Book excerpt: Ruth Stump loses her baby in childbirth. Granny offers her a newborn, unwanted by its mother, but tells Ruth, “If you take this baby, you gotta swear you won’t tell a soul he ain’t yours...ever. If you tell, you could cause this baby...and you great harm.” Ruth takes the baby but wonders: Has God opened a door? Or is the devil laughing at her? Fifteen years later, the local preacher accuses Ruth’s son, Tommy, and his friend Cassie Yocum, of witchery. Black cats are hangin’ dead from trees, haints are roaming the woods, the fearsome cry of the Banshee is echoing through the hollows. And Tommy’s pa has disappeared. Tommy must find his pa and destroy the real evil before he loses his family and his home.