![Motheater](https://bingebooks.com/files/books/photo/67662121cd839/thumb2_9781645661818.webp?ext=jpg)
Motheater
- eBook
- Audiobook
- Hardcover
- Book info
- Sample
- Media
- Author updates
- Lists
Synopsis
In this nuanced queer fantasy set amid the Appalachian Mountains in Virginia, the last witch of the Ridge must choose sides in a clash between industry and nature.
After her best friend dies in a coal mine, Benethea “Bennie” Mattox sacrifices her job, her relationship, and her reputation to uncover what’s killing miners on Kire Mountain. When she finds a half-drowned white woman in a dirty mine slough, Bennie takes her in because it’s right—but also because she hopes this odd, magnetic stranger can lead her to the proof she needs.
Instead, she brings more questions. The woman called Motheater can’t remember her true name, or how she ended up inside the mountain. She knows only that she’s a witch of Appalachia, bound to tor and holler, possum and snake, with power in her hands and Scripture on her tongue. But the mystery of her fate, her doomed quest to keep industry off Kire Mountain, and the promises she bent and broke have followed her a century and half into the future. And now, the choices Motheater and Bennie make together could change the face of the town itself.
Release date: January 21, 2025
Publisher: Erewhon Books
Print pages: 416
* BingeBooks earns revenue from qualifying purchases as an Amazon Associate as well as from other retail partners.
Reader buzz
![](/img/default_avatar.png)
Author updates
Motheater
Linda H. Codega
1Bennie – Now
Benethea Mattox was not raised to be a fool. Yet here she was, fishing a skinny, barely breathing white lady out of a river. She hauled the waterlogged woman up the steep banks of the backwater creek, taking her time on the muddy incline under the bridge. It was probably the stupidest thing she had done in the whole four years since she had moved out to Kiron, and that was saying something.
The thing was Kiron lay along the western Virginia border, nestled deep in Appalachia—there was nobody else coming down this road, and Bennie would be damned if she called the cops before trying to help someone herself. Besides, the woman didn’t seem to be in danger of dying. Her heartbeat was steady, if slow, and her lips weren’t blue, so she heaved the half-drowned woman on her back and slowly, carefully carried her up the bank. The lady was thin as a reed and weighed nearly the same. Bennie had once carried her two little nephews up a mountain when her brother-in-law said Bennie couldn’t do it. One limp, non-braid-pulling woman was nothing she couldn’t handle.
At the bridge where she had pulled over, Bennie arranged the strange-looking woman as best she could in the bed of her ten-year-old truck. She might be a bleeding heart, but she didn’t want to put a stranger next to her in the small front cabin, just in case the lady woke up and immediately freaked. There was still a leftover moving blanket in the truck bed, and she nestled the lady in as best she could.
There was something off-putting about her—beyond the weird dress she wore or her messily cropped coal-black hair or even the fact that Bennie had pulled her out of the goddamn river. She seemed . . . faded. Drained, or something. Her features seemed smudged, as if her cheekbones should be sharp and ended up rounded out. Bennie stared at her, trying to figure if she had seen her around, if she looked like any of the maybe two dozen families that had lived in Kiron for centuries.
Her nose was a little crooked—maybe it broke when she was a kid and healed bad. She was pretty, if you were into thin ex-cult ladies who needed a good shower. Bennie noticed a nick in her ear, like a dog’s after it had been caught in a bad bind.
She rubbed at her own nose, pulled her cap over her braids, and jogged around to the front seat. Before Bennie touched her keys, she took a deep breath and leaned forward, putting her forehead on the steering wheel. Her heart was beating fit to burst, loud and insistent.
What in the hell was wrong with her? As soon as she had seen the shape washed up on the rocks, she had been hoping to find a dead body, or a body part, or something damning. She had been disappointed when she had scrambled down and found the woman still breathing on the edge of the slough creek, downriver from one of the White Rock Mining Company’s boreholes, and looking nothing like a miner.
Because a miner’s body could be pinned on White Rock. Or at least garner enough suspicion to get an injunction to stop work in Kire Mountain for a minute. She was desperate enough to go after dead bodies in Appalachian rivers to prove what she knew: White Rock was letting their miners die in the dark.
