So… I'm back. Sorry for the delay, I got distracted by this little thing called life. Also, I started rewriting my Avengers fic for the third time and began another one with The Phantom of the Opera ;) Anyway, the regular updates should resume now, probably a chapter every two (or three, we'll see) weeks.

Like all the other ones, this chapter was edited by my Beta Reader, FateMagician, whom I can never thank enough for all this amazing work.

I also want to thank those of you who reviewed, followed, and favourited this story. I hope it'll keep living up to you expectations.

The title is also the title of a hymn written by a Carl P. Daw. I found it quite by accident on the Internet ^^

Enola opened her eyes with a sharp intake of breath… which she immediately regretted when the foulest smell she had ever endured caught at her throat and turned her stomach: rotting leaves, decaying flesh, hopelessness, death—a cold, thick smell that clogged her nostrils and her throat. Even the Horseman of Death himself didn't stink this badly. Right now she'd have buried her nose in his coat if it meant escaping that stench. At that thought, she couldn't help smirking. The face he'd make if I did that! A picture of her hugging a completely flummoxed Horseman crossed her mind and she let out a giggle. She immediately gave herself a mental slap: she was in Purgatory, God dammit! This certainly wasn't the place to be distracted. And she couldn't see his face anyway. Because he doesn't have one… I wonder if he was handsome… I'll have to ask Ichabod…

The most lucid part of her mind protested forcefully against this new and definitely irrelevant line of thought, and she vigorously pinched her own hand. The pain, although light, was enough to help her focus. She sat up, the clammy dead leaves that covered the ground sticking to her palms, and looked around. She was in the middle of a sparse forest plunged into the night and mist was floating among the thin trees, its pale billows blurring her surroundings. She could hear crows cawing somewhere and people—damned souls—were wandering aimlessly, paying no attention to her. Abbie and Ichabod were nowhere to be seen.

"Great," Enola mumbled, pushing herself off the ground and brushing leaves and dirt off her jeans. "Please don't tell me I'll have to search the whole bloody place."

She swept aside the last shreds of cobweb lingering in her mind and scrutinized the darkness, hoping to see the familiar figures of her friends.

"We entered Purgatory together, so they can't be too far," she reasoned aloud.

She decided it was safer to look for the church where Ichabod had seen Katrina during his visions: since it was her friends' destination too, they'd eventually go there, right? No need to spend hours looking for each other in this place… But still, she could call out to them a bit, just in case.

"Abbie! Ichabod!" she yelled.

She strained her ears for an answer but none came. Enola bit her lower lip as a gut-twisting anxiety began to well up in her. This place unnerved her… scared her in fact, and all her instincts were begging her to leg it the hell out of there. It felt... stifled underneath a leaden shroud of stillness, despair, and death that was beginning to press around her too. And all those lost souls… She couldn't bring herself to pity them: all she felt was unease and disgust at their blank, sometimes disfigured faces, their jerky gaits, and their slumped shoulders. The air was filled with their moans and she could hear unnaturally high-pitched sobs. And that stench…

And then the noise began: it was as if someone was repeatedly and brutally striking two low-tone piano keys at the same time, creating a perfectly eerie sound which finished freaking her out.

"Abbie! Ichabod! Where the hell are you?!" she shouted in a half-hysterical voice as she looked around frantically.

This time, much to her relief, she heard a call.

"Enola?"

That way! She took off at full speed and, a few seconds later, she skidded to a halt in front of the two Witnesses.

"There you are!" she exclaimed, her voice filled with relief. "Are you all right?"

"We are," Ichabod answered with a reassuring smile. "What about you?"

"Physically, I'm fine. Mentally, however…"

The vampire trailed off and pursed her lips, clearly uneasy with confessing her fear. Ichabod nodded in understanding.

"Yes, this place is rather unsettling," he commented with a glance around.

"That's the understatement of the year, Ichabod," Enola quipped dryly.

It was at this moment that she noticed Abbie eyeing her suspiciously.

"Uh… Abbie? Did I say something wrong?"

"How do we know it's really you, and not another trick?" the lieutenant asked, staring hard and straight into the vampire's eyes as if to dare her to lie.

"Oi! Of course, it's really me!"

The vampire was about to go on when she noticed that Abbie had visibly relaxed and that she and Ichabod were now exchanging amused smiles. It was Enola's turn to gaze at them quizzically.

"What did I say?" she inquired, doing her best to keep annoyance off her voice.

She wanted to get the hell out of that place, and right now they were just wasting their time.

"You said 'oi', so yeah, it's definitely you," Abbie explained, still smiling.

Enola chuckled and shook her head. For once, this tic of hers—which she had gotten by dint of watching and re-watching Doctor Who and sometimes let slip—was being useful. However, the atmosphere of Purgatory soon caught up with them, snuffing out the comfortable moment, and their smiles slid off their faces like ink in the rain.

