chapter eleven, successful séances
" When I was a child, I'd sit for hours
Staring into open flame
Something in it had a power
Could barely tear my eyes away "
ARSONIST'S LULLABY ━━
hozier
━━ 𝗆𝗎𝗋𝖽𝖾𝗋 𝗁𝗈𝗎𝗌𝖾 ♱ 𝟮𝟬𝟬𝟮
SCREAMS ECHOED IN THE HOUSE, AS THEY HAD DONE MANY TIMES BEFORE. These were screams of pain that echoed through the halls of the infamous Murder House, there was only a small amount of relief for the woman in pain ━ pain medication. It didn't stop the pain fully, but she enough to offer a small amount of relief as she pushed, her fingers digging into the mattress beneath her, nails ripping at the fabric.
The faces around the woman were blurred from either her sweat or tears or maybe she simply just wasn't seeing right. Everything else was wrong after all. There were strangers there, helping her. Not getting her to a doctor but doing it herself and her husband who sat on her right, urging her to push seemed to trust them completely. She had no time to question him though, as the house creaked and groaned, helping them instead of destroying them for once.
Juliet Harmon stood scared, outside the doorframe of the room. She was silent, not a soul had noticed her presence, too focused on the babies that were coming right now. It was too soon. Her father had told her they would go to a hospital and do a special delivery, this was not at all that. There were strangers in her new home. However they weren't exactly strangers. She knew them. She'd seen them in her house, and then when she'd close her eyes and open them, they'd be gone again. They were here now though, helping her mother as she gave birth to two babies, who Juliet had said would be perfect.
Tears ran down Juliet's face, and after a particularly loud scream from her mother her hands shot to her ears as she whimpered in the doorway, and still no one noticed her presence. It felt like hours of people talking to her mother, whispering words of encouragement, telling her that she would be okay, even though in the end it would all be pointless.
Everything fell silent for a few seconds, Juliet hesitating before pulling her hands away from her ears. She saw them hand the first of the two babies her mother was pregnant with be handed off, wrapped in a bundle of blankets. Her screams started up again as the baby was handed to one of the many people in the house that Juliet did know ━ Nora Montgomery.
Juliet's eyes trailed the woman as she held the small bundle close to her, turning gracefully and leaving. Not wanting to be left along with her mother who was in pain, Juliet quickly ran to catch up to Nora who was walking elegantly across the floorboards, staring happily at Juliet's baby brother, who for some reason Juliet was unable to see crying. She thought babies always cried when they were first born? Maybe this baby was special, she reasoned finally catching up to Miss Nora.
"Miss Nora." Juliet's small child voice called. "Miss Nora!" She called again when the woman didn't turn around, and this time she caught her attention. The woman turned her eyes catching Juliet and she smiled, Juliet taking a small step forward but not smiling back, still hearing the screaming if her mother in the background, although muffled. "Is it a boy or girl?"
Nora Montgomery crouches down, still holding the baby delicately in her arms as though it were her own, the smile on her face stretching from ear to ear. "It's a boy." She answers, cradling the child and Juliet peaks over the cloth seeing a small baby, almost too small she thinks but dismisses the thought. It was her brother.
Juliet reached out her finger, offering it to the baby. "Hi there." She giggles seeing his little hand move and grab it. It felt real, so real. She had a little brother now. "He's kind of ugly." She mutters, not knowing that he had yet to be washed.
Nora gave a breathy laugh, "Oh, he's special in his own way. Just give him a bath and he'll look more adorable than you know. I suppose all babies start out ugly anyway." She said, caressing the small being's head, before standing up again and walking away as though Juliet had never interrupted her, leaving the raven haired girl to the screaming of her mother.
It didn't last long though, and as it ended Juliet walked back into the room again to see her next baby brother, only this time the child was swept away by Constance Langdon, the neighbor next door that Juliet would sometimes sneak over to. Once again she also followed the woman away from her parents, longing to see her new sibling who this time gave a few cries before falling silent. The floorboards creaked under her footsteps as she left the chaos of the room behind, along with her dying mother.
