Welcome to Oddville (conclusion)

This is the con­clu­sion of a two-part sto­ry. If you haven’t read part one, you’ll want to do that now: Welcome to Oddville (Part one).

“How are you feel­ing, Brayden? That’s a mighty good piece of pie, isn’t it?”

Brayden couldn’t answer. He noticed the oth­er men stand­ing up and sur­round­ing him. He tried to cry out but his words seemed trapped. The world turned black.

Brayden’s eyes began to slow­ly open. The room was bright, but his eye­sight was blur­ry. He could see the out­line of a man stand­ing above him and the sil­hou­ettes of sev­er­al peo­ple around him. He shook his head to try and clear the dis­ori­en­ta­tion. As his eyes adjust­ed, he real­ized that the fig­ure stand­ing above him was behind an altar. It was Jeremiah. Surrounding him, oth­er mem­bers of the com­mu­ni­ty stood sto­ic, all wear­ing long black robes. Brayden want­ed to run, to scream, but his hands and feet were bound to a straight back chair and his mouth had been gagged. Jeremiah was notic­ing his panic.

“I see you are awake, evil one. Everyone! The evil one has awak­ened! Brayden Coldiron, you are being pre­sent­ed to the Redemption Road Church on the charge of prac­tic­ing witch­craft. Brother Ezekiel will remove the gag from your mouth so that you may answer to these charges. There is no need to scream. No one will hear you. No one will come to your aid. Brother Ezekiel, please remove the cloth so that he may speak. Evil one, what say ye.”

Brayden was stunned. But, he knew he must remain calm if he was going to escape this insan­i­ty. He took a deep breath as Ezekiel removed the cloth from his mouth.

“Why are you charg­ing me with witch­craft and why am I tied up? What is going on?!”

Jeremiah looked down at him, a smirk slow­ly spread on his face. “You are our pris­on­er, evil one. That is why you have been restrained. The charge of witch­craft has been assigned to you due to your hea­then views of our Heavenly Father and the blas­phe­mous gar­ment you wear mock­ing the most holy cross.”

Brayden looked down at his t‑shirt with the white cross­es, “With all due respect, Jeremiah…”

“REVEREND JEREMIAH!” He shout­ed down from the pulpit. 

His boom­ing voice star­tled Brayden, caus­ing him to jump. This pleased the pastor.

“I apol­o­gize,” began Brayden. “With all due respect, Reverend Jeremiah, sir, this t‑shirt was nev­er meant to offend you. It is only art­work from a music album. I am not a witch.”

“SILENCE! This is the devil’s art­work! God will decide your fate.” Jeremiah looked at the mem­bers of the con­gre­ga­tion. “I here­by sen­tence this witch to a tri­al by swim­ming. That will reveal the truth, my brethren. Ezekiel! Malachi! Take this pris­on­er to the pond.”

The two stepped for­ward approach­ing Brayden. Malachi lift­ed him from under­neath his arms and Ezekiel car­ried him by his feet. Brayden began fight­ing to get loose. He could feel the ropes loos­en­ing around his feet. Malachi spoke up.

“It is best if you do not resist. God will decide your fate. Resisting could deter­mine that sooner.”

Brayden turned to look at Malachi who was look­ing straight ahead. Brayden decid­ed to stop resist­ing and con­cen­trate on the ropes incon­spic­u­ous­ly. If any­one noticed that they were giv­ing way, his chance for escape would be impos­si­ble. The two men sat the pris­on­er at the bank of the pond behind the church as the rest of the parish­ioners approached. Jeremiah stood next to Brayden and faced his flock.

“Brothers and Sisters, we are gath­ered here today in the pres­ence of the Almighty God to decide the fate of this hea­then witch. He has come to us by virtue of the demons of Hell wear­ing his gar­ment of blas­phe­my into our fair town to spread his per­ver­sions, sin­ful acts, and evil spells. We will not have it! We shall allow our Father in Heaven to decide the fate of his soul. As I, your rev­erend, through the pow­er of Jehovah, decree that the evil one shall be thrown into the deep­est sec­tion of the pond, bound by his hands and feet. If he sinks, we the con­gre­ga­tion, shall cel­e­brate his inno­cence. If he floats, we shall know he is a witch sent here by SATAN!”

The crowd cheered. Brayden looked at Jeremiah. “If I am inno­cent I will be dead.”

Jeremiah looked at him, a snarl slow­ly com­ing across his face. “Ah, my lost sheep. If you are inno­cent, you will have the chance to meet Jesus this day. What a glo­ri­ous day that will be!”

Brayden was stunned. He had been slow­ly and method­i­cal­ly work­ing his way out of the rope. He knew he could sur­vive this test he was as excel­lent swim­mer. But get­ting away from this crowd felt hope­less. He must wait for the per­fect oppor­tu­ni­ty. He had no idea where his car was. He would run if he had to. This was not how he was going to die…not today.

