"Previously on "Salem"..." "The witches completed their dreaded Grand Rite." "Tell me about my father." "I loved him more than anything." "But he is dead." "Cotton Mather." "You are confined to Boston and..." "Forbidden from returning to Salem." "It's time to face what you really are." "There is nothing I care to learn from you." "I have found him." "He is quite possibly the savior of Salem." "Who is it that led the Grand Rite?" "To answer that, we must go to Salem ourselves." "Do I have your protection?" "_" "_" "_" "The war is on." "If you defy me, only horror awaits you." "The battle has begun." "It is I, not Mary Sibley, who..." "And the front line is in Salem." "Mercy Lewis killed our witches." "True witches." "The Elders." "_" "Courage, men." "This is our ultimate battle." "We have every reason to believe the crags are the last refuge of the Salem witches." "For the sake of all our people, your wives and children, it's clear what must be done." "We end it here." "Again!" "Again!" "Witches!" "Suffer not one to survive and torment us more!" "Kill them!" "Kill them all!" "You wanted war." "Now taste war." "_" "_" "_" "_" "_" "We are the people of Salem," "God's chosen people, given this land on which to build a new world of Faith and freedom." "But even God's gifts come at a price." "A dreadful price." "Mercy Lewis and the daughters of Salem fell under the devil's tragic influence." "You all saw what they did last night..." "Slaughtered two old, innocent beggars from the outskirts of town, hung and burned like animals on the stocks." "An act of war on all of us." "I weep for our lost children." "But such are the casualties of this war on witches." "We must be willing to bear any burden, pay any price." "It is up to us what kind of land this shall be." "A Heaven on earth..." "Or a Hell." "Witch blood fall, black earth rise." "Hear my call, make me wise." "Time foretell for me alone when all mankind, its sins atone." "Pretty words, but as you well know, words without blood are nothing but air." "For once, cease your shriking, harpy." "I am mistress of blood as well as words." "Observe this exquisite movement." "See here." "This is the clock..." "The clock of the doom that hangs over Salem, over the puritans, over this whole land." "And over you, too, should you fail." "Know that you shall never truly possess that boy as your own son if you do not complete the Great Task." "Save your breath." "I have already sown the witch seeds, and today the plague bodies begin to be dumped into the crags to await their transformation." "The comet will soon Blaze overhead, terrifying all for only three nights." "By the time it passes in fiery glory, the crags will be filled with hell-blood, the gate will open, and our dark lord at last incarnates." "For once, lay aside all your suspicions and grudges, my dark sister." "Exult." "We have long lain in their grim gutters, but our eyes have always remained on the stars above." "And now our time is at hand." "Indeed, you have done marvelously well." "But there remains one flaw in your gem." "And what is that?" "Against all judgment, you entrusted the Malum to that idiot Isaac." "And now he is near awakening and will most likely tell your handsome doctor exactly how this pox began." "You must fix it... for good." "On the one hand, the news is almost all grim." "The number of victims increases exponentially." "At this rate, there may not be anyone alive here in a fortnight." ""Almost all grim"?" "That sounds entirely grim." "Uh, yes." "But then there is your Isaac." "He is finally conscious." "And what says he?" "Well, so far, only one word." ""Mary."" "Isaac and I are childhood friends." "It's true." "May I see him?" "Certainly." "This way." "I hope the sight of you will revive him sufficiently to tell us what we so desperately need to know..." "How he first encountered this dreadful pox." "Dr. Wainwright, might I have a quiet moment alone with him first?" "It might help." "Of course." "Mary." "Is that you?" "Yes, sweet Isaac." "It is I." "I'm so sorry." "Sorry?" "What on earth for?" "It's all my fault." "Calm yourself, Isaac." "What's your fault?" "All this." "All of this death." "See, at the last moment, I lost Faith." "I didn't do as you told me." "If I did as you said, perhaps none of this would've happened." "Hush, now." "What's done is done." "And it was wrong of me to put you in such danger." "Let us never speak of this again." "To anyone." "As you say, I will do." "Please... a drink." "A drink." "I'm so sorry, Isaac." "Rest here." "Let me get you a fresh glass of water." "Now, what do you think you're doing?" "Playing, ma'am." "Well, we must all have our amusements." "But do not let your mother catch you at such playing, understand?" "Yes, ma'am." "Mr. Hathorne." "Greetings, my dear girl." "How may I help you?" "It is I who am here to help you." "Oh, I thank you for whatever kindness you may intend, but I'm rather busy at present." "No