Page 38 of Echo
I opened the journal to the first page.
Dear Madison,
I hope you’re already dead, and it’s Mary Ellen’s Tasha that is finding this.
Whoever the unlucky soul is, here is what you have to know.
The Rinah family has a history of being called witches since 1587 when we first landed in Roanoke. It took hundreds of years, but slowly our family landed here in 1642, but when we claimed this land, something already lived here. At first, we thought it was natives, but we soon found something else resided among us.
The natives didn’t have a name for it, but our ancestors called these things mimics. They were similar to the skinwalkers our ancestors met in the far west, but they are a whole other beast.
Our ancestors were lucky the first one they found was a runt. Our men thought nothing of it when they stabbed the tiny thing with iron spears and mounted it on the land as a warning to the others.
But as fate would have it, there was a bigger, meaner one who was stronger, faster, smarter, and older. He laid waste toour men. A coven of our sisters worked to trap him on the land, as one distracted him asking what it was he desired.
It was no surprise he wanted a woman. A mate.
We have offered him, woman after woman, and yet he has refused every offering. If the woman who is offered to him survives, she becomes the guardian of the land, maintaining the borders and keeping him here. But the promise of another offering keeps him from trying to escape.
That duty has been passed on to you now.
Assuming he has not claimed you as his own.
That skull was described as a runt.
What the actual fuck?
It was the summer of 1979 when our mother died. We always knew what lived in the shadows. We always knew one of us would be offered to the beast. But it was Ruby who was to inherit the role, once she turned eighteen.
The coward convinced the neighbor’s son to run away together, and on her eighteenth birthday she took to the trees to meet up with the foolish idiot. The beast caught her fleeing and decided she was to be his mate.
He murdered the young man before the beast realized that the harlot was pregnant. She was tainted and was refused even as a guardian. He would claw her out of spite and rip chunks of her hair out. Then she ran for good, leaving me to clean up her mess. Like always.
It’s not fair. But Madison, you are going to be the one to pay for her sins. He should have killed her, and you never would have been born.
You are everything we believe he hates in a woman. He’s killed every woman with traits like yours, so understand this is a cold calculated revenge to make Ruby pay for dumping this piece of shit life on me.
You were never meant to exist, and because you do, our people will continue to live in terror.
The journal explained a lot. Pearl’s disdain for Grandma Ruby and me were just the icing on top. That iron appeared to be its only true weakness. No fire or bullet could damage it. However, many men and women alike had tried to kill this one and failed. Pearl was convinced that the only reason Grandma Ruby was able to leave was he didn’t want her here anymore.
The celtic shield knots were from our days in Ireland and kept him from touching anything brandished with it. It was imperative to make sure all babies and children wore the sigil of protection. Which explained the blanket grandma made me.
Everything else I already knew for herbs and salt, Grandma Ruby already taught me. She was trained by her mother in preparation and was taught our family’s ways, and even if I didn’t realize it, she passed it on to me.
I could do this.
Remember everything you’ve been taught. Deep breaths. Keep your heart steady. Don’t run. Stay calm.
Grandma escaped. So could I.
I put a huge bag of salt in my purse and ducked my head under the strap. I smiled at Ranger, ready to play the part I needed to.
I grabbed the big wooden carrier full of honey, that I’d found already prepped in storage, out to my car, hitting the trunk button so it unlatched. I placed it inside the trunk and tossed my purse into the driver’s side. Keeping my pace calm and intentional, I continued loading the crates I’d found in the cellar. Surely, it was normal for Pearl to sell these jars at the community market the cop mentioned. I felt eyes raking over me in a way that made my blood thrum.
That stupid part of me once again wondered what he’d do when he caught me.
Kill you, idiot.
