See No Evil

One

SHIVERING IN THE NIGHT AIR, REBEKA HIBBENS PUSHED aside the reeds and the brush at the river’s edge, at the place where firm ground flowed into mud and marsh and then on into the ocean’s sandy shore. Her dress was torn and her cloak streaked with dirt. Oblivious to the mud that sucked at the ankles of her boots, she knelt and, using her hands as a trowel, searched for the shallow grave she knew lay in the soft ground.

The others stood on the sand, gathered around a large bonfire and a bush whose exposed roots resembled a knot of sleeping snakes. Including Rebeka, there were seven: six women and one man. All had been convicted of witchcraft and had just escaped from Cambridge Prison. All were being pursued by the righteous goodmen of Massachusetts Bay Colony. And all were to be hanged at dawn the following day.

The Immortalis must be done, Millicent Glover called to Rebeka, but her words were shredded by the wind and Rebeka heard only a few snippets of sound.

Groping in the dirt, Rebeka’s fingers finally hit upon the soft object she sought. Gently pulling against the sucking mud, she brought forth a soiled bundle the size and heft of an infant born a few months before its time. Peeling off the binding cotton shroud and letting the muddy cloth drop away, Rebeka exposed a naked doll to the cold moonlight.

She looked down at the misshapen thing: a sorcerer’s poppet she had hurriedly crafted from old rags and stuffed with boar bristles. The doll’s pewter eyes, which in her haste she had affixed slightly askew, gleamed dully back at her: flat and empty and ominous.

She held the poppet heavenward, revealing it to the stars and the waxing crescent moon that stood out against the ebony sky. Although she felt an abiding sadness at having to speak the words, nonetheless Rebeka said, Those who risk the sanctity of the coven shall be punished by eternal death.

Mahala, Millicent called to Rebeka again. We must make haste. They shall soon be upon us.

Rebeka nodded, and dropped the poppet into a deep pocket in her skirt. As she approached the group around the bonfire, Rebeka saw how weak and low they all were. Dirt outlined the deep wrinkles etched into Millicent’s skin, and one of Abigail Cullender’s eyes was swollen shut, swallowed by a purple and black bruise. Bridgit Corey’s arm hung at an odd and useless angle as she leaned into Foster Lacy—he in ripped breeches and a single boot. Mercy Broadstreet stood on Foster’s other side. Rebeka was overcome with an aching tenderness for them all. Even for her cousin, Faith Osborne, who was the cause of it all.

Faith’s hair was full of leaves, and the dirt on her face was streaked with the tears she had shed, and was still shedding, over the death of her only child, Dorcas, who had been hung a fortnight ago on Gallows Hill. Looking at Faith, Rebeka was stirred to empathy: how terrible to have watched the life being smothered from the one for whom you cared the most.

And yet, Rebeka knew, Dorcas would not have been hanged but for Faith’s own folly. Nor would the rest of them be in such danger, forced to make quick business of what Rebeka and Millicent had intended to be a prolonged and glorious event.

Rebeka touched the magic lancet that hung from her neck on a braided chain of human hair and reminded herself that Faith was not one of them, that Faith should not be here, partaking of this sacred ritual; it was Dorcas who was of the coven, Dorcas whose power, if it were present, would allow the coven to unchain itself from humanness and ascend to immortality. But now that Dorcas was lost to them, three more Immortalises would have to be performed and three more human lifetimes would have to be endured before the coven could regain the power necessary to reach eternal life among the sages.

Rebeka entered the circle, promising herself that, care as she might for Faith, she would complete the poppet’s curse before this Immortalis was done. Although vengeance was not in her nature, the sages had made it known to her that Faith must pay for her deeds.

With the crescent moon to her back, Rebeka lowered a wooden dipper into the pockmarked pot. She lifted the full dipper and turned to Millicent, offering her the first sip of the liquid. Heliotrope, sage, malaxis, christianwort, heart of lubin, aconite, she chanted as Millicent drank, her voice vibrating with power. To live, one must die. Although Rebeka knew the goodmen would soon be upon them with their rifles and their dogs and their chains, she spoke the words she had written with clarity and deliberation. To die for future life is the privilege of the few.

