Lacrimosa

The last time she had fallen asleep, she woke up on the cold, misty floor of a boiler room. When she had regained consciousness this time, she was in a small, warm bed in what appeared to be a one-room dwelling. There was nobody in the room at this particular moment, and Holly was far too comfortable to move. All of her muscles relaxed all at once, completely against her will. While it brought her relief, it certainly wasn't a good situation to be in when you were on the run.

I hope to God that I am not drugged. I will bloody haunt the poor bastard who drugged me if I die because of him.

Though she could not move her body, she felt many bandages covering her wounded limbs and joints. Her wrists and fingers were bandaged, her knee and shoulders were wrapped up as well as her ankles, and she felt patches on her chin, cheek, and other areas that had been wounded. Her skin also felt a lot cleaner than before. She must have truly been in bad shape if her body was this exhausted. She tried to will herself to move, but her muscles defied her every desire.

With a groan, she finally gave up the inner struggle. If she was not going to move, she may as well go back to sleep. Either way she looked at it, she was already in danger, was just as vulnerable awake as she would be asleep, and there was no point in tiring herself further by staying conscious. So she simply closed her eyes and drifted back into sleep.

The second time she woke up, she was relieved to find herself in the same room, and this time could smell the aroma of food. Her bruised eyelids fluttered open and she saw two female factory workers standing over her. One held a bowl of warm water and a washcloth in her hand, and the other had a tray with what Holly assumed to be some kind of food. Both of them looked surprised to see her awake.

"Bless my soul!" the one with the washcloth gasped. "Thank God you are still alive. You had us worried to death!"

Holly groaned slightly and moved her mouth to speak. Immediately the woman with the food hushed her. "Don't start talking now, dearie! You need all the rest you can get. Three days of sleep simply wasn't enough!"

Holly's eyebrows rose and she felt the uncomfortable shifting of the sticky bandages against her skin. I've been asleep for three days?

It would certainly explain why she couldn't remember much. She did not forget the torture, and she did not forget climbing into a furnace to escape. The particulars from the soot and cooling agents of the furnace certainly added to the pain of her injuries. Probably even caused some infection. Regardless, while the pain was vivid in her memory, how she escaped the furnace and made it here was not. It was a question she was going to have to ask these two at some point.

"We thought we would wait until you woke up before we called for any outside assistance…" the woman with the washcloth said. "Do you want us to call the foreman? Or anybody else?"

At this, Holly shook her head. If she was here and not back in the boiler room it was because Sebastian did not know where she was. And she did not know if anybody was searching for her. It was best that she remain in this place, away from all the attention, at least until she knew what to do next. The two women looked very suspicious, but did not comment on the matter further. They simply respected her wishes.

The woman with the bowl, who went by the name of Anne, proceeded to change Holly's bandages for her. To Holly's convenience, this woman was very quick but also very gentle. Cleaning her infected and sore wounds was not going to be a fun experience, and yet Anne made sure to tend to those places with as little pain as possible. The medicine stung, the stitching was irritating and drawn out, and yet somehow it did not feel nearly as bad as she would have expected it to feel.

The woman with the food, who went by the name of Jane, helped her sit up against her pillows so that she could eat without complications. The food was some sort of porridge that was not all that pleasant to eat, but if it gave her back her nourishment and strength, she would be happy. Though it probably wasn't entirely healthy for her, she ate two bowls of the food rather than just one. Binge eating was something she normally refrained from doing, and under normal circumstances she would have been happy with the amount of weight lost over the past few days. But having been without food for as long as she did made even the most unpleasant of porridges taste like heaven.

There was so much Holly wanted to ask them, but could not. She was certainly surprised that these two women were caring for her. At the same time however, she made sure to observe their faces as they tended to her wounds. There were expressions of the utmost sympathy and sorrow, and perhaps anger. On some unconscious level it made sense to Holly that human women could empathize for what was done to her at the hands of a male vampire, but the memories of the two factory workers who left her to die was still very vivid in her memory.

Though she appreciated their effort to help her, she knew she could not trust them. Not yet. Not until she knew their true motives.

