Episode 0.5: The Witch Queen

## Content Warnings

"Religious fundamentalism, death of parents by illness and implied suicide, child abandonment, offscreen attempted romantic coercion, shapeshifting, description of monstrous animal, discussions of mortality."

## Blurb

They say there's a witch in that valley and you'd do well to stay away from there. Join us as we journey back to the settling of the central plateau and witness the power of mountain women.

## Plot Synopsis

The Narrator begins the tale of Daughter Dooley, the Witch Queen of Appalachia, describing her outset into The Green alongside her mothers, Catherine "Katie" and Edith "Edie" Dooley after being driven from Williamsburg, Virginia by a physician's accusations of witchcraft. They are traveling with the Monroe Company. While on the trip, Edie falls sick with pneumonia and dies; a few days later, after a bout with a deep depression, and several nights where the rest of the party could hear her having conversations with Edie, Katie is found to be missing and is assumed to have thrown herself off one of the nearby cliffs, leaving Daughter Dooley an orphan.

The Monroe Company presses on, but is whittled down through sickness and attacks. By the time they are approaching the Cumberland Gap, only Daughter Dooley and an old man named Marvin are left. They meet and join up with the Blessed Folk of His Unending and Undying Gracious Love, a religious group out to found a settlement (which would one day become Jacob County, Kentucky). The Blessed Folk take Daughter Dooley into their settlement, and it takes a year before they discover that she is, in fact, a witch.

They take her to a valley, far from civilization, and leave her to fend for herself, allowing her to bring all of her mothers' books, charms, stores, and other possessions; and are kind enough to build a shack for her. For a year and a day, she lives off the land, learning witchcraft from her mothers' books, crafting totems and charms, and performing rituals, before she hears someone calling her name from outside her shack. Outside of the perimeter of her wards, she sees a figure, which reveals itself to be the late Edie Dooley--or rather, a haint wearing her form. Daughter Dooley quickly recognizes the trick, and returns to bed. The next night, she hears another noise, which appears to be 'Katie' Dooley; but, again, she is quick to discover the deception. The next day, Daughter Dooley doubles her wards and protective measures; that night is silent, with a new moon. Out from the wood emerges a huge, black buck with burning red eyes and amber antlers. The being cannot penetrate her wards, and converses with her. It denies being either spirit or demon, stating that she has no name for what it is.

The stag makes an offer to Daughter Dooley, on behalf of a mysterious "we," based upon her connection to the land: immortality, knowledge, and the land itself in exchange for her service, citing that "[Daughter Dooley's homestead is] impressive for one so young, but...will fade with time, as all things do; and all we have to do is wait, and we are the best at waiting," before insinuating that something else, something far more malevolent than itself, would kill Daughter Dooley; but it, The Thing Whose Name Sounds Like Horned Head, But Is Not, can protect her. Distressed at the thought of facing something that ancient and powerful, she agrees.

## Relevant Characters

* Daughter Dooley
* The Thing Whose Name Sounds Like Horned Head, But Is Not