𝐒𝐞𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐦𝐛𝐞𝐫 𝟔𝐭𝐡, 𝟏𝟔𝟔𝟔
You felt your face go numb as the entire congregation burst into roaring chants.
"Witches!"
"Hang the witch!"
"Devil's whore!"
Solomon slumped low into his pew in defeat. Thomas stood standing, frozen in place with shock. Caleb was preening under all of the attention. He tilted his chin upward as he soaked up the displaced fear and angry cries of the townspeople. "Death to (Y/N) O'Connor!" He cried out. "Death to Sarah Fier!"
Before you could stop yourself, you gasped and felt Sarah's hand slide over your mouth to stifle the noise. The quick movement in the dark caught Solomon's eye and he turned his head. Your cheeks flushed and you considered ducking below the window sill. Surely he cared about you, but to go against the will of his own brother and every other body in Union? You couldn't be too confident about where his loyalties lied.
He looked almost as terrified as you and you stood facing each other for a number of moments before his lips parted and he moved them silently. He was speaking to you through the glass.
Run.
You pulled Sarah's hand away from your lips and latched onto them tightly, spinning away from the window and darting back down the dirt path which carried you to the meeting house in the first place. This time, you spared Sarah the courtesy of holding Hannah's hand.
The moonless night offered you no guidance as you slipped through the yards and back-alleys. You passed doorways slathered in stripes of lamb's blood and tightened your cloak around your shoulders with a gulp.
On the northern border of town, there was a low wooden fence that ran from the blacksmith to the mayor's house. You came upon it and looked out beyond the underbrush.
Even if you escaped Union, what would become of you? Starvation or freezing to death in a ditch somewhere? Perhaps you could reside with the widow until the smarter townspeople came looking.
These were the thoughts that burdened your mind as Sarah helped you up and over the fence, holding up your cloak so that you wouldn't trip over it. Once you were safely over, a low hum filled the air that you immediately distinguished as a swarm of approaching voices. Splotches of torchlight appeared over the horizon like fiery stars.
"Quick," you hissed, grabbing for Sarah's hand over the fencepost, but she shrugged off your grip. You blinked up at her, horrified at her defiance. "Sarah?"
"Go," she said, not bothering to lower her voice. You unintentionally flinched at her volume. "Run far away from here. We will come for you when it is safe."
"Now is not the time to be stubborn, Sarah," you whispered bitterly. Tears were springing up in the corners of your eyes. Your legs felt like jelly. "Please, I can't. Not alone."
"You can and you will," she insisted. Hannah was already inching away down the fence. She was innocent; the pastor's daughter. But she still clung to your friend's side like there was no other safety in the world.
You saw no circumstance that led to you and Sarah crossing paths ever again, whether or not she believed that to be true. So you took that final second to memorize her face in the nonexistent moonlight—the face of your closest friend and savior—before turning toward the treeline.
You must've walked for miles, blind and alone in the woods with no lantern or candlelight. Your face had been slashed with twigs and tree branches. Several times had you fallen and dirtied the knees of your dress or torn the fabric of your sleeves. It felt as if the further you strayed from Union, the colder the air became.
Despite being so desperate for anything resembling light, the sight of a lantern bobbing in the distance made you tense up and duck behind an outcropping of large boulders. You held your breath as the light drew nearer and curled your cloak tight around you.
"(Y/N)! Where are you?"
Thomas.
It was Thomas.
He was standing so close now that you could hear the rusty handle of his lantern swaying back and forth, threatening to snap. Your heart was beating so loud in your chest that you wondered how he hadn't felt it thundering under his feet.
"Please come home!" He called, and you exhaled softly at the realization that he hadn't seen you. "I'm sorry, I hadn't–" he paused, taking a ragged breath. "I need you to return home. I will protect you, I promise. I won't let them hurt you!"
He took a sidestep near the rocks and you fumbled through your skirts for the knife that Solomon gifted you earlier that morning. Before your sister was dead. Before you were deemed a witch. You hold the small blade out in front of you, afraid that Thomas will come closer, but he doesn't. He retreats deeper into the forest and calls out for you several more times before he falls out of earshot.
You loved him as much as you thought it possible to love another human being, but there was no way on heaven or earth that you would let him drag you back to Union. Silently, you waited until the light from his lantern was no longer touching the forest floor before darting out of your hiding place.
Several questions ran through your mind as you raced through the labyrinth of trees without seeing a single familiar sight. At one point you were for certain you passed through the clearing where the bonfire had taken place, but you didn't sit and wait long enough to make a fact of it.
