The Awakening by Heather Graham Read Free Book Online

mood to really suck up to your relatives!”
    â€œOkay, I’m hurrying, but we’re going to make a stop on the way.”
    â€œWe’re going to stop? Hey, I may run out of suck-up steam.”
    â€œNo, you won’t, because when you have a chance to talk more with Morwenna and Joseph than you did at our wedding, you’re going to like both of them.”
    Finn didn’t reply for a moment as he walked by her side. He didn’t think she was right. He wasn’t sure what color Morwenna’s hair was supposed to be, but not the raven black she had it colored. And she continually wore black. Complete black. Joseph was the same. His hair was as long as his wife’s; he wore it queued back. He wore black trousers and a black shirt, and a huge silver pentagram, at all times.
    He wondered what the two would wear to the beach. If they ever went to a beach.
    â€œWhere did you want to stop?” he asked.
    â€œThe Salem Witch Museum. The boy, Joshua, was right. It takes about twenty minutes, and is the probably the best, most concise way, of getting an overview of what happened during the frenzy in 1692. You’ll enjoy it, really.”
    â€œLead on,” he told her.
    â€œThere are more places we have to go, of course. The Peabody Essex Museum is incredible. There’s so much in there that’s just about American lifestyles through the centuries. Lots of the historical buildings actually belong to the museum now. Sometime, we’ll have to get to the House of the Seven Gables. It’s a wonderful area, really, and a lot of what is historical is all within walking distance. Morwenna’s shop is down a block or so and around the corner from the Salem Witch Museum, and it’s just a block or so from the Peabody Essex Museum. And there are all kinds of little wonderful shops in between. And we can eat lunch at a little place on the water. Actually, I have to admit, I loved it all a lot more when I was growing up. Everything was a little spookier and more historical. Now, there’s a fair amount of what’s commercial going on.”
    â€œThen, of course, there has to be a bit of those who were just born here, have the good old New England reserve and stamina, and just grew up without finding the world spins on the history and witches—real and imagined—in Salem.”
    She glanced at him sharply.
    â€œHey! I’m just saying I’ll bet there are a lot of normal people here just living their lives.”
    â€œWell, of course. It’s just a town, a charming town.”
    â€œA beautiful town,” he agreed.
    And it was. October. A lot of the leaves had already fallen. No snow yet. The temperature was chill but not at all painfully cold. The colors of fall were everywhere, some of the leaves still on the trees, glorious in shades of orange and gold and amber. The town—whether they all believed in witchcraft or not—went all out with pumpkins, jack-o’-lanterns, scarecrows, and decorations. By day, they were light and airy—fun. But it seemed that every house they walked by had something going on—Wal-Mart ghosts hanging from their trees, a pumpkin patch by an old elm, skeletons flying from the porch eaves, bats . . . and at a few houses, the old green witches on broomsticks slammed against a tree, as if they’d run into it. Cute. Harmless.
    â€œMorwenna hates those,” Megan commented as they walked by one of the latter.
    â€œAh, come on, they’re cute. Don’t Wiccans have a sense of humor?”
    â€œWell, sometimes. But I guess they feel that the old crone concept—warty noses, green flesh, broomsticks, all that—contributes to the idea of evil. And if you follow the concepts of Wicca—”
    â€œWhether you follow the concepts or not, witchcraft is associated with Satanism, and Satanism has had a bunch of what you might want to call really, truly evil people over the