Instead, she had a real, live, breathing lady in the bed of her truck, dirt all on her boots, and none on the mining company.
Bennie took another deep breath, pushing down her panic. She needed to get the strange lady to a hospital, and that was that. She could wonder about corpses later. She fumbled with her keys, annoyed that her hands were shaking as she put the car key in the ignition. The truck turned over, groaning.
“All right, I know,” Bennie murmured, pulling onto the barely paved country road. “Oil change this week.”
She glanced at the rearview mirror, adjusting it so that she could see the woman’s arm where Bennie had placed it over her chest. As long as she drove slowly, the woman should be fine.
Bennie took a deep breath and looked forward again. It was nearly twenty minutes into town, and she could only hope that urgent care was open. She couldn’t even call to check—service in the mountains was spotty even on good days.
As Bennie drove over a bump in the road, she winced, glancing at her mirror. The lady’s arm had moved, but that was probably because of the pockmarked drive. The trees lining the road seemed to arch over them, growing denser as she drove.
Bennie swallowed and glanced back at the woman again, her palms sweaty against the steering wheel. There was a regret like cigarette smoke curling through her heart, thick and choking. She had an unconscious woman in her truck. What
the fuck had she been thinking?
Honestly, what was she even doing mudlarking in the White Rock Creek, anyway? The river was full polluted after years of being used as a slough by the company, so she was much more likely to get an infection than she was to find anything that might hint at the mining company’s negligence. And the odds of her finding anything in that damn waste was next to nothing. But failure had made her fearless. She had been trying to find out what happened in the mines after Kelly-Anne died for near on six months. Beyond that, it had been over a year since she and her best friend had first started to suspect that White Rock was covering something up in the mines. She needed something, and at this point, she was willing to do some extremely stupid shit to find it.
But this? This was bad. This was so, so bad. It didn’t matter that pulling the woman out of the creek was the right thing to do; there was no way that this was going to end well. The woman didn’t even have shoes.
Bennie slowed through a turn, and a flash of movement crossed her mirror. She glanced up and saw the woman rising, standing up on the truck bed. Bennie’s eyes widened. She slowed, and as she turned to tell the crazy white lady to sit down, the woman jumped out and ran into the woods.
Bennie cursed, slammed the brakes, left the keys angrily beeping at her, and ran after the woman.
“Hey!”
God, she was fast—hadn’t she just been unconscious ten minutes ago? Bennie could barely keep up with her, even though she was tearing through the underbrush in a sturdy boilersuit and work boots, and this woman was in rags and bare feet. Around her, the Appalachian forest was thick grown with massive oaks and hickory, the spring ferns and weeds running bramble on the ground. Bennie turned around, trying to find any hint of the woman. She spotted movement and, decidedly ignoring the fact that this was hungry-bears-outta-sleep season, ran forward.
“I’m trying to help you!” Bennie yelled, darting around a tree and then under a fallen branch. The wind in the low valley picked up, shaking the spring-green branches, knocking the birches together like hollow chimes. Bennie ran around a large rock and saw the woman fall down, tripping over a piece of the mountain that had been thrust up from the earth.
“Hey, hey, hey, wait now,” Bennie said, walking up slowly, as if talking to a frightened animal. “It’s okay. I’m not going to hurt you. You gotta be real scared, right? All I wanna do is help.”
The woman scrambled to get away from Bennie, lips pulled back in a feral sneer. Bennie hesitated. This woman didn’t seem like she had been near death ten minutes ago.
“I’m Bennie,” she said, crouching down. She held up her hands as the woman backed up against an outcropping of rock, the moss yielding to her shoulders. “I want to take you to the ER.”
The woman narrowed her eyes. They were coal dark, nearly black.
“Please, I know we just met, but please trust me.”
The woman whispered something that Bennie couldn’t hear. Under Bennie’s foot, something
moved. She jumped, worried for a second that she’d crouched on a covered-up rabbit warren or snake. As she backed up, the loam under her feet slipped under the treads of her boots. She began to sink.