one can replace your father, either in your life, or the life of the community." "But someone must try." "Sugar?" "No." "Thank you." "Your father was a most impressive man." "How far he rose during his years here in Salem." "After all, he alone of the senior selectmen was not a founder." "No." "He came here only after some years in the west Indies." "I envy your father his grit." "He is... was..." "What they are now calling a "self-made man."" "Whatever that may mean, given that we are all made by God." "But still, uh, impressive, and wise, too, to have made a fortune." "I don't know any Hales back in old England." "Do you know your ancestors?" "No." "Uh, my father was the only one of his family to... make the crossing." "Ah, I see." "Too bad." "Family is everything." "And a tall family tree, planted with deep roots, blessed with wide, plentiful branches, is the best guarantor of a successful life." "So, with no cousins, the task of preserving and expanding your father's fortune falls on your lovely but narrow shoulders." "I suppose so." "It's a dangerous world for an orphan girl." "Filled with predators who would take your fortune and your innocence." "In whom you place your trust and your troth will be the most important decision of your life." "And I trust, when the time comes, you will make the correct one." "Oh, e-excuse me." "The air is rather dry today." "I should go." "I shall return for you, my dear." "Excuse me." "Where are those coaches headed?" "Boston, Jamestown, New York." " I'd like to purchase passage to..." " May I see your travel permit?" "Since when does one need a permit to travel?" "Sorry, miss." "New orders from the selectmen." "Part of the quarantine effort." "You'll need to apply to them or Mrs. Sibley for a permit." "Miss Hale?" "Did she send you to stop me?" "She?" "Oh, no." "Our mistress has no idea that I'm here." "She may be your mistress, but none of mine." "That would be a mistake, miss Hale." "You really must learn the virtue of patience." "You speak to me of virtue?" "I detest everything she and you stand for, everything you're doing..." "Turning this town into a pit of death, seizing powers never intended." "I want nothing from her or you." "In truth," "I share your discomfort at some of her actions." "But for the time being, stay still and learn from her." "I cannot bear it!" "I must get out of this place!" "But where would you go?" "Away." "Anywhere but here." "Well, you know where to find me, and I you." "Miss Hale?" "What on heaven and earth are you doing here?" "The ranters are right." "This is the end of the world, and the dead walk." "I was told a friend of the Indians lives in these woods." "And so he does." "Who are you?" "Some call me Petrus." "Petrus?" "Yes." "I remember that name." "Are you a witch?" "Whatever I may be," "I have been much engaged on your behalf." "I showed Mary Sibley your funeral." "So you're on our side." "A circle has no sides." "Come." "Alive or dead, you are still the most wanted man in the colony." "Bring out the dead!" "Bring out the dead!" "Bring out the dead!" "My dear husband." "I'm sorry, but we must take him." "How dare you?" "I have sent diggers to prepare a resting place for him." "You have no business taking him!" "Reverend Lewis, these bodies must be removed from the town." "It is far too dangerous to keep them within the village." "Where would you take them?" "Mary Sibley informed me that you have a place outside of town where you sometimes dispose of bodies?" "The crags?" "Sir, it is a matter of the health of the entire community." "You may have dedicated yourself to the health of the citizens, but I am responsible for their souls!" "Gentlemen." "It is precisely this degree of argument and dissension, in full view of a public that look to us for unity, that is the most dangerous of all." "Did you order that all bodies..." "Puritan, good men and good women..." "Be dumped into the crags like slaves and common criminals without the benefit of prayer or service?" "Mr. Hathorne, these are extraordinary times with extraordinary dangers." "And they call for extraordinary measures." "We would do best if all those who fall to the pox were interred some distance from the center of town and farther away from the waterfront and the well, lest they aid in the spread of the pox." "I'm glad, at least, they didn't send you back unarmed." "I sense them, your tools of power." "A witch dagger to kill, a moonstone to see, and a medicine bag to be unseen." "It hurts to hide." "I should know." "I've been hiding my whole life." "How many witches in Salem?" "How many thorns on a rose?" "One hundred is not enough if you wish to protect the flower," " and one is too many." " How many?" "!" "What matter the exact number?" "Because I intend to kill every last one of them, so it'd be helpful to know how many and their names." "But the names I know, you know." "Mary Sibley, Tituba, Magistrate Hale." "Who else?" "I cannot