Ticks, Black Flies, and Witches, OH MY!

It's getting to be that season MMers, ticks and black flies are out in full force. But are the pests accosting you just part of the natural season cycle or are you being targeted by disgruntled neighbors, coworkers, or ex’s? Reports have reached us here at Malevolent Maine that there is a coven of witches operating somewhere in Southern Maine. This coven in order to make enough money to pay for exotic supplies is taking orders for hex totems that draw pests such as ticks and black flies to unsuspecting homes. 

What a totem could look like

We interviewed someone who was a new potential member of this coven who ultimately decided against joining. She told us her name was Talia, but also said that wasn’t her real name. “Well I’ve always been super into the occult and alternative lifestyles, but once I was actually in with these people I realized how weird they were.” Talia told us about strange initiation rituals where they had to kill small animals such as squirrels and rabbits, and make trinkets and totems out of their bones. “It was pretty icky” she said, “I was really uncomfortable the whole time, but some of the other people were really into it.” Some of these totems would then be used to hold the hexes that bring pests down on unsuspecting people.  

What a totem could look like

The leader of this coven was known simply as the Betrothed. “When I asked why she was called that, I was told it was the highest title of the coven. It meant she was like literally engaged to marry the devil, like satan you know? And that sketched me out.” Talia said that after a few weeks she started trying to figure out how to get out of the group. “Eventually I told them that I couldn’t participate anymore because my dad was sick. He wasn’t, but it was the only way I could figure out how to get out of all that. They offered to heal him but it would take more than a few little animals, but I declined.” 

Talia says that if you are experiencing any sort of curse or hex be sure to look around your home/property for small totems made of sticks or bones, tied with hair or strips of leather. This is most likely the source of the misfortune befalling you. She also warns against joining any sort of occult group “It seems fun at first, and sometimes you feel powerful, but eventually they will ask you to do something you aren’t comfortable with. It isn’t worth it.”  

Check your house for these totems, avoid occult groups, and stay safe out there, Maine!

The Witch of Woodland Valley

Good afternoon, MMers! With summer rapidly approaching and the weather improving, we wanted to take some time to warn you about potential harm found in a seemingly safe hobby. As you may know, there is a disc golf course in Limerick called Woodland Valley Disc Golf. You may have even played a round there yourself at some point in time. However, what you didn't know is that there is an evil spirit that haunts the grounds. If you've ever played there, you may have experienced a chill crawling up your spine around the sixth hole on the Grizzly Bear course. The hollowed out tree that marks the hole? Well, that's not there by accident. 

Back in the early 1690s, long before Maine was granted statehood, a woman named Isabelle Houser was arrested, and later convicted, for practicing witchcraft. It was said that she used her powers to lure young boys and girls out into the woods, pierce their ankles with rusty nails, hang them from a tree, and slowly drain the blood and life force out of them until they expired. Many believed that this was Isabelle's way of staying young, as she was 102 years old according to local records, but she didn't appear to be a day over 70. Once she was convicted and found guilty of witchcraft, murder, and other unmentionables, it was decided that she herself should hang from the same tree she had drained so many children from. So, the noose was readied, and Houser was hanged until death. The locals decided to not bother taking her body down afterwards, as she "deserved to rot" for what she had done. Six days after Houser's hanging, the middle of the tree seemingly imploded on itself, leaving only the hollowed out trunk that exists now. Interestingly enough, the tree hasn't changed shape since those days. Some say that it has an impenetrable hex that can never be removed. 

After her death, there were numerous reports of strange activity in those woods. Some reported hearing cackling in the distance, others heard the cries of desperate children. If you got close enough, you might even be able to smell, even see, the fresh blood of innocent children dripping down the tree's bark. 

Britney Bernard in the Hollowed Tree

In recent years since the disc golf course's opening on those "hollowed" grounds, a trend has started in which players pose in the hollowed tree for a photo opportunity. In 2017 a local, Britney Bernard posted a picture to her Instagram of her posing in the infamous tree. Britney was found dead six days later, cause unknown. We tell you this today, MMers, to warn you while you are out in those woods. If you hear a strange noise, smell the scent of freshly spilled blood, or even feel something brush against your shoulder, you should pick up your disc and leave the grounds before it is too late. Stay safe out there, Maine! 

My Great Aunt Married a Ghost

We've got a real weird one for you, MMers, so hold on. Shelly Macintosh, a college student out of Westbrook, tells the story of her great aunt, who she claims married an actual ghost!

