CHAPTER ELEVEN

Despite what happened, I fell back into a comfortable routine. The police had taken my statement into consideration, but I didn't have much hope that they'd do anything about it. Dr. Thredson had a decent reputation and I knew that investigating him would be hard.

Knowing this, every dark room made me nervous, so I tended to avoid them. I spent most of my time keeping busy. There were also more nights that I spent at the asylum than at home. I no longer felt comfortable there. I did feel bad about leaving Michael with Ben who seemed to want nothing to do with him and Violet who had a proper social life, now. If only I had a place to shelter him. I didn't want to miss any of his milestones. He was growing up so quickly.

As I continued to ponder, my eyes darted to Sister Judith, or what appeared to be her. This was not the no-nonsense dictator that I came to know. This was a frail woman who seemed to have lost her mind. What did they do to her and why? Was it the Monsignor? Could that be why he was situated in her office, now? Or was it something else entirely?

"It's fascinating, isn't it?" Sister Mary Eunice took a seat beside me.

I tilted my head. "What do you mean?"

"The human mind. It bends and breaks so easily."

What was she talking about? "Are you okay, Sister Mary Eunice?" She was definitely not herself. I felt a tug at my mind as I tried to rationalise her behaviour. The pain was immediate, so I let the thought slip away.

"I'm perfectly alright. You don't look too well, though," she told me. "Perhaps I could help you up to the dormitories?"

"No!" I quickly protested before quieting down. "No, it's fine. I'm alright."

"The ordeal must've been so terrible for you." She placed her hand on my knee causing me to jump. "I'm glad you're back, but Thredson wouldn't have been able to keep you for long. He's quite out of his depth in the matter." Her beautiful face twisted into a sneer. "You would never belong to him."

I swallowed hard. The tightening of her slaw-like grip was becoming painful. "I don't belong to anyone," I reassured her.

She smirked at me. "Of course not." There was something oddly sinister and condescending behind her words.

I spotted Kit and tried to quickly excuse myself. Before I could leave, her parting words made my blood run cold. "I can't say the same for our dear Kit Walker, though."

What had he done now?

I scurried off to him and pulled him into a secluded location where no one could eavesdrop on us. "What have you done?" I hissed, hoping that this wasn't as bad as his current predicament. How much worse could it really get for him?

He blinked at me in confusion. "What do you mean?"

"Sister Mary Eunice!" I exclaimed. "She implied that you belong to someone now?" If this was another woman, I was going to completely lose it. I didn't need to deal with my heart shattering into a million pieces, right now.

"I… well… it's complicated," he mumbled with his eyes downcast.

"Complicated?!" Tears were already pricking my eyes. "What do you mean complicated? If there's someone else, just break up with me now and stop leading me on."

Immediately, his eyes snapped back up to look at me. Panic was on his face. "What?! No! There's no one else. There's only you, Madi. Always." He pulled me against him. "There won't' ever be another. What she meant is… Well… You know how I was able to do all that to save you? Sister Mary Eunice helped me. If it wasn't for her, I would be helplessly trapped here."

"I don't understand."

"Neither do I," he sighed. "But Sister Mary Eunice had some weird power. It… didn't come free, though. She wanted something in return."

"What is it?" She wouldn't have taken anything too drastic from him, right? She was such a kind soul – most of the time. What would she possibly ask for?

He mumbled something incoherent.

"Pardon?"

"My soul," he whispered, just a little louder. "She wanted my soul."

My heart stopped. Surely, it was a joke. "What do you mean she wanted your soul? You didn't agree to that, did you?" He couldn't have. That would be too much. I wasn't worth his soul!

"Of course, I did!" He looked straight into my eyes. "You're worth everything that I could give,. Without you, I'm nothing."

"No…" I shook my head in denial. What did that mean? Why would she ask for that? I knew she had been odd lately, but did she actually think that she could possibly own his soul? "What's going to happen, now..?" I asked no one in particular because neither of us knew the answer to that.

