Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Once upon a time, in a small village in the 18^th century, there was a young man.
His soul carried holy light from the cradle, and he was destined for the priesthood.

Years passed, when the boy came of age and became a priest, a demon was chosen to wreak havoc among a small town. It chose a young woman. Unusual, for the preference of the infernal spirits at the time was young children.

Once it was discovered after burning an altar, the townspeople locked her up in one of their prisons. They stood by her day and night, waiting for the demon to leave, but to no avail.

The priest got word on the situation. He took it upon himself to help the woman free herself from the fallen angel. He submerged himself in ancient texts, even those considered heretical.

One fateful night, he found a solution: he needed to bring her to a place where the walls between the natural and the unnatural were very thin. To the man's great relief, one was nearby. With the help of the townsfolk he took her near a cliff for the ritual. They did not dare come closer to the place, for it was haunted.

First, he bound her body with a rope soaked in holy water. The dark entity did not leave, it even dared to taunt the priest. Left with little choice, he chanted the ritualic words with an outstretched arm and banished the fallen one back to where it came from.

The ritual left the woman very weak, so she was brought to the humble town doctor. Alas no matter what, no medicine was able to heal her. The priest soon realised that this was no ordinary illness, but a remnant of the demon's presence. He would cleanse her soul and spirit and soon she would be like her old self.

Life returned to normal, but a bond started forming between the priest and the woman. Soon they got married. The Lord tested them with sorrow, but blessed them with joy in equal measure: four children, each a piece of their parents' hearts. They lived happily ever after. But this is not that kind of story.

When the children were still young, scarcely old enough to understand the shadows in their father's eyes, the demon returned. And it wanted revenge. It wanted to destroy. It did not choose the woman, or the children, but the priest who had cast it down. It possessed the man, for he was not protected with the holy sign of the cross.

Blade in hand, the demon used the priest as its instrument, and the woman fell by hands that had only ever loved her.

It was the eldest child, barely old enough to read the holy words, who saved his father. The boy's soul burned bright with the same light his father carried, and he bound the demon with iron and prayer, then destroyed it utterly. That darkness would never return.

Grief and guilt consumed the man's heart, and he threw himself into prayer, seeking forgiveness for hands that sinned without his will. He watched his children with trembling devotion, determined that no evil would ever touch their innocent souls. He never remarried, could never bear to. His heart had turned to stone the night he lost her. His only purpose now was to guard them, his last pieces of her, from the darkness that seemed to hunt their bloodline.

But fate, it seems, is not so easily changed. Though the priest loved all his children equally, he could not watch them always. One of them grew lonely. One of them grew curious. And when a darkness with a known name came calling, it wore a friendly face. What happened next is a story already told. Of desperation, of a father's impossible choice, of a ritual that failed. And there, at the bottom of that cursed cliff, the priest remained. Neither living nor dead, bound by broken ritual and holy magic gone awry, waiting in darkness for a salvation he believed would never come. And so this story ends as it began: a priest, a demon, and a cliff where the walls between worlds grow thin. Until one fateful day, when a young woman's spell reached down into the depths and pulled him back into the light.

Chapter Text

Esther hurried through the rain to the chapel, her green jacket doing little to keep out the autumn chill. The inside was completely ruined, thanks to Abaddon, but still useful for what she was about to do.

The chapel was rather small. The few pews inside were broken and rotten, filling the air with a damp, earthy smell that reminded Esther of mushrooms. It made her stomach rumble. She really should have eaten more at dinner. But she was here now. Better make the most of it.

She set her book on the stone altar, one of the few things still intact and blessedly level, and began preparing the ritual. According to the text, this should allow her to summon a holy entity. An angel, ideally, or at least some benevolent spirit. She just wanted to see if she could do holy magic, after years of only working with the dark. Then she'd reverse it, go to bed, and Katherine would never know.

Simple.

She drew a pentagram on the floor before the altar with her chalk, making sure each point faced the correct direction. Then came the symbols at each point, cross-referenced carefully with the book's diagrams.

There also was a footnote. It mentioned a sacrifice for… something? Most of the text was unreadable, but it should still work with the stuff she did have. Hopefully.

“Oh blessed spirit, hear my humble request.” Esther muttered the first incantation. It felt disrespectful to talk out loud in the deserted chapel. And maybe she was a bit nervous, this was her first time using holy magic after all. But nothing she couldn’t handle mind you. She'd dealt with actual demons. How hard could an angel be?