The woman in question, Mary Kaminski, was a spinster well into her fifties, according to her great-niece Shelly. "She was always a bit of a homebody, if you know what I mean. She liked cats, jigsaw puzzles, that sort of thing. Super nice, though."

As Shelly tells it, Mary met a man who moved into the apartment across the hall from hers. "He was older, maybe seventy, seventy-five. Pretty old school, but still a nice guy. We all thought it was cute he and Mary were dating."

The couple was soon married and moved in together. For a few years things were great. Mary and her husband, a man named Donald Warren, were happy. It was like a breath of fresh air for the couple. "They both seem reinvigorated, full of life," Shelly told us. "It was great!"

But then things started to change. "I noticed that Don always walked about the war and his experiences," Shelly continued. Don would tell stories of practicing with live ammunition and that his friend William Corbell jumped up too soon and was shot in the head. He used terms that were outdated, that didn't seem to be a part of the modern world.

"At first, I thought he was just an old man, you know?" Shelly told us. "Like he came from a different generation. You know it's not right, but sometimes you just have to accept that he's stuck in his ways. You know what I'm saying?"

It wasn't until Don mentioned the Battle of Blackburn's Ford that Shelly began to seriously question. "It didn't sound like a World War II battle or Korea, or Vietnam or whatever. So I did a little research and I found  that Blackburn's Ford was a Civil War battle in Virginia. Well, I thought that was odd, so I did a little more research."

It turns out that the 113th Infantry Unit from Maine, under the leadership of one General James A. Cluthcher took part in that battle. It was a bit of a rout by the Confederate troops, and many of the Maine brigade perished in the battle. 

Including one Private Donald M. Warren.

"My first thought was, okay this is weird. Maybe it was like an ancestor of his," Shelly said. "Then I googled a few more things and I found the story about his friend William Corbell getting shot during a training exercise, and suddenly the pieces started coming together."

The outdated manner of speaking, the hatred for Southern States, his stories of a nebulous war that sounded nothing like modern warfare. Shelly was convinced he was a ghost. The real kicker was when she found a picture of Private Donald Warren and compared it to one of the man who had married her great aunt.

Donald Warren, 2020

Private Donald M. Warren, 1861

"I was scared," Shelly admitted. "So i burned some sage and doing some reading on the internet, I found a... not a spell, I guess, but a ritual? I don't know what the right word is, but it was to cleanse the spirits of the lingering dead. I went over to Mary's house one day when I knew her and Don were out and I said the words I printed off the website. I left the little charms and symbols it told me to draw."

Shelly never saw Don again. According to Mary he disappeared one night while she was asleep. It was as if he had never been there at all. Mary became depressed and after a few months, just a few days shy of her sixty-third birthday, she passed away in her sleep. Shelly suspects it was from a broken heart.

"She really loved that guy, and I guess he really loved her. I know he was a Civil War ghost or whatever, but maybe I shouldn't have intervened. Maybe I should have just let them be happy. Wherever we go when we die, I hope they're together."

Stay safe out there, Maine!

Sit down with the Midnight Magician

 Okay, MMers, we've got a lot going on this week, so let's dive right in.

It took us awhile but we were finally able to track down the Midnight Magician, Malachai Blackstone, or more accurately, he tracked us down. Before we get to that, however, we have to tell you how hard it was to learn anything abut this guy.

Marty's Magic Shoppe

Our research brought us into contact with one Martin Ellison, owner of Marty's Magic Shoppe in Dover, New Hampshire. Marty was an accomplished magician in his younger days, performing under the name the Magnificent Marty. After he retired from the traveling scene in 1987, he opened Marty's Magic Shoppe to service all the regional magicians. Marty's is a one stop shop for costumes and magic tricks, as well as training, books on the craft, and just a general place for magicians both up and coming and well-established, to come and share secrets. It was Marty that gave us our first real clue about contacting Malachai Black.

Marty Ellison

"He's an odd one, that guy," Marty told us, his voice still thick with a New York accent. "Yeah, I know him. Knew his parents too, God rest their souls. They said it was one last effect - a magic trick if you will - that did them in. The Blackstones were the best in their day - Prospero and Evanora. Kinda goofy names if you ask me, but what I can say, I called myself Magnificent Marty."