say." "Then what good are you to me?" "No man knows his own worth." "But I will tell you that there is one less witch in Salem since you left." "Hale is dead." "How?" "Wrong question." "And the right question is?" "What now?" "You need to start talking or you'll be deaf as well as blind." "Salem will need a new magistrate soon." "So?" "What do I care for puritan politicking?" "Mary Sibley is determined to place another of her hive in that powerful position." "Find out who Mary Sibley is backing for magistrate and I find the next witch in line." "There." "It's good to see you can still smile, miss Hale." "So, tell me, what brings you to Boston?" "Is your father in town on business?" "My father..." "Dear miss Hale, what is it?" "My father and my mother..." "Both dead." "Dead?" "From the pox." "The pox?" "Salem is gripped by pox?" "It is as if the Angel of Death himself has descended upon the town." "A pox." "Is this it?" "What?" "The Malum." "Evil unleashed." "The apple opened." "The witches' Grand Rite." "I don't understand." "I feared something like this." "They wouldn't listen." "But a pox... ha!" "This they can't ignore." "They must do something." ""They"?" "What about you?" "You must do something." "Me?" "I am..." "I am banned from even speaking about Salem." "I'm explicitly forbidden by the elders from returning." "Perhaps in a month or two they will reconsider and relent." "We do not have months." "We may not have weeks." "I fear all will be dead by then." "Please, Reverend Mather..." ""Cotton."" "I think after all we've been through, you may now... call me Cotton." "Cotton..." "Please return to Salem." "Even if I could, what use?" "Everything I did turned to dust or... or worse." "Simply put, miss Hale," "I'm a failure." "Back in Salem, it was my doubts soothed by your calm confidence." "It pains me to find you sunk in doubt." "Since the incidents in Salem..." "And my father's death, I..." "I doubt everything." "I've even begun to doubt the existence of witches." "No." "Never doubt there are witches." "Miss Hale..." "Anne..." "Has something else happened?" "I mean to you?" "You know you may tell me anything." "Countess!" "This is a day of surprises." "What brings you here?" "Cheese, wine, pork, and sausages." "A bachelor alone rarely feeds himself properly." "Though I find you not nearly alone as I expected." "Countess Palatine Ingrid Von Marburg, may I present Anne Hale, newly arrived from Salem." "From Salem." "Oh, my dear... my poor dear." "You must tell us everything..." "Everything." "It's so hard to believe any of it." "Who could imagine such horrors?" "I thought I smelled a witch in Boston." "Where am I?" "Within." "Within?" "Within what?" "Your soul." "Who are you?" "Oh, my dear, I have had so many names." "Hecate, Medea, Báthory are just a few." "I'm the Swallower of Souls, she who flowers from her own wounds." "I'm the last of the first, the last of the true witches." "What do you want with me?" "To help you discover your true nature." "Your bright light has been buried 'neath the coal of half-wit half-breeds of the so-called Essex witches." "Imagine my surprise to find that, of all the hives that survive, it is weak-blooded Essex witches who have done the undoable..." "Complete our Grand Rite." "What I want to know..." "Is who." "Who?" "Oh, yes." "Who, my little owl." "Who amongst the Essex hive has initiated the Grand Rite?" "I don't know." "Oh, do not lie to me." "Ever." "There could be no greater error than that." "You do know, and you will tell me." "No, I do not know, truly." "I know nothing of the witches." "I-I didn't even know I was one." "Oh, no, I see that now." "You do not even know what it is that you do know." "I am deeply desirous of knowing who it was that performed the Grand Rite." "My own triumph was stolen by that pestiferous, pus-headed killer," "Increase Mather." "You know Increase Mather?" "Oh, he and I danced a lively jig, and neither of us left it unmarked." "I will tell you all my stories sometime." "But it's not about me now." "It's about you." "Me?" "What have I to do with... anything?" "You are uniquely placed because of your heritage." "Your father did not tell you the whole truth, did he?" "Well, you must ask him." "Ask him who you truly are." "You are no mere Essex witch any more than he." " I cannot ask him." " Why?" "He is dead." "Well, do not weep for him." "We must all murder our fathers and mothers." "This is the way." "How did you know I..." "Child, you have so much to learn." "I almost envy you the long path to endarkenment that you must walk." "When you learn to talk to your father again where he is, then you will be ready to hear what he can tell you." "In the meantime, weep no more unless it is to bring the rain." "We will meet again, little owl, and soon." "Until then, tell no one that we have met." "Their time for knowing me is not yet." "And trust me," "I will know if you have told anyone." "And things will not go