Days had passed. She wasn't keeping count, but in that amount of time, she had been in the constant care of these women. Sometimes they would leave her to return to work, but they always came back to feed her, change her bandages, and try to build her strength back. Eventually she was strong enough to exercise the muscles and joints of her arms and legs. She walked with a limp in both of her legs and though she could move both of her arms, it hurt to lift them too high or too suddenly. Also, twisting her torso too far or too quickly caused pain to the injury on her stomach.

Perhaps the most disturbing part of all of this was how her fingers looked without nails. Anne, who acted a nurse for injured factory workers, said that the root for the nail had been damaged, and if the nails grew back they may come back deformed. She had cleaned the skin of all the particulars from the furnace, and said that to prevent further infection that Holly should keep her fingertips bandaged for six months. In regards to Holly's broken nose, Anne did suggest snapping it back into place. It would hurt and would certainly cause a lot of bleeding, but it would be quick and would heal better. Regardless, Holly refused the offer. She had underwent more than enough pain over these past few days, and there was something that sounded very unpleasant about snapping the cartilage in her nose back into place.

"Come now, it will only be a moment of pain. Do you want to go on living with a crooked nose?" Anne asked, but Holly merely shook her head.

"I can live with it. It isn't the worst thing that's happened to me." was the reply.

Her hand went to her nose feeling how the cartilage was smooth at first, and then bent at the bridge. It must have looked as distracting and as horrid as it felt, but she quickly put it out of her mind. There was a far more important question that needed to be asked, and Holly turned her head back to Anne.

"…I want to thank you for everything that you and Jane have done for me. And I hope you will not find me ungrateful for asking why you did this for me…" she said.

Anne gaped at her. "Why? You are asking why?" she gasped. "What decent human being wouldn't help you? You probably don't remember, but you were in such horrible shape when you crawled out of that furnace! You were covered in soot and blood, your wounds looked so horrible, your body was shivering and shaking, not to mention your clothes were just about bloody gone!"

…Perhaps it was a good thing that I didn't remember it… she thought to herself.

"I don't mean to bring up any horrible memories you may have had, but my God darling, what on Earth happened to you? There were so many rumors! The vampire Sebastian has been in the worst mood over these past days, apparently looking for a human who wronged him. And the day before his tirades, we find you in this terrible state!" she cried, her voice growing more suspicious with every word she said.

At this, Holly was silent. She wasn't entirely sure what to say about all of this, and she wasn't sure what to make of this situation. Those two factory workers from before knew what was happening to her and they both did nothing. And all that Jane and Anne seemed to know was that Sebastian was searching for a human. Perhaps after these two had found her, and heard that Sebastian was looking for someone the very next day, they knew better than the turn her over. Since they seemed to be in the loop, maybe now would be the time for Holly to inform them of everything that happened. And maybe if she used them for witnesses, she could file some sort of complaint to the Sarafan Lord about all of this. Sebastian would be punished for disobeying his orders, and Holly would certainly be compensated for her troubles.

But then again… there was that terrible, nagging feeling at the back of her head.

"…Was there a problem with one of the machines a few days ago?" Holly asked, looking back at Anne. "Did the foreman send for a mechanic to repair anything?"

Anne looked confused for a moment, but then shook her head. "No, dear. Not at all. Everything has been operating just fine except for that furnace… why do you ask?"

…Everything was working fine… Holly's eyes hardened. 'Report to the Industrial District immediately…' '…perhaps a machine has broken down and needs repairing…'

She was set up. This was all planned out, wasn't it? Did the two vampires conspire against her? Was that letter from the Sarafan Lord forged, or was it by his hand? Did the General Marius know what was going to happen to her when he sent her with those two young soldiers? Were they even dead at all? Did they simply hand her over to Sebastian and return to base?

"Ma'am! Stop it! Look what you are doing!"

