Salem: Phantom Lesbians

-Salem, Massachusetts, autumn 1691-

--Author's note: this story was inspired by my recent research into the Salem witch trials of 1692, and one author's observation of the sexual undertones in the accounts of witchcraft: "pricking", arched backs, moaning, etc. So I decided to spin this concept into an erotic story of women-loving-women. I plan to write several spin-off tales from this one, all set in the sexed-up Puritan world of 1690s Salem.--

Sarah skirted the edge of the forest with an ash basket slung over her forearm, eyes scanning the margin between forest and meadow for the herb with the ticklishly feathery leaves and the power of healing: yarrow. Spotting a cluster of them, she takes only one plant; she wants the yarrow here to endure, so that she can harvest here again and again, and she only needs a few leaves for her current purpose: tending Mercy's wound.

Medicine found, Sarah hikes up her skirts and runs, deer-like in the nimbleness of her feet, towards the old oak under which Mercy sits. She sees Mercy first, and Mercy, thinking she is still alone, has hiked up her own skirts dangerously high to inspect the gash on her knee. Her thigh, pale and smooth from its normal hiding place, dazzles in the fading afternoon sun of early autumn. Sarah slows to a walk, approaching nearly soundlessly. She wants to prolong this view of Mercy, so bewitched by creamy thigh, but she also knows that she should look away, announce her presence, let her right her skirts.

Mercy senses her then and hastily yanks down her skirts, cheeks flushing slightly. Sarah grows warm herself. They lock eyes for a moment, in silent acknowledgement of the feeling between them that they cannot name but still sense is forbidden. "So, did you find the plant?" Mercy asks, glancing down.

"Yes. I just need to chew it into a paste and then we can apply it to your wound."

"Are...are you sure this is right? This remedy seems a little...well, a little like witchcraft, and the Reverend says you shall go to hell for doing that."

Sarah had already accepted that her dabblings in magick might land her in hell, but that fact was strictly secret from everyone except her mother, her teacher. "Oh Mercy, this could not be witchcraft, do we not use herbs all the time for getting well?"

Mercy considers this for a moment, and Sarah admires just how lovely she is when her brows are knitted in concentration. "I suppose so, but getting the plants from the forest, rather than herbs from the garden, seems much more...witch-like."

Sarah waves this concern away. "Nonsense, Mercy. God created all these plants that we may benefit from them. One just needs to know how to use them." She chews up two leaves and spits them into her hand, pressing them into a layer with her thumb. "Now let us put this on your knee to stop the bleeding." She offers the paste to Mercy to apply herself.

"Perhaps you could apply it instead,"Mercy says, tentatively lifting her skirts. 'It's simply medicinal,' Mercy tells herself, 'like any physician might touch you to make you well again.' She hopes God will follow this logic, too, and not smite her for wanting Sarah's hand on her knee, or perhaps higher...

"Oh...okay." Sarah works the mash into a suitable paste and gingerly swipes it over the gash on Mercy's knee with her thumb. Mercy's eyes follow her hand, and her body sings with alertness. After she finishes, Sarah wipes her palms clean on the grass and begins to stand.

"Wait..." Mercy nearly beseeches her. Sarah pauses halfway to standing. "I think I may have also scraped my thigh when I struck that rock."

A fiery blush passes over Sarah's cheeks. She does not know the line on Mercy's body which she must not cross to avoid eternal damnation, but a small unholy part of her wants to find out. She waits for Mercy to draw her skirts up further. When she does, Sarah glides her hand over the hill of her lower thigh. Her heart leaps at the hitch in Mercy's breathing.

"I do not see any other wounds," Sarah announces, brushing off her hands and standing abruptly. "It must have only been your knee that was hurt."

"Oh, alright then." Mercy avoids Sarah's gaze as she recovers her thigh. "Shall we return to the village?"

They walk back silently, an arms-length between them, but Sarah still writhes under the tension strung between them that wants to take control of her body.

