Bloodlines (3 page)

“What if they get in and take the book?”

“They won’t get in. This room is protected now.”

“How?”

“A spell.”

“Well, couldn’t they break it?”

“Maybe, but only if they knew the exact spell I’d used. And there are a lot of them, so it would take them a while.”

Lily seemed to relax a bit and got into bed. I was tired myself now, so I put the book under my pillow.

Chapter 3

Could It Be?

We woke early the next morning. All was peaceful and life had returned to the motel. I sat at the table with coffee and the book while Lily got showered. I’d only been reading about ten minutes when she came in.

“Found anything interesting?” she asked.

“How it all began.” I told her what I knew up to that point.

We were both hungry now so we went out for breakfast. I hid the book under the floorboards beneath the bed and put another spell on the room as we left. I would instantly know if someone was trying to get in. We drove into the village and went in the same café we’d been in the day before. We were the only people there other than the staff. After breakfast we decided to walk further into the village. When we got to the corner of the street we bumped into Lucian and Jake.

“Hey.” Lucian smiled.

“Hi,” we both replied.

“How are you both today?” Jake asked.

“Fine, thank you,” Lily said, going a little pink.

“How is your studying coming on?”

“Slowly actually,” I groaned.

“Why?” Lucian asked.

“We don’t really know who we can talk to about the things we need to know. I’m not being funny but the people around here don’t seem to be very friendly. We just get glared at all the time.”

“Ah, that’s because you are in the old town. People here are still very superstitious and wary when they see a new face. Maybe you should go to the new town.”

“But we’re not here to study the new town, are we?”

“Yeah, that’s true. Well, we could try and help you out. We know a lot of the history; it gets drummed into you in our families.”

“Why?” Lily asked.

“Our families have always lived in Massachusetts, Salem mainly, so they pass the history down,” Jake told us.

“Well, we would really appreciate any help you could give us,” I replied tentatively.

“When are you free?” Lucian asked.

“Anytime.”

“Well, there’s no time like the present. Shall we go somewhere we can talk properly?”

“Yes, where?”

“We can go to my house,”

I hesitated for a moment. I looked at Lily, who nodded. “OK,” I said.

Lucian’s house was like something out of the movies. The gates stood three times my height and the place seemed to be bristling with security. You had to either buzz to get in or, in Lucian’s case, hold a key fob in front of the scanner. The approach to the house was surrounded by trees – it was beautiful.

The house, or should I say mansion, looked very old yet modern at the same time. It had been well looked after over the years. Its great stone walls reached to three stories. It had black-painted old-fashioned windows and, in some places, ivy grew. When I got out of the car all I could do was look at it in amazement. I was in a world of my own until Lily took my arm and snapped me out of it. Lucian let us in and led us into a reception room. I looked around in awe; the ceilings were high with large gold chandeliers hanging from them. There was a massive stone fireplace in the center, with new wood piled up ready to be burnt. What I assumed to be ancestral portraits hung on two of the walls. Dark wooden cabinets with glass fronts were filled with gleaming antiques.

“Make yourselves comfortable,” Lucian smiled, motioning to one of the large black sofas.

“Thanks,” we both said, taking a seat. They sat on the sofa facing us.

“So what do you need to know?” Jake asked us.

“What can you tell us? We need as much information as possible,” I told him.

“What exactly are you studying?”

“The Salem witch-hunt.”

“Ah.” Lucian said “You were right not to ask anyone in the village then; we’ll fill you in on what we can.”

“Do you want to take notes?” Jake asked.

“I have an excellent memory,” I replied.

