Chapter 1

Looking across the large room, confusion locked me in place. I had no idea what I was going to do. I watched as a very pretty woman in a sexy nurse costume looked around her in every direction. It was clear that she was looking for something or someone.

A man in a wolf costume stepped up to her then. She looked up at him and smiled. "Joey?" she asked. He shook his head. She wasn't rude or even impolite to him, but her sense of disappointment was apparent. Her shoulders slumped. Her head and chin dropped and her beautiful smile vanished. After chatting for a moment the wolf moved on.

A few moments later, Iron man moved in on her. His costume was a technological marvel. It had flashing lights, an impressive laser that shot from the arms and the visor lifted mechanically to reveal the wearer's face. I wished I had that costume. I love Iron man.

Somehow though once the wearer's face was revealed, her disappointment became even more pronounced. I used the plastic representation of a very stylized Hessian Cavalry battle axe that came with my own costume to scratch my head. I really had no idea what I should do. Since my head was actually where the chest of my costume was, it looked very strange.

I didn't care how it looked. If anyone watching had wanted to see strange, I could always scratch my ass with the axe. Besides, over the past few weeks I'd been through so many things that I no longer cared what things looked like. Life is simply too short to worry about appearances. Things aren't always what they look like anyway.

In fact, if it wasn't for me and the tiny redhead I was staring at, along with another group of people who had now scattered to the winds, none of these people would be here to enjoy this Halloween party in the first place.

Looking at the woman again, her sexy nurse costume seemed kind of ... out of place. She was kind of tiny and not really the sex kitten type; at least not on the surface. But as I've said, things aren't always what they seem.

Rebecca's body is deceptive. Yes, I know her name. I know it very well. You see, I'm the Joey that she keeps asking for. And right now, I'm both very afraid and very confused. Until very recently, that deceptive little body was my playground.

Rebecca is a natural redhead. She has the milky skin and freckles that go along with it. She's also lied about her height for most of her life. When we first started dating, she told me that she was 5 foot 1. Our first trip to an amusement park brought out the truth. When we stepped up to get on the roller coaster and the teen ager running the ride noticed that even though she was drinking a beer she was significantly shorter than the 5 foot tall safety line, he politely asked her how tall she is.

"I'm 5 foot 1," she said, gripping my hand tightly.

"Can you step over to the board ma'am?" he asked. Again he was very polite and very professional.

"Why?" asked Rebecca, sharply.

"Ma'am, I could lose my job if I break the safety rules and I'm not sure you're tall enough," he said nervously. The people in the line behind us were growing anxious, including Rebecca's fourteen year old niece Kali and her friend, who had come to Kent Park with us.

"Go on Aunt Beck," said Kali. "I want to get on the coaster."

Rebecca stepped up to the line trying her best to stand on her tiptoes without it being obvious. There was at least an inch of daylight between the top of her head and the bottom of the safety line.

"You're too short. Come back next year Punkin," snorted someone behind us. I knew what was coming. Most of the time, Rebecca was as timid as a fawn. She was very soft spoken and sweet. But...

Her face got as red as her hair suddenly and her beautiful green eye flashed. Back then I smiled because I'd seen it before. Back then I had no idea how dangerous that tiny woman could be.

"Fine!" she yelled. "I didn't want to ride your fuckin' roller coaster anyway! I'm going to Cedar Point next weekend to ride some real coasters!"

"Wait for us Aunt Beck," screamed Kali as she and her girlfriend got into seats on the ride. She looked at me.

"I'll be here when you get back Joey," she said.

"I can't go either," I said. "The math doesn't add up."

"Let me guess," she said. "Since you're an engineer, you've calculated the weight of the cars, the speed of the coaster, the diameters of the bends and the height of the rises and you think it's unsafe to ride, right?"

"Nope, it's much simpler math," I said. "Factor one, I love you Beck. Factor two, we will always be together. So one plus one, adds up to the two of us on the ground." Her eyes got wet then. Since I knew she hated to cry in front of people. So I threw in, "Shorty."