Marty didn't know much about Blackstone's current whereabouts, but he did tell us that from time to time Blackstone has had use of Marty's shop. He explained to us the old means of contacting a magician:

"They say in the old days if you need a witch or a warlock, you left a coin outside your house, on a fence post or windowsill, with the face side scratched with an x. After a day or two, the coin would disappear and soon after you'd be contacted by the wizard. Complete rubbish if you ask me, but Blackstone seems to use that trick. I don't know how he does it, but it's worked for me the few times I've needed him."

It seemed ridiculous (and we're guys who hunt for Bigfoot and write about ghosts for a living!) but we were desperate, so we tried. He carved an x into a quarter and left it outside our office. Sure enough, the next day, the coin was gone. Inside, on our desk, we found a black slip of paper with an address, a date,  and a time written on it in the same silver ink we had seen on the black envelopes.

We went to the location, which we're keeping secret for now, at the assigned time (11:45 at night). We knocked on the door and after a moment a mysterious figure opened it. For the first time, we were face to face with Malachai Blackstone.

Not quite Malachai Blackstone, but pretty close

He was taller than expected. Thin, but strong. He wore a black dress shirt and black pants, but honestly, he would have looked just as comfortable in a black hooded robe. There was an aura about him that was hard to explain. Icy was the best way to describe it. Or like that feeling in the air right before it snows. Except this wasn't going to be a shake of the snow globe kind of storm, this was going to be a blizzard that dumps over a foot of snow and knocks out power to half the state. There was an air of mystery about him, but a dangerous type.

He gestured for us to take a seat in a high-backed velvet chair. Two had been set up in the middle of the room, which was large and completely dark except for the small circle that illuminated the chairs. Where that light came from, we never knew; there were no visible light sources anywhere. He wouldn't allow us to record his voice, but we can tell you it was deep and yet soft at the same time. His voice was like a cobra waiting to strike.

We asked him about the Black Tarot and he scoffed. He claimed no knowledge of them despite his initials appearing on the cards, though he did admit that "the tarrocchi are often a useful tool for the true adept." We asked him about the people who received the cards. Again he maintained he knew nothing of them. This wasn't getting us anywhere, so we asked him to tell us something about himself.

"I was a practitioner of the arts before I ever knew it. My parents, as you know, were some of the finest artists the world has ever known, but from a young age, I knew I was different. I could hear it. You don't understand, but it whispered to me. This world is too confined. There are tremendous and treacherous things beyond. If we could pierce the veil, lift the shroud that covers this world, we could see it all. I'm doing that. With my rituals, I am showing the world beyond. Az'azouzis."

When asked what he meant by that word,  he explained it meant, "the end is not the end." It was a phrase he had learned from his masters. 

"I'm changing this world," Malachai Blackstone told us. "I am opening the forgotten doorways. I'm bring it through. You don't understand, but you will. I will remake this world into the infinite and we will see plain what stares at us from beyond."

Readers, we have to warn you, what we're about to describe is 100% impossible. This blog is pretty comfortable with the unexplainable, the mysterious, and whatnot. What happened next does not fall into this category. It is something else entirely. After he spoke, Malachai Blackstone turned to water. His body rippled like a current on a river, and then he simply collapsed, as if a water balloon had suddenly been popped. One minute he was whole and solid and sitting across from us, the next his entire form turned to water and washed away. There was nothing left except a now wet chair where he had once sat.

We're still processing everything we saw and heard, but we do have one small addendum. We finally heard back from a linguistics professor who claimed to have some knowledge of the strange word that had been carved into the stone monolith in Crannog's Field and that Malachai Blackstone had said to us. When we told Professor Carter Derwent what Blackstone said Az'azouzis meant, he had this to say:

"He's lying. Or he's wrong. It's an ancient word, predates the Babylonians, but it most certainly does not mean, 'the end is not the end.' It roughly translates to, 'dark watcher from beyond the stars,' but it probably means something more like Satan or the Devil. It is the name given to the great adversary of mankind."

Az'azouzis, dark watcher from beyond the stars

Stay safe out there, Maine.

The Reference Section

There are a lot of terrible people out there, and those who have dealt with a life of suffering at the hands of bullies, abusers, and just general jerks, can easily spot someone who is dealing with the same situations they have been in. Grace Vickery was a student at USM in the early 2000’s and the library on campus was her sanctuary. She had always been a shy girl, and although she had plans to get out of her shell in college she had never found her crowd. So she kept to herself mostly either doing her school work or reading fantasy novels. Either way she was in the library a lot, and formed a close bond with the assistant librarian there who’s name was Mr. Davis.  Her junior year however her safe space was invaded by a group of athletes who were on the verge of being put on academic probation and had set up camp in the library to make themselves at least appear like they were doing something. 