Shocked, Bennie looked up at the woman, who was standing now, her hands spread slightly. She was murmuring, and the leaves that had pulled Bennie down to her calves in the soft dirt were now crawling up her legs. The paper-thin, silvery shreds of winter climbed up her body, dragging her to the ground, compressing her. Bennie was dragged down to her knees, the leaves sliding toward her like a great slouching wave, traveling up her arms, threatening her mouth. She was being eaten by the undergrowth.
Bennie screamed, panicking, pushing the leaves away. She grabbed onto a branch, heaving herself out of the trap. The litter fell to the ground in tatters. She hiccupped, scrambling back away from the pit that had pulled itself down around her. As she kicked at the ground, the leaves broke into cracking flakes under her feet.
The air smelled sharp and flinty, like a stone breaking. It left as soon as it came, and the leaves were clumped around Bennie’s hands and legs. They were just leaves: some brown, some silver, all dead.
When Bennie looked up, the woman was gone. Breathing hard, Bennie rubbed the back of her wrist against her mouth, her terror receding as she saw the forest calm around her. What in the hell was that?
As she glanced around, her heart in her throat, she saw an indent in the stone where the woman had pressed her shoulders against the lichen-covered surface. It looked like the stone had molded itself around her, as if she had been made a part of the rock. Bennie crawled over and laid her hands against the smooth, concave shape there. It was warm. She looked over the hole that had almost swallowed her. Oak leaves clung to her chest as she stood up on shaking legs.
“What in the holy fuck,” Bennie said, staring at the hollow in the ground. She did not sign up for this.
She covered her eyes for a few seconds before she turned and picked her way back to the road. There was no sign of the madwoman. Fine. Bennie wasn’t about to go wandering on strange property just for the sake of being a good person. She had enough to deal with, and getting run off by dogs or the business end of a shotgun wasn’t part of her ideal morning routine.
Moving around a large oak, Bennie started as a small chipmunk scampered across the toes of her shoes. Jumpy, she pressed her hand to her chest, but not a second later, the strange woman ran right in front of her, chasing the chipmunk. Bennie clapped both hands over her mouth as the woman dove and grabbed the small rodent, tumbling over the shrubs, her back slamming against a tree with a shuddering force Bennie did not expect.
“Seriously?” Bennie gasped. The woman shifted on her knees, holding onto the chipmunk with both hands. She grinned, opening her mouth wide.
“Whoa!” Bennie scrambled after her, holding her hands up, alarm making the blood in her ears ring. She almost tripped as she went onto one knee in front of the lady. “Don’t eat that. Please don’t. I have a weak stomach. I really just . . . I’ve been traumatized enough today. Don’t eat that baby chipmunk in front of me, please.”
The woman, hands still clutching the skittering rodent, looked skeptical, but at least she had shut her mouth. The noise the critter was making was enough to drive Bennie
off the edge.
“I’ll get you food, okay? A meal?” Bennie pleaded. She mimed eating, in case the crazy lady was part of some strange sex cult and had only just escaped the bunker. “Food?”
The woman tilted her head slightly. She considered the chipmunk and then Bennie, as if judging whether or not the promise of food was better than the creature she had in her hands. Finally, she nodded and let the chipmunk go.
“Oh, thank God.” Bennie shook her head, stood up, and thought better of offering the woman a hand. “C’mon, there’s a burger joint down the road.”
The woman blinked at her. Then, slowly, as if she hadn’t spoken in a long time, as if her throat had calcified, as if her teeth held spiderwebs she was afraid to dislodge, the strange woman spoke.
“What’s a burger?”
x
Sitting in the truck in the parking lot of Happy’s Burgers, Bennie couldn’t stop staring at the odd woman. She seemed blurry, the paleness of her skin running into the gray of her clothing, her features not completely in focus. She had spread the wax paper across her lap and had proceeded to carefully pick apart her burger, examining each individual piece, taking a small bite of everything, and then carefully arranging it back together. Despite the fact that she, not fifteen minutes ago, had been ready to literally eat a chipmunk alive, she seemed reluctant to bite into one of Happy’s famous hamburgers.
Famous for Kiron, anyway. It weren’t like this part of the world got famous for anything other than coal mining, oxy, and rockslides.
“Dig in,” Bennie said, done waiting for the woman to get the bravery to eat. She peeled back the greasy wrapper and tucked into her own meal. That seemed to convince the woman, who shifted in the front seat, made a face, and then followed Bennie’s lead.