"I am not short!" she said loudly. She's actually four foot eleven.

Her thick red tresses are full of waves and curls. They hang down her back nearly to her waist. Sometimes, I swear that hair has nerves and can feel things. When we first moved in together, I was informed that besides owning her body and her heart, I owned that hair and was responsible for it.

That meant a lot of time brushing it and combing the tangles out of it when she got out of the shower. And almost every time I brushed her hair we ended up having sex. It got to the point where our friends would tell her not to do her hair if we were going out to meet them, because we probably wouldn't show up.

You really can't tell when she's clothed, but Rebecca has fairly large breasts. They look odd on her tiny body, but they're so soft that clothes seem to compress them. The first time I saw her naked I was shocked.

Her butt is really nice too. When she bends over you can see her sparsely furred fiery thatch of pubic hair. That's one of her ways of teasing me. She bends over knowing that red fur drives me wild.

As the room fills up with happy people some of whom are trying to meet someone special and others who just want to score, she seems to become more and more withdrawn. A couple of really cute women in costumes that leave very little to the imagination try to convince me to dance with them.

"Maybe later," I told them. They're really nice, really drunk and really pretty, but I came here tonight, to either put away my doubts and move forward with the woman I love. Or failing that, I want to just move forward.

You see, a few days ago, Rebecca and I went through something that makes me wonder whether or not we have any kind of future. At this point I have more questions than answers when it comes to not only what happened, but what it means for us.

Before you go any further, I should tell you that THIS isn't how it started. But it is how it started for me.

I know the whole saving the world thing is probably important, but to me my personal problems are at the center of this.

I work at a manufacturing center in Madison Heights, Michigan. We make all kinds of parts for anyone who contracts us. Our only scruples involve getting paid. So we make parts for GM one week and that Italian company, Chrysler, the next. My shifts rotate on a monthly basis and this month I'm supposedly working midnights. Unfortunately or fortunately, depending on whose point of view you're looking at things from, we lost power to the entire complex 15 minutes before my shift was supposed to start. So after shedding a few tears about a lost night of production, I sent my crew home, while visions of my favorite little fire crotch danced in my head.

So I jumped in my Honda and high tailed it for home. I was about three blocks away from the home I shared with Beck, when I noticed her Fusion heading through the intersection. I know my woman, or at least I thought I did. And she wasn't driving like Beck. She was flying. Beck is a little afraid of driving so she drives like an old lady. Her parents were killed in a car accident and she didn't get her license until she was 22.

I wondered why she hadn't called me to tell me that she was going out. Then I figured that maybe it was an emergency and she was in a hurry. I followed her to see what was going on.

She stopped on front of a house that I didn't recognize. There were a couple of older, creepy looking guys out there and she walked right up to one of them. The four of them went inside of the house. It didn't make sense. I wondered if the old guys were friends of her family or relatives. I thought that I knew most of her family and I didn't recognize those guys at all.

I was torn. I didn't know whether to go to the house and knock on the door or to wait and see what happened. I didn't think that she'd be in there for very long, so I decided to wait and see what happened. After about twenty minutes I got the idea to call her. I dialed her number and it rang and rang until it went to voicemail. It wasn't like Beck to ignore my calls.

I got out of the car and walked up to the house. I looked in a window and all I saw were naked bodies. Three or four dirty, ratty looking older guys were running a train on Beck and fucking the shit out of her. My fists opened and closed reflexively as I watched.

She was on her back in the middle of a living room that looked like an indoor garbage dump. One guy was between her widely spread legs with his bony, misshapen hips thrusting into her as fast and as hard as he could. Becky's pelvis rose to meet every thrust from the guy and her head bobbed up and down as she sucked the rancid looking pecker of another of the guys who leaned over her.

Beck was eerily quiet. She was usually very vocal when we had sex. But that could have been because her mouth was obviously full.

