The Damnation Chronicles: Book of Shadows, #3.5

By Michael Penning

Three short companion stories to the bestselling Book of Shadows series are collected here in one spine-chilling volume. What drove Rebecca Hale to sell her soul to the Devil on the eve of her hanging for witchcraft? How did Abigail Jacobs come to possess her powerful Book of Shadows? What happened the night of Anna Jacobs' first ghost-hunt? The answers to these mysteries are all here.

 

A Firebrand of Hell: Salem is ablaze with dreadful talk of witchcraft. The village girls have fallen into fits—shrieking in agony, writhing on the floor, contorting themselves into grotesque poses. Reverend Parris proclaims them tormented by witchcraft and soon the accusations begin. Fear imbues every whisper. Suspicions are rampant. Neighbours cast sidelong glances at each other. Some say the Devil himself has come to Salem.

 

It's only a matter of time before they come for the notorious Rebecca Hale.

 

The Witch of Gallows Hill: Seven years after the tragic All Hallows' Eve that changed her life forever, Abigail Jacobs braves Salem's haunted Northern Woods in search of the lost spell-book of the witch of Gallows Hill. But she soon discovers the dead won't give up what is theirs without a fight.

 

What will Abigail be willing to sacrifice to claim the mysterious Book of Shadows?

 

The Haunting of Siren's Inn: The murderous spirit of a jilted lover returns every seven years to haunt the Siren's Inn and relive the night of his bloody crimes. While a winter Northeaster ravages the seaside hamlet of Gloucester, ghost-hunting occultist Abigail Jacobs and her daughter, Anna, have only one chance to lay his malevolent spirit to rest before he claims another victim. But the old inn is full of secrets, and nothing is as it seems.

 

Their survival is left in Anna's hands, and it won't come without a price.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Michael Penning
• Release date: Sep 25, 2022
• ISBN: 9781778152337

Michael Penning

Michael Penning is an award-winning screenwriter and bestselling author of horror and suspense. He is an avid fan of Halloween, haunted houses, and things that go bump in the night. When he’s not coming up with creative ways to scare the hell out of people, he enjoys travelling, photography, and brewing beer. He lives in Montreal with his wife, daughter, and black dog, Salem.

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Copyright © 2022 Michael Penning

All Rights Reserved

This is a work of fiction. Any reference to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination and any resemblance to actual events, places, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

THE DAMNATION CHRONICLES

First edition. October, 2022

ISBN: 978-1-7781523-3-7 (ebook)

www.michaelpenning.com

CHAPTER ONE

THIS COMPANION STORY to the Book of Shadows novels takes place before the events of All Hallows Eve, but can be enjoyed at any time.

Rebecca Hale knelt in her cell and cursed the people of Salem. They reviled her and branded her an enemy of God. She was the one who tormented the poor village girls. She was the witch who blighted the harvest. Rebecca Hale rode the midnight winds and brought sickness and death to the innocent. The Puritans of Salem had condemned her and made her suffer, and now she damned them all to Hell.

If it be blood they crave, let them drink blood ‘till mine be repaid, she rasped through lips that were cracked and raw.

Rebecca had once been pretty, but her teeth were now sickly yellow. The freckles of her face and arms were now obscured by grime smeared across her pale skin. Her thick red hair was a tangled mess of impossible knots and her mouth was a dry crack stretched between two sunken cheeks. Dull green eyes stared from the depths of hollow sockets like tarnished emeralds tossed in a well. The limp remains of a simple black gown hung from her emaciated frame, the linen now little more than soiled rags.

Imprisoned in a chamber no wider than an upright coffin, Rebecca had crouched low enough to kneel on the filthy floor. It was her only respite from endless hours standing upright. There wasn't room for a chair or bed. Lying across the floor to sleep was impossible. Rebecca’s only luxury was a tin pail for her waste. Above where she knelt, slivers of feeble candlelight flickered through rusty iron bars set into the oaken door. Some villagers had questioned wasting good candles on such wicked prisoners, but Edgar Fisk had been adamant.

Salem’s jailor was a brutish blacksmith who blamed the witches for his wife’s death. He was the first to volunteer to keep them behind bars—and to serve as a hangman if needed. Fisk knew what horrors the witches were capable of; he wouldn’t leave them alone in the dark to work their evil. Each evening, while the dying light of dusk still glowed through the jail’s only window, the jailor descended into the dungeon to set a candle on a ledge in the narrow stone corridor.

The air down there was so cold and damp that water ran down the walls in thin but constant trickles, leaving behind sticky streams of rusty orange mildew. The candle’s fragile flame sent a tendril of oily black smoke up into the darkness that shrouded the ancient beams of the ceiling. In the gathering gloom, the weak light gave off no warmth and no consolation. The stench of unwashed bodies, filth, and mold that permeated the cavernous dungeon overpowered the sour scent of the tallow wax.

Some nights, Fisk’s candle burned itself out more quickly than others. Fisk never dared to venture down into the black depths of the dungeon to replace it. He had thought about it once. He’d even lit a new candle and stood peering down the steep staircase into the murky darkness below. The candlelight illuminated the first few rickety steps. The rest vanished into a gaping pool of blackness. Somewhere down there, Fisk could hear the witches breathing, moaning, whispering. What were they doing down there? Conjuring? Communing with the devil?

Fisk had glanced down to find the candle shaking in his hand. His nerve failed and his feet felt rooted to the floor. He couldn’t will himself to take a single step down that staircase. With a shudder, he slammed the heavy door and slid the bolt home, checking it twice. Despite his misgiving about leaving the witches alone in the dark, some nights it was safer to leave them be and pray he was worthy of God’s protection.

Tonight would be one of those nights.

Rebecca huddled beneath the sputtering rays of Fisk’s dying candle and whimpered to herself as she waited for the dreaded darkness. Of all the terrors she had suffered in the months since her arrest, it was the darkness she feared most.

That’s when he came to her. The Dark Man.

Rebecca’s vacant gaze roamed over a jumble of scratches streaked across the stone walls on all sides of her. She no longer knew how long they had imprisoned her, and she no longer cared. She knew only that three nights had passed since she had gouged those walls with her nails—the night another wretched victim of the town’s hysteria had died in a neighboring cell.

Ann Foster’s