The Witch In The Wardrobe - Season 5, Episode 20
A cabin burns down in the woods, revealing two bodies - one of a modern-day witch and one from the days of the Salem Witch Trials - leading Booth and Brennan into the world of Wicca to find a killer; and when Hodgins' reckless driving gets him and Angela arrested and thrown in jail, Sweets and intern Clark Edison step into unfamiliar territory to help out the team.
Sheriff Gus Abrams greets Booth and Brennan at the scene of a fire. He shows them to the remains: a skeleton in a white wedding dress inside a steel wardrobe. Brennan confirms the skeleton is real. It belongs to an elderly female, and she is surprised that the bones have been rearticulated with wire. Someone put them together quite amateurishly. Angela and Hodgins notice a circular path all the way around the house, dusted with powder. Crows caw overhead. Brennan believes there is a fresh kill nearby. She finds remains under fallen debris: a skeleton wearing red shoes... which promptly curl up, just like in The Wizard of Oz.
At the lab, Brennan wants to start with the recent remains; however, they are coated in ceiling insulation, which melted in the fire. Cam determines the victim was dead before the fire began. Clark finds wire ligatures around her wrists. They turn their attention to the second skeleton. The steel wardrobe preserved the body during the fire. The victim is Caucasian, and 40 to 50 years old. Brennan notes that she would have had a hunched posture. There is evidence of crushing and a puncture wound. Brennan recognizes it as a kind of torture used during the Salem Witch Trials. Angela and Hodgins drive back from the crime scene. Angela brings up the tension between them. Is it because she is single now or because she treated Wendell badly? Hodgins says there's no tension, and he's happy to work with her in the field again. She looks at a symbol from the house on her camera. Hodgins takes a look, and swerves out of his lane. Sirens blare, and Sheriff Abrams pulls them over and asks if Hodgins has been drinking. Hodgins decides to mouth off to him, and Angela just tries to charm him instead of answering his questions... so they're both thrown in the clink.
Sweets is fascinated to learn they have a Salem Witch at their fingertips. His first published work concerned the Salem Witch Trials. Sweets wants to find a link between the old victim and the new one. Booth gets a call. The house belonged to Cheri Byrd. She has a surviving brother. Booth talks to Jesse, who hasn't spoken to his sister in months. They used to be close, but the witchcraft came between them. Cheri changed her name to "Zephyra." Jesse says a guy named Mario Trivisonno wanted to buy their house for a development. Cheri didn't want to sell. Clark, inspired by Hodgins, conducts an experiment to see which solvent can clean the bones. He determines that acetone would best remove the insulation from the bones, but ruins his shoes in the process. Meanwhile, Angela and Hodgins sit in jail. Sheriff Abrams informs them that Angela has an outstanding bench warrant for failing to appear on a speeding charge. Hodgins also has a warrant for escaping police custody during a protest eight years ago. Abrams can't let them go until a judge rules on their warrants. They have a long wait ahead of them.
Mario Trivisonno tells Booth he's no longer interested in Cheri's property. She put a hex on him, and Mario went bald. He didn't want people to know a witch used to live on his development, so he scrapped the whole project... just not in time to save his hair. Clark cleans the bones with acetone, and shows Brennan sharp-instrument trauma to the sternum and ribs. The victim was stabbed repeatedly. Brennan asks for casts of the wounds. Clark also found a gold glob on the manubrium. Hodgins will have to identify it: Where is he? Brennan gets a call from Angela, who asks to be rescued from jail. Booth is sure Abrams had a good reason to arrest Hodgins. Sweets mentions that bad witches use animal sacrifices in their spells. Mario saw a dead cat in Cheri's house. Sweets suggest they talk to the local coven: the Circle of Moonwick. They have a ceremony tonight.
Stiff and uncomfortable in their jail cell, Hodgins offers to give Angela a back massage. She accepts, and is moaning in pleasure when Cam arrives to try to spring them. Sheriff Abrams won't agree to release them. He gives Cam the evidence they were transporting, and says she can call them anytime but they have to wait for the judge. Booth and Brennan trek through the forest at night to the Waning Moon Ceremony. Brennan is excited to study the Wiccans anthropologically. They hear chanting, and see women in white robes. They burn a miniature effigy after sprinkling powder on the bonfire. Suddenly, all the women disrobe. Booth didn't want to see these women naked. Later, Booth questions witches Ember and Rowan (the head of the coven). He asks them about Zephyra. They explain that they were marking the end of her corporeal life in their ceremony, though she was not a member of their coven. Zephyra used her magic to make a profit. Her clients employed her to do evil.