This time Juliet hesitated before calling to the woman, having always been cautious around her. The first time the four year old had happened to wander into her yard she'd been yelled at, before the woman bent down to examine her small face, growing soft very suddenly. Ever since then, Juliet felt as though she walked on thin ice around the woman, and absolutely hated having to talk to her. But eventually she did. "Constance?" She asked lightly, gaining the woman's attention although like with Miss Nora, she was too focused on cooing to the baby to face her.
"What do you want?" Constance asked in a flat, but light so as not to startle the baby, tone.
"I want to see my baby brother." Juliet answered.
Constance sighed, not wanting to give into her request but eventually did, turning around to face the small child with the youngest in her arms. Like Nora, she crouched down, showing off the baby in her arms but not letting Juliet get close enough to touch it, snapping at her whenever she tried, "You don't want to hurt the baby." Juliet obeyed, happy just staring at her youngest brother, who slept peaceful in his grandmother's arms.
"He's beautiful." Juliet muttered in awe, eyes locked on her younger brother.
"Yes, and now I have to clean him. So move along, go to your parents." Constance stood, arms holding the baby tightly as Juliet pouted, but left her anyway.
However when she'd get back to the room that her mother had given life to two children in, she'd find that life had been taken. Her own mother's, lifeless body lying on the bed, her father staring heartbrokenly at it. Juliet couldn't tear her eyes away, until someone got in her way. Her older sister, Violet stood there, shielding her view of the body.
"Hey, don't look." Violet warned. "Go to your room. Don't look. Don't look."
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HOZIER WAS PLAYING, ECHOING IN JULIET'S HEAD. Her eyes were closed and she rested on her bed, not giving a thought to anything as she relaxed for the first time in a while. Her ear buds were in, allowing her to drift away and not pay attention to the noises that echoed throughout the house, which weren't many at the moment. All was silent, Fiona and Cordelia were out, Fiona checking on her daughter who was coming home from the hospital today. Juliet breathed softly, one might assume she was asleep her her silent and relaxed state. Her face looked peaceful, no looks of anger or pain on her face.
"Hey get up." Juliet tried ignoring the words of her sister witch, Zoe Benson, probably back to bother her with something else. Instead she turned up her music, muffling Zoe's voice and drowning out her words effectively. Zoe however, wasn't putting up with it it seemed because a second later, she'd grabbed a pillow from the other bed, hitting Juliet over the face with it. It was a bad idea bothering the relaxed witch because a second later Zoe was thrown back.
Pushing herself up, Juliet looked to see Zoe groaning on the ground, pulling out her earbuds. "What?" She asked innocently, only to receive a glare from Zoe who rubbed her head. Juliet just smirked, crossing her feet on the small twin bed, tilting her head to the side as she watched Zoe stand.
"We need to meet downstairs." She stated. "All of us."
"Last time I checked, I don't answer to you, Zoe. Hell, I hardly listen to Cordelia and you think after knowing you for a week that I'm just going to follow you?" Zoe pursed her lips, crossing her arms across her chest as Juliet gave a breathy laugh. "You've got another thing coming, sister."
"Please." Zoe begged.
Juliet gave a sigh, tossing her legs off the bed saying, "Okay. But if you ever throw a pillow at me again I will set you on fire."
Upon walking downstairs, footsteps echoing through the empty house they found Queenie and Nan already together, standing around a table and waiting to see what Zoe had to say. Pictures were spread across the table along with shot glasses Zoe had gathered, and the four gathered around, Zoe and Juliet on one side, Queenie and Nan on the other.
"A hundred years ago, this academy was packed to capacity. They had bunk beds and slept eight to a room. Now... notice anything?" Zoe said, spreading out each picture for them to see which they examined, the three other witches not caring all that much, minds elsewhere.
Nan, who was still annoyed about her little boyfriend answered, "Yeah. Luke's not here. His mom keeps slamming the door on me."
"She means that we are dying." Juliet said, picking up a picture and examining it, only for Zoe to snatch it away, giving her a look.
Despite being annoyed with the girl who'd thrown her into a wall, Zoe agreed, "Look at the pictures. Our numbers have gone down every year for a century straight. Witches are dying. In Salem, there were hundreds of us. Now there's three. Used to be four, until... Madison went missing or dead. And no one in charge has done shit."