lightly for you." "We are just dying to hear your opinion." "Do bring miss Hale to dine." "Sebastian is most anxious to meet you." "And I know he will be thrilled to make miss Hale's acquaintance as well." "We're all going to be such friends," "I just know it." "Good lord." "Mrs. Sibley." "W-what are you doing here?" "I could ask you the same question." "I live directly opposite and have known this house to be long unoccupied." "When I saw movement, I..." "I knew you were strong and smart but never suspected how brave..." "To confront a potential robber alone." "Well, to be frank," "I thought it might be the previous occupant, a man I've known all my life and never had cause to fear." "Well, then you were even braver, as I am told the previous occupant was none other than the notorious king of the witches." "Perhaps, like me, you doubt the very existence of such things as witches." "No, I'm quite sure of the reality and threat of witches." "I never could believe John Alden was one." "But how come you to be here?" "Well, Mr. Hathorne told me the house was empty and seized on account of, well, witchcraft and that I might as well use it myself." "Do you have some objection or perhaps some attachment to the house yourself?" "I surely would do nothing to offend you, of all people." "No." "Uh, Mr. Hathorne was, for once, quite correct." "You do not like Mr. Hathorne?" "No more than he likes me." "Hathorne seems simply unmanned by a strong woman such as yourself." "Hm." "And you are not?" "Science teaches what the poets always knew..." "Woman is not only man's equal, but his superior." "Really?" "In what way?" "Well, the most important..." "Her capacity to endure pain." "Even the frailest woman can take far greater pain than the strongest man." "I've delivered too many babies to doubt that." "Trust me..." "If men had to deliver a child from an opening in their body that small, the earth would be a cold, dead place." "You look like one who's known pain intimately." "Perhaps in this very room?" "My pain, like my body, is mine alone." "You'd do well to remember that." "Good night, Dr. Wainwright." "But where will you sleep?" "Oh, I have never slept in this room." "It was my father's, and I find, even in his absence," "I am much more comfortable in my old room." "You will come to Salem, won't you?" "Lord knows what the elders will do." "Banish me, excommunicate me." "But yes, I will return to Salem." "Thank you..." "Cotton." "What did she taste like, mother?" "Like lemons and honey." "Like strawberry and sugar." "Like innocence." "I can still taste the honey." "Well, nothing lingers like innocence." "And what did you learn from your kiss, beyond the sweet taste of her lips?" "All she knew but didn't know she knew." "Most importantly, that the Grand Rite was led by one Mary Sibley." "I would have thought it was her father." "Oh, no." "Hale was a charming and cultured man but wasn't capable of leading the Grand Rite." "He was a survivor and carried always a survivor's guilt and fear." "He never would have taken the risk." "Ah, but this Mary Sibley..." "She must be something very special indeed." "Not content to survive, she would thrive." "Oh, Mama, I am fascinated already." "When shall we meet her?" "Soon, darling, soon." "But we must tread carefully." "We are no more welcome amongst the gutter hives than we are amongst the puritans." "And if we were to be recognized prematurely, it might be an awkward and bloody thing." "You never mind the blood, mother." "No." "But like a good carpenter," "I prefer to measure twice and cut once." "So let us take the measure of this Mary Sibley before we go to Salem." "As always, your beauty is exceeded only by your prudent wisdom." "I nearly forgot." "I brought you a present." "Oh, what a thoughtful son!" "Now, what did I do to deserve you?" "Only everything, Mama." "Only everything." "Boo." "Voilà, George." "The results of an excellent day's work." "With the first bodies being delivered to the crags, we are well under way." "You people have no idea what's coming for you." "You are so dim, with no more understandfng of the celestial movements than ants have." "We witches have always understood the skies and known how to predict what is coming." "And what is coming is death for all of you and a new life for us." "The comet will be here soon." "Our plague turns your dead bodies into Wells of hell-blood." "The crags will be filled when the comet passes over." "Well, then you puritans will be right for once." "The comet really will be a portent of doom..." "Your doom." "All of your dooms." "Well done, mistress." "Well done." "As a reward, you shall have a small taste of the maternal intimacies you may expect when your tasks are complete." "Come." "Soon, child." "Soon we shall be together every day and every night and nevermore be parted." "When, mother?" "When all my work is complete." "And all the world shall be yours." "Father..." "Your baby's home."