The guy screwing her started to lengthen his strokes as if he was winding up. Then he rammed her as hard as he could and she reached her free hand around his waist to hold him inside while rubbing her pubic bone against his. I could see the muscles in his hips clenching as he came. "Ahhhhhgggh!" he yelled. Then he pulled out, stood up and wiped his dick on her face. Another guy moved in to take his place. This guy tapped her on her shoulder and said something to her. She flipped over and he started fucking her doggy style.

He rammed his pelvis against her ass so hard that it had to be hurting her. But she still didn't utter a sound. But her mouth was still full. The new guy that she was sucking was ramming her throat as hard as the guy in her other end was slamming her hips.

The guy fucking her acted as if he hadn't had any pussy since Nixon was in office and was doing his best to bring back his glory days. But those days were probably only memories now and for good reasons since he couldn't last very long in Beck's extremely tight, fiery hot gash. After only a few strokes he too grabbed for her tiny waist to hold on to as he began to spasm and jerk uncontrollably while he flooded her insides with whatever noxious fluids his body put out.

The next guy had a different idea. Even as his predecessor staggered away still groaning he started trying to loosen Beck's anus up with a dirty greasy finger. He dipped the finger into her pussy to scoop out some of the slippery fluids the first two had deposited. Beck obligingly lifted her ass even higher to give him access, while beginning to suck even harder on the dick in her mouth. My mouth dropped open in shock.

The same woman that had pledged eternal love for me, yet only gave me blowjobs on my birthday and Christmas, because she wasn't that kind of girl, was sucking a homeless guy's dick like she was fifty feet under water and it was the only airline. Meanwhile another guy was lining his dick up with her supposedly virgin asshole. An asshole that I, the idiot who married her, got evil looks if I brushed against it while we had sex.

It just pissed me off and mystified me even more. The bum at her butt pushed his dick forward sinking in. She paused for a second, making me think that she'd come to her senses and was about to revolt against the intrusion. But I was wrong again. She spread her legs a little more, allowing him to slide it in more easily. Then he started pumping away at her ass while she pushed back against him in perfect synchronization.

The easy way that they got their rhythm together while she continued to puff away at his comrade's dick seemed practiced to me. I wondered how many times they had done this. I have to admit that I wasn't thinking about the future. As I watched in horror, with tears flowing down my cheeks, I began to wonder about my future. I suddenly realized that I didn't have one. At least not with the woman I had so recently married.

I had seen enough, so I started to walk away from the scene. As I did I heard the roar as yet another man emptied himself into Beck's welcoming body. I got into my car and drove away. I drove around for a while with no destination in mind. I just drove as my mind wandered. I drove for hours and suddenly realized that I'd been driving for most of the night. In fact, it was getting close to the time I usually woke up. I had several decisions to make.

I knew that during the day, I needed to find a lawyer. As much as it had seemed a good decision at the time, I began to regret having married Beck. If we'd just continued to live together, I could just walk away. But the pressure from her family and even my own insecurity had pushed me to pop the question.

I can still remember the conversation as if it was yesterday instead of almost a year ago. We'd been lying on the deck behind our house that the two of us had just built. It had taken us months of weekends, since we weren't contractors. Pure desire and a lot of "Do it yourself" videos from Home Depot had helped us. That evening as we lay there under the stars sharing a Dos Equis on the deck we'd built ourselves, I realized that the little redheaded creature I held in my arms was the most important thing in my universe.

"Beck, will you please marry me?" I asked. I don't know if it was the desperation in my voice at the thought that without some kind of legal thing to hold us together, she might someday leave me, or if she'd begun to succumb to the external pressure as well, but she answered me quickly.

"Joey, I've been waiting for you to ask me that since the first second I set eyes on you," she said quietly. "In my heart, we've been married since five minutes after we met. I love you so much I don't think I could live without you. But, if you really want to spend a big assed chunk of our money, to please our relatives and feed them; Yes, Honey, I'll marry you."

I sat up and looked down at her. At that moment I was more filled with love for her than any man had ever been for any woman throughout history. Okay maybe I'm exaggerating that part but you get the idea. I looked into her eyes and saw nothing but love for me reflected back. But I saw something else there too and it scared the living shit out of me. When I looked into the eyes of my beloved, for a fleeting instant, I thought I saw a flame burning in those green orbs that I worshipped.