"Let's go and find Katrina," Abbie decided, glancing around in hopes of finding some path they could follow.

"Good idea," Enola muttered. "I want to get out of here."

They chose a direction and set off. Enola was pretty sure it was by a pure stroke of luck that they found the small white wooden church as quickly as they did. Although at second glance, she wondered if it could really be called luck: the clearing in which the church stood was swarming with damned souls and their moans had become louder, scraping Enola's mind like a piece of chalk dragged on a blackboard by a sadistic teacher. Several of them had their heads wrapped in rough cloth, one was dragging a giant key behind him, another was crawling on the ground, some were clinging to the wire netting protecting the tall windows, like insects.

"What the hell?" Abbie incredulously muttered.

"A form of hell, it would seem," Ichabod agreed with a low voice and a hard face. "Lost souls… searching for salvation."

"Could we get in please?" Enola all but whimpered.

The Witnesses glanced at her and frowned in unison: clearly, the place was affecting the vampire even more than them. Her eyes were darting around nervously, her lips were tightened into a thin line as if she was trying not to throw up, and she was wringing her hands so forcefully that she was probably about to break her fingers. Her friends knew her well enough to know that this wasn't fear, but sheer discomfort. And indeed, she could feel Purgatory's murk crawling over her skin like icy fingers groping for the smallest crack to seep into.

Maybe it was because she was undead, Ichabod thought. Granted: since Abbie and he were alive, they had, in theory, nothing to do in this place either. But living people could be imprisoned there—Katrina was the proof of this. Such was one of the rules of Purgatory. Now Enola… she was neither truly dead nor truly alive, her soul was hers, and she wasn't even an undead created by Moloch, the master of the place. She did not belong there, and it looked as if Purgatory was doing everything to let her know how unwelcome she was.

"Let's go," Abbie simply said, and the vampire cast her a grateful glance.

They quickly made their way among the lost souls and stormed into the church. Ichabod closed the door behind them and barred it with a beam. Enola sighed in relief: the inside of the church was warmer, brighter, and much quieter. True, it still felt as if time was frozen, but death's presence wasn't nearly as strong and oppressive as in the woods.

"My love… No, no, no!"

Enola turned towards the owner of the panicked voice and discovered a human woman in her early thirties, tall and slender. She had a beautiful face with thin pink lips, a small upturned nose, and big pale green eyes, her square jaw softened by the long dark ginger waves of her hair. Her fair skin contrasted sharply with the black colonial dress she was wearing, appearing almost as white as milk.

"I begged you never to return here!" she continued as she hurried towards Ichabod.

"What do you know of the secrets of Washington's Bible?" the Englishman asked briskly, joining her halfway.

Enola frowned in disapproval. Seriously, Ichabod? I thought we were here to rescue her, not to interrogate her!

"Only that he wanted to ensure that it found its way with you," Katrina answered, clearly confused.

"Among its revelations, it holds a map, allowing us to summon a doorway to and from this place," Ichabod explained. "Now, the second Horseman will ride into the mortal realm this very day... And you can stop him. You'll finally be free from this place," he added, his voice thick with emotion.

Ah, there's the loving husband. Good.

"We're gonna bring you home," Abbie added in a confident and reassuring tone.

But instead of the joy that she—they—expected, there was only fear on Katrina's face.

"Oh no, I can't," the witch breathed, shaking her head.

Enola frowned again, this time incredulously. What?!

"Of course you can," she intervened, stepping away from the pew she had been leaning against. "We'll even help you pack. Anything to get out of here as soon as possible."

Katrina eyed her with curiosity.

"Who are you?" she asked.

"Enola Vallombreuse," the vampire introduced herself with a slight bow. "I'm a friend of the Witnesses' and I'm here to help them free you."

"I am grateful, but no soul can leave this place without being granted forgiveness," Katrina explained. "To leave without it… It would break down the walls between the worlds."

"I can't accept that," Abbie snapped. "We didn't come this far to get dinged by some metaphysical technicality."

"I agree," Enola said, impatience seeping into her voice. "The world isn't going to end because we saved a soul that doesn't deserve to be here in the first place."

"We're not leaving without you," Ichabod declared, driving their point home even further. "With War's arrival, our destruction is assured either way."

At these words, Katrina averted her eyes from them and pressed her lips together in a mixture of indecision and embarrassment, which made Enola frown. What's going on here?

"What are you not saying?" Ichabod asked, understanding his wife's expression better than his friend.

The witch hesitated and Enola's impatience reached new heights. She breathed deeply several times and as discreetly as possible, and it took all her will not to grab Katrina's shoulders and shake her while yelling at her to spill the beans. Oh, how I'd like to smash something… One of these pews perhaps… But since she didn't really want to see the look on her friends' faces if she went Hulk on the furniture, she had to content herself with clenching her fists as hard as she could.

