Five Sisters

Prologue

Although, she was blind folded, she knew she was being dragged through the dark woods. The fear in her belly rumbled along with the baby who seemed to kick at her nervously. She didn’t know where Simon was but did know that it was her father that was leading the noisy group of people to that horrible altar in the woods.

Estelle fought against the hands that dragged her forth. Mean hands, that clutched her arms too tightly, connected to even meaner legs with feet that kicked her each time she stumbled. Her stomach was so large and ungainly that she was sure she would fall any moment and land on her belly harming the waiting child inside of her.

The warbling sound of a night owl pierced the dark air and sent her heart racing even faster. Estelle felt faint and blinked blindly against the sweat that tried repeatedly to run into her eyes.

“Please,” she tried to mutter over the gag that was secured in her mouth. She took a deep breath and tried again, this time yelling, “Please!”

“Scream all you want, girl, there is not a soul brave enough to help you and just so you know, your darling brother is locked up in the tunnel,” her father chuckled gravely, “and I may just leave him there to drown.”

Tears mixed with her sweat-soaked blind fold as they continued to walk on and she felt more desperate with each step. Suddenly, when she felt she could go on no longer, they came to a stop. The blind fold was quickly removed from her head but before Estelle could get a good look around, she was being lifted horizontally and lied down on cold, solid cement. She had indeed been placed on the altar.

Her dress covered in sweat and dirt was unceremoniously cut away from her body. It was odd how suddenly the cool air that should feel so refreshing, chilled her to her bones.

Estelle saw the shining arch of a knife slowly descending toward her flesh.

“Father, please no! Please oh god, no,” she sobbed on words her father merely laughed at.

“It’s alright child, I do not mean to kill you, just that abomination that you carry within you, for all I know it could even be your brother,” he chuckled evilly as he stroked her brow gently. Just then the tip of the blade started at her navel and went all the way down to the part in between her legs.

Chapter 1

Kneeling down, Martie looked at how precisely Lynn, who was the newest and sixth member of the crew, had laid the wallpaper which was cream white with the palest of green bonsai plants printed on it. Martie stood up and carefully glanced around the room with pride and satisfaction, her crew had done a wonderful job! The small Chinese restaurant was both elegant and inviting with its Oriental reds and bamboo accents, and it was only the third project that Five Sisters Renovation & Cleaning had completed. The project had only taken them a month when they had quoted the owner six weeks, which meant they would get the bonus he had offered upon early completion. Martie just hoped that they would get their next project soon or money would get tight and plans would need to be adjusted.

While Martie thoughtfully circled through the building once more just to make sure that everything was absolutely perfect as their reputation depended on it, the rest of the crew was standing tiredly outside by the van, enjoying the time and company with a cigarette or quiet conversation.

Martie locked the front door of the restaurant and turned with a beaming smile to look at her girls. Not only were they the perfect crew with all of the individual skills and personalities that they brought to the table, but they made for one hell of an awesome coven as well! She felt strong with the power of the team as she approached them and nearly didn’t stop herself from squealing and jumping around girlishly with happiness.

“We rock!” she stated proudly, “now let’s get the hell out of here!”

Martie was happy to let Cynthia drive the large economy van as she herself hated to drive and most specifically, drive on busy highways of Jacksonville. Cynthia smiled at Martie and popped in a Stone Sour disk setting the volume on low so that just she and Martie would be able to hear it. With so many people in the vehicle, they all had different musical tastes and most of them were busy in conversation. It was fully dark when Cynthia eased the large, dirty, white van into the side driveway and everyone crawled out quietly gathering their bags and trying to race the others to the two showers that the five-bedroom house they rented offered, without anyone else being the wiser to it.

The house had originally just been home to Martie, Daphne and Cynthia, but when the business and coven started up, it had just made sense for the girls to all share the large house. Cynthia enjoyed the attic space with its single front window all to herself which she kept spotless. Because it was the highest point of the house, it reminded her of the two story houses up home in Philadelphia where she was from. The rest of the girls were happy to let her have the cramped space and enjoyed continually joking about the dwarf who lived up there, as Cynthia was barely five feet tall and about ninety-nine pounds on her heaviest days.