I blinked and it was gone but a chill had gone down my spine. I had the feeling that I'd seen something that I shouldn't have seen. I chalked it up to a reflection of the moon in those big pretty green eyes. It had to be. Beck had a bit of a temper but there was nothing evil about her. She rarely ever even used swear words.

I put the memory down and returned my mind to my car and my plans. As soon as I woke up the next afternoon to get ready for work, I had to get myself a lawyer. I needed a really good one and I needed him fast. After what I'd just seen, there was no way I could stay with her.

Interlude: Six months earlier: This is how it really started

Spirits moved in the darkness of the full moon. There were many spirits moving here and most of them were very old spirits that had not moved on. Some remained tethered to the earthly plane to watch over loved ones. Others remained because they were angry about things that had happened while they were still mortal. Those spirits in particular, grew very powerful with time. In the spirit world the physics work differently. Things like anger, things like intent, become power.

On this particular night in early spring, the rare alignment of a particular group of stars superimposed over the full moon rendered the veil between the dimensions thinner than it had been in over four hundred years. Something far older than any of the spirits here, reached out to communicate and by doing so establish a connection to the spirit realm. This connection was only the first tenuous step in the being's plan though.

"Bridget Bishop can you hear me?" the voice asked in a language that sounded like the rustling of the leaves against the ground. Humans and animals in the area reacted to the voice. Humans felt a chill in their spines and all but the bravest knew fear. Some would run, knowing nothing of why they'd chosen at that moment to flee. The brave would get their hackles up and prepare to fight, although there was nothing around them to do battle with.

The animals on the other hand would simply run and keep running until they felt safe again.

"Bridget Bishop, first wronged ... most angry!" cried the voice across the plane of the universe. "You were the first to die, due to the pure stupidity of the masses and the greed of a few."

Even the spirit the voice tried to contact could be lured out or baited into answering.

"Tituba was the first to be tried unjustly in the Witch trials. Get your facts straight," answered the spirit.

"My facts are correct, dead human," answered the voice. The voice had accomplished its mission as soon as Bridget's vanity caused her to answer. All the being had required was for someone, anyone to answer his summons to complete the circuit and give him a connection into the spirit world. Bridget Bishop, by answering him had provided that. He decided to go further. "Though Tituba was tried, she confessed. She was sold into slavery and lived out her life. Tituba, though not very powerful was indeed a witch. Her abilities came from teachings from her homeland and were akin to voodoo."

The rustling sound grew louder. If any living beings had been in the area it would have sounded almost as if the wind spoke words.

"Is it not ironic Bridget Bishop, that although you were not a witch you were the first to die. You died because you were a very powerful woman. You, like many of the women in the current age, knew everything ... except how to keep her mouth shut. Men in power or authority in your own town saw you as a threat and wanted what you had. So they named you a witch and claimed all you'd built."

The being fed off of the waves of anger that came from Bridget.

"Your land, where you grew such luscious fruit, is now a restaurant. Streets stand on what was once your land. Land that by right should belong to your descendants ... except that you have no descendants do you?" it asked.

"If you believe in the power of numbers, little witch, this should be your time. Three hundred and twenty one years have passed since you were murdered. Three - two - one, is a powerful sequence. It is the sequence of unmaking. In this year and this one alone you can undo what was done to you..."

"Yes," cried the spirit of Bridget Bishop.

"You can have everything that was taken from you returned!" hissed the voice.

"Yes," cried Bridget louder.

"You can regain a human form and walk the earth again!" crooned the voice joyously.

"Oh yes," shouted Bridget.

"You can wreak vengeance on the souls of those who did this to you!" cried the voice.

"Yes!" gushed Bridget triumphantly.

"But ... wait..." said the voice softly. "You aren't actually a witch though ... are you?"

" ... But ... I ... I" whined Bridget's essence.