Holly glanced down and saw that fingers had balled into a pair of tight fists. They were clenched so tightly that her arms were trembling and the wounds from the removed fingernails had reopened, causing blood to bleed through the bandages. Immediately Holly drew back, trying to calm herself. Anne immediately began to fix her up again, and there was no further comment on this matter. She merely told her that she should not rile herself over thoughts that would cause her further injury. Her recovery was the most important issue at this particular moment.

But her recovery was not the only issue at hand. Jane had returned one evening with food for the three of them and had mentioned a story she overheard in the lunch line. The male workers were having a conversation about an invasion that had taken place at the Sarafan Keep. It was reported that a vampire had somehow infiltrated the premises, killed several of the guards and the inhabitants, and had rescued an imprisoned vampire scheduled for execution. The rumor was that Sarafan Lord had been present at this event and attacked the two vampires, yet the two somehow escaped with their lives. To make matters worse, the body of one of the Sarafan Lord's vampire guardians was found in the Upper City Cathedral.

Though Holly would have commented on this particular matter, she decided to keep her words to herself. On the inside, she was smiling. A vampire in service to the Sarafan Lord who was found dead within a cathedral in the Upper City. One could only guess which little leech that one was.

It was Kain, wasn't it? He killed you. She thought to herself then glared. You got off lucky, Marcus… God knows you deserved much worse for all that you did.

"There's more…" Jane said, and then looked to Anne. "There were bodies found within the factory. All completely drained of blood!"

Anne glared and crossed her arms. "It is probably that bloody bastard Sebastian… I wish someone had the balls to tell that leech that he can't go around killing workers just because he's mad about… well, whatever it is he's mad about."

But Jane shook her head. "No… he has been informed of the matter and denies feeding from these men. Could very well be a bloody lie, but we all know how much of a sloppy butcher he is. The ones he feeds on are found in pieces, and these bodies were not. Which means there may be another vampire invasion."

Anne gasped. "Another one? You would think that those creatures would be smarter than that! Everyone saw what happened to the last creature they caught trying to break into our factories!"

Holly's face paled at this. Another vampire had invaded… she remembered the face of the first vampire. She very much doubted that she would return to this place after what she had been put through within the Sarafan Keep. And yet, there was the vampire that had slain two of the Sarafan Lord's vampire guardians, infiltrated the Sarafan Keep and escaped with the captive vampire. Who better to send for a second infiltration than the vampire Kain?

And then a thought entered her mind.

…And where do you think Kain is going to be heading…? And who do you think is going to be waiting for him…?

Her mind flashed back to that chamber she had visited. It held that one strange stone; the one so important and so confidential that they would not share information about it's purpose to the one responsible for it's protection. Why was it so important that the vampires were trying to get to it? Why was it so useful?

…You do realize that if both of them are there… there may be an altercation. And it would probably be an ideal time to get rid of both of them…

The thought slithered its way into her mind so subtly that when she realized what she was thinking, it nearly scared her. What she was suggesting was madness. While she knew that the Sarafan soldiers would not object to the deaths of two vampires, she did not know how the Sarafan Lord would take having another pet vampire killed off.

But then again… there is always that possibility that he was the one who may have set you up…

This was true. But at the same time, she was so unclear of what may have happened. There were so many possibilities that it made her head spin. She knew for a fact that Sebastian and Marcus were in on her torture, and that there was a possibility that the two workers were scared into obeying their wishes, very much like the Tapster had been. But was this an act that was planned by those two alone? Were other people involved in this matter? Were the Sarafan soldiers themselves involved in this matter?

It was made abundantly clear that putting her trust in the officials was going to be a stupid move on her part. She did not know of any soldier or general that she could trust after this. For this she could blame her paranoia, and she could possibly even blame insanity. God knows that after everything she had been through, her thoughts probably weren't in order.

On the other hand… if Sebastian took the liberty of degrading her in the way that he did, would it really be so bad of her to take the law into her own hands?

Just for this one time?

"Are you feeling alright, my dear?" Jane's voice sounded very concerned, and Holly noticed that the two were looking at her. "You are very quiet this evening…"

Holly glanced at the two women… and then a smirk formed on her lips.

"…Do you ladies have a worker's uniform that comes in my size?"