“OK, well, despite generally being known as the “Salem” witch trials, the hearings were conducted in a variety of towns. In Salem village, in 1692, there were two girls – Betty Parris, who was nine, and her cousin Abigail Williams, who was eleven. They were the daughter and niece of the Reverend Samuel Parris, who had just become the new priest at the old parsonage. They began to have fits described as “Beyond the power of epileptic fits or disease” by a minister in Beverly…

“The girls screamed a lot, threw things around the room, made strange sounds, crawled under furniture, contorted themselves into strange positions. The girls said they felt like they were being pinched and pricked with pins. Two other young women in the village began to behave just the same and people began to talk about witches. The first three people accused and arrested for allegedly afflicting Betty, Abigail, Elizabeth Hubbard and little Ann Putnam were Sarah…” Lucian’s voice trailed off.

As soon as he mentioned the name Putnam, my eyes widened and I sat up straight.

“Something wrong?” Jake asked curiously.

“No, nothing,” I replied. “This Ann Putnam, was she some kind of a relation to John Putnam?”

“Yes, she was his daughter; he also had a son who was just over a year older than her…”

“Edward,” I said quietly to myself, but not quietly enough.

“How did you know?” Lucian asked, frowning.

“I came across the name doing research,” I lied, looking down at the beautiful cream-and-red patterned carpet.

“But Edward Putnam disappeared when he was nine years old. Not many people know about him. He isn’t in any of the history books I’ve read, so how do you know about him?”

“If he isn’t in any of the books, then how do you know?” Lily said, jumping to my defense.

“Like I told you before, it’s been passed down through the family.”

“Did John Putnam get accused of witchcraft?” I asked casually.

“Yes, he did, but I’m not telling you anymore until you tell me how you know about Edward,” he insisted. His voice had become grave.

“Well, in that case I suppose we’d best be going…”

“Hang on!”

“Thanks for the bit of help,” I said, as we made our way for the front door. As we started to open it two other guys came in in a hurry and nearly bumped into us.

“Sorry.” one of them said, then glared at me.

“It’s OK.” Lily said.

I glared back at him and a rush of anger swept over me, I recognized his voice from the previous night. He was the one who’d said, ‘Get the book!’ Then when I looked at his friend I noticed how tall he was and that he was walking with a slight limp. Lily saw the look on my face and grabbed my arm and led me to the car. As we pulled away they all stood at the door watching us.

“What was wrong with you in there?” she asked me.

“Lily, I swear to God it was them out there last night. I recognized that guy’s voice when he said sorry.”

“I don’t believe it!” Lily began.

“And the tall guy, he was walking like he had an injury. Just maybe from being attacked and thrown by an energy ball.”

“How do you want to handle this then?”

“I’m not sure yet. But there was something about that house too; I felt like I belonged there.”

“Maybe you do. Listen, don’t do anything hasty. He may just sound like the guy from last night”

“So explain the guy with the limp and how there just happened to be four of them.”

“I’m not saying you’re wrong,” Lily said defensively “You just need more proof before you go off on one. If they are innocent, you could cause yourself no end of problems and expose yourself. Try and find out more about them first – their full names, for example.”

We were quiet for the rest of the journey to the motel.

When we got back we decided to go and talk to the receptionist. Her name was Sarah; she was young and lived in the new town. She was only working here for a bit of money during the college holidays. She was really nice and very chatty.

“So do you know a guy named Lucian? He lives in a big house on the other side of the village,” Lily quizzed her.

“Ah yes, you mean Lucian Turner. Good-looking, fit.”

“That’s him. Does he hang out with three other guys?”

“Yes, the families are very close; they’re like brothers.”

“What are their names? I know Jake,” I told her.

“Yes, Jake Culver, Tyler Rickman and Danny Goodwin. My dad told me their families settled in Salem back in the early eighteenth century. They never bother with anyone else really, which is a shame. Lucian is gorgeous and Tyler, he is so funny and really cute. A lot of the girls around here would love to be with him,” she smiled to herself. “But people in this part of town tend to keep away from their families because their ancestors did or didn’t do something…I don’t really pay that much attention to it all. There are a lot of superstitious people around here and I’m sure they still believe in witches and all that mumbo-jumbo…”

“Thanks,” I smiled.

“Anytime.”

We made our way back to our room.