"No matter," said the voice. "I can teach you what you must know. To begin, you need power. For now, you are naught but a pissed off disembodied loser. In order to get what you seek, you must be a thousand times more powerful than you are now. Every spell you master will grant you power. Every alliance you make will give you aid. But in order to broker those deals with the darkness you must have power."

"But how do I get power?" asked Bridget.

"You don't get power," snapped the voice angrily. "It's not like you're going after a fucking slurpee. Power has to be taken. It must be wrenched violently from those who have it. And all the while, they will try to take yours. There are those around you, who are linked to you by events of the past. If you add their power to yours you will be three times as powerful as you are now."

"Tituba and Giles Corey," said Bridget.

"Exactly," sang the being. "But they are as strong as you are. To get their power will take a few steps. First you need an ally on the earthly plane. You need someone to act as your agent until your power grows sufficient to affect things in the physical world. I have someone in mind."

"Reach out with your thoughts and call to the one we seek," said the voice.

Mason Devereaux

I wheeled the stretcher into the X-ray lab. I was chatting about baseball with the 88 year old man lying on it. I introduced him to the imaging tech that would perform the x-rays on his chest, ribs, right elbow and hip. "Bobby here will take good care of you, Mr. Jenkins," I said to him. Even as I left the room the buzzing in my pocket made me smile.

I flicked out my iPhone and looked at the screen. I rushed out of the room and down the hall. I stepped into one of the lounges that were reserved for staff to take their breaks in.

"Hey," I said into the phone. "I thought I was having terrible luck tonight. But now I have nun," I quipped. It was a terrible pun, but I knew it would make her laugh.

"I must be spending too much time in the cemeteries," she said back. "My heart beats faster hearing some dead guy's voice."

"Hearing your voice makes me wish that my heart still beat," I said.

"I love you Mason," she said.

"Piety, I don't know what you've done to me, but I've never felt this way about anyone, EVER," I said.

"I just wanted to hear your voice before we go after this Wendigo," said Piety.

"Where the hell are you?" I asked suddenly. I always worried about her when she was in the field.

"I'm in Canada, Honey," she said. I could hear the pleasure in her voice. "That's where they keep the Wendigos, ya know?" she sounded absolutely cheerful.

"Piety, why do you sound so damned cheerful?" I asked.

"Because, someone cares for me so much that he gets angry and worried about me doing my job. It's cute," she chirped. "But don't worry, Mason. Everything that's holy is on my side. Besides, I don't really think there are any Wendigos left. No one has seen one on over a hundred years. This probably won't be any worse than that werewolf we went after last week. It just turned out to be a frigging bear that was attacking tourists in a park for food. The bear had gotten rabies somehow. That thing threw us all around and scratched the crap out of us. Finally, we took it from three sides. Patience shot it with her crossbow to wound it. I distracted it and while it came after me, Penance crushed its skull with her mace."

"Score one for the angry nun," I laughed. "Tell Big Green that I owe her one for protecting my angel."

"Awww!" she crooned. "Is that how you see me? Am I your angel?"

"Yeah, but you say that as if it's a good thing," I laughed.

"It's a very good thing. I like being your angel," she said.

"Then you really didn't read the bible too well," I laughed.

"What do you mean?" she asked.

"Piety, angels aren't the way that people think they are. Whenever God wanted to fuck some shit up, he sent an angel. Go get that Wendigo. And then come and see me. It's been too long," I said. "I'm immortal but I can't wait that long."

"Mason, it's only been a week," she said.

Rebecca

The day started out shitty and went downhill from there. To begin with I woke up and felt like I was alone. Our bed is a queen sized sleigh bed. It's cozy but it's really not that big. Even before we were married, I got used to waking up in Joey's arms. But there he was rolled as far away from me as the bed would allow. One of his legs was hanging over the side of the bed. I felt like if I gave him one little push, he'd spill onto the floor.