The USM Library

The boys and their girlfriends weren’t just rowdy, whenever Grace walked by they would whisper under their breath and then laugh once they felt she was far enough away. One time a large football player pushed back his chair at just the right time to bump into Grace and she ended up falling to the ground and losing all the papers and books she had been carrying. They all made a big show of helping her up, but “they were snickering the whole time” Grace said. “It was so disheartening, it was the one place I felt at home there, I wasn’t bothering anyone, but as soon as they started coming there I felt like they zeroed in on me as the butt of their joke. One day I just couldn’t take it anymore so I headed deep into the reference section, just so I wouldn’t be near any of them, and so I could have a good cry. I thought I was alone but Mr. Davis came out of the rows and put his hand on my shoulder ‘Don’t let them bother you too much Grace’ he said, ‘they’re insignificant, no better than dumb oxes, and far more useless’.” “I laughed through my sobs,” Grace said, “Mr. Davis sat with me a while and said that the next time he saw them doing something to me he would ban them from the library forever. I got a little nervous at that, I thought it would only make it worse, so I told him not to worry, that I could deal with it. He just nodded and told me if I needed anything to let him know.”

The bullying went on however and as finals week approached Grace was worried that she wasn’t in the right mental state to study and pass all her finals. She cocooned herself in a cozy corner of  the reference section far away from her antagonizers.

“Next time I saw Mr. Davis back there, he asked if things had gotten worse. I told him no it was about the same, I just couldn’t deal with it and study at the same time. He stood up and motioned for me to follow him. He led me through rows upon rows of books, left turns, right turns, I almost lost track of where I was. In the furthest corner of the reference section he stopped, and pointed down a dimly lit row that was filled with dusty books. ‘There are ways of getting even Grace, ways to make people like that regret how shitty they are.’ I didn’t know what to say but was intrigued by the books so I followed him down the aisle. ‘It takes some studying but I know you are good at that’ he smiled, ‘but maybe one day one of them has a freak accident, one comes down with an illness, one is mauled by a rabid dog. These are things we can do with the right words, the right books.’ I can tell you that I was a little disturbed by what he said, but I can’t say it wasn’t appealing to me. To make these assholes pay for treating me like crap all the time, that was something I could get behind.”

Grace tells us that she spent probably an hour going through that section with Mr. Davis, exploring the old books. “Most didn’t have titles, at least not on the cover. When you opened them up a lot were in this weird script that I still haven’t been able to identify. It wasn’t Latin, I studied Latin, it didn’t appear to be Arabic, or a system of language like Japanese or Chinese. I was at a loss and still am.” Grace describes some books as bound in this thin paper like leather, that looked as though it had blue veins running through it, other books had blood stained pages. “All the while we were back there Mr. Davis talked about me joining some sort of exclusive group, one with power, one with the ability to shape the world. But I just couldn’t do it, it all sounded so wrong. I thanked him, but said it wasn’t for me, those people would change eventually or they wouldn’t, I didn’t have to be around them forever, and at the end of the day they meant nothing to me. I wasn’t going to waste however many years it would take to learn whatever it was Mr. Davis was offering just to get back at people that ultimately don’t matter. I still remember that language though, and the feel of the books, some days I regret rejecting him, knowing a spell or two would have been cool, but I also know if I had gone down that path I would have lost something of myself.”

If you are at USM in the library, although Mr. Davis is long gone, perhaps you too can find this hidden batch of books in the back. We do warn you about the dangers of delving into the dark arts however. 

Stay safe out there Maine!

Black Tarot

 Good Morning, MMers! We've got a story for you that spreads out all over the state. Several of our loyal readers have sent us emails about a mysterious envelope they have received in the mail. The envelope itself is black, about 3.5 inches by 5 inches. The recipient's name and address are written in silver ink. There is no return address, and strangely enough, no postage. So far, four different people have contacted us about these envelopes, Larry Gilbert from York, Sharon Messina from Farmington, Dominic Stoddard from Corinth, and Sara Burgess from North Yarmouth. 

Here's, Sara Burgess. 

"This envelope just showed up one morning," she wrote us. "I didn't know what it was, but figured someone sent me a card or something. It felt heavy, like one of those nice cards. It wasn't my birthday or anything, but you never know. So when I opened it I was shocked the find these five cards."