As Rebeka passed the dipper around the circle, the hem of her cloak dragging along the ground, Millicent began the story of the Immortalis. We come to this ocean that carves the edge of the earth, to perform the first great Immortalis, she said. "It is a deep magic Rebeka and I have crafted to insure that our seven souls shall be reborn together again, and again, and again.

One plus zero plus one, Millicent continued. One hundred and one. Every one hundred and one years until the great millennium, in 1793, and in 1894, and in 1995, we shall meet upon the ocean’s sand under a waxing crescent moon to perform the Immortalis: to give up our present forms, to meld our souls and our energies, until we are able to reach the sages and our immortality.

The wind picked up and brought with it the whooshing sound of movement: the sound of something, or someone, approaching. Millicent froze.

Rebeka held her arms wide in a gesture of comfort. ‘Tis only a bird, she said as a long-necked heron dove between the killdeer and the pickerelweed at the water’s edge. Only a bird.

Millicent sighed and concluded her story. And in each new incarnation our coven shall grow in knowledge and in power and in the magical crafts, she said. Until we have learned all there is to learn, until we are able to leave behind the shackles of our human carapace.

As Millicent’s words were carried away by the wind, Rebeka turned to the dark water, its waves pulled by the force of the new moon. Slowly, she walked across the sand and into the ocean, stopping when the water flowed just above her waist; her cloak swirled as it rode the restless waves. She turned and beckoned for the others to follow.

They stepped into the sea: Millicent and Mercy held hands to keep from stumbling on the slippery rocks; Foster helped Abigail; Bridgit and Faith clutched each other tightly. Slowly, the six made their way to where Rebeka stood.

When they were a circle once more, enfolded and rocked by the bone numbing water, Rebeka stepped into the middle and tugged the ribbon that gathered the neck band of her cloak. As the cloak fell open, she pulled out the lancet. It was a physician’s lancet, and concealed within its wooden case, carved with serpents, pinecones, frogs, and a winged caduceus, were four keen-edged blades. Reverently, Rebeka opened the lancet and fanned the knives above her head. I wield the lancet of heaven, she whispered into the fog that hung in ghostlike wisps over the ocean. The touch of this divine blade shall carry us high.

To die for future life is the privilege of the few, the coven chanted.

The touch of this divine blade shall ensure breath be with us for all eternity, Rebeka said, touching each of the four blades to her nose, to her lips, and to the soft spot at the base of her neck. To live, one must die.

No! Faith cried, pulling her hands from the circle. ‘Tis against God’s will.

Rebeka reached out and took Faith’s hand in hers. This must be done, she said softly.

Muffled sounds from upriver interrupted Rebeka. This time the sounds were not the natural noises of the marsh; this time they were the cries of men, the thud of horses’ hooves. Rebeka turned to Faith. Look at me, she ordered. When Faith raised her eyes, she was caught within Rebeka’s unblinking stare. You shall do as we do, Rebeka said.

I-I … Faith stuttered.

You shall do as we do, Rebeka repeated, her gaze burrowing deeper and deeper into Faith’s eyes, deep into the core of Faith’s being. You shall say what we say: ‘To live, one must die.

Faith’s eyes were fixed on Rebeka, trancelike and dazed. To live, one must die, she repeated in a stilted and disembodied voice. To live, one must die.

Torchlights flickered through the naked tree branches and the sound of barking dogs was carried by the wind. Rebeka turned from Faith to Millicent. Faith will fallow my will, Rebeka told her friend. Then she bowed her head in a gesture of both respect and farewell. Go to new life, Millicent Glover. We shall meet again soon.