It took two bites for the hesitation to disappear. The woman made quick work of the burger and then dug into the fries, putting a whole handful into her mouth. Bennie winced, grateful they stayed in the truck. She hadn’t wanted to sit inside the restaurant with the woman wearing a dress that could generously be called a rag, still waterlogged and slightly gross besides. Sitting the damp lady in her truck was not ideal either, but Bennie could clean her car seats.
“Where you from?” Bennie asked cautiously. Bennie hadn’t managed to get any kind of conversation out of her yet, but maybe food would change that.
“Not sure,” the woman said in between bites. “Here, I suppose. Here, a long time ago.”
Her voice was just as strange as the rest of her. It was hick as any other voice in Kiron, but slower even, a dark, melting beeswax that dripped off her words. A rougher, lower cadence.
“What’s your name?”
“They called me Motheater,” she said, making a motion that looked like she was trying to push back bangs that were no longer there. Bennie took a longer
look at her.
Her dress was a dark blue, or a gray, with some kind of embroidery on the half sleeves. There was a suggestion of lace at the ends and around the collar, but it looked like it had been torn away. It wasn’t quite modest enough to be Amish, but it wasn’t fancy enough to be something that the Ren Faire nerds would conjure up.
“Motheater,” Bennie repeated, frowning. She looked up at the young woman, but she had already returned to her fries, eating them one by one, savoring them now that she was near the end of her meal. “Why they call you that?”
“Well, I were a witch and refused to marry. And ’fore that, my father was called a preacher by nigh on the town and a snake charmer by the louts moving in.”
“You’re a witch?” Bennie asked quietly.
Motheater nodded, looking back to her fries. “How else you think I got dead leaves to listen to me, five seasons robbed?”
“I thought that was just the wind? A sinkhole?” Bennie said mildly, trying to offer the woman an out. There was no way in God’s green earth that this half-drowned lady calling herself Motheater was actually a witch.
“Surely you heard of witches?” Motheater chuckled, finishing the last crusty fry. “The world cannot have changed so much.”
“Of course I’ve heard of witches,” Bennie hissed. “But they’re not real. There’s nobody really hovering over a cauldron trying to make a love potion—”
Motheater snorted, smiling down at the greasy paper on her lap.
“Oh, excuse me?” Bennie asked, eyebrows up. “Have I offended you?”
“I half dragged you down into your first grave, and you doubt what I am?” Motheater said, teasing. Bennie saw something in her mouth, a flash, a shine, and it both terrified her and drew her in. “Fine. Take me to a Neighbor, and I’ll prove it.”
“Nope.” Bennie wiped her hands on a napkin, stuffing it into the empty bag. She didn’t know what Motheater meant by “Neighbor,” but it probably wasn’t someone she’d find in the ER. “I’m taking you to the hospital.”
“I don’t need a doctor,” Motheater said, voice rising. “I need a Neighbor.”
“Too damn bad,” Bennie muttered. She turned over the truck, and the engine made a rattle that she did not like.
“Please.” Motheater clutched at Bennie’s arm. Bennie shifted toward her and found it hard to look away from Motheater’s onyx eyes. Her face was an odd mix of plaintive and demanding. “I need help no doctor knows how to deliver.”
Bennie stayed quiet, staring at her. Motheater’s hand clutched at her jacket a little harder.
“Take me to a Neighbor, and I will work a miracle,” Motheater said, her voice dark and low. “One made just for you.”
“Why are you so desperate for this, huh?” Bennie asked, her palms starting to sweat. “I don’t even know what a Neighbor is, and I dunno why I should take you to one, even if I knew what you’re after.”
For a second, Motheater looked stricken. “I don’t remember any part of who I am. I only know what
I was. I need someone like me, someone who knows how to use magic, who can divine what happened to me. If I am made whole, mind and magic, I can move the whole earth.”
Bennie chewed on the inside of her cheek. Motheater was staring at her, unblinking, her eyes so wide that it was hard not to feel bad for her. She didn’t know if she believed Motheater, but . . . it wouldn’t hurt to play along for a bit. “What kind of miracle?”
“Name it,” Motheater said quickly. “I can feel my power; I know it’s there. I just have to be able to tap into it.”