Sara recognized them as tarot cards, but there was something off about them. "I don't know much about tarot cards - just from like movies and stuff, but just looking at them, something didn't feel right."

The cards themselves were slightly larger than playing cards, about four inches long and 2 3/4 inches wide. Their backs were black dull gold designs reminiscent of fancy playing cards, with two eyes staring outwards. 

The back of the cards each received

The other side, the face sides, were terrifying. Here's Dominic Stoddard:

"When I was a kid, I read those Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark books. Scared the crap out of me. The art looked like that, but I did some looking on the internet, and it clearly isn't the same guy. I can't find these images anywhere."

For those readers who are unfamiliar, the art of Stephen Gammell is quite terrifying in its simplicity and style. It's given thousands of readers nightmares for decades, but Dominic was right - this wasn't the work of Gammell. His agent even clarified it for us stating, "This is not Mr. Gammell's work, though obviously an inspired imitation." 

Sharon Messina was shocked. "My mailbox is at the post office - a P.O. Box you know - and yet there was this envelope. I asked the postmaster, but he had never seen it. He couldn't explain it either."

Larry Gilbert, fifty-two, recognized what was wrong right away. "The art was unsettling, for sure, but at the end of the day that's just pictures. It was the cards themselves that was all wrong. As a kid I got really hooked on this occult stuff, you know? Aleister Crowley, H. P. Lovecraft, tarot, all that stuff. So I sorta knew the cads, and these were cards of the major arcana that don't exist in any tarot deck I've ever seen."

For those who don't know, a tarot deck is broken into two sections - the minor arcana, consisting of four suits of fourteen cards (1-10 and 4 "face" cards) and the major arcana (22 suitless face cards). Unlike playing cards, the suits of the minor arcana are typically: swords, cups, coins, and batons. The suits of these cards were blades, wands, sigils, and grails, all pretty clear interpretations of the familiar suits. It was the major arcana that differed wildly.

These cards, which we are dubbing the "Black Tarot" contain cards not found in the normal major arcana; cards with titles like, "The Necromancer" or "The Black Sun." It's clear this deck has drawn some sort of twisted inspiration from a traditional deck, but seem to be something of their own.

There seems to be no connection between the recipients. They have little in common. They do not know one another, are separated by locations, ages, jobs, you name it, these four people seem to be randomly selected. So why did each one of them receive five of these Black Tarot cards in the mail. These could be construed as a spread of some kind. Here's one such spread:

What these could mean and who is sending them is still a mystery. We asked all four of the recipients for pictures of their cards, and they were happy to oblige. Without knowing what the cards all mean, what the spread is, and maybe most importantly, what the initial question asked was, it's almost impossible to determine what all of this means. Still, it doesn't stop Sara Burgess from feeling creeped out.

"It's weird, you know?" she said said. "I mean, who has all these creepy cards and why send them to me? How do they even know me? I don't know, it just feels like... like an invasion of privacy or something."

If you have any information about the Black Tarot, their meaning, or sender, please reach out to us at malevolentmaine@gmail.com. 

Sara Burgess' cards

Larry Gilbert's spread

Dominic Stoddard's spread

Sharon Messina's spread

Stay safe out there, Maine.

Tiverton

Heads up, MMers! We've got a real spooky story for you on this Friday the 13th! This one concerns the town of Tiverton in Franklin County. Not many people have heard of Tiverton and that's because there are only 12 full time residents! That's because Tiverton is known a vortex of dark energy. Visitors to the town, which was originally settled by Puritans in 1692, have reported seeing orbs of light, wolf-shaped black shadows, and hearing disembodied voices whispering their names. 

Then there's the mysterious group said to patrol the woods around Tiverton. They're called the Dark Watch and some say they're a cult of descendants of the original inhabitants. Others claim they're a group of black magicians who want to keep people from entering the town.

If you do visit Tiverton, make sure you don't take anything home with you. Reports say that anyone who takes an artifact from the town will be cursed. Dark shadowy figures will follow you around and terrorize you. 

One loyal MMer, Torey from Bath, claims he took a small statue he found in an abandoned building. He said that at first he just had some bad dreams. Soon he began to see shadow people around his house and heard strange noises, like a cross between a growl and some sort of whispering. He said every night the shadow people got closer and closer to his bed.

We haven't heard from Torey in some time, but we're sure he's fine. If anyone hears from him, please let us know. And as always, stay safe out there, Maine.

courtesy of Torey, 2019

courtesy of Torey, 2019