Woodside Part 3

A man fell onto the floor. “Ugggh. Where even am I?” He looked around to find the familiar place where he fell asleep. “Fuck. How drunk did I get?” He grabbed his head as an extreme aching pain coursed through it. A heavy weight rested on his chest and something shiny caught his eye above him.

His eyes opened wide. A woman wearing a mask of sorts, a heavy coat, and pointing a knife at him rested a knee against his stomach. He looked around again. A hand dangled from an out of place poker table. One of the doors had been torn from its hinges. Red stained the carpet beneath the two lifeless bodies of his friends he’d been drinking with that morning.

“Wh-who are you?” He blinked to ensure he was seeing things correctly.

“Who I am is not important. The only thing that matters is what I am going to do to you if you do not tell me what I want to know.” She rested the blade between his eyes.

He went cross eyed staring at it. “W-what do you want?”

“What is the barn for?”

“A-all I know is the Consulate folks go there a lot.”

“Where do you keep your documents?”

“I-I can’t tell you that. They’d have my head.”

“Who would have your head?”

“I ain’t saying another word.” The man put his hands over his mouth, only now realizing what he just said.

The woman dropped a stack of papers onto him. “I do not need you to.”

“W-wait! I’ll tell you everything. There’s this woman, Morgana right. She’s a witch who lives deep in the forest who likes to experiment on children with her magic and we sell them to her. That’s where they all go, and where we get all our money from.”

The woman smirked.

Did she know something?

 “When was the last time the five children here were fed?”

“Aren’t there six of them?”

The woman turned the man onto his back.

The man looked down in shock. “No, no. That kid couldn’t have died. We didn’t hurt him that bad did we?” All color left his face at the realization of what he just said. The last thing he felt was a sharp, stabbing pain in the back of his head.

———————————————————————————————————————

Mary, Vivian, Fiivon, Cassius and the four orphans walked up to the orphanage.

Vivian pointed her staff at the door. She looked bored. A pink light circled around her staff.

“Look away from her staff.” Mary commanded.

A bright flash of light erupted from Vivian’s staff, surrounding the entire house.

The front door popped outwards. Three loud clicks came from inside the house as other doors did the same.

“Vivian, professional door opener…” She looked at Mary with a dead expression on her face. “Better than babysitter.” She looked at Cassius. "Or receptionist."

Mary glared at her.

“Ooookaaay kids, who wants to see some dead bodies?” Vivian looked at the orphans. “You look like you want to?” She pointed at one standing in front of the others.

“We’ve already seen some miss.” One of the orphans replied as they all looked solemnly at the ground.

“What about you Fiivon, want to see more of ‘mom’s’ handiwork.”

“I’ve already told you Miss Mary isn’t my mom Miss Vivian, and no I don—” He spotted Addy’s body on the ground. His face became pale and he turned his head towards Mary. “You… you didn’t do anything as bad as last time did you Miss Mary?”

Mary rubbed her hand against his back. “No. I did my best to inflict as few wounds as possible.” She looked over at Vivian

“What?” She looked irritated.

“Will you handle the bodies? Give the child a headstone and be respectful when handling his body.”

“Oh gods, you actually killed a kid, I never thought you of all people would do that, but I’m impressed.” Vivian leaned towards Mary’s ear. “What made you decide to do it?”

“He was dead before the merchant bought us.” One of the orphans corrected Vivian. “He tried to go upstairs and the masters weren’t happy about it. I don’t think they ever even knew he was dead.”

Mary glared at Vivian. Why would I ever kill a kid you psychotic deadbeat!? “I do not kill kids Vivian.”

“Fine, fine. I won’t joke about it again alright?” A magenta hue surrounded Vivian. “Where do you want those bodies buried? I won’t need Cassius’s help and would rather do that than spend any more time around these filthy things.” She threw Addy’s body over her shoulder as though it weighed nothing more than a beach towel.

“In the forest. That will give you more time away from them like you want.” Mary looked over at Cassius. “Keep an eye on the kids while I look through their documents.” Mary entered the building.

