February 1692
Goody Martin's Home
Salem Village, Massachusetts
Steam wafted from their teacups, carrying rosemary and lavender. Lilith stood across from Goody Martin at the worn table, fire crackling in the hearth. That morning, she’d woken to a chicken’s rear in her face—Levi’s idea of a joke. After gathering eggs, she’d traded half for fresh dairy from the neighbor.
Now, as twilight bled into the sky outside, she stood at the worktable beside Goody, drinking tea and preparing dinner. Knife in hand, she sliced radishes into thin coins and chopped onions into a rough dice. The sharp sting of onion filled her eyes and she blinked hard, wiping them on her sleeve. Goody stirred the hanging pot, adding the vegetables as Lils passed them over, the broth already rich with herbs, soaking in a chicken carcass with the last of the winter carrots.
Outside, Levi had scampered off for firewood, buying them an hour alone. The boy was a chatterbox with no filter whatsoever, and secrets weren’t safe with him.
“Lils, heed me now on Samuel Proctor, thy cousin,” Goody said, her voice low as she reached for the next handful of radish. “He’s no kin in spirit. Especially not to his sister, Eliza.”
Lils set the knife down, wiping her hands on her apron. She leaned in, the onion scent clinging to her fingers. “What do you mean?”
Goody stared into the flames, shawl drawn tight. Her voice quivered. “Mary, their mother, my dearest friend form childhood, died birthing Eliza’s sister nine years back. Their father pinned it on Eliza.”
Lils looked at Goody, confused. “How? She was just a child.”
"Grief twists folk.” Goody shook her head, taking the diced onion Lils offered and tipping it into the pot. “Eliza wailed all during the birth, as bairns often do. The babe came tangled in the cord and Mary bled out. Samuel Sr. claimed Eliza's incessant cries caused the blood to come and the cord to tangle.”
Lils gripped the handle of the knife, the wooden handle warm under her palm. “That’s madness.”
“Aye, it is.” Goody stirred the stew. “Then Samuel Sr. buried himself in work, ignoring his remaining children. Remarried a year later to Prudence, barely elder to his oldest."
Anger ripped through Lils’s chest and she picked up the knife again, chopping up another onion with more force than necessary.
“And Eliza? Why’d she run from the magistrate?”
Goody paused mid-stir. “She came to me after harvest, broken by Prudence’s cruelty, and her father and brother's cold, indifferent nature. Begged for a place elsewhere. I knew folk in Andover needing help, so I wrote a letter of recommend.”
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
Lils nodded, scraping the radishes into the pot. The broth hissed and popped as they hit the heat.
“But it was all for naught, as Prudence’s prize hen dropped dead not long after. Old bird, but she swore Eliza cursed it, claimed she saw her muttering by the coop.” Goody’s lip curled into a sneer. “Twas nonsense, but Prue wanted to rid herself of the girl who favored Mary so.”
“Over a chicken?” Lils’s voice rose. She set the knife down, breathing through her mouth to escape the onion burn.
“’Tis enough, there were whispers of witchcraft.” Goody’s eyes met hers, clearly still sad over the fate of her friend. “She was meant to hide here till I could find her safe passage to Andover. But the men came swift. I waited all night... nothing.”
Tears gleamed in Goody’s eyes and Lils reached over to squeeze her arm. “Until I showed up, looking like her.”
Goody nodded, wiping her face. “Yes, quite providential.”
The door burst open and Levi tumbled in, firewood clattering, Mags darting at his heels. “Driest ones I could find!”
“Good lad.” Goody composed herself, voice steady. “Stack them by the hearth.”
As Levi busied himself stacking, Lils caught Goody’s eye with a look that said, What now?
They all gathered around the table, the two eating the stew in silence as Levi chattered about what all he had seen on his walk, grabbing seconds of the stew and praising the flavors. The radishes were tender, onions mellowed into sweetness, and the chicken had served as an incredible base for the bone broth. The wind was rattling the shutters again, but with Levi and Goody in the house and a warm belly full of stew, the rattling was nowhere near as frightening as it had been the first night she'd arrived.
Later, after Lils spun fairy tales for Levi and tucked him in, Mags curled up at his feet, Goody pulled her aside.
“If trouble comes, child, know this—I cannot shield thee if it risks Levi.”
“I know that, Goody.” Lils touched her pentacle necklace through her blouse, Stevon’s old necklace, a cold weight against her. No tarot, no knife, no tourmaline. A dead phone upstairs, as useful as a brick. Botched spell, botched everything. “I’d never ask you to do that."
Goody studied her with a faint smile .
“Rest now, child. I leave to the market early tomorrow, I'll rise with the rooster crow. If men come, hide in the root cellar and stay there.”
Lils suddenly hugged Goody Martin, clutching her tight. Goody patted her back. "There, there, child. The Lord is thy Shepard."
Lils said nothing and simply hugged her tighter.
Lils climbed up to the loft for the night, wool blanket scratching her chin as she listened to Goody bank the fire down below.
Stars shone through the roof gaps, brighter than any light-polluted sky back home. She pictured Eliza in her time and hoped Aunt Ivy and Lucy were doing a good job guiding her. She thought about Samuel Proctor, whose betrayal had set all of this in motion. He'd chosen to let grief mold him into someone who could condemn his own sister.
I’m going to fix this, I have to, Lils thought desperately, even though she had no immediate plan yet. Below, she heard Levi’s soft snores and Mags’s contented purr.
For now, at least, she was safe.
But February was fading fast, and March was coming. And with March came the trials. The examinations, the imprisonments, the executions that would haunt Salem’s history forever. Lils closed her eyes and tried not to think too hard about everything.
Aunt Ivy was clearly struggling to make any contact, so maybe this was up to her to figure this out? She had no idea what to do.
She shifted her thoughts to Stevon—reliving their last day in Salem together, hearing his laugh. Seeing him twirl one of his curls, play with his pentacle necklace, flip his pencil while drawing out their stories.
I wish you were here, she thought, touching the pentacle necklace. More than anything. If you can hear me, I miss you like hell.
Outside, the cold wind howled as if to answer her, and the winter winds blew steady. But spring would soon be here, and with it, the beginning of the trials.