At Rebeka’s words, Millicent plunged a single blade into the soft spot at the hollow of her own neck. Deep red blood spurted into the dark waters as she twisted the knife to cut the shape of the crescent moon into her skin. To live, one must die, she whispered as she handed the lancet to Faith. Then Millicent waded toward the deep channel, lay back upon the moving waters, and let herself be carried out to sea.

Faith stood motionless in the frigid water, the lancet in her open palm.

Go to new life, Faith Osborne, Rebeka said, her eyes searing into Faith’s, ordering her to do her bidding. Faith remained frozen, the lancet at her side. Rebeka lifted her cousin’s hand and, with Faith’s fingers wrapped around the hilt, Rebeka placed the knife to the younger woman’s neck. Rebeka glanced over her shoulder; the torchlights were growing brighter and the horses’ hooves louder.

The sages have rendered judgment upon you, Rebeka told Faith. "You must sacrifice your life. And you shall be cursed to be with us, to make this same sacrifice, in every succeeding lifetime and at every succeeding Immortalis—until we have achieved our immortality and your soul is lost forever."

With her free arm, Rebeka pulled the sodden poppet from her skirt pocket and held it up to the heavens. The moon caught the dull shine of the doll’s pewter eyes and, for a moment, the thing seemed to come alive. One silver eye flashed her a roguish wink, while the other pierced straight into her soul with its depraved stare.

Those who risk the sanctity of the coven shall be punished, Rebeka said to Faith. Then she threw the doll into the ocean.

Faith gave a feeble kick as Rebeka guided the knife to the hollow of her neck, but it was apparent to all who watched that the young woman’s spirit had been broken. Rebeka pressed the blade home, slicing a deep crescent into Faith’s taut skin. With a slight tremor, Faith slipped from her grasp. Within moments, she was gone.

The other four followed in quick succession. Rebeka was the last to go. Standing alone as the frigid waves lapped at her waist, she watched the first of the goodmen break through the birch and pine trees, knowing she would be gone before they were able to detect her form upon the water. As the throng of horses and dogs and men thundered toward the long spit of sand, she cut a deep crescent into her own neck and cast the sacred lancet back toward shore.

As she knew it would, the lancet flew as if it had wings over the water and the sandy beach, until it dropped into a crevice between a large outcropping of rocks. Rebeka noted exactly where the lancet had set down and then lay herself upon the waters, thinking of Faith Osborne, cursed to unwillingly sacrifice her life in 1793 and again in 1894 and again in 1995.

It had to be done, Rebeka thought as she let the swiftly moving waves carry her far into the night. Justice had to be done.

Deborah Sewall carefully closed the cover over the yellowed parchment pages from which she had been reading. Placing her hand on the book’s leather spine, she raised her eyes and gazed into the five rapt faces before her. Although she and Rebeka shared the same soul—were, in essence, the same person—the intervening centuries had hardened that soul. For Deborah had been forced to endure, as Rebeka Hibbens never had, the consequences of Faith Osbome’s deed.

Deborah’s eyes peered into the shadowy darkness of the small room. And as we did in 1692 and 1793 and 1894, she told those assembled at her feet, so too shall we do in 1995.

Two

LAUREN FREEMAN DROPPED TO AN EMPTY BENCH AND inspected the small health food store on the other side of JFK Street. RavenWing was etched into the shop’s window in elongated letters that filled the plate glass, serifs dripping into the casing. The store was one of many squeezed into two matched gray and orange buildings, each twin outlined by octagonal bays crowned with pointed roofs and orange dental molding. Half a dozen restaurants, two boutiques, a psychologist, anda résumé service were layered above and below as well as next to RavenWing. In front of the buildings, two groups of students were distributing fliers; one set of flier people accosted passersby with green sheets of paper, while the other group taped pink ones to lampposts and street signs. Lauren couldn’t help smiling: Harvard Square at its best.

Meet me at RavenWing at three, Jackie Pappas had told her that morning. "I think Deborah’s going to come across with the chronicle. Jackie’s voice had italicized the words. This could be our big break, she had added before hanging up. Lauren shook her head, wondering how she had managed to get herself into a position where her big break" was meeting a woman who claimed to be the reincarnation of a seventeenth-century witch.

