December 7th 1926 - New York - Church of the Second Salemers - Eight years later
Credence checked to make sure that Modesty was preoccupied downstairs before ducking under the youngest Barebone adoptee's bed. He scrabbled around searching through the various bits of junk on the dusty floor. And then he froze as his left hand and eyes found something he had not seen in eight years and never thought he'd see again.
"Whatchoo doin' Credence?"
Credence moved so fast to get out from under the bed that he banged his head on the way, emerging to face little Modesty.
The wand he thought he'd never see again, clutched in his hands.
"Where'd you get this?"
"Give it back Credence. It's just a toy!" Modesty protested in a frightened and guilty voice.
"I-it's just a toy Creed! Really, just-just a toy I promise!"
Suddenly as the overwhelmingly awful sense of déjà vu increased as the door banged open and Mary Lou entered the room. She looked with a furious fire in her eyes from Modesty, to Credence, to the wand in the young man's hand.
"What is this?"
Downstairs, Chastity Barebone, the middle child, looked up from where she was organising leaflets when she heard her mother say
"Take it off!"
She knew what that meant.
Credence had broken the rules again and was going to be punished.
As Credence began to remove his belt and Modesty looked anywhere but at her brother, Mary Lou held the wand up and with a twitch of anger on her face, snapped the toy clean in two. The crack of the wood made Modesty jump and Credence flinch as he fumbled with his belt buckle, before removing the garment and handing it to his mother.
"Ma..."
"I am not your Ma!" Mary Lou snapped "Your mother was a wicked, unnatural woman!"
Suddenly Modesty seemed to find both her voice and her courage as she stepped in between her mother and brother
"It was mine" she said bravely and Mary Lou looked down at the little girl with something like a mix of betrayal and disbelief on her face.
"Modesty-" she began but stopped as suddenly the belt she had been holding whipped out of her hand, leaving behind the same welts on her palm that she had so often inflicted on Credence.
"What is this?" she almost whispered looking from Modesty to Credence who had dropped to the floor and was hugging his knees and shaking.
Mary Lou took several deliberate steps forward and made to pick up the belt, but once again it whipped out of her reach.
Mary Lou, straightened, scowled and as she turned to confront her children...
All hell broke loose within the Second Salem Church.
It was late.
Very late.
Pitch dark by the time she arrived on Bleakers Street.
But she had to see. Had to see if what she had heard was true.
She knew it was when she arrived outside the Second Salemer's Church.
Or what was left of it.
She shivered as she looked at the ruined building, partly from the cold, partly from imagining what had happened here and partly out of fear. She was still afraid, even though the man who had forbidden her from ever returning here was far, far away.
"Creed" she whispered into the night "Where are you?"
The sound of distant sirens was her only answer.
December 9th 1926 - Hell's Kitchen
NEW YORK TERROR OVER - AURORS PRAISED FOR BRAVERY
"Bravery! What a joke!" was her angrily sad thought.
She threw the copy of The Wizard's Voice paper back into the trash can that she had retrieved it from, after a snooty looking witch with a fur coat had tossed it inside.
Credence was not a terror.
Credence was the boy who had held her as she cried after her mother had given her to Mary Lou.
He was the boy who had sat at her bedside for a week when she came down with a fever.
He was the boy who had stolen her a copy of Grimms fairy tales for her tenth birthday and hidden it from Mary Lou for her.
He was the boy who had been beaten almost daily and eventually broken by the only mother he had ever known.
The aurors weren't brave. They didn't have to kill him. But they did it anyway.
She couldn't be here anymore. Not in New York, not in America, just not - here.
There was nothing to keep her here anymore. Not her ma, her real ma or Mary Lou. Not him.
And not Credence.
Ta da!
Okay look; I know it's really short but I needed this as basically a filler chapter to get back to the main plot. I know I suck I'm sorry! Please don't hate me!
I promise there will be more soon, with much longer chapters!
More soon.
Geronimo xx