Jeremiah turned to Ezekiel and Malachi. “Take the pris­on­er to the cen­ter of the pond and let us watch Hell swal­low him up.”

Jeremiah’s hench­men did his bid­ding pick­ing Brayden up off of the ground and plac­ing him in a small boat. Entering the boat on each end they rowed to the cen­ter of the pond. 

Malachi made eye con­tact with Brayden for the first time.

“May God have mer­cy on your soul.”

The men stood, strug­gling to bal­ance the boat as it rocked back and forth. They heft­ed Brayden swing­ing him into the cold water. Brayden gulped a last lung full of air as he splashed into the murky depths. Concentrating hard, he reached down toward his ankles, fin­ish­ing his work on loos­en­ing the rope around them. The rope slid off, slow­ly falling below him. He was run­ning out of time, but for his plan to work, he had to make sure he could free his hands. The des­per­a­tion to breathe was clos­ing in. His chest began to ache. As he felt the rope around his wrists loosen enough for them to move freely, he des­per­ate­ly kicked toward the sur­face. Violently break­ing through the sur­face, Brayden inhaled an enor­mous gasp of glo­ri­ous air. He allowed his body to float as he regained his strength. The con­gre­ga­tion was shocked. Brayden could hear the loud mur­mur­ing and stir­ring as Jeremiah shouted.

“Witch!! Get him! He shall burn at the stake!”

Brayden could see Ezekiel and Malachi row­ing toward him and the crowd run­ning toward the oppo­site side of the pond where a large stake stood. He was to be burned there! As the boat float­ed clos­er, Brayden freed his wrists, took in a deep breath, and dived under­wa­ter. He swam deep enough that the onlook­ers could not see the direc­tion he was going. He would not be able to take a breath until he reached the shore. The mud­dy water offered zero vis­i­bil­i­ty mak­ing it disorienting. 

Concentration was essential…concentration and hope. Brayden could feel the bot­tom of the pond. He was near­ing the edge. Slowly he maneu­vered his way to the sur­face for air and per­spec­tive. As qui­et­ly as he was able, he resur­faced, look­ing around at where he was locat­ed. Exactly as he had hoped, the crowd was scur­ry­ing to find him on the oth­er side. 

Ezekiel and Malachi had jumped in attempt­ing to recov­er the body.

Brayden slow­ly and qui­et­ly inched his way to the edge, haul­ing his tired body out of the water. There was no time for rest. He ran as fast as he could toward the road in front of the church. Behind him, he could hear that he had been discovered. 

“There he is! He is get­ting away!”

Jeremiah’s voice could be heard above them all. 

“Get the witch! He must die!”

Brayden ran past the church and turned onto the high­way. He ran as fast as his legs could car­ry him. He did not dare look behind him for fear that he would real­ize his plans were fail­ing. In the dis­tance, he could see his car! Escape was so close! He had almost no gas and hoped that the keys were still in the igni­tion. Reaching his car, he flung open the door and quick­ly got in lock­ing the door behind him. The keys dan­gled in the igni­tion. Turning the key, the engine start­ed with the fuel light shin­ing bright­ly. The mob was mere­ly yards away. Throwing it in reverse, he peeled out from Jeremiah’s shop with grav­el fly­ing. He gunned the gas and decid­ed that he would go as far down the high­way as his car would take him. Looking in the rearview mir­ror, the crowd was sink­ing far­ther and far­ther away. There were no oth­er cars on the road as Brayden drove near­ly 100 mph on the curvy high­way. If he just kept fol­low­ing this path, it would have to lead him to the next town.

In the dis­tance, Brayden spot­ted a stop­light. He was free! Oddville would nev­er have a stop­light. He looked in the rearview mir­ror again. There was noth­ing. Tears filled his eyes as he allowed him­self to let the relief wash over him. He eased off the gas and could see a gas sta­tion ahead. A police cruis­er was parked next to a car with the hood up. 

The police offi­cer was talk­ing to the per­son work­ing on the car. Brayden could ask them for help! He pulled up to the two vehicles.

“Officer! Please help me! I just came from this church in Oddville. They tried to drown me in a pond claim­ing I was a witch! I’m not sure what or who they were…maybe a cult, I don’t know…”

The offi­cer was lis­ten­ing intent­ly, “Hold on there, slow down. A cult? 

Oddville?”

“Yes, sir. Oddville the town up the road, about fif­teen miles that way.” Brayden point­ed in the direc­tion that he had come.

“The only town that way is Olive Branch.” The offi­cer turned to the per­son work­ing on the car. “Jerry, have you ever heard of a town called Oddville??”

Brayden froze. From behind the hood stepped a pleas­ant-look­ing man with a round face and gray beard. He was wip­ing his hands on a rag. He looked at Brayden as a grin came across his face.

“No, sir. I can’t say that I have…”