Nervous, Bennie suddenly felt claustrophobic in her truck. She couldn’t look away from Motheater, from the frayed hem of her dress, her pale skin, her hair sticking up at odd angles. “I want White Rock Mining outta Kiron.” Bennie’s voice seemed to stick to the sides of her throat. “They’re killing people. Have been for years. I want them stopped.”
Motheater nodded, leaning in, assured in a way that was unnatural. The woman might not have known what White Rock was—Bennie wasn’t even sure Motheater knew what year it was—but Motheater seemed to understand the gist of what Bennie wanted. “Get me to a witch, and I will turn them over.”
God. Bennie believed her. Motheater’s conviction was a real thing, nestling in like a seed in her chest. Her heart wouldn’t stop beating fast, and she couldn’t look away from Motheater. She swallowed her hesitation, mouth dry with it.
“There’s a palm reader down the road.” Some of the Baptist women liked going to get a thrill when their husbands were watching football. Bennie pulled out of the parking lot, and Motheater’s hand fell off her arm. “I dunno about a witch, but she’s the best we got.”
Next to her, Motheater curled in her seat. Bennie took a deep breath, her hands tight around the wheel. Miss Delancey would have to be good enough.
2Bennie
Two seconds after walking up to Miss Delancey’s Tarot and Palm Reading, Bennie knew that she was going to regret this.
Next to her, wearing her threadbare dress and refusing to put on shoes, Motheater peered at the neon light in the window suspiciously. Her disastrously held together outfit wasn’t a good look anywhere, but especially not in Kiron. Especially not for Bennie, a Black woman who had already been accused of suspicious behavior. Bennie had thought about getting her a change of clothes but decided the less time spent in Motheater’s company, the better. Besides, Kiron had its fair share of strange characters, right? Bennie held onto delusion tightly as she took a deep breath in front of the palm reader’s.
“I can’t help you if I ain’t all of myself,” Motheater said, her voice tinged slightly petulant. “But I don’t think no decent Neighbor would tart her work like this.”
“Vikki Delancey is the closest thing Kiron’s got to a witch,” Bennie said, resolutely ringing the doorbell. “I don’t know anything about Neighbors, and right now, this is the best I can do.”
That seemed to placate her, and Motheater moved to stand next to Bennie. She examined the doorbell and then pressed it herself.
“Stop that,” Bennie muttered, batting Motheater’s hand away. “You’ll annoy her.”
“It’s like a piano key,” Motheater justified herself. “It’s not magic.”
“No, a doorbell isn’t magic—”
“It doesn’t even sound like a bell.”
The door swung open, and the two young women were face-to-face with Delancey. She was a tall, thin white woman with blonde hair wrapped up in a scarf, and she pursed her mouth as she looked at them through bifocals, quickly undoing the magnet at the bridge and dropping the pieces, letting them hang like leaves on a vine.
Bennie could feel Motheater’s hackles rise. Some shift in her shoulders betrayed her, gave her a stance like a wounded creature. Delancey might have noticed the expression on Motheater’s face, because she turned quickly to Bennie. Her mouth softened.
“Ah, Miss Mattox.” She smiled, and Bennie wanted to throw herself into the gutter. Her last desperate attempt at using “magic” had led her here, and she hadn’t come away with anything other than a lighter wallet. “Something I can do for you, dear?”
“I’m here with . . .” Bennie paused, watching Motheater warily out of the corner of her eye. “A friend. She’d like a reading if you have the time.”
Motheater, thankfully, did as she had been coached and nodded. “I’d like to see my future if you can offer it.”
There was something about the way she said it, Bennie thought, earnest and disbelieving at the same time. Like she knew prophecy could happen but was sure it couldn’t happen here.
“Of course, dears, come in.” Delancey gestured them inside, then led them through to the back parlor. The promise of money was enough to smooth over any judgments that Delancey might have had when she first saw the mismatched pair of them. “Did you find your last reading helpful, hon?”
“Yeah, super insightful.” Bennie plastered a fake look of gratitude on her face, widening her eyes. “Thank you.”