Every trace of dust, blood, and any other sign of dirtiness was gone. I will need to thank her for using her cleaning magic on the building as well.

The five orphans looked at her. “Your back?” The eldest one looked surprised.

One of the younger children took a sip from the canteen. It seemed as though they were rationing the water.

The four orphans Mary rescued from the merchant walked in behind her alongside Cassius and Fiivon.

Vivian picked up the other two adult bodies then disappeared in a pink streak of light.

“You… You actually saved them.” The eldest orphan was surprised.

“You came back for us.” Another orphan said.

“I’m glad you’re all still alive.” One of the orphans who had been rescued earlier ran over to the others. The other three followed.

The nine of them huddled together in a group hug.

Mary looked over at Cassius and Fiivon then walked into the room with a broken wall.

“Fiivon removed a bag of zhuguai meat from his pocket and started to hand small pieces of it to the orphans. “You’ll want to start by sucking on it so it softens up.” He handed out canteens to each of them as well. “These will help.”

Cassius performed various magic tricks using his playing cards to try cheering the orphans up; most of which ended up being mini firework displays.

Mary shut the rear exit; a click sounded throughout the building as she did. Inside the safe were three, large, binder-like books filled with papers, some older than the others. She sat in a chair and skimmed through the books.

The first book was full of intake records dating back decades; there appeared to be a sharp increase in the number of orphans entering the orphanage over the last decade. 

Outtake records were in the second book; earlier records showed most orphans had either been adopted or never left, but, within the last decade, nearly every orphan had either been sold to merchants or The Consulate of Mages. The outtake papers involving The Consulate of Mages were heavily redacted.

The third book was smaller and only dated back a decade; it contained detailed lists of people who had gotten suspicious of what the orphanage had been doing recently, including people who had already been ‘taken care of.’ She returned the books to their places in the safe. I will look at those in more detail later when I have the time.

Thuds came from the stairway as Vivian dragged the remaining five bodies out without any care as to what they hit.

Cassius ended his magic tricks when Mary returned to the orphans.

“Fiivon, there are three books in a safe in that room. Will you put them into your storage?”

“I’ll do my best, miss.” He ran into the other room.

“There are only eight beds upstairs so one of you will need to sleep on a couch.” Mary addressed the orphans.

“The eldest spoke up. “We aren’t supposed to go upstairs.” He looked at the last remaining corpse.

“All of the bad people are gone and I will be here to protect you from any other bad guys.” Mary rubbed his head.

“Okay miss. We'll go if you go with us.” The orphans stood up and walked over to Mary.

“Have you made soup before Cassius? There should be a small kitchen upstairs in the center of the building and they will need something easier to eat.”

“While it isn’t a specialty of mine, I could certainly make some.” Cassius walked upstairs.

One of the orphans tugged on Mary’s coat sleeve. "Where will you sleep, miss?”

“I will sleep in the big room.”

“No fair.” The girl pouted.

Mary patted her head. “It is the least secure room in the building. I will be able to do a better job of protecting you that way.”

"ookayyy."

The orphans followed Mary, their eyes darted about, constantly on edge.

Once they reached the top of the stairs, Mary made sure to console each of them before they picked their rooms. 

———————————————————————————————————————

Sergent Morian sat in thought at his desk under a concrete dome. He sat up and prepared his sleek, wooden staff.

An orange glow surrounded the staff followed by a rectangle of light shooting out of it. 

“Sir, Belzinth, Sir.” He saluted. “We received another report of the orphanage being invaded.”

“Even if the report were true, I have given you orders not to engage.” Belzinth replied. "Consider forbidding them from making further contact."

“That is likely unnecessary sir. We saw the woman who is believed to be Vivian carrying bodies with clothing resembling theirs into the forest. I believe they have taken the orphanage over and intend to use it as a base of operations.”

“The orphanage has no defenses the squad of mages arriving tomorrow night couldn’t handle. Thank you for the information you provided."

“Sir, Belzinth, Sir.” He saluted. The rectangle disappeared. “Something about this doesn’t sit right with me.” He rubbed his chin.