“Did you notice their surnames?” Lily asked.

“Yes, none of them match.”

“So they’re not the ones you’re looking for?”

“It would seem that way.”

“So aren’t you glad you didn’t do anything stupid?” she said, making it sound more like a fact than a question.

“No, Lucian said their families were some of the first to settle here, which would mean they were around during the trials, and yet that girl just told us that they didn’t settle until the early 1700s, by which time the trials were over. So one of them is lying. Plus I know for a fact I’m looking for males and they…”

“How do you know that?” she interrupted, frowning.

“Sit down, Lily. I’ll make us some coffee…I’ve got something to tell you.”

I went into the kitchen and put on the kettle. Then I sat beside her and passed her one of the two steaming mugs.

“I haven’t been completely honest with you,” I told her.

“Pardon?”

“When I said the only reason I hadn’t tracked them down before now was because I didn’t have the means too…”

“Hmm?”

“Well, I lied. I never wanted to track them down because I didn’t know about them. I thought it was just my family that were affected and that was that. I never asked questions and so I never found anything out. I was told until the time came that I wanted to know the history I could do as I pleased. And that suited me. But then about four months ago I started having dreams.”

“About what?”

“Other people like me, all male.”

“So all this started because of a few dreams,” she said, raising an eyebrow.

“Over a few weeks the dreams became more and more intense. I would remember them sometimes and not others. Some nights I would actually wake up screaming.”

“Why? What was happening?”

“I had to watch helplessly while they were being killed. They would scream at me to help them. I would try to get to them, but no matter how fast I ran I never got any closer to any of them. Then other things started to happen to me. I would hear someone calling my name when I was alone. It was a voice I didn’t recognize and it happened more and more often. It seemed like the more intense the dream was, the more I would hear the voices the following day. I thought I was losing my mind and I didn’t know where to turn, so for about three months I suffered in silence. Then it got to be too much, I was scared of going to sleep at night and I walked around with my headphones in all day, as loud as I could stand it. But it was no good; I could still hear the voices and the lack of sleep started to make me ill. That’s when I told you I had the flu. D’you remember…?

“So in the end I went and spoke to my granddad about it. I obviously couldn’t talk to my father and my mother…well, she never wanted to know anything about it. As you know, once my dad died she ignored me and avoided me as much as possible. I think she was afraid of what I was. My granddad was very poorly as you also know, and I didn’t really want to worry him but I didn’t know where else to turn. I got to him not long before he died and that’s when he gave me all the papers I showed you. That was when I learned about the other families and knew we weren’t alone. He said he knew one day the families would have to be reunited, and that the reason I was hearing voices and having the dreams was because they were trying to call out to me. To see if I actually existed. For all they knew the Putnam family could have died with Edward.”

“Oh.”

“I’m sorry I lied to you. I thought if I told you I wanted to find them because I was hearing voices and having weird dreams…”

“I’d call you crazy?” she interrupted.

“Yeah.”

“You don’t have to lie to me. Jesus, I’m the only one outside of your family that knows about this. And I’ve coped well, so I think I could have handled that.”

“I’m sorry.”

“No more lies?”

“I promise,” I nodded.

“So the voices you heard, did they sound like theirs?”

“No, the voices were, shall we say, not human. They would echo around in my head.”

“Why do the families need you all of a sudden?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t get much time with my granddad.”

“Didn’t he say anything else before he passed away?” she asked softly.

“I was with him when he died, and just before he closed his eyes he said, ‘I always knew you were the one with the strongest and purest power. Something extra runs through your veins. I knew it from the moment you were born.’ Then he tried to smile at me, but then it faded…He was gone,” I said as a tear rolled down my cheek.

“I’m sorry,” she said, taking my hand. “I didn’t know you were with him when it happened.”

“I couldn’t talk about it. I loved my granddad very much and it was painful.”

“I understand,” she said in a broken voice. She was getting upset herself now.

“So then I spent a couple of weeks going through everything.”