The real answer was no, but she had come a few months after Kelly-Anne’s death, on the verge of breaking up with Zach, lost and looking for . . . well, anything. It was the same reason that she had been driving along the creek that morning. One more vain attempt to find a hint, a clue, something to help her figure out what the fuck White Rock was doing in that goddamn mountain.
They never recovered Kelly-Anne’s body. There was no trace of her at all. How could a woman just disappear in a modern mining operation?
Delancey smiled as they walked into the parlor, and Bennie was relieved that she seemed satisfied with the half-assed praise. The room smelled of stale incense, and while it stung Bennie’s nose and almost made her cough, Motheater didn’t seem to notice, looking around the room with a critical eye, measuring the worth of the woman by the cheesy decor and gem collection.
Motheater sat, and Delancey swept around the small table.
“Your accent is unusual,” Delancey said, sitting and arranging her skirts. She pet the velvet table cover delicately, her chipped manicure a sickly shade of violet that matched her sour smile. “Where are you from?”
“Here,” Motheater said, staring at the woman. Bennie, annoyed that she was relegated to the vinyl-covered furniture, sat on the arm of the couch, angled toward Motheater.
Over Delancey’s shoulder, Bennie could see a kettle beginning to boil over, the cap left off. She almost wanted to mention it, but the irony of a forgetful psychic might push Motheater over the edge entirely.
“From the mountains?” Delancey asked, picking up her tarot deck and shuffling it.
From her vantage point, Bennie saw Motheater smile. She looked like a predator.
“Yes. My family lived there.”
“Well, not many of your folk left anymore,” Delancey muttered, still looking at the cards.
“Not many at all.”
“Been there a long time?”
“A very long time.” Motheater grinned, wider than she had before, showing all her teeth. Were her teeth filed into points? Bennie was grateful that Delancey had kept her glasses off, as she couldn’t imagine that Motheater’s sharp little teeth wouldn’t have freaked her out.
Delancey didn’t seem to notice the wolf in front of her. Bennie assumed that her prescription must be exceptionally strong if she was missing Motheater practically licking her chops. This was a horrible idea. Maybe she should have just dropped Motheater at the ER and washed her hands of it. Bennie shifted in her seat, the vinyl squeaking.
Delancey looked up sharply. Bennie mouthed an apology, and the woman settled again, looking at Motheater. “I’ll give a basic reading, and if you have more questions, we can go further. The first spread is usually paid upfront.”
Motheater looked at Bennie. Bennie sighed, dug into her Carhartt jacket, and pulled out her wallet. She put a twenty on the table—the same price as last month’s reading—and watched it swiftly disappear into Delancey’s sleeve. It was half an oil change, but Bennie was in too deep now. She had committed to this terrible plan, and she was going to see it through. Bennie couldn’t forget the feeling of the leaves sliding in between her boots and pants, the crunch of dead leaves that had slipped under her clothing falling apart in the soft spots behind her knees. Wind didn’t do that. If that was what Motheater could do now, . . . what would she be capable of when she was made whole?
Bennie had to resist a shiver.
Motheater narrowed her eyes at the bill and looked back to Delancey. Bennie couldn’t read her expression as it curdled strangely in the corners of Motheater’s mouth. Bennie was fascinated by her every expression, trying to decode the omens written on her face.
“An expensive reading,” Motheater said archly.
“Worth every penny, dear.” Delancey shuffled the cards, then cut them into three piles. “Pick one.”
Motheater concentrated hard on the deck. She tapped the pile on the far left. The other two were swept underneath, and Delancey nodded, as if pleased.
“The first card represents
your past,” Delancey said, laying a card down. “The Moon, reversed.”
Bennie leaned closer. It was the same deck that Delancey had used when she had gotten her reading. This card showed a dog and a wolf howling up at the large, full moon. From her angle, the twin towers in the background were jagged, broken against the background. Bennie didn’t know much about the cards beyond what her big sister had recited from a manual back in high school and what her own furious internet searching had turned up after she had asked Delancey for help four months ago.
Motheater leaned forward, frowning, as the second card was placed.
“Your present, the Four of Cups.”
A young man against a tree, refusing the fourth cup.
“Your future,” Delancey said, in what she was probably hoping was an impressive voice. “The Emperor. Reversed.”