It wasn’t as if she didn’t have enough to do in the twentieth century: She needed to get a batch of books from Jackie’s house for the graduate seminar in historiography she was auditing; she had fifty quizzes to grade for Dr. Conklin’s Making of the Modern World course; her son Drew needed to be picked up from his extended day program before she got a late fine—again; not to mention her empty refrigerator, the pile of dirty laundry next to her bed, and the ever expanding dust balls that were threatening to take over her apartment. She stood and dashed across the street, cutting in front of a slow moving pickup truck and scowling at the driver when he honked at her.

Reaching the half flight of stairs that led up to RavenWing, Lauren scanned the sidewalks for Jackie, although she had little hope her friend would be on time: Jackie was always breathlessly and apologetically late. Waving away the flier people, Lauren leaned against the wrought iron railing. These witches were Jackie’s contacts, and Lauren was disinclined to enter the store without her.

When Jackie had first proposed they coauthor a book together, Lauren had been flabbergasted that a woman of Jackie’s caliber would even consider her. Only twelve years Lauren’s senior, Jackie was aeons further professionally. Jackie was a well-respected, tenured full professor, while Lauren—although thirty-eight with a son and a soon-to-be ex-husband—was just another graduate student struggling to complete her dissertation, get her PhD, and enter a world with little use for green historians. So when the history department had consented to accept the book in lieu of her doctoral dissertation, Lauren had jumped at the project.

A cold wind was blowing off the Charles River, more reminiscent of January than of late October. As a frigid blast hit her from behind, Lauren climbed the stairs with the unrealistic hope that Jackie had been early and was waiting for her inside. Wind chimes rang gently as Lauren pushed the door open. She looked around expectantly, but aside from a businesswoman engrossed in a book, a teenage girl with bad teeth stocking shelves from a stepladder, and a canary in a graceful bamboo cage, the store was empty. As the door closed softly behind her, the chimes pealed again.

Although disappointed that Jackie was nowhere in sight, Lauren was pleasantly surprised by the store itself. It was lovely: the rose-colored walls and soft recessed lighting; the slightly burnt, pungent smell of sandalwood; shelves of books clustered around a few beanbag chairs in the far corner; Mozart playing softly in the background. Somehow, this wasn’t what she had expected.

Lauren took a deep breath of the spicy-sweet air. Had she really expected the place to be dark and cave-like, filled with glowing talismans and mandrake roots and pin-studded voodoo dolls? This was nothing like that. It was comforting and earthy, almost erotic, like having all of her senses pleasantly, but subtly, stroked.

Wandering down a crowded aisle, she saw it was stocked with normal enough looking lotions and shampoos—although everything seemed to be made from bee pollen and to have names like Brainstorm and Waterfall. Then she noticed an entire section devoted to aromatherapy: tiny bottles of clary sage, neroli, and bergamot for tension relief; other concoctions to enhance meditation and well-being. Was she going to have to talk seriously with a woman who believed in aromatherapy?

Lauren glanced at her watch and headed toward a niche formed by two ceiling-high bookshelves along the back wall. The shelves were filled with books as ordinary as Diet for a Small Planet and as extraordinary as Witches Heal: Lesbian Herbal Self-Sufficiency. Some were classic, leatherbound editions; others were obviously self-published. She pulled out an herbal encyclopedia and began to flip through it.

If all goes well, our book’ll be on these shelves soon, a soft voice said in Lauren’s ear as she was enveloped in a huge bear hug. Pressing Lauren to her with one arm, Jackie waved the other at the book niche.

Despite her apprehension about the project, Lauren felt a leap of exhilaration at the thought of a book with her name on the jacket. She disengaged herself from Jackie’s voluminous wool cloak and smiled at her friend. Jackie was a handsome woman whose comfort with herself exuded from her every pore; she wore no makeup and no dye streaked her silver-white hair. Jackie’s attractiveness lay in her intelligence and enthusiasm for life—and she was astute enough to know it.