"We'll go to Fiona." The curly haired witch, Queenie, suggested.
"I trust that bitch as far as I can throw her." Juliet stated and continued holding up a finger as though saying pause, "Without using magic."
"Last I checked, she was setting witches on fire." Zoe argued, opening up a cabinet and pulling out a bottle of something that Juliet didn't really recognize. "Okay. Madison wants us to find her, and we can't afford to lose a single witch if we want to survive. From now on... we watch each other's backs." She poured a far amount into each shot glass, handing them out to each of her fellow witches, Nan drinking it quickly.
On the other hand, Juliet observed the liquid with caution. "This... looks disgusting." Raising it to her nose she drew back saying, "Smells disgusting too. You don't happen to have any vodka in that cabinet of yours, do you?" Zoe gave her a look and she sighed, "Fine but if I get poisoned by this I'm coming back to haunt all your asses." With that, she downed the drink, groaning at the sweet burn it left in her throat.
Queenie observed her own glass reluctantly, before stating, "Look, I've been taking care of myself for a really long time, so I'm not sure I need some white girl sorority sisters to cover my ass. And what is this green shit?"
"It's not a sorority. It's a coven." Zoe corrected before adding at the end, "And this is absinthe, drink of the divine. Which we are." Queenie surveyed her for a moment, before she too down her own glass, Zoe doing the same a second later.
They found themselves in a darkened room, a spirit board rested before them, provided by Zoe who used a shot glass, setting it on the table. All of them sat on the ground, Queenie and Nan looking rather skittish, Juliet looking bored. She'd already tried warning them that contacting spirits was a bad idea, and while Queenie was on her side, it seemed they were going through with it anyway. A candle was the only source of light in the room, casting an eerie glow on the coven of four.
"Do you know what these things do?" Queenie asked after a rather crop tic answer from Zoe about where it was.
"Contact the dead." Zoe answered.
"You don't know shit." Queenie snapped, pointing at the witch as Nan and Juliet watched. "Spirit boards have two stages: contact and release. I saw my grandma use one once. She thought it was cool, too, till a bad spirit came out, burned her house to the ground and took half her face off with it."
Zoe looked unimpressed, pointing out, "There's four of us. You want to find Madison? Witch up." She stated, glaring at Queenie who backed off.
"So, what do we do?"
Each of them rested two fingers on the shot glass in the middle of the board, or at least, three of them did before staring at Juliet pointedly. She'd zoned out and hadn't listened after Queenie started her story, drifting off into her own thoughts. She looked up in time to realize they were starting, and sighed, resting two of her fingers on the cup, her ringed fingers glinting in the candle light.
"Ask the questions." Queenie answered. "Be polite." She added.
Zoe let out a breath, asking, "Are we alone?"
Slowly, but surely the cup moved, guiding their fingers to the upper right corner. NO. Despite them all being witches, and having hoped for this outcome they all gasped, or on Juliet's case, jaw dropped, the hair on the back of her neck sticking up in warning. She didn't like this.
"Did you die here?" Queenie asks after a short silence.
"Souls are tethered to where they die." Juliet muttered under her breath, even as the cup started moving to the opposite side of the board. YES. She swallowed harshly, glancing around as though the ghost would magically reveal itself.
"Were you murdered?" Zoe asks, causing the cup to move only slightly before returning to its original place. "Yes." Zoe read. "Who killed you?" She asked.
The cup started moving to the letters, spelling out what it wanted to say slowly, moving between letters making them spell it out in their head. Juliet let's out a loud exhale as it finishes, blinking and looking to see the others reactions as Nan read, "You did."
They all retract their hands from the cup, looking around. "Madison, is this you?" Zoe asks, only for the cup to go back to the right hand corner. NO. "Who are you?"
In a blur of movement, the cup quickly, as though angers starts sliding across the board, moving from letter to letter letting them spell it out. "Axeman." Queenie says as it finishes. Wait, stop. Stop, stop!" She shouts, slamming the cup across the room, breaking it before turning to Zoe and pointing at her. "If survival is so important to you, you better find out who you're talking to." With that, she blows out the candle.