Delancey sat back, nodding as if all this made perfect sense.
None of these cards seemed bad to Bennie. No devils or towers or the Ten of Swords that had shown up in her own reading. She hoped that Motheater was at least paying attention, if not intrigued.
“Hm.” Motheater frowned. “Explain this.”
“Of course,” Delancey said, as if being asked was all she had ever wanted. “The Moon in any position indicates fear, darkness, and mystery. Your past was probably full of confusion, living as you . . . living apart from modern civilization.”
No response. Delancey continued. “The Four of Cups shows you’re entering into a time of rest and contemplation, a spiritual awakening. This is probably because of your decision to shun your family’s ways, coming down from your family’s homestead in the mountains.”
Bennie’s eyebrows went up. Sure, Delancey made a living on this sort of thing, but still. It seemed a little presumptive to just come out with shit like that. Worse, what if it were true? If Motheater really were escaping some kind of conservative cult in the Blue Ridge, this whole thing would probably just confirm that people in towns were godless.
Bennie felt, very keenly, that she might have made a mistake. She sat up straighter, not looking away from Motheater.
“And last, The Emperor . . .” Delancey hesitated. Bennie saw her eyes flick to Motheater’s hands, which she had on the table, held like a prayer. “Your father, or an uncle, a domineering male force. Someone who has kept you under his thumb. Beware his influence; he seeks to drag you back into a life of servitude.”
Motheater’s brow was folded up like the drying banks of a creek in autumn. She looked over each of the cards carefully, taking in their symbols, the backgrounds. Her eyes hesitated on The Emperor. Bennie didn’t see any kind of satisfaction in her pursed mouth, her narrowed, dark eyes.
“I understand,” she said finally, sitting back. She glanced at Bennie, and before Bennie had a chance to say anything, to reassure Motheater or tell her they could leave, she gestured at the cards again. “Another.”
“What?” Bennie couldn’t keep the surprise out of her voice. “Really?”
“Yes. Another. I understand now.” Motheater sat up straight, her gaze fiercely direct. The psychic seemed pleased with herself.
“Of course.” Delancey looked over at Bennie, who sighed and gave her the last twenty from her billfold. “A reading for direction, perhaps? To help guide your way?”
Delancey had already
swept the spread back into her hands, shuffling them into the deck. Motheater hadn’t looked away from the cards. Her shoulders straightened, and Bennie could tell there was something changed in her. She fiercely wanted to know what it was. “It doesn’t matter.”
The parlor went silent. The kettle boiling behind Delancey hissed as water hit the hot steel burner, and Delancey started in her chair. She put her deck down and quickly twisted her specs back together to peer at Motheater intently.
“Would you like to ask a question instead?”
“No. Do it again.”
The boiling water sounded like rain against a river. Bennie found herself staring at Motheater’s profile, barely breathing. The steam seemed to encompass the room, a horrible moist heat. Or was it just her? Delancey didn’t seem bothered by the change to the temperature, her gaze fixed on the self-proclaimed witch.
Delancey sighed and then split the deck three ways again. Motheater gestured vaguely, and Bennie could see that Delancey was getting annoyed, despite the forty dollars she had been paid for ten minutes of mumbo jumbo.
Delancey drew the first card quickly, putting it down without looking. “The past.”
Motheater sat back with a satisfied smile. Immediately, Bennie didn’t like that look—it made her teeth tighten like she had sucked a lemon. There was a squeak of protest from the vinyl as she stood up to get a better look.
The card was blank. All that was on the table was a piece of thick, coated paper, with no image on its face. Delancey hesitated. “A printer’s proof, my apologies.”
She swept the card across the table and laid down a second on the purple-trimmed velvet. It was as blank as the first, but this one had a small stain on the front. The steam was making Bennie sweat, and there was a bit of perspiration on Delancey’s eyebrow, threatening to drop on her low glasses, but she had gone very still. Her hands began to shake.
Motheater stood, mouth twisted up sharp and beautiful, like a hawk.
“You are no Neighbor,” Motheater said, soft and cold, “and you are not known in any good book.”
Delancey flipped over a third card, then a fourth. Nothing. Sweat dripped onto her hands. She spread the deck in front of her, seventy-eight cards, all blank. She stared at them. Behind her, the kettle was rattling furiously, the last bit of its water spitting against the heat, a heaving flood through a small creek.