She began placing the materials, starting with earth. She set the graveyard soil in the bottom left corner of the pentagram. “Sense this soil and be grounded to this Earth.” She felt her heartbeat in her chest and a bit dizzy. Like the earth itself pulled her closer instead of what she was summoning.

Next came fire, a simple white candle in the bottom right. Esther struggled a bit with the lighter, but got it eventually. The flame was unnaturally motionless. “Sense this flame that guides you here.”

Water at the top right, holy water, borrowed (definitely not stolen) from the church in town. “Sense this water to give you form.” She finally started to feel a bit more confident. This was almost like dark magic! Just with a different purpose.

Air at the top left, frankincense incense, already beginning to smoke sweetly. When she set it down, a breeze from the stained glass window behind her stirred her hair. “Sense this incense, let it carry your voice.” Her voice rose to a louder volume. Almost there!

And finally, spirit at the top point—white dove feathers, arranged carefully in the form of a fan. She stood up, arms wide, looking at the ceiling. She yelled, purposely dramatic: “Oh blessed spirit, hear my humble request and answer my call!”

The flame shined brighter, the smoke of the incense filled the room with unsettling speed, the soil creeped into the floor and the holy water started to boil. The lines of chalk began to illuminate from the centre, casting everything in a soft ethereal light.

Esther felt ecstatic! She didn’t care to examine whether it was because the ritual was working or because of the ritual itself. One by one, each element became enveloped by light. It grew so bright that anyone near could see something was going on, but Esther did not care.

“Answer my call!” She repeated just because it felt right. The wind grew stronger, ruffling her hair into a wild mess. That seemed to be the peak of the ritual, because the light got impossibly brighter. Filling the room entirely. It hurt so bad that Esther needed to turn around and put her arms around her face. Then it stopped, so suddenly that Esther thought she imagined it all. She turned around, anticipation rising in her chest. Did it work?

No, it didn’t. All she gathered was still there, although a bit worse for wear. Did she really have to use a sacrifice!? The part that mentioned it was illegible, using the wrong one was more dangerous than nothing at all! Now she needed to look up what the safest thing to use is.

Her watch beeped. Crap, bedtime. She hurried out of the chapel, leaving everything behind. No one uses that place anyway. Thankfully she got in bed on time, falling asleep the moment her head hit her pillow. That ritual took more out of her than she thought.

-*-

Morning light filtered through the stained glass, casting coloured shapes on the stone floor. One sliver of red touched the edge of the pentagram. The candle had long since burnt out. The smell of incense lingered, stale now, like a memory of something sacred.

It was quiet for a moment.

A rat burst through the ajar door, claws scraping against stone, breaking the peaceful silence. Something slammed against the door behind it, shutting it in. A muffled curse followed, young and furious.

It scrambled across the floor, desperate, and stopped in the centre of the pentagram. For one moment, it stood still, catching its breath.

That was enough.

It stopped. It dropped. It did not move again.

For a moment, nothing. Then out of nothing, the soil shifted. The candle wick glowed, not with flame, but with something beneath it. The holy water began to bubble. Smoke rose from the incense, though nothing burned. The feathers rearranged themselves without intervention.

The chalk lines illuminated from the centre outward, pale and steady, until the whole pentagram shone. The light grew, and grew, and grew.

And then it stopped.

Where there had been nothing but a small body, now there was a man, pale and still. He lay in the centre of the pentagram, motionless. The rat lay beside him, already cold.

-*-

The man lay there for some time, getting used to sensations he had not felt in that dark place. Whatever he was lying on was warm, like the sun peeking through the clouds on a cold winter day. The sound of birds chirping filled his ears, their songs joyful, calm in a way he hadn't felt in a while. He wanted to enjoy those feelings for as long as it would last.

After a respectable amount of time had passed, he sat up, wanting to thank whoever found a way to free him. What he found, however, was nothing at all. Only various materials and lines of chalk that had smeared his dark robes. And a dead rat, for some reason. Most likely a ritual, he thought.

The destruction around him was not so easily explained. Disbelief flooded through him, who dared to destroy a holy site ? A place for prayer, for community, for God? His chest tightened. He already missed the comfort he felt mere moments ago.

He looked around for his hat. He found it lying not far from him. Picking it up, he took a moment to brush off the dust and feel its fabric under his fingers. He felt slightly more himself once he put it on. He searched for a place to pray amidst the destruction. He needed to. It was the only thing that made sense right now. Seeing that only the altar remained somewhat intact, he chose that.