Can’t you just see it? Jackie asked, her eyes shining. "The Lost Coven of Rebeka Hibbens: Hoax, Sorcery, or Social Psychology? by Jackie Pappas, PhD, and Lauren Freeman, PhD."

As long as we don’t end up with a book that doesn’t need ‘hoax’ or ‘social psychology’ in the title, Lauren said. Not to mention the question mark.

Jackie’s laugh pealed across the store. Your open-mindedness is staggering.

Well, you’ve got to admit this is getting pretty far from our original idea, Lauren said in what she knew to be a vain attempt to buttress her position. Their initial concept for the book was a multidisciplinary investigation of an actual historical event: six women and one man convicted of witchcraft in Cambridge in 1692, who vanished from their prison cells on the eve of their executions and were never seen again. The original proposal had set out an outline for the first half to contain a description of the events, followed by chapters posing historical, social psychological, anthropological, feminist, and supernatural explanations of the disappearances. But ever since Deborah Sewall—the co-owner of RavenWing and the self-proclaimed reincarnation of Rebeka Hibbens—had told Jackie about The Chronicle of the Coven, Jackie’s plans for the format and content of the book had changed.

Jackie studied Lauren carefully with her open, childlike gaze, a gaze that was strangely congruous with the fine web of lines around her eyes. You can’t possibly believe we shouldn’t take a look at their chronicle, she finally said, shaking her head at Lauren in mock despair. Even a ‘rational’ scholar couldn’t resist a little peek.

Of course I want to look at it, Lauren said. I just think there’s a danger if we begin to take the chronicle, or this Deborah and Cassandra, too seriously. Cassandra Abbott was the other owner of Raven-Wing; she claimed to be the reincarnation of Millicent Glover, also a member of the lost coven.

I’m just keeping an open mind. Jackie’s tone clearly stated that Lauren was not.

Lauren looked down at the herbal encyclopedia she still held in her hands. Immortality and reincarnation—as well as the power of the herb violaceae to reduce growths, benign and malignant—were a bit much for her to buy. How come no one ever claims to be the reincarnation of a garbageman or a peasant? she asked. How come they’re always the reborn soul of some extraordinary person?

Jackie sighed. "I just got off the phone with Nat. That’s why I was late. He’s talked to a few people in the publishing house and apparently they’re all very excited about our new slant on Rebeka Hibbens."

Aren’t you all jumping the gun a bit? Lauren asked. Nat Abraham was their editor at Boylston Press. He had already told Jackie that if the chronicle contained even a fraction of what Deborah had hinted at, he wanted the supernatural explanation to be integrated throughout the book rather than relegated to a single hypothetical chapter. And now it sounded as if he had the publishing house behind him. We haven’t even seen the chronicle—let alone read it. The whole thing could be complete bunk. Lauren closed the encyclopedia and placed it back on the shelf.

That’s why we’re here.

I don’t know, Jack, Lauren said. "I’m just afraid that if we put too much supernatural in Rebeka Hibbens, we’re going to lose our credibility."

"Is this book about our credibility?"

Lauren ran her finger along the binding of a book written by someone named Starhawk titled The Spiral Dance: A Rebirth of the Ancient Religion of the Great Goddess. Without knowing you’re reading the work of a credible source, she finally answered, what’s the point of studying history at all?

Maybe historical research is about pushing limits—or maybe it should be, Jackie said. Getting people—and ourselves—to think in ways we’ve never thought before.

I suppose.

It was a hopeless argument: Lauren’s commitment to the painstaking, rational amassing of historical data based on primary sources was as strong as Jackie’s was to radical experimentation. She would never convince Jackie—and Jackie would never convince her. So where’s Rebeka? Lauren asked in the hope of changing the subject, though she couldn’t help adding, I’ve never met a three-hundred-year-old soul before.

Don’t be so sure, said a deep voice behind her.