Martie decided that it wasn’t worth a fight, the shower would still be there when the rest of them were done with it, and thanks to the huge hot water heater, so would the hot water. She walked into the large brightly lit kitchen with small, planted pots and fresh herbs from their own garden hanging upside down to dry. A glance in the refrigerator showed that it was brimming with all of the typical girly foods of veggies and fruits, but it also had its share of heartier foods, a few bottles of wine, and a few different types of beers. Martie found herself suddenly thirsty for a beer and pulled out the ice-cold bottle before sitting down in the heavy wooden chair and pulling her feet out of her work boots before she curled her legs into it. It was not long before Daphne, Martie’s oldest friend, entered the kitchen and smiled more at Martie’s beer than at Martie herself,

“Yeah, now that’s what I’m talking about!” She grabbed herself a beer and sat across from Martie at the table before raising her bottle in a toast, “We did a damn fine job!” Martie was more than happy to meet the well-deserved toast before taking a gulp of her own beer and sighing in contentment. She watched Daphne’s hand tug at the tassel on the tablecloth. Daphne had beautiful hands, chocolate brown with thin, but long, delicate fingers and naturally long nails. Daphne noticed that Martie was staring at her hands and laid them flat on the table modestly, with a sigh.

“I’m telling you, you could have been a hand model,” Martie said softly.

“Yeah yeah, where do you even find a job doing that,” Daphne snickered at her, but her yellow skin lit up around her high cheek bones with surprising modesty.

“Yeah, good point.”

Michelle walked into the room with her still wet, waist length blonde hair flowing wildly down her back, “Shower is open if you’re quick enough,” she smiled around the unlit joint pursed between her lips.

“No, it’s not!” they could all hear Cynthia yell from the second floor. She may have been small, but you’d never know it from the size of her lungs. The three of them looked at one another and laughed loudly.

“I just hope that Bridgette and Lynn don’t take too long in the shower, you know how those two are,” Martie said before taking a drag of her cigarette.

“They better not be doing that in the shower right now, I feel dirty and don’t want to wait all night!” Daphne said, her eyes lighting up with mirth.

“Well, while we’re waiting, we should think about dinner. I don’t know about you guys but I’m starving,” Martie stated.

“Yeah, food sounds good, but whose turn is it to cook?” Daphne asked.

The three of them looked at each other tiredly,

“I’m not sure. Maybe we should just order pizzas.”

*****

Martie stepped out of the shower happy to be clean and feel human once again. Her black cat, Nyx, named after the Greek Goddess of the night, brushed against her still wet legs, her long silky fur tickling Martie into laughter as the beautiful cat stared up at her with bright green eyes and meowed impatiently for attention. Martie picked up Nyx and stroked her fur lovingly before kissing her small cat nose and gently setting her back down.

She wiped at the fogged-up mirror with her hand as best as she could and glanced at herself as she slowly became visible in the mirror. Her long, auburn hair lay in wet waves down over her shoulders and her pale, but bright green eyes looked more tired than she felt. She brushed out her hair and put on a silky but simple teal shirt and shorts pajama set before heading down to join the others and hoping that they had left her some pizza.

The girls were crowded around the large oak dining room table that had seen many better days, but its size alone made it valuable to them and with the hand embroidered dark green table cloth it didn’t look so bad. All of the girls were freshly showered and looked relaxed with their various assortments of drinks. Martie was happy to see that one of them had been sweet enough to put two pieces of pizza aside on a paper plate for her and guessed that it was either Cynthia or Daphne.

Martie grabbed a fresh beer and scooted her chair closer to the table intent on gobbling up her supreme pizza in silent glory.

“You know it’s a new moon tonight?” Bridgette asked, her bright green eyes shining with mischief directly at Martie.

Martie tried to hide her smile from her youngest convener, “It sure is.”

Five faces were staring expectantly at her, when finally, Daphne said, “Well?”

Martie appeared to ignore them as she slowly enjoyed her pizza letting the cheese stretch out before she bit it.

“Martie!” Cynthia finally said in exasperation.

Martie looked up at her innocently, staring into her dark brown eyes,

“Yes?” she did her best to sound naive.

Daphne smiled knowingly and slowly put out her cigarette before saying with a put on, long southern drawl, “Martha darling,” and pretending to stop short at the rage in Martie’s eyes over the use of her given name which she hated because it seemed like an old lady’s name. All of them burst out laughing, including Martie herself.

Finishing off her last bite of pizza and purposely taking her time, Martie finally glanced up coyly, “Are any of you wearing bras?” This question brought up a roar of excitement as six women scattered from the table in several different directions, because they knew that no bras, especially those with underwire, were to be worn during ritual.

The backyard was dark under a moonless sky and fully alive in the chorus of remaining frogs, crickets and cicadas that sang in the early September night holding out before the colder months would come to silence them. Each woman stood silently in front of a tall pillar candle, the color of the candle matching the color of her summer cape she wore over her shoulders. Their silent circle was formed around a large wooden pentacle made of cut oak tree branches that matched in size. In the heart of the pentacle was a black cast iron cauldron burning small flames of fire. The cool grass felt good under Martie’s bare feet as she walked in a slow circle around the circle made up of her coven holding her ritual knife, which is called an athame, out against any negative elements. Coming full circle, Martie knelt to put the sharp blade of the knife into the earth and stood back up waiting.