He stood carefully, testing his weight. His right leg buckled, the foot twisted at an angle that sent sharp pain through his ankle. He caught himself against a broken pew, breathing through the sensation. The fall. Of course. He tested his weight carefully, found a way to balance that worked, and limped to the altar.

He kneeled with a sigh, joints cracking in complaint, and bowed his head. It felt respectful, a familiar way to focus body and mind on God. He tried closing his eyes, but the darkness crept back, so he kept them open. It felt odd, he had never prayed like that before. He took a deep breath, the air was colder than the floor he lay on, to clear his thoughts, the confusion, the questions, the creeping dread, and started speaking.

“Heavenly Father,” His voice rasped, unused for so long, “I ask for clarity in these confusing times. “ He tightened his grip on his hands for what he will say next, “I have fallen from Your favour, this I know, yet I remain faithful that You shall guide me through. Thank You, Father. Amen.”

He remained still, listening. For guidance. For peace. For anything. Silence answered.

And then something else entirely. A presence. One he knew too well.

He followed the feeling and limped outside, each step careful on the uneven ground. The light was blinding, he shut his eyes and lowered his hat to protect them from the worst of it. The cold wind bit through his clothes, though he was glad for his gloves. Snow. It had snowed.

He tried to locate where he was after his eyes adjusted. Trees as far as the eye could see, a sun that provided little warmth and a grand mansion on the horizon.

That is where he must go, he decided. He was about to take a step, his bad foot forward, testing the snow, when the feeling intensified. The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end. He looked down. Footsteps in the snow, fresh ones, leading directly to him. His heart lurched. He looked behind him. A figure stood on the chapel roof.

Every instinct screamed at him to run. He spun toward the trees and pushed off, his ankle collapsed under him. He went down hard. Above him, the figure leaped.

A scream tore through the air, one he had heard only once before and never forgotten. The world went dark again.

Chapter Text

The most annoying sunbeam in existence disturbed Esther's sleep. For a moment she contemplated sleeping in and just hide under the sheets from that blasted sun. she'd promised Abaddon she'd show him what she'd been working on for weeks. That he might help her with her problem is a pleasant bonus.

She lifted the sheet and was met with a wave of cold air. Esther hid back under the blanket. Did she leave a window open or something?? She looked to her curtains, which were indeed waving with the wind. Great.

Stepping out of bed wrapped in the blanket, she shuffled to close the window, but when she opened the curtains she saw everything covered with a thick layer of snow. Strange. The weather app said it wouldn't snow for at least another month. Then again, those things were wrong half the time anyway. Someone had been out this morning, strange tracks in the snow led right up to the front door. Deep ones, too, like something heavy had been dragged. Now she definitely needed Abaddon.

She threw on her clothes and bolted downstairs, snatching her jacket off the hook as she passed. She could put it on once she found Abaddon. She arrived in the kitchen, panting, and looked for Abaddon's usual residence in the kitchen cabinet. “Abaddon, I might need your help after all-” She yanked open the cabinet door. Empty. Huh, where is he? Maybe he went out early? Or late, you never knew with him. She checked the vents after, which was just yelling in the nearest one, but that also came out with nothing.

Oh well. His loss. Something had definitely happened, and she wasn't waiting around to find out what

Esther went back to the hallway, but only now did she realise the floor was wet. Not obviously so. Maybe Katherine is awake after all and she already went outside? Or Abaddon, but he hates the cold. Demon thing, probably. Should she follow the track outside or inside?

“Hey! What are you doing so early in this beautiful morning?” A cheerful voice said behind her.

“Jeez Nathan!” She exclaimed, clutching her jacket “You scared the bejeesus out of me!”

Nathan raised his hands. “Sorry, sorry. New force of habit as a ghost. I keep forgetting how quiet we are.” He looked down. “Why is the floor wet?”

“Yeah whatever. But it’s good you are here, in the mood for an adventure? You might find out why the floor is covered in water!”

“Always! Where do we start?”

Esther opened the door, inviting in a biting gust of air. Nathan didn't react to it, despite wearing nothing but his usual collared shirt and sweater. Ghost perks. “In the chapel!”