"There's no time for indecision, my love," Ichabod insisted gently.

"There is... an alternative," his wife finally relented. "One that requires a sacrifice of great cost, one I cannot ask."

"Spill it," Abbie pressed calmly.

Katrina hesitated again, her eyes travelling from her husband to the lieutenant and Enola who had closed her eyes and was pinching the bridge of her nose. She was grinding her teeth so hard that soon, she wouldn't have any of them left, but she thought it was better than hurling insults at her friend's wife.

"My soul can leave this realm... But only if another were to take my place," Katrina eventually confessed.

Enola's eyes snapped open, Ichabod took in a sharp breath and Abbie bit her lower lip.

"Please, I beg you, leave before none of us can," Katrina pleaded without waiting for their reply.

"If one of us is to remain here in order to set you free... It shall be me," Ichabod decided.

"Certainly not," Enola snapped.

She'd known what she had to do the moment Katrina had said that someone had to stay. It was obvious, actually: she was the only one who wasn't indispensable for stopping the Apocalypse. Some small part of her mind was grumbling that perhaps whoever had created vampires shouldn't have given them souls after all—that way she'd have had an excellent excuse not to stay when the very idea made her nauseous. But she couldn't see another solution.

"I'll stay," she went on, folding her arms, almost unable to believe she had actually said it. "Abbie, Ichabod, you have to stop the Apocalypse; and you, Mrs. Crane, need to help them. Besides, you've spent more than enough time in here."

"Don't be ridiculous," Abbie protested, grabbing her friend's arm. "That place is getting at you even more than us, you'll end up mad!"

"Then what do you suggest?" the vampire almost shouted, her self-control fraying by the second.

"I'll stay," the police lieutenant declared, and Enola suspected that she felt much less confident than she sounded.

"That is not an option," Ichabod protested, pointing a finger at his partner. "And this is true for you too, Enola."

"I have to face him, Crane," Abbie insisted. "Moloch. I can't keep running away! I won't!"

"Lieutenant..."

"I'm not asking for your permission. You did not ask me for mine when you decided to end your life before you knew that Parrish could separate you from the Horseman."

"And then you very wisely convinced me there is always another way."

"This is the only way!" the lieutenant burst out. "We were chosen for this," she went on, more calmly but her voice no less filled with conviction. "To sacrifice ourselves so that humanity can endure, so that people can choose their destiny! It's my turn, Ichabod."

The latter looked perfectly dismayed, all the more so as he couldn't find any argument to refute his partner's.

"Moloch warned that I would deliver you to him, and here we are," he ground out bitterly, a hint of self-disgust in his voice. "If we do this, his prophecy will be fulfilled."

"No, it won't," Enola intervened.

Her arms were still folded and she was staring hard at Abbie.

"Because I'm staying with you, and I won't let that creature take you."

Her nerves were going raw from Purgatory plucking at them, making her wonder how long it'd take for her to lose her mind. And if she was being honest with herself, she dreaded facing Moloch, the first of Satan's generals according to Milton. She might have been able to beat a weakened Horseman of Death in a fight, but Moloch... well, he was on a whole other level, wasn't he?

That being said, Purgatory would fill with rainbows and unicorns before she'd let her friend face him alone.

"Enola–" Abbie began with a disapproving look.

"No!" the vampire cut her off. "Don't waste your breath. I'm staying and that's final."

This time, Abbie's gaze was flooded with gratitude as she understood that Enola truly was adamant. The young woman really was a gift from God, she thought for the umpteenth time. Sure, she was quick to anger—although she made considerable efforts to rein in her temper—and sometimes her bluntness bordered on tactlessness, but she was a good person, a skilled fighter, and above all, an unerring friend. Which she had just demonstrated again.

At this moment, a sudden and distant snarling startled them. Moloch.

"We are out of time," Katrina said urgently.

She removed the necklace she was wearing—a bronze medallion embossed with a pentacle and hanging on a chain—and put it around Abbie's neck.

"This amulet was bound by the Sisterhood of the Radiant Heart," she explained. "It will protect you from Moloch… I am sorry, I only have one," she added with a worried glance at Enola.

The latter dismissed the apology with a wave of her hand, trying to ignore the dull sound of heavy steps that grew louder with every second.

"It's okay, I'm more than capable of defending myself," she said with a strained smile while Ichabod and Abbie said goodbye to each other.

"Oh?"

"Well, I'm a vampire," Enola confessed, "but I've never killed anyone," she hastily specified before Katrina's surprise could turn into fear and/or disgust. "I'm much stronger and faster than any human, and I've even given the Horseman of Death a good thrashing," she continued with a wry smile. "Ask Ichabod, he'll tell you everything."