I smelled my armpit because I couldn't remember if I'd taken a shower the night before. I smelled clean and soapy. As a matter of fact, my skin was still slightly damp as if I'd just taken another shower. And my legs felt funny. They felt like they'd been forced apart and held there for a long period of time. My whole body felt as if I'd had really rough sex. That was strange because I'd never had rough sex. I don't think I'd like it. I'd only been with one man before Joey, and he was a fumbling twenty year- old that I'd met in college.

The idea of letting some guy turn what was supposed to be an act of love into some kind of animalistic, chest beating trip to downtown pound town just didn't appeal to me. I love my Joey. I love the gentle and loving things he did with me. At that moment I couldn't think of anything I wanted more.

I reached out to stroke his hair and he moved in his sleep as if he was disgusted. I had never seen Joey respond to my touch like that. He must've been having a really bad dream. For some reason, I felt really bad. I felt as if I'd done something to let him down somehow. I just couldn't figure it out. He'd told me that he didn't want dinner. And I'd gotten really tired last night. The last thing I remember was him kissing me goodnight and tucking me in just before he left to go to work. He was probably upset about something that had happened on the job. I wondered why he was taking it out on me. When he woke up the two of us were going to have a talk.

Interlude

Bridget reached out with her essence, the way she'd been taught. At first it was hard in more ways than one. For most of her life she'd been the typical woman of her era. She'd been raised in the church. She'd been raised to believe in God and fear evil. It had done her no good. Where was her God when they put the rope around her neck and took her lands?

Bridget's mind touched something. It wasn't exactly human ... at least it wasn't anymore. The creature was far older than a human being as was Bridget herself. It was over a hundred years old. It wore the clothing from a bygone era. It had an old hat placed jauntily upon its head and carried a walking stick. Bridget wasn't sure, but she couldn't remember the last time she saw anyone with a walking stick.

As she'd been taught, Bridget probed the creature's mind. She knew exactly what to say. In fact as she'd been told, she had a lot in common with the beast. They were both motivated by the same things. They both wanted revenge. The beast seemed to want revenge against three nuns. The nuns had destroyed the creature's progeny. It hated the women for that. It also felt that if the women were allowed to continue, not only would they destroy more of his kind. They might someday destroy him, if he wasn't careful.

The women also had the support of the church and a handful of magical or blessed weapons. The creature decided that some magical help of his own might come in handy ... He was willing to do Bridget's bidding in exchange for her help against the nuns. And so a pact of the most unholy was formed. What the creature didn't know was that the contract between them would be temporary at best. Bridget's plans and those of the creature would soon part ways because Bridget had her own plans for one of the nuns.

The very next night they started. Bridget reached out with her essence and found the spirit of another woman who'd been tried for witchcraft. This one had been a witch. Her spirit told Bridget's that she had never done anything evil. She had just used her knowledge of plants and herbs to make salves to heal her family's aches and pains. Sometimes she'd also make them for her neighbors and friends. She had never worshipped the devil or anything other than her lord Jesus.

Bridget laughed inside at how stupid the woman was. "Power is power," she thought. Bridget used her honeyed thoughts to get on the woman's good side. She promised that if the woman would tell her where she was buried, Bridget would see to it that fresh flowers were placed on her grave. The woman told her. Bridget relayed the information to her vampire familiar.

Moments later the vampire went to the unmarked grave, dug up the woman's remains and burned them. The long-dead witch suffered an agony she had never imagined as her spirit passed into true, everlasting death. This death was far worse than the first, because her spirit didn't pass into Heaven, Hell, or even the limbo that she'd been in for the past three hundred or so years. Her spirit simply disappeared into nothingness as if she had never existed. But in the process, Bridget gained her power.

"I feel stronger already," thought Bridget. "One down, ninety nine to go." the voice had told Bridget that in order to gain the power she needed she had to get it from other witches. Until that moment Bridget had never considered herself, just as the unfortunate creature whose spirit she'd just raped hadn't, to actually be a witch. "Who cares what they call me," she said. And her voice too was like the rustling of the wind. "If burning the witches gets me what I want, I'll burn them all."