The Year of the Witching

by Alexis Henderson

“Isn’t it strange how reading a book is a sin, but locking a girl in the stocks and leaving her to the dogs is another day of the Good Father’s work?”

“Good people don’t bow their heads and bite their tongues while other good people suffer. Good people are not complicit.”

Immanuelle couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t speak. All this time she had been so busy chasing beasts and devils, believing that evil began and ended with them. She had been so foolish. True evil didn’t lurk in the depths of the Darkwood. It was not in Lilith or her coven, or even in any of the curses they cast. True evil, Immanuelle realized now, wore the skin of good men. It uttered prayers, not curses. It feigned mercy where there was only malice. It studied Scriptures only to spit out lies.