**********

The cold tightens its grip as the autumn recedes into winter, so by the time the first snow coats the ground, Mercy and Sarah are both confined to the indoor tasks of their respective homes, and see each other only in passing at the Sunday service. Mercy tries to convince herself that she has felt nothing but sweet friendship for Sarah. With the harvest complete, though, she discovers more idle time in her day, wherein she fights the tide of thoughts of Sarah: Sarah, smiling; Sarah, laughing; Sarah, blushing; Sarah, touching her thigh. She regrets the distance growing between them with the change of season, though, so one day, after a long argument with herself, she decides to pay a visit to Sarah. She trudges across the fresh snow to the outskirts of the village where Sarah lives with her widowed mother. As she allows her mind to wander, she realizes that Sarah, also 19 years of age, will probably be wed to some young man soon. She kicks at the snow, and does not why something akin to jealousy sours her blood.

Just up the hill from Sarah's home, she freezes at the sight of Sarah through the window. She is raising a handful of herbs above her head, eyes closed in reverence, and murmuring words that Mercy cannot hear but is certain are a sell. She blanches; this must be witchcraft!

Sarah, meanwhile, has not forgotten what she felt that day that she saw Mercy's thigh and blushing while painting her wounded knee with yarrow. Yarrow: bloodstopper, for love. This nostalgic herb is in her hands again, along with thistle, for remembrance; lilac, for first love; marigold, for her inquietude; and daffodil, for delusive hope. She recites a prayer to the earth mother, and seals her spell with a kiss. When she opens her eyes, the object of her desire is standing just up the hill from her kitchen window. She thinks it an omen - though wicked or divine, she does not know. Sarah runs to the door, throws it open, and calls to her, "Mercy, how lovely a surprise! Please come in."

Mercy hesitates. Perhaps she misinterpreted the sight, but she cannot calm her racing heart. If Sarah is doing witchcraft, though, she must try to convince her to stop. She loves her friend, and does not want her damned or hanged. So she trudges down the hill to her doorstep.

Sarah scrutinizes Mercy's discomfited expression when she stomps her snowy boots at the door. "Mercy, what is it that troubles you?"

"There's something I need to talk to you about... I am concerned for your soul."

Sarah's eyebrows shoot up. She hopes that Mercy has not discovered her witchcraft, but would not be surprised if she had. She had never excelled at hiding things from her dearest friend, for whom love squeezed unbidden out of her heart. "I shall make tea first."

Mercy nods and sits down at the squat kitchen table. When Sarah hands her a cup of brewed chamomile, she lifts it to her nose, inhaling its aroma: familiar, calming, *bewitching*. Her eyes flutter back open to discover Sarah watching her, and so they follow her cup back down to the table.

"Sarah, I have become suspicious of all you know about plants and what they can do. For years, I thought perhaps you were just an excellent gardener... but Reverend Paris's sermons about witchcraft of late have made me begin to suspect that there are indeed witches in Salem, and that you are one of them." Her eyes flash up to Sarah's stark white face, and she wants to reassure her. "Do not fear, I will not tell a single soul what I suspect. But, Sarah, if you are a witch, then you must stop at once. Renounce Satan, repent for your witchcraft! Perhaps there is still a chance to save your soul!"

Sarah grips her teacup, and, brows knitted by indecision, fixes her gaze on a smudge near the edge of the table. She rubs at it with her thumb while she weighs her response. She sighs. "Mercy, I cannot lie to you, my dearest friend. I have been practicing witchcraft, but it is not how you think! I do not worship the Devil, nor do I abandon God or torture innocents. I simply use plants for the magickal properties that God endowed them with."

"But witchcraft is a sin against God!" Mercy protests.

"I think it actually brings me closer to God, knowing Creation so deeply." Sarah is surprised by her own composure.

Mercy, in turn, surprises her with a question. "Is plant magick really all that you dabble in?"

It is Sarah's turn to scrutinize her cup. "Well, I have begun to learn how to use poppets..."

"Poppets?!" Mercy cries out. "Sarah, whatever for?! Witches use those to harm innocents!"

"Oh, Mercy, I would never use them to hurt someone! I only use them to bring about... pleasant sensations to the body. I could even show you..."