It took them a short while to get to the old building. The whole time Esther's teeth were clattering and her whole body seemed to want to escape her skin with how much it was shaking. Nathan was annoyingly happy, looking around and commenting on how beautiful the winter was. Yeah, real beautiful, there is only white and cold and snow in your boots. The only good of a heavy snow day was that there was a chance she wouldn’t have to go to school, maybe. And he wasn’t sinking to his knee in the snow!

The closer they got, though, the more Esther noticed the tracks. They weren't random. They led straight to the chapel.

Her chapel.

Where she'd left the ritual last night.

Her excitement started curdling into something else.

In front of the chapel were a few weird footsteps. Esther stopped, staring at them. One foot pointed forward, the other twisted almost completely backward. They made a few steps before stopping at a vague human-shaped impression in the snow. Like someone had fallen.

The drag marks started from there.

An awful noise came from the chapel door when it got pushed open. Esther took in the damage: her chalk pentagram was smeared out, the candle was just a pile of wax, the bowl with holy water empty and the incense was just ash. And a dead rat. That was odd. It lay in what was the middle of the pentagram. Had the ritual found it’s sacrifice after all?

“Oh no…”

“Esther” Nathan started carefully. “Do you want to tell me what happened here?”

She grabbed her hair in a panic. Whatever she did, worked after all. Her stomach dropped. She'd actually done it. Summoned something, someone, and now they were loose. In the hotel. With Katherine. With Ben. What if it was dangerous? What if it hurt someone? What if Katherine found out and-

“Esther?” Nathan put a hand on her shoulder even though it phased through, “You’re worrying me a bit here.”

She took a deep breath to inform Nathan what she did and what she thinks happened after she left. Or rather tried to take a breath at all, because her explanation got a bit lost in between them: “I tried summoning something holy last night! It didn't work, or I thought it didn't, but clearly something happened!”

Nathan's expression shifted from cheerful to worried. “Right. So we're looking for... a holy something. That's loose. In the hotel. That shouldn’t be too hard?”

Abaddon appeared out of nowhere, startling both Freelings. He stood proudly before them, chin lifted, wearing a wide-brimmed hat that absolutely did not fit him.

“Do not worry, you shall not have to look for long, for I took care of that nasty priest.”

Silence.

“Priest?!” Esther's voice cracked. “It was supposed to be an angel!”

Abaddon blinked. “An... angel?” He said the word like it tasted bad. “Why would you want to summon something like that?”

“That is not the point! I wanted to try out holy magic! Something with benevolent spirits!” Esther gestured wildly at the disturbed chapel. “Not some random priest!”

Nathan raised a hand hesitantly. “To be fair, priests are kind of... holy-adjacent?”

“Not helping, Uncle Nathan!” she turned to Abaddon and demanded: “Where did you leave him?”

“Where I usually put my potential torture victims. The closet under the stairs, next to the lobby.” his tone turned surly when he added: “I had to change location because of the matriarch.”

They hurried back toward the hotel, Esther's mind racing through increasingly terrible scenarios. Katherine finding out. The priest escaping. Someone calling the actual police.

Behind them, Abaddon called out, “Does no one care where I got my new hat from?”

His voice carried across the snow, genuinely disappointed.

-*-

It was dark when he opened his eyes again.

For a moment, just a moment, he thought he was back in that place. The panic hadn't fully formed yet, his mind too dazed from whatever had struck him, when he noticed the sliver of light beneath what must be a door.

Not there, then. Somewhere else.

The relief was brief. A headache throbbed behind his eyes, made worse by staring at even that thin line of light. He looked away, and that's when he registered the rest: his arms bound tight to his body, fabric pulled across his mouth, the taste of dust and something metallic on his tongue.

He closed his eyes despite the fear that came with darkness. Keeping them open took too much effort, and he needed to think. To stay calm. He did not want to learn what his captor had planned.

After a moment, he forced his eyes open again and tried to make sense of his surroundings. He was seated. A chair, he thought, though he couldn't move enough to be certain. The space around him was cramped. He could make out the faint outline of a long-handled brush, bottles of strange shapes lined against a wall, something metal with a tube coiled beside it. A storage room of some kind. The air smelled sharp and chemical, foreign, making his headache pulse.

Then it occurred to him: his hat was gone.

They had taken his hat.

That was enough.

He raised his right foot and slammed it against the door. Pain exploded through his ankle immediately, shooting up his leg in a white-hot wave. He bit down hard on his tongue, trying to muffle the sound, but a strangled noise escaped anyway.

His ankle. The twisted one. Of course.

