The Church seemed colder than it should have been, the tall spires and golden interiors only interrupted by the grand paintings and murals. The shapes and colors of the faces so many placed their faith and trust into for daily needs and salvation. Maven looked up at their eyes and felt cold distain echoing back as she knelt down to pray.
The words felt like hollow dust in her mouth as she began to pray. Not lifting a finger towards the neatly stacked prayer books in the pew next to her, merely miming the words she thought would bring comfort, before falling silent and resigned to waiting. The halls around her refused to be silent, for as much as the church was empty during the week, there was still business to be had with God and his people. Black robes with gold patterns stitched into them moved like specters from one gathering place to another, speaking to those with silks and fine red and purple garments. The plain clothes she wore standing out amongst them, like mud on a freshly cleaned floor. a pauper in a grand palace.
The whispers became unbearable, she squeezed her eyes shut against the luminous gold as a dreaded fire roiled inside her skull. Threating to burst outwards and spill across the marble in a shower of blackened red relief, the image touched her vision with a sight like a great portrait of wedding scene made in stark red and somber gray, a great red wedding train decorated with pale pearls and dim opals, flecked with white pieces of ivory around the fringes. A grave shroud for the pauper sitting in the pew. Just as spectacular as her murdered dreams once were, only scraps of innocence remaining behind, the body behind the black veil, the flesh laid to rest.
A warm hand touched her shoulder and she jumped, the vision shattering like ice in front of her. Looking up in fright she saw Father Brion's face and sighed. Behind him stood two men in white robes, each stoic and resolute. The wore the Hospitals cross.
"It's time my child." Father Brion said, somber, gentle, but reassuring. It would be a long day and they would not have much in the means of comfort for a while. Maven rose to her feet and followed behind the Father as the entered the Churches deeper corridors and chambers. The saints watched with mournful light, praying always, for those under they're care.
The room they entered was dark, the door thick and the walls heavy enough to muffle any sound. Maven released a nervous breath, her mouth quivering as she saw the iron chair before her. The straps, the pan behind the head, and the table of careful instruments laid aside on a table. Father Brion lifted a cloth a presented a simple cup. "Would you like some wine? I hear it helps dull the pain of the operation." Maven smiled and let her face slid into something more comfortable and mischievous.
"I've yet to turn down anyone who offers me a drink, and I'm not one for pain either." The brave words left her mouth like they were strangers and Brion nodded, passing her the cup slowly. The fire in the wine did little to drown the sea of terror that still lurched inside her. It was a good wine, it had some heart but was also bitter. It took her mind of things as she felt the men in white press her down into the chair, the ropes tightening around her hands and ankles, another to hold her head in place. While fingers moved through her long hair, tracing her skull like it was a globe.
Father Brion stood Infront of her, holding her hand, before gesturing to the men behind her. And they began to cut.
The wound gave easy, and the spot was soft, the found the place where the skin had grown over and needed to be cut away, revealing where the hole underneath. They set their knives aside and Brion felt her squeeze tighter as the siphon crossed the edge of her vision.
"Now, Maven." he said "Speak to us about your life. Tell me of your mother and brother, your sister. What where they're names? Where did you live?" Maven felt the tip of the hose touch her wound and flinched, Brion shot a vile look at the man and Maven struggled to laugh.
"It's okay Father, it's natural to get excited when entering strange lands, I reckon this will be the first time for him, being inside a woman's mind." she joked, Father Brion gave a smile and wiped something from her face, then she realized her nose felt wet for some reason.
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"Continue." he spoke gravely. Something inside her touching off an electric buzz across her left side like a firebrand as the two masses pushed against each other.
"Maven" the Priest spoke, "Tell me about your family." he spoke slowly. Maven replied, fighting to repress the sudden need to scream, either in fear, anger or something unseemly, she couldn't decide.
"My, mother was a maid working in a manor, my brother's name is Crow, Crowely. Mother always called him Crow, she loved birds." she started, a wave of lethargy swept her legs, and she felt her feet vanish into a deep pit somewhere. "Mother's name was Catherine, and my father He died in a-Ah, A farming accident. Mule caved his skull in. His name was Horrace, Mother loved him. Said he loved dancing and couldn't sing."
"What of your sister?" Brion asked.
"What sister, I didn't hav-" a sharp pain kicked the back of her eyes like an angry bull. She gasped as the restraints held her fast, swallowing hard as the panic threatened to overwhelm. "My sister's name was Mag- Magpie! she wasn't very old when we went to the city. She did stitching in a handkerchief factory for a time, then-Then she started wearing these red ribbons in her hair-."
Maven stopped in her tracks "Wearing those ugly red ribbons, I told her to get rid of them, but she wouldn't and then we fought." her fists balled in rage as she bit her lip till it bled. "Crow left to find her one night, I was waiting for them all night, when I saw her again, she was still wearing those stupid ribbons in her."
Brion interrupted her "How do you like working for Artman? Is he a nice man? You're his new assistant, aren't you?"
Maven calmed herself "No Father, I'm his model. Though he's interested in nerves more than skin. Those pins are unbearably itchy after a while, but it helps him work, apparently the parts he's trying to replicate aren't in the books he reads." She tried to smile, it was hard, the keen awareness that the two men in white behind her were up to something with their knives and tools, there was something tugging on her hair that made her want to scratch. Father Brion asked her something and she blinked.
"Maven, I asked you, how do you like working for Artman? Has he been good to you?" He repeated himself.
"Oh, Father he's insatiable, I can hardly get him to notice me once he starts working and his mind races like a streak of lightning. Why I could walk up to him as in naught, but babes clothing and he'd be buried up to his nose in woodworking and paints." she paused "And yet I can feel myself falling in love with him and his ridiculous magic tricks. He's so bright I know he'll make it, and the promises he's made, the silly boy."
The siphon pulled free with a wet squelch, heavy with black bile and wine dark blood.
"I want to love him Father, I do, but I can't. Not after, I'm broken Father. I shouldn't love anyone. Not again." Maven near whimpered. Father Brion shushed her, kissed her forehead. "It's alright my child, it's alright." and with a breath like a whisper "Rest now and think only the good in your life. Think about your mother, your father and your siblings. Think of fields and flowers, children's games and Sunday mass. God's love and kindness towards you in life. Use these to banish the evil memories, the pain and the misery. I will untie your hands now. We're done but hold still while we seal the wound. " She nodded and sat still in placid relief, While Brion released her from the first set of restraints and then walked beside her and took something from one of the men in white, his gown now smeared with blood.
It was a jar, full of a writhing liquid, despite the jar being uncomfortably cool to the touch. Father Brion gave a brusque grunt and began to pray over the roiling waters he was holding. The simple ritual caused the fluid to writhe even harder, but as it did it became thick like tar and as Brion spoke it hardened further into a hard stone, then ground into powder.
He set the jar on the table and closed it with a lid and sealed it with wax. The symbol on the jar warned against opening and was etched in awarding patterns that would keep the vile substance from awakening or trying to free itself and become pestilent.
Father Brion sighed. It was over, for now. Maven would likely have to repeat this process in two months' time to truly clean out everything. He'd rarely performed this kind of procedure but had heard from the others how brutal it could be for the patients, young men and women enthralled by outside forces. Some came willing, others less so. But Maven had been struggling for a time and had already been treated before. Odds of recovery where better than most.
He glanced back over his shoulder to see her coming shakily to her feet and leaning on of the surgeons for aid, practically fainting into his tunic. Very much in her usual outgoing manner. She would recover well, once she got some rest.