Page 87 of Mystery in the Mountains

“He’s from VenDeer?” Julie asked, looking at the papers on the table.

“Yeah.”

“Also, I keep getting this vision. It’s come in a dream and in waking visions.”

They all listened as Sunny told them about the rain on the road, the fire and smoke, the big black truck, and when she mentioned the red eyes, “Coal Miner’s Daughter” started blaring up the stairs.

Sunny held her hand out in a see? gesture.

The music cut off, and Asher called up from the bottom of the stairs, “How’s the witching going, my love?”

“We’re good,” she called down to him. “That’s the other part. Anytime something happens with any of this, that radio blares ‘Coal Miner’s Daughter.’ I’m starting to hate that song.”

That, of all things, pulled Esther’s focus.

“Sunny, you know we don’t speak ill of Loretta Lynn.”

“I know,” Sunny said, hiding her irritation. “I’m just so tired of that freaking song playing and making me jump clear out of my skin.”

“That is strange . . .” Bridget said as she looked out the window.

“Has your house acted this way before?”

That question wasn’t as straightforward as it would seem.

Sunny shrugged. “Yes, and no. My mom used to swear some of the mountain’s magic made its way into this house since we are so close to the mountain. Just little things, like searching for your keys that would magically be found a moment later right next to the door even though you just looked there, but it’s never been anything like this.”

“I see,” said Bridget with a pensive nod.

“And there’s something else.”

She was about to tell them about the piano teacher with the glowing red eyes, but before she could, Esther stormed over to the board.

“What is this?” she demanded, taking a card off the board. Turning the card around to face them, Sunny could see if it was the church that said Church of Divine Deliverance.

“Does that mean something to you?” Sunny asked. “Asher and I have been stumped about that one. We didn’t know any churches in the area with that name.”

“I know that church,” Julie murmured.

“You do?” Esther said.

“Yeah, I grew up in the fundamentalist faith, but all the men in my church used to go there. It’s an all-men’s church. They would hold conventions and stuff like that.”

“They’re witch hunters.”

Esther said it like it was common knowledge, as if just the utterance of those words didn’t send chills up their spines from the centuries of oppression the witch hunters had brought down on the generations of witches before them.

“I didn’t know that,” said Julie. “But it makes total sense. I remember when my dad came home from one of those retreats. He found out I had watched The Worst Witch at a friend’s house and gave me the worst beating of my life.”

“And when that awful warlock died last year, he did warn of the witch hunters again. It would seem that they are not only in bed with the warlocks but also the coal company.”

Esther gave a rough chuckle. “Well, it that isn’t the scariest trifecta of evil, I don’t know what is.”

“No good can come from that,” Bridget said.

“And I’m sure if it’s related, but I’m thinking maybe it might be now . . . I don’t know, but there was something else we were talking about, and we thought I might ask you . . .”

“Out with it, lass.”

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