He let his head fall back against the chair, breathing hard through his nose, trying to pull in enough air past the gag. His chest heaved. The pain ebbed slowly, reluctantly.

He would need to be smarter about this.

He raised his other leg.

The kick pushed him further in the room and made the chair spin for a moment. It took him by surprise. A rolling and turning chair, how curious. He let the chair do its thing, not daring to disrupt it. He ended up facing the opposite wall when it stopped.

He would indeed have to be smarter about this, he thought with a huff.

He took a moment to compose himself, no need to get frustrated. He straightened his posture as best he could and tossed his head to get his hair out of his face. The back of the chair was tall, he could feel it. Maybe all he needed was a bigger surface to slam against the door. That seemed logical.

He put both his feet against the wall, this would hurt. He pushed as hard as he could. The following bang was loud, surely warning his captor, but the door did not open. His ankle pulsed with pain, but he bit through it.

He tried it again, forcing himself to breathe slowly as he rolled the chair back into position. Panic would not help him now. He pushed off again. Still nothing. One more time. This time it had to work. Surely three times would be enough. His ankle was screaming this time, he did not take the time to acknowledge it. He rolled back painstakingly, out of breath and sweating just from those two tries.

One last try and then he would think of something else. He had to stay calm. Had to think clearly, despite the pain clawing up his leg.

He pushed off again. The slam against the door jarred his back this time, but the chair didn't stop. It kept rolling, slowly, out of the closet. It took him a minute to process. He was out. He was free. Well aside from the chair, but he would figure that out.

The hallway was grand, lined with dark wainscoting that rose halfway up the walls, topped with cream-colored wallpaper. The long red carpet running down the hallway would make rolling around difficult, however.

He began his difficult task. He pushed himself backwards with his good foot to the direction he wanted to go. That seemed to go faster than using his foot to pull the chair forward. He was grateful for the wheels under this chair, but not for the spinning mechanism of it. At first it was fine, joyful even, but it turned into a nauseating experience way too fast.

After some time went by, he began to realise he was lost. The hallways seemed to stretch out forever and they all looked alike, aside from their paintings and furniture. But even those were difficult to distinguish.

He came to a stop, if you excluded the spinning, to take a break. Even though he let his injured ankle rest, it kept on hurting. The wound on his head copied his heartbeat, fast and irregular. His breathing was laboured, the ropes around him preventing to take a deep enough breath.

This was useless, he was getting nowhere.

Still, he kept on pushing to see what was behind the nearest corner.

A woman. She was wearing odd clothes, and typically male ones at that. A vest with a very plain shirt underneath and buckled pants. Her hair was gathered and bound at the back of her head.

They held eye contact for several seconds before she pinched the bridge of her nose and muttered: “Goddammit Abaddon.”

She approached him with careful patience. If she was frustrated, it didn't show on her face or she'd given up on trying to hide it.

The woman removed the cloth covering his mouth.

He worked his jaw, tasting dust. She had spoken the Lord's name in vain. Casually, as if it meant nothing. Best not to mention that now.

“So, who are you?” She asked immediately, and there was the frustration—in her voice, clipped and direct.

“Josiah Teller. And you?” He appreciated her directness in this situation.

“Katherine Freeling.” She looked down at his twisted ankle. “Can you walk with that foot?”

“With difficulty.”

“That's a no.” She moved behind the chair and gripped the backrest. “Tea or coffee?”

“Tea, if I may.”

She began pushing the chair. He expected her to free him first, but apparently not.

“You will not untie me first?”

“In a minute. I'll use a kitchen knife.” The chair rolled smoothly across the carpet. “I've never been able to undo Abaddon's knots by hand.”

“This is not an isolated incident, then?” He knew it wasn't, with how calm she seemed. But it looked like she needed someone to complain to.

She huffed. “You have no idea.”

The hallway opened into a larger room. The chair's wheels moved more easily here—wooden floors instead of carpet.

“So.” Katherine grabbed a knife from the drawer. “Want to tell me what happened?”

Josiah hesitated. How much should he tell? What should he even tell?

“Well... I woke up in the chapel, the one in the woods.” He stopped, hesitating to mention the ritual that had brought him here.

She sawed through the first rope. “Woke up in the chapel. Okay. And before that?”

He didn't answer immediately.

“Look, I saw a flash of light from that direction this morning. And my daughter ran out earlier looking guilty. So unless you walked here in colonial cosplay...”

She cut through the last rope and officially freed him.

“Thank you. Your help is much appreciated.”