Suddenly, our future didn't feel so bright anymore. Not only did we have to clear up his name, we also had to deal with the possibility that he had just sold his soul. I couldn't even begin to fathom how we could get out of this in one piece.

He kissed me softly. "If I had the chance to do it again to save you, I would a million times over."

Tears pricked my eyes. I didn't want him to feel that way. Didn't he know how dear he was to me? "We'll fix this," I told him. We had to.

…

I went home that night with the intention of moving to the manor. Ben was in his office doing whatever he did for work. Michael was wailing in his baby cot. I couldn't do this anymore. I couldn't subject little Michael to this neglect. If the Monsignor vehemently forbade me to bring him along, I'd have to find another way for him to be cared for while I worked.

I stayed in my room for the night with Michael beside me. I was already doubting myself. Could I really take him away from his father? It really wasn't fair for him to choose between his father and his sister. Not only that, this was my home for as long as I could remember. Memories of mother may be locked up in one room, but it was as if I could still feel her with me.

What would she have done in my situation? As I thought this, I could practically hear her voice telling me to forgive him. Violet always viewed her as weak, but I think she just loved too deeply to let anyone go.

The doctors had advised her to abort the baby during her pregnancy. She didn't even consider it an option. By then, she was already completely in love with the parasite growing inside her. This was the reason why father didn't like spending time with his son. Even though he had never vocalised it, I knew he blamed Michael for his wife's early death. I didn't see how treating the very child she gave her life to with such disdain would do her memory any justice.

Then again, when father first brought Michael home and told us the news of mother's death, I, too, couldn't help feeling hate for the brother I didn't know yet. What right did that tiny thing have to steal my mother away from me?

Of course, I couldn't hold a grudge against him. He was so cute and he seemed to possess the same ability to love as our beloved mother.

"Madi! Madi!" He blinked at me when I tucked him against me. It was decision time. For better or for worse, we were going to have to live with this decision until Michael can decide for himself.

When I walked downstairs, I saw Violet watching me, waiting for me to do something. I contemplated talking to Ben who sat eating his breakfast, completely ignoring me, but I chickened out.

"Vi…" She walked over to me, biting her lips. "I know you're still young…"

Violet rolled her eyes. "I'm really not and I know what you want me to do. It's fine. I can take care of Michael when you're gone."

I opened my mouth, but she interrupted me, again.

"I won't smoke with him in the room. I'll feed him, change his diapers, do whatever I see you do. I know I was messed up before, but I can do this. He's my brother, too, and you're not his mom. You don't have to do it all by yourself." Her words made tears stream down my eyes. "Stop crying, you're acting like mom, now!" With that, she stomped up the stairs and I could hear her greeting Michael.

During my time working, I never realised how much she'd grown. I had still thought of her as the problem child, but I evidently didn't give her enough credit. She worked hard and managed to dig herself out of the deep hole she had stepped into.

As I walked out the door, I saw Ben glance over to me, but no words were exchanged.

When I arrived at Briarcliff, I felt much lighter than I ever did. For that short moment, I was able to forget about everything and do what I had to.

I smiled at all the other Sisters, ignoring their confused stares and went on my way. True, I was still a little worried about Michael, but I knew that Violet wouldn't let me down.

As I went on with my duty, Sister Mary Eunice walked up behind me. I immediately jumped and took several steps back. She merely laughed at my actions. "What are you so afraid of? I would never hurt you."

I shook my head. "What have you done to me? Every time I feel like I've figured it out, my head hurts. What did you do?!" It really wasn't until Kit told me about the deal did I decide to pursue the topic. I had chalked it up as something coincidental at first, but knowing that she had the possible ability of taking a soul, perhaps it's something I shouldn't ignore anymore.

As expected, she didn't tell me. She didn't tell me anything at all.

She had left me just as confused as I was before if not more so. What she had done to Kit… to me. I couldn't figure out why she was doing this. What would she gain? We were two insignificant people amongst many others.