The witch nodded, a little reassured—about Enola's relative harmlessness as well as her safety—but still…

"Moloch is much more powerful than Death," she warned.

"Really? And here I thought it'd be an easy fight," the vampire scoffed before she could check her tongue.

Katrina was visibly stung by her tone and Enola pursed her lips in regret.

"Sorry," she sighed, shaking her head wearily. "I think Purgatory pretty much obliterated the filter between my brain and my mouth. What I meant was, I know and I'll do what I can."

A hand on her shoulder caught her attention and she turned around to see Ichabod, concern weighing on his brows and pulling at the corners of his mouth.

"I promised Abigail that I would come back for you," he said in a solemn tone. "I promise it to you as well. I will not leave you here."

Enola forced a smile that didn't reach her eyes and squeezed his arm lightly.

"You'd better not," she warned jokingly, but it was half-hearted. "Or I'll haunt you for the rest of your days."

Her words brought a small smile to her friend's face… a smile that vanished when the silhouette of a massive humanoid figure, with two long curved horns protruding from its head, appeared on one of the three tall stained-glass windows at the back church. The creature banged its two fists against the window with a furious roar, making the entire building tremble.

"Go, go!" Abbie shouted, pushing Ichabod towards the church door while Enola did the same with Katrina.

Enola grabbed Abbie's hand as they watched the Ichabod and Katrina recite the incantation and the portal open like a shattering mirror. Neither of them let go when they fled the church after their friends had disappeared.

"Well, at least no one's dead," Enola mumbled in her pillow—her real pillow this time.

God really has a fucking twisted sense of humour, she thought bitterly. Henry Parrish, the sin-eater, was the bloody Horseman of War and Ichabod and Katrina's son. As for Katrina, after being trapped in Purgatory for two and half centuries, was now the captive of the Horseman of Death, also known as her ex-fiancé.

"Seriously, God, do you have more like these in store?" she grated. "What's next, Cyrille coming back as the Horseman of Famine?"

Of course, no answer came. She sighed and gathered what was left of her energy to drag herself out of the bed, have a shower, put on her pajamas and brush her teeth, all the while trying not to think she had class in the morning—she'd be on the other side of the desk, but still. Finally she allowed herself to collapse on her bed for the second time this evening.

Unsurprisingly, she had a hard time shutting her mind down: memories of Purgatory kept tormenting her, denying her unconsciousness. Also, despite her shower, the stench of Purgatory still lingered in her nose, although she couldn't say if it came from her or if she was only imagining it.

The vampire shuddered and curled up into a tight ball under her comforter. Again and again, she heard the neck of the Ichabod-doppelganger snap, saw his lifeless body crumple to the ground. At the time, she had been positive that he wasn't Ichabod—his smell… it hadn't been that of clean clothes and wool, but something cold and flat. She had prevented Abbie from touching the doppelganger, lunged at it, and snapped its neck in the blink of an eye. She hadn't doubted her decision for a second, and the appearance of the real Ichabod right after that had confirmed that she had been correct. But still, the sight of her friend's corpse had shaken her. She could still feel his skin and his hair against her palms when she had grabbed his head and twisted it. And that sickening crack…

Next came Moloch: his hulking figure, his greyish leathery skin, his long curved horns… The sheer evil he exuded had gnawed at their skins and made every hair stand on end, and the hatred in his white eyes had burnt them to the bone. Enola shuddered again: no, this picture wasn't likely to go away soon. Even a kick in his chest, delivered with all her strength, hadn't been enough to knock him down—sure, he had staggered, but he hadn't fallen. Katrina's amulet, however, had seared his flesh and made him roar in pain, and this memory brought a satisfied smirk to Enola's lips.

The vampire flopped onto her side with an annoyed huff. Her dreams had stopped right after she had met the Witnesses, but now she had trouble finding sleep because she was too busy worrying over what Moloch was going to throw at them next. Although, apparently, someone somewhere had decided that she still got too much sleep, and had added both the icing and the cherry on her crap cake—namely Parrish and Katrina. She suspected that they'd try to find the latter first, not just for Ichabod's sake and hers, but also because having a powerful witch on their side couldn't hurt their odds. Naturally, Enola intended to bombard her with questions about witchcraft, and she decided to start a list immediately, hoping to stop her mind's fretting so she could finally sleep.

Unconsciousness swallowed her at the eighth questions—'Is it possible to castrate someone remotely?'

It took me more time than it should have to come up with that question… Of course, because of Katrina's choice to stay with Abraham, Enola won't be able to satisfy her curiosity… or will she? Yeah, yeah, most of you already know, but I'm talking to the newcomers, so shh! Spoilers. You'll have the answer in two chapters.

Next time, some fighting. I'll let you guess who are the combatants ^^

Drop a review to let me know what you think! Also, I only need thirteen more reviews to reach a hundred, so get to work, everyone ;)