Lauren whirled around and saw a tall woman with a wild mane of curly dark hair that was liberally sprinkled with gray. The woman’s eyes were an eerie white-brown, nearly transparent, and they were looking at Lauren with disquieting intensity. I’m Deborah Sewall, she said, holding out her hand.

Automatically, Lauren held out her own hand, but her eyes never left Deborah’s. The woman emanated a commanding energy. Her presence was so powerful it seemed to vibrate around her. Like her almost colorless eyes, she was simultaneously seductive and repellent.

Hi, Lauren finally said. Lauren Freeman.

Deborah nodded and took Jackie’s hand in both of hers. Please come with me.

Where’s Cassandra? Jackie asked.

Cassandra’s on a knowledge quest—a stained-glass course in Vermont. We all do it toward the end, Deborah said. Knowledge gained at the tail of a lifetime is the most enduring.

Lauren tried to catch Jackie’s attention to share her astonishment at the confident manner in which Deborah had delivered this decidedly odd piece of information. But Jackie was watching Deborah with an inscrutable expression and did not meet Lauren’s eye.

After pausing to give a few instructions to the teenage girl, Deborah ushered them into a back room that obviously served as both storage chamber and office. The room was long and low and lit only by a small, dirty window on the rear wall. Deborah snapped on a floor lamp; the occult symbols cut into the lamp shade threw odd shapes of light over some portions of the room, while casting deep shadows into others.

Following Deborah and Jackie, Lauren stepped around burlap bags covered with strange letters and stamps denoting their place of origin: the Maldive Islands, Benghazi, Dondra Head. Shelves, loaded down with books, candles, and hundreds of wax figures, circled the room. The shelves held so many dark pockets that the pieces hit by the irregular light were edged with a sharpness that seemed to expand them beyond three dimensions. So this was RavenWing’s dark underside, Lauren thought, wrapping her arms around herself. She wondered if Deborah had an underside also.

Deborah cleared cartons of incense and vitamins from chairs at a long table, then motioned for Lauren and Jackie to sit. She remained standing. We’ve never shown our chronicle to an outsider before, she began. But I had a vision the sages wished us to share our knowledge with you. Deborah turned her intense gaze from Jackie to Lauren. Although this gift is not without danger.

Lauren shifted her eyes to the shelf behind Deborah. It overflowed with wax forms: normal-looking tapered candles; waxen pentacles and pinecones; a very tall, winged caduceus. A life-size mask of a man who appeared to be breathing leaves was highlighted by the lamp’s beam. Meeting the mask’s deep-set, shadowy gaze, Lauren shivered and quickly pulled her eyes back to Deborah’s.

I see you’re going to have difficulty with what I’m about to tell you, Deborah said, looking at Lauren. But you’re an historian—you’ve studied religion, seen its power, its mystery. Tell me, she demanded, what is a religion?

You want me to answer that question? Lauren asked. Deborah nodded, and Jackie gave her a whimsical smile. Well, Lauren began slowly, I guess you could say it’s a system of beliefs about how to live life. A set of constructs explaining the unexplainable.…

Deborah nodded again. And to explain the unexplainable, one must have faith. All religions—Christianity, Judaism, Islam, whatever—depend on it. One must believe in miracles, whether they be the virgin birth or the parting of the Red Sea. And our religion is no different.

Although your miracles are, Jackie said.

I know it’s hard for people to believe, but you’re exactly right. Deborah ran her fingers through her hair, pulling it into an even wilder mass around her head. "The Chronicle of the Coven is similar to your Bible. It’s full of knowledge, history, philosophy, religion, magic. It contains the story of our founders. Morality tales. Fables."

Jackie leaned her elbows on the table and looked up at Deborah. Fables like Moses receiving the Ten Commandments? Like Lot’s wife turning to salt? she asked. Can you tell us one?

Deborah’s irises paled to a dusty white as she looked past Jackie into a place and time far beyond the walls of RavenWing. Our most sacred artifact is Rebeka’s lancet. We have many tales of its power to bring forth our immortality—or to destroy us.

