Oh, no, Gwendolyn. I’m afraid the time for bargaining is long over. This plan has been in the making for generations. I will succeed where my mother failed. I will bring our coven back from the banishment your preciousAunt Colette—” She spat the words, eyes flashing with spite. “—forced us into. I will drain all remnants of her bloodline to restore our rightful place in Salem. A true force of power, uncontested. As it was always meant to be.”
The cloaked Heretics behind her began to chant again, a hushed flow of Latin I wasn’t fluent enough to translate.
Hetti paused, brow furrowing as she stared at me. “The Bay Colony Coven has grown old. Not only in age, but in their ideas. They refuse to see the potential unlocked by blood sacrifice. They praise only their precious moon goddess and shun our horned god. They do not understand him, or those of us who choose to follow him. They cannot grasp our loyalties.” The glint of madness in her eyes was truly alarming. Her voice was a hushed, fanatical whisper. “It is his dark dominion to which we pay fealty, and his superior malevolence through which we worship. It is through his ruinous grace that tonight, we make our sacrifice and reclaim our stolen birthright.”
“Hac nocte resurgemus,”the Heretics chanted in unison from all around me, a chilling chorus. “Hac nocte resurgemus.”
Reaching into the pocket of her cloak, Hetti pulled out an ornate athamé, much like the one that killed Eliza. My eyes fixed on it, unable to tear away from the blade as it shone in the moonlight.
“We might’ve left the Bay Colony Coven alone, but their new High Priestess began to cause problems. She was hovering too close, trying to bring you into their circle of protection. We couldn’t have that. She left me with no choice.” She smiled her crazy smile, spinning the knife playfully in her grip. “I admit, I did find a certain amount of enjoyment in staging her body for you to find.”
Hetti killed Eliza.
It all made sense. The pieces fell into place like dominoes inside my mind. She knew my running route. She had access to the weapon that killed her. She was certainly crazy enough to do the deed.
I tried to jerk away as Hetti reached out and patted me on the cheek, but my frozen body barely moved.
“There, there, Gwendolyn. Don’t look so distraught. It will all be over soon. You’ll be at peace on the other side. And you can take heart in knowing your death was not without purpose. Indeed, you will be the very mechanism by which we rise.”