With hands raised up to the sky, long platinum hair cascading down her back, Michelle called, “Guardian Tower of the North, element of Earth, of hooves and home, I call upon you and ask for your guidance, come be with us this night.”

Cynthia waited a heartbeat and then raised her hands up, her shapely short legs straddling the ground, “Guardian Tower of the East, element of Air, winged and free, I call upon you and ask for your guidance, come be with us this night.”

Lynn who had been chosen for the west tower because she was from Tacoma, Washington stood proudly and for the first time with the coven called upon her tower, “Guardian Tower of the West, element of Water, creatures of water and sea, I call upon you and ask for your guidance, come be with us this night.” Her short buzz cut of blonde hair appeared nearly silver under the stars.

“Guardian Tower of the South, element of Fire, spirit and soul, I call upon you and ask for your guidance, come be with us this night,” Martie solemnly requested.

Each woman then bent down to retrieve their athame from the earth and raised it high to the sky, holding it with both hands, their voices a strong oneness,

“Mother Nature, Great Mother, our shining deity, we call you now and request your presence, come if you will.”

Chapter 2

The nine-a.m. alarm clock buzzing seemed entirely too early for Martie as she rolled over and rudely smacked it. She shrugged into a light silk robe and scowled grumpily at herself in the antique oval cherry wood mirror that had been her grandmother’s. Her footsteps heavy with fatigue, Martie followed the smell of fresh coffee to the kitchen.

Cynthia, who was almost always up before everyone else, sat at the table alone pounding away on her pink laptop and barely glanced at Martie.

Martie clapped her hands together at the sight of the beautiful, hot, dark coffee.

“Oh, small blessings, I love you!” she whispered.

“What, the coffee or me?” Cynthia asked with her thin left eyebrow cocked up defiantly.

“Both?” Martie asked turning to glance at Cynthia.

“Well, I made this brew that you so seem to love, and I don’t even drink the shit,” she said purposely taking a delicate sip of her Dr. Pepper.

“Then I shall love you more! Cyn, blessings to you!” Martie gave Cynthia a short hug before sweetening her coffee to blonde hazelnut perfection and sitting down heavily at the table. It was the first morning in a couple of weeks that Martie didn’t have to rush.

Martie held her crystal coffee mug in both hands and inhaled the smell as much as she consumed the brew. Cynthia was staring at her trying not to laugh at her coffee addiction, but finally closed her laptop and tapped her small fingers on the table. Her long, dark brown hair was pulled back in a tight ponytail and she was already neatly dressed.

“So,” she said to break the silence.

Martie stared at her in confusion for a moment, cleared her throat and finally said,

“So, we need a new project to come up, like yesterday.” As one of her oldest friends Cynthia was intuitive enough to see what Martie was easily able to conceal from most others. She was worried.

Before either could respond, the house phone, also the primary business line, since all the women had their own separate cell phones, rang loudly, jolting Martie up. Martie quickly tried to clear her throat to rid herself of her morning voice as she raced toward the phone in the living room.

“I can get that,” Cynthia shouted from the kitchen right before she heard Martie’s professional greeting, Five Sisters Renovation and Cleaning, this is Martha speaking.

Cynthia stood in the doorway watching Martie talk on the phone, she reached for a floral designed note pad next to the phone and with a purple gel pen quickly started writing details down.

“Yes sir, I can be there in three hours, thank you, I look forward to meeting you as well!” Martie nearly knocked the phone over because she banged it down so hard when she hung it up.

“Who was that?” a grumpy voice called from the foot of the stairs. Martie and Cynthia turned to see Daphne standing there sleepily in her purple robe.

With both Cynthia and Daphne now staring at her, Martie paced in crazy, sporadic circles.

“That?” Martie asked pointing to the now silent phone. She spun around quickly, “That was Mr. Jason Tierney!”

Daphne rubbed at her eyes, mumbling, “Okay and?” While Cynthia stood with her arms casually crossed waiting for her crazy friend to make some sense of the situation.

Martie calmed herself enough to quit moving for just a moment.

“Mr. Jason Tierney is the new owner of the Palm Breeze Inn in Palatka!”

Daphne’s eyes were suddenly free of their previous lethargy,

“You’re kidding?” from her excited voice, it was obvious that she hoped that Martie wasn’t kidding.

Martie made her way to Daphne by jumping and bounding, her face lit up with an excited smile,

“No, I’m not kidding!” Cynthia watched the two women embrace and dance around enthusiastically.

“Okay, great, we got a new project,” even though she had tried, her voiced lacked the enthusiasm shared by the other two.