Fallen Daughters

“I’m sorry, Lettie. So sorry,” I said, somehow physically incapable of shedding tears, but not feeling such agonizing pain since the change of William to scratcher.

“There’s an other side,” Lettie replied. She coughed again as blood shot out with every hack. “Don’t be afraid, Hannah. I can feel it. I see the light in the distance. It’s there. It’s there.”

Lettie coughed again, gagging on the bubbling blood filling her airway. She coughed again, and her eyes began to fade. “Promise me, Hannah. Promise me you will cross over and find me on the other side. I’ll be there waiting. Promise me.”

“I promise.” I nodded with my eyes clenched shut. I didn’t want her to see my fear or the fact that I didn’t believe that there was an other side. This was just a sick twisted ritual of a mad man.

I opened my eyes when I heard Lettie gasp for air as her body slowly died.

Lettie! Lettie! Lettie!

Lettie! Lettie was dead. Dead! My head spun, and all I could hear was a high, blood-curdling scream. Someone was screaming. I was screaming. It was me.

Lettie! No! No, please! Don’t leave me!

I screamed over and over until there was nothing. Darkness. Defeat. My body finally decided it was time to shut down and give up the resistance against my bonds. Nothing but the beating of my broken heart as I stopped my struggle and would just allow Father Dane to kill me as well. End my fucking misery.

It didn’t end with Lettie’s death. Oh no. That would have been too easy. Carving a cross down her tiny body was not enough for this sadistic man. Apparently that was just the beginning, because I watched as Father Dane climbed onto the alter and straddled Lettie’s dead body.

In shock, I watched as he violently pitched his hips, thrusting his rigid cock again and again into her limp, dead body. He was fucking my dead friend and there was nothing I could do but watch on in horror. I couldn’t even scream for the thick blanket of mortification nearly suffocated me.

“Forgive me Father, for I have sinned,” the priest grunted as he gyrated his body against Lettie’s lifeless frame. Groaning with every thrust, he added, “Accept this sinner upon your grace. Open your arms so she may enter your paradise.”

His palm rested on Lettie’s pert, blood-coated breast as he pushed into her. I couldn’t look away. I didn’t want to look away. I wanted to be like the statue of Jesus Christ staring at Father Dane as he fucked my friend. My friend. I would cast my judgment upon this man.

“You sick fuck,” I said. Or at least I think I said. The ringing in my ears muffled all sound.

Father Dane turned his head to look at me as he thrust in and out of Lettie, never pausing once. His eyes locked in stare with mine as he groaned one last final time, filling Lettie’s pussy with his evil seed.

39

gently wipe every tear from our eyes: in the name of the Father, and of the Son,

It was my turn.

I watched Father Dane and his flaccid cock dismount from Lettie’s bloody slab and walk to the alter. He never looked at me once as he took the white linen, dipped it in the metal bowl of water and wiped his cock free from the signs of his heinous act. No amount of holy water could free him of the sin far worse than anything the Devil himself could do.

Once his cock was clean, he then took the bloody knife and repeated the act of cleansing it of all signs of Lettie’s murder. Her sacrifice in the hope of something better.

Maybe she was right.

Maybe there was something better.

Anything better than where I was right now.

When Father Dane turned toward me with dagger in hand, I knew right then that I wanted to die. Give me my bloody cross on my chest so that I no longer have to be in this hell. Even if there was no other side, nothing could be worse than this. Nothing could be worse than the scratchers. Father Dane. The Church. At least now, I could stop running from the darkness. Either I was diving head first into the black pit of nothing after, or I would truly see Lettie and my William waiting for me with open arms. Regardless, I was ready for my bloody cross.

“Oh lord. In this world, she has died. Let her live with you forever,” Father Dane preached with dagger held over his head. Bringing it down hard upon my chest, he added, “Accept this sinner into your home, for she will be cast from all evil by my hands.”

I expected to feel pain, but I did not expect the intensity of the searing heat branding into my very being as the dagger sliced through my flesh. I couldn’t scream. I couldn’t beg. Death engulfed every action. All I could do was watch my blood splatter upon Father Dane’s face as he carved the holy symbol into me. I could hear my flesh tearing. I could smell the metallic scent of my blood as it beat out of my chest with every pulse of my dying heart. I could hear the hollow sound of boots belonging to the grim reaper walking toward me.