Rebeka Hibbens? Lauren asked.

Deborah grinned and Lauren was jolted by the seductiveness of her smile. Rebeka Hibbens was a very powerful witch, Deborah said. Her magic created the lancet that will allow us to break free from the chains of humanness.

This time Jackie met Lauren’s eye; she shook her head slightly.

But according to our lore, Deborah continued, if the lancet is ever lost or destroyed, the coven will be too. Every member will cease to exist and every soul lose its chance at immortality.

Did the lost coven lose the lancet? Jackie asked. Is that what happened to them?

The coven was never lost, Deborah said patiently. And neither was the lancet. One part of the chronicle, ‘The Book of Mahala,’ tells the story of what did happen—

Mahala? Jackie interrupted.

Mahala is what Rebeka was—is—called by the coven. It’s a term of reverence meaning ‘wise one,’ but it also connotes deep respect and affection.

And ‘The Book of Mahala’? Jackie prompted.

The book describes what life was like in 1692. Why the coven was arrested. How the escape was accomplished.

Lauren’s heart began to pound as she listened to Deborah. She glanced at Jackie. How stupid she had been, focusing on the supernatural angle and Deborah’s slightly deranged behavior. She had missed the whole point. This was a primary source from the time in history that fascinated her the most: an account of day-to-day life in the late 1600s written by someone who had lived then, using paper and ink made then, in her own words, with her own misspellings.

Lauren had spent the better part of the past five years reading and studying Colonial history—so much so that she sometimes felt as if she were actually living in the seventeenth century, especially in her dreams, when she imagined she was wandering through smokehouses hung with huge hams or sitting at a foot wheel, spinning flax thread into linen. Even if ninety percent of this so-called chronicle was bunk, it could still provide incredible insights. To discover a new primary source was the stuff of a scholar’s dreams. Who wrote this book? she asked.

Rebeka Hibbens.

Lauren clasped her hands together; her palms were damp. What kind of condition is it in? Can we turn the pages? The last three-hundred-year-old document I used was kept under glass and had to be read at the library.

The chronicle isn’t actually that old, Deborah said slowly. It was written in the late nineteenth century by Harriet Reardon Smith—one of Rebeka’s reincarnations.

Oh, Lauren said, letting her breath out in a rush.

As the daughter and wife of wealthy men, Harriet got to study art, literature, and history—but wasn’t allowed to use her knowledge, Deborah continued. So she poured all her learning and all of what she knew of the past into the chronicle. It’s a masterpiece of social and historical interpretation. She looked at Lauren as if her colorless eyes could see into Lauren’s soul. If I do say so myself.

Lauren’s shoulders slumped and she closed her eyes for a moment. Was Deborah saying she was both the reincarnation of Rebeka and of Harriet? That a book written in the nineteenth century was a primary source from the seventeenth? "You mean this Harriet Reardon Smith wrote down what she remembered from her life two hundred years before—when she actually was Rebeka Hibbens?"

That, along with the collective memory of the coven, Deborah said as calmly as if she were commenting on the weather.

Lauren stared at the poised woman before her. How could someone intelligent enough to offer a cogent argument on the functions of religion, someone together enough to run a successful business, be so clearly delusional? Unable to come up with even a semblance of an answer, Lauren turned to Jackie. It isn’t a primary source.

It all depends on your definition. Jackie’s voice was thoughtful and deliberate. Although I guess it really is something new altogether: a primary source written two hundred years after the fact.

But isn’t that a contradiction in terms? Lauren argued. "If it’s after the fact, it’s not a primary source."

Deborah cleared her throat. "The Chronicle of the Coven is much more than just narrative history. The chronicle also tells of magic spells and potions and reveals the mysteries of reincarnation, as well as the rites for consummating the Immortalis—the ritual we reenact at the ocean’s edge, under a waxing crescent moon, every one hundred and one years. The ritual that will ultimately secure our immortality. Deborah paused for a long moment. And it is here that the danger