Katherine waved him off. “Don't mention it.” She moved to the counter. “Take a seat. Actual seat, not the spinny one.”

He gripped the table as he stood. The chair wobbled under him. “I must surely be a bother right now. “He limped slowly to the table and sat down with a heavy sigh.

She waved that off. “I've dealt with worse.” She filled some kind of metal pot with water. She touched something on the pot. It roared to life with a sound that made him flinch: a low, humming growl from inside the metal. No fire beneath it. No flame at all.

“Right, should have warned you.” She tried to speak above the noise.

They waited for the machine to stop. Josiah took the opportunity to observe the room. The kitchen was larger than he expected, with high ceilings and pale tiles laid in perfect squares. The walls were painted in a soft, muted tone, trimmed with dark wood that matched the wainscoting in the hallway.

Shelves lined one wall, painted in a darker shade and laden with dishes of various sizes and colors. Glass jars held what might be preserved goods or spices, their contents mysterious.

A large table dominated the center of the room, solid and well-worn, with a bench on one side and individual chairs on the other. Practical. Familiar, even, despite everything else being strange.

The work surfaces gleamed with that same unnatural smoothness he'd noticed before, yet were made of the same dark wood as the wainscoting. Cabinets hung above them, crafted from matching wood. A large white box, like a cabinet but too perfect, stood against the far wall, humming quietly.

An odd lantern hung from the ceiling, though it held no flame he could see. The light it cast was steady, unwavering, unnatural.

Everything was too clean, too precise. As if the room had been built by someone who'd never cooked a meal in their life.

The kettle clicked off. Katherine poured the water into two cups, added small pouches on strings, and brought them to the table.

“So.” Katherine sat across from him, wrapping her hands around her cup. He copied the gesture, grateful for its warmth. The tea was... adequate. Weak, perhaps, but hot. Everything else in this room was wrong—the lights without flame, the humming box, the unnatural smoothness of every surface—but tea, at least, was still tea.

“I'm assuming a summoning?” She looked at him over the rim of her cup. “You don't seem like you came here on purpose.”

“I did not. I was—” He paused, uncertain how much to share. “I was elsewhere. And then I was in the chapel.”

“Elsewhere like... dead elsewhere?”

He didn't answer. His silence said enough.

“Right. Okay.” Katherine rubbed her temples. “And Abaddon knocked you out because...?”

“We have... history.”

“Of course you do.” She took a long sip of tea, studying him. “You're a priest, I assume? The clothes kind of give it away. Are you the one who bound him?”

Josiah's hands tightened around his cup. “I... attempted to, yes.”

The silence stretched between them, heavy and uncomfortable.

“He told you, then.” Josiah's voice was quiet.

Katherine hesitated. “He mentioned it. Once.”

Silence.

“He told me about what happened. About the binding attempt. About... your son.”

Josiah's hands tightened around the cup. The tea rippled.

“Isaac.” Barely a whisper. “His name was Isaac.”

Katherine set her cup down carefully. Too carefully. Her hand stayed on it for a moment, like she needed something solid to hold onto.

“I didn’t-” She stopped. Started again. “I didn’t realize.”

Her mouth opened, then closed again. She looked away.

Josiah stared into his tea like he might find something there, the cup shook in his hands. Katherine studied the table.

The clock on the wall seemed to tick louder.

“I'm-” Katherine started.

“Please.” He didn't look up. “Don't.”

She nodded. Took a breath. “Okay.”

They sat in that silence for another moment. Katherine took a sip of her tea. Tried to think of literally anything to say that wouldn't make this worse.

“So what do we-” Movement outside the window saved her. Two figures ran past. The first one's head was barely visible, just a blur of orange hair. The second was slower and older, brown hair and a mustache, visibly out of breath.

The front door opened. Footsteps echoed down the hall.

“Just ignore us, Mom!” A girl's voice, young, breathless.

“Nothing to worry about, Kathy!” The older man, equally breathless.

Then silence again.

“Who were those?” Josiah asked, grateful for the distraction. “Your husband and daughter?”

“Husband? Oh no, that was my brother Nathan with my daughter Esther.” Katherine's expression softened slightly. “I told you they were up to something.”

“Quite the pair, those two.”

Katherine huffed a quiet laugh. “That's one word for it.”

The silence returned, but it was slightly less oppressive now. Josiah took another sip of tea. Katherine stared at the door like she was waiting for something.

She didn't have to wait long.