Mercy opens her mouth to protest such wickedness, but she also wants to know about those pleasant sensations. She considers for a long moment before answering Sarah's invitation. "Do you think I would be punished for being touched through a poppet?"

"No," Sarah replies, "the punishment would all be upon me."

Another long pause from Mercy. "Are you certain, Sarah, that you are willing to take that risk?"

Sarah has never more certain. "Yes, I certainly am, Mercy."

"Alright. What do I need to do?"

Sarah reins in her excitement. "It is best if you are laying down." She points to the cot on the other side of the room. "And I'll need to pluck a strand of hair from your head." This is not entirely true - she need not pluck it herself - but she wants to put her hands in Mercy's hair.

Mercy obliges. Sarah follows her to the cot and kneels beside her head. She strokes a hand over Mercy's bronze tresses while Mercy watches her, expression unreadable. She feels an inexplicable desire to tangle both her hands in her hair and pull their bodies together...but she forces it back down into the fire in her belly. She winces at the flicker of pain on Mercy's face when she plucks a single strand from her scalp. This she wraps around the wrist of a ragdoll that was laying beside the bed. She closers her eyes and speaks a few words in Latin. Opening her eyes again, she instructs Mercy to close her own.

Breathing deeply, she procures a yarrow leaf from her pocket and feathers it over the poppet. Mercy wriggles in laughter as if Sarah were tickling her directly. Sarah drags the leaf over the poppet's lips, touching her own sensitive ones with the tip of her finger. She replaces the leaf with her finger and brushes it over the front of the poppet. Mercy inhales sharply. Her fingertip begins to work circles over the poppet's torso, then elongated strokes, then back to circles. Mercy's breath labors, and the softest moan passes through her lips. She finds the poppet's nipples, and begins to work that small area, alternating between rubbing and pinching and twisting the point of fabric there. Mercy moans again, more insistent this time. Sarah sets both hands to work, one on each poppet nipple, and Mercy writhes and gasps at the sensations.

Sarah glides her fingers down the outside of its legs, then up their inseams. She pauses just below the pelvis, and Mercy tightens in anticipation. She feathers her finger ever so lightly along its crotch, and Mercy cries out. This response she is familiar with in herself, and she knows it to be a sure sign to continue. She runs her finger back and forth there more insistently now, and Mercy seems to buck against her phantom touch. She strokes her more roughly until she knows that it is time for the finale.

Pulling her finger away for a moment, she jabs it at the center of the poppet's crotch, invaginating the cloth. Mercy gasps, so Sarah plunges her finger, then three, into the poppet's non-existent entrance. Her thrusts are so persistent that the poppet's crotch inseam yields, and then she is plunging even more deeply. Mercy moans and bucks uncontrollably.

Sarah does not sway from her course, watching for the tell-tale tensing of Mercy's body. At the first sign of its onset, Sarah thrusts her fingers in even more deeply and rapidly. Mercy cries out as her back arches up from the bed, like a woman possessed. Sarah does not slow her pace until Mercy's body begins to relax and twinge away from thrusts, at which point she withdraws and waits for Mercy to regain her senses.

For a few long moments, the only sound is the breath heaving in and out of Mercy's chest. "Lord have mercy upon me," she pants. "That cannot have been anything but a sin."

Sarah laughs. "God gave us our bodies with which to enjoy creation."

"Sarah..." Sarah loves the way Mercy says her name. "What would the Reverend do if he found out that you are capable of this?"

Sarah looks down at the poppet in her hands, stuffing poking out of its new hole. "I think it is best if he never finds out."

Mercy sits up and nods. "I should go home now, but... perhaps I could pay another visit tomorrow? My chores are fewer now that it is winter again, and I am certain that it becomes lonely out here...

Sarah's heart inflates. Daffodil: delusive hope. Perhaps her spell was effective after all. "Yes, certainly!" She swoops in to peck Mercy's cheek, then blushes at what she has done.

Mercy's cheeks burn, too; part of her wants to run out the door, and other part roots her where she stands. Some courage she is unaware of whooshes through her body and she returns the peck. Then, smiling demurely, she walks out the door.