Cam brings Clark the evidence that Angela and Hodgins collected. Clark is troubled that he will have to do his job without them. He is already having trouble with fragments of the hyoid and throat cartilage that have been difficult to clean. Meanwhile, Angela and Hodgins toss pennies into a cup. Hodgins has won eighteen cents. Angela recalls a cabin they stayed at in the mountains. There was no heat, but it was fun keeping warm. Sheriff Abrams interrupts, wheeling over an old computer so that Cam can consult with them. Hodgins looks at an image of the glob. He confirms that it's amber, likely from a piece of jewelry that melted in the fire. Angela sees an insect embedded inside. Hodgins believes it is a fungus gnat, an insect that lived a hundred million years ago. Angela notices a hair. It could be from their killer.
The hair on the amber turns out to belong to Murray Huddler, who was paroled last October. Huddler's wife left him for her divorce attorney, and Huddler subsequently assaulted him and went to jail. Cam shows Brennan a newspaper article with a picture of Murray Huddler and his ex-wife. Mrs. Huddler is wearing the same white wedding dress as the skeleton. Booth questions Murray, who says he hired Zephyra to put a hex on his ex-wife. He paid $2000 up front, and would owe another $1000 if the hex worked; however, the hex didn't take. Murray gave Zephyra his hair and his ex-wife's dress for the spell. A fishing knife was found in Huddler's truck, but it does not match the murder weapon. Brennan tells Clark that the small bones he has been working with are not human. They seem to belong to a small animal. When consulted, Hodgins identifies them as bat bones. Someone shoved a bat down the victim's throat.
Angela and Hodgins return to their penny-tossing game. Talk finally turns to their relationship. Hodgins thinks about their breakup everyday. He regrets not stopping her from leaving the diner that day. He panicked, and lost faith that they could sustain happiness together. Angela regrets walking out on him. They lean in, and begin to kiss... just as the judge arrives. Sweets informs Booth and Brennan that only one Salem Witch died as a result of pressing, a form of torture from which their second victim suffered. Emily Quimby died in November of 1692. Her grave was robbed six months ago. Sweets researched Quimby's family tree, and it turns out that Ember is her direct descendent. Did Ember kill her for digging up her ancestor? Booth interrogates Ember: he knows she purchased bat bones on-line. She swears she didn't harm Zephyra. She had no idea Zephyra robbed her ancestor's grave.
Clark identifies the powder found at the crime scene. Brennan doesn't believe Ember was strong enough to murder Zephyra alone. She remembers that in the woods, the witches formed a circle similar to the stab marks on the bones. The injuries are clustered in the shape of a pentagram, an ancient Wiccan symbol. The entire coven killed Zephyra. Sweets is confused. Wiccans are good witches. Clark says they were not in their right minds. The powder on the path was rye flour infested with a fungus, the natural substance from which LSD is derived. It was used centuries ago for ceremonial purposes. Some believe the exact same substance was responsible for the hysteria surrounding the Salem Witch Trials.
The Circle of Moonwick is questioned, and Rowan confirms that they use rye flour in some rituals. Sweets believes they were conducting a ritual to keep Zephyra's evil from spreading past the circle around her house, but the fungus made them afraid of Zephyra. Ember breaks down. They were just trying to help, just trying to restore the balance. At the jail, Justice of the Peace Floyd Barber releases Angela and Hodgins... and marries them. They exchange their vows, and Hodgins pulls a ring from his wallet that he has kept since their first wedding. They begin kissing before the ceremony is even over. Sheriff Abrams throws confetti.
At the Founding Fathers, Booth tells Brennan he still believes the Wiccans were good people. He produces an effigy of Brennan that the witches gave to him. If he burns it, the wish he makes for her will come true. Brennan doesn't put any stock in the superstition, but of course Booth does it anyway. He tells her that he wished Brennan would find happiness. She thanks him, clarifying that she's thanking him for his kindness and friendship, not the ritual. Booth teases her mercilessly about the magic. They both giggle.
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