The heat left, like every window in the room had been thrown open. Bennie shivered, excited, nervous, thrilled. She watched Motheater as if the woman were true north. Bennie had been desperate, hadn’t she? Maybe she’d just been waiting for this moment. Maybe all she needed was real magic.
Motheater turned and didn’t look back as she left the parlor, leaving the front door open as she walked outside.
Bennie stepped forward and touched one of the cards on the table and was surprised that it was
hot, almost burning. She pulled her hand back fast, eyes wide as the laminate started to bubble on the table. The cards were boiling. This was incredible. This was happening, real, right in front of her. Fuck.
Delancey’s hand stuttered toward hers, and Bennie jumped back. “So sorry,” Bennie muttered, almost tripping over her feet as she backed out of the parlor. “Thank you, I—”
“Get out.” Delancey’s voice became harsh, losing its mystical breathlessness. “Get out!”
“Oh, sure thing.” Bennie waved, skipping out of the small home and running to the truck, Motheater already seated inside. This was thrilling. The most exciting thing to happen to her in years, something that she couldn’t explain or reason away. She was so excited she was shaking.
“What the fuck was that?” Bennie asked, turning the truck over as soon as she got into the seat. She didn’t want to be anywhere near here if Delancey decided to call the cops.
“A small cunning,” Motheater murmured, arranging her dress. “More a grammar. It took little from me.”
“You knew she was a liar from the start,” Bennie said, pulling out of the parking lot, breath catching in her throat. A witch. Real magic. The possibilities began taking shape. Motheater really could help Bennie find the bodies that White Rock buried in Kire Mountain.
“You had brought me here,” Motheater explained, voice far softer than when she had been proclaiming Delancey a fraud. “Figured I should at least respect your estimate. Whether or not it was a fair opinion is not your fault when faced against thieves.”
“And that second reading? You really needed to give her more money just to embarrass her?”
“Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.”
“I don’t appreciate being preached to.” Bennie didn’t care; she was still grinning. “You spent my last twenty to prove a gospel. Put your damn seat belt on.”
Motheater held her hand out, two bills folded in between her thumb and forefingers. Bennie blinked. When the hell had she swiped those back?
“Ain’t got time to pay liars,” she said, smiling a little as Bennie took her money.
“Was that magic, too?” Bennie stuffed the forty bucks into her pocket. Motheater seemed to have figured out the seat belt. Bennie doubted that even a witch could survive a crash on Kiron’s one-lane roads.
“No,” it came out naw, something low and mountain. “I’ve met pickaxes who’ve taken fewer hits than Delancey. ’Course she didn’t notice a little slip on the way out.”
Bennie laughed. The strange, skinny woman smiled back, her eyes crinkled at the edges, her strange black hair stuck up at odd angles. God, she was incredible.
“You need new clothes,” Bennie declared. “There ain’t no way you can keep running around in a half-falling-apart dress.”
“Fine,” Motheater muttered.
Bennie took a turn that would get her to the Baptist church. They had a donation closet in the basement. “But you’re on a budget.”
Motheater smiled at her and then turned to the window, pressing her forehead against the glass. Bennie tried to focus on the road, on the potholes and hidden drives, but she couldn’t help glancing at Motheater a few times every minute.
A witch with magic. Real magic. Wasn’t this Appalachia? Weren’t witches as a part of this place as the wild ginseng and hidden swimming holes? Didn’t they belong here, same as her?
Bennie clenched her hands around the steering wheel as they passed neat little double-wides. Bennie had tried everything else to bring White Rock to heel, get justice for her friends, protect those she loved who still worked under the mountain. There wasn’t a single family in Kiron that didn’t have blood or friend in Kire Mountain, working to extract coal for White Rock.
Now, if she helped Motheater find herself—whatever that took, whether it was her memories, magic, whatever—Bennie might be able to save Kiron from the threat that loomed over the whole town. At the very least, she had to try. ...
We hope you are enjoying the book so far. To continue reading...
![Motheater](https://bingebooks.com/files/books/photo/67662121cd839/thumb2_9781645661818.webp?ext=jpg)