When my shift was over, I returned to the dormitories where I had a semi-permanent place there.

The next morning, I was woken up by a feeling of complete dread and sheet error. I looked around the room, trying to see if anything had gone wrong, but nothing seemed to be out of place. I checked Sister Mary Eunice's bed and saw that she had already risen and was nowhere in sight, along with half of the staff.

I quickly dressed, trying to brush off the paranoia, but it continued to persist as I served breakfast and when I walked around the common room. I could see the looks of concern on Kit's face whenever I walked by. I couldn't tell him anything because I didn't know if there really was anything to talk about.

What made it worse was that I could see a mirror of my fear on Lana's face. I hoped that we were both wrong, but when she pulled me over after lunch, I knew that something was definitely up.

"I'm pregnant!" she blurted out to me.

I stared blankly at her as the words slowly sunk in. When it did, I could feel myself pale. "I'm so sorry…"

"I'm going to get rid of it. I'm not going to make that monster's baby!" I didn't know how she was going to go about this nor did I know why she was telling me of all people. She seemed to have a natural disdain for me and it only grew stronger after what happened in the basement. Perhaps that was also the reason why she thought I was the person to talk to. We were there together. It was likely that we were the only survivors of Bloody Face. There was no one who would understand what we went through than each other.

"I am sorry for what happened," I apologised again, but I felt as if I had already paid for it in full when she left me to face Thredson's anger alone. To be honest, if it wasn't for her, Kit probably wouldn't have needed to trade his soul away.

As I came to this conclusion, my own hate for her escalated. It was her fault that our future was going up in flames. The rational side of me knew that that was a preposterous way to think, but it felt good to put the blame on someone else, even for a short while.

I shook away the hate and sighed before walking away.

To be honest, even though Lana trusted me with her secret, neither of us intended to be particularly amiable towards the other. We just weren't compatible.

Maybe if…

My blood ran cold as I turned the corner and bumped right into my nightmare.

"Hello, princess."

AUTHOR'S NOTE

Sorry, this chapter was so short and how long it took for me to upload! I had a bit of trouble and I had a lot planned, but then I took out the main focus because as I was typing it, I didn't want it there and… Yeah…

Anyway, to explain why Kit's soul is still at peril… The first time he used the power, he only got as far as the office before Grace woke him up. As he went back a second time, that's when the deal kicked in. He knew what he was getting into, but didn't care because he needed to find Madi.

Thank you MEGUMIthePENGUIN, NameWithNoMeaning, NeonBe8tz, King Reeses, SPARKELS77, and guests (anonymouscsifan and DaisyChain) for reviewing!

MEGUMIthePENGUIN: I'll definitely start working on a Daniel Atlas one-shot! I currently have a Spencer Reid one posted some time ago, but I do plan on writing another one soon.

NameWithNoMeaning: The Loki story is dooone‼! It's also roughly 13k words long… I'm not sure how good it really is, but I hope you like it!

anonymouscsifan: I'm glad you like seeing the Rubber Man's appearance! If you like, I can probably make him reappear. Haha! I can definitely just refer to her as Madi in the Coven story! What I have initially planned is that Madi will be Kyle's sister, but then I'm not sure I want to cross that boundary of incest to that degree in my story, so it's back to the drawing board in terms of how they'll meet, unless you and my other readers don't mind.

NeonBe8tz: I'm so glad you're still liking this story so much! I'm so sorry that this chapter is short! It'll definitely be back to its original length for next chapter!

King Reeses: I love writing about possessed Sister Mary Eunice. Sorry, it's not what you expected or wanted to see, but I'm glad you like the rest of the story well enough!

DaisyChain: I'm so happy you liked the Rubber Man‼

SPARKELS77: Thank you!

Thank you as well to everyone who has favourited and followed this story.

Please drop a review because I love to hear from all of you!

The Loki one-shot has also been posted if you'd like to check that out.