Were Hannah and Sarah alright? Would you all meet at daybreak and make your escape to the hills?
A dark mass bubbled out of the shadows, thicker than any tree and humming with life. You paused for the first time since your encounter with Thomas to duck behind a tree and catch your breath.
A pillar of smoke was billowing over the top of the massive dark shape. As your eyes finally adjusted to the velvet darkness, you spotted two grave markers a few paces away from where you were hidden. A relieved sigh escaped your lips and you nearly flew out from behind the tree.
Solomon's home was nearly impossible to find in the night, but you would have to have been blind not to recognize it now. You threw yourself onto the doorstep and began beating your fists against the door with reckless abandon.
Please be at home, please be at home, please be at home.
"Away, Elijah," he called, voice heavy with agitation. You were too afraid to call out, lest there be more men like Thomas mulling about with guns and the means to use them. So you continued to slam your hands against the wood until there was no doubt in your mind that they would bruise.
"Elijah, I said go–"
Solomon pried the door inward and you nearly collapsed to your knees on the spot. You could only imagine what a state you were in; shoulders shivering, face and hands torn by brambles and thorns. You felt yourself tremble as the knife dropped from your hands. "Please," you sniffled. "You have to help me."
He said nothing for a concerning amount of time but was quick to pull you to your feet and into the cottage, looking both ways to make sure you were alone before latching and locking the door in your wake.
"Oh lambkin," he tutted, pulling down your hood and shrugging your cloak down over your shoulders. It took a moment, but he eventually pried the knife out of your shivering, iron grip. "You're bleeding."
It was the first and only thing you heard through the haze clouding your mind. "Am I?" You asked, reaching up and feeling a wet spot on your cheek that you hadn't noticed before. One of the cuts you'd received in the underbrush must have opened further. There was a teardrop of blood trickling down your face.
It felt as though warms of honey bees were buzzing in your ears. Your heart continued to beat as if you were still running blindly through the wilderness. "They're going to hang me," you realized as Solomon fussed over your injuries.
"They'll do no such thing," he said with enough certainty to make you even more uneasy.
"They will!"
"Listen to me," he stopped and grabbed your shoulders, pulling you flush against him. You gasped, too afraid and exhausted to struggle. "If I say you are innocent, you are. If I tell you that no harm will befall you this night, it shall be so. Do you understand?"
"Solomon!"
You gasped and Solomon pulled you away from the window with a mumbled curse. You didn't need to be standing just behind him as he parted the thin gauze curtains to know that it was Thomas Slater walking up the path with his bright lantern held out before him.
He had an angry, surefire look on his face. Like he could sense you within the walls of the cottage and was ready to take you away by any means necessary.
"Hide," Solomon whispered, pushing you away without looking up from the window. "Go quickly. Make haste."
He returned the knife to your hand and prepared himself to prop the door shut with his body in case it was forced open. You disappeared into the only other room in the house—Solomon's bedroom. It was small, much smaller than yours, and had room only for the bed underneath the window.
Sinking to your knees, you kept your back against the door and put your ear to the wood so you could listen in. To your horror, you heard the front door unlatch followed by the heavy footfalls of Thomas entering the house.
"I know she's in here."
"Thomas, I'm afraid I know not of what you speak."
You flinched at the sound of glasses shattering and furniture getting thrown about.
"Do not play the fool, Solomon Goode. She's got a bounty on her head and every man from Union is in these woods. If I don't find her here, someone else will."
This statement, as bone-chilling as it was, rang true. A pulsing orange light beat against the walls of the bedroom. More torches were approaching and fast. You didn't have much time.
A low, rumbling groan made its way to your ears and you bit back a yelp as a small, square-shaped door creaked open at the foot of the bed. You gaped down at it. It seemed to have been pulled open by a soft breeze that now tickled your fingertips and whistled in the space beyond.
A fairy door.
As quietly as you could, crawled across the bedroom floor to kneel beside it. Taking the lit candlestick from the bedside, you held it through the threshold and peered within. A sturdy-looking ladder descended down into a musty-smelling cavern. The air was wet and stale and reeked of death.
But you didn't have much of a choice, now did you?
(A/N: This feels...rushed? I don't know. The pacing is off. Oh well. I'm sorry that I fell off the face of the earth this week. I have no idea whats going on. I think updates will be back on schedule until Halloween. Then I am laxing with casual updates until Christmas break).