Start of First Folder, Ernest, Ernest pt.2, Patches
“So, what do you think?” I asked Sergio.
The two of us were standing in the embalming room of Forever More Funeral Services. The funeral home I had inherited from Thane.
“Why me?” there was a hint of suspicion in the tone of his question, “Shouldn’t you hire someone more qualified?”
“You are more than qualified to run this place,” I replied, “Especially with the discretion I require.”
“What do you mean by that?” he narrowed his eyes.
I told him about the deal I’d made with the hag in the sewers a couple of days earlier.
“I didn’t have a choice.” I don’t know why I was defending myself to him. I guess some part of me felt guilty about what I’d agreed to.
He stood there silently mulling over what I’d told him.
“If I agree to do this for you,” he finally broke his silence, pointing his finger at me as he spoke, “I want your word that all I have to do is harvest the parts. I won’t have to deliver them for you.”
“I would never ask you to do that,” I assured him, “The deal is between me and her so it is only fair that I am the one to deliver them to her.”
“I’ll help you for now,” he sighed, “But if things start getting out of hand, you’re on your own. I won’t do anything that will put Bella in jeopardy,”
Neither would I. She was like a daughter to me.
“Fair enough,” I reached into my purse, retrieved the keys to the funeral home, and held them out to him. “We open for business next week.”
***
As I was about to drive out of the parking of the funeral home, my phone began ringing. I considered letting the call go to voice mail until I saw who was calling.
“Hey, Carol,” I said after answering the phone, “What’s up?”
Carol was a friend of mine who worked with the city’s Department of Children’s services. She was the one who’d asked me to consult on Ryan’s case. The boy who was having nightmares about the Gimcrack, the ritualistic castration device that belonged to his grandmother.
“Are you busy?” she asked.
That was what she usually asked whenever she needed my help on a case.
“You need to stop asking me that,” I said, hoping she could hear the humor in my voice, “You know I’m never too busy to help you. Tell me what’s going on. If I think I can help, I will.”
“Is there any way you can stop by my office this afternoon? You’ve got to hear this story for yourself.”
“Yeah,” I quickly agreed, “I’m on my way.”
Twenty minutes later, I was following Carl into one of the meeting rooms the department used to interview kids. All types of toys were scattered across the floor. In the center of the room was a short circular table covered with crayons and markers and coloring books. Sitting at the table coloring was a young girl. Next to her, playing on the floor with a pile of blocks, was her younger brother.
“Can you give us the room?” I asked. It would be a lot easier for me to talk to the kids without another adult hovering over us.
“Yeah,” Carol said, “I’ll just be…” she gestured at the large two-way mirror on the wall, letting me know she was going to be watching us from the other side.
I waited until Carol had left the room before I approached the table.
“Wow, Cora,” I said, leaning over to look at the girl’s progress, “You’re really good at that.”
Cora stopped coloring, looked up at me for a moment, then returned her attention to the coloring book. Her eyes were red and puffy from crying. Her brother ignored me and continued playing with his blocks.
I sat down across from her and set a couple of drawings on the table, “Did you draw these?” I slid them closer to her so she could see them better.
Carol had given me the drawings when I first arrived, after explaining the details of Cora’s case to me. The first drawing was of a typical stick figure family. There was a mom and a dad and two little kids. The second drawing was the one that concerned me. It showed a picture of some sort of monster, eating someone. Two little stick figure legs protruded from its mouth.
Cora nodded her head slowly.
“This is you, right?” I pointed at the stick figure girl in the first drawing.
She nodded again.
“Can you tell me who…or what that is?” I pointed at the monster in the second drawing.
She stared at me for a moment before shaking her head. I got the distinct impression that she was lying to me.
“I’m going to tell you a secret,” I leaned across the table and lowered my voice, “Something that most people don’t know.”
Cora continued to stare at me but I could tell I had her attention from the slight rise of her eyebrows.
“Monsters are real,” I said, “And I can prove it.” I reached into my purse and pulled out the old polaroid image I had taken of Mr. Nobody’s eyes and handed it to her
“I’ve got another secret.”
She looked up from the picture.
“See these scars?” I lifted my shirt enough to show her the scar on my stomach where Franny had cut me and then pulled my collar away from my neck so she could see the one where Mr. Nobody had bitten me. “I got them protecting kids like you from the monsters that wanted to hurt them.”
“My name is Dr. Morrigan,” I continued, “I know you saw something horrible. Something you think you can’t talk about because nobody will believe you. But I promise you, whatever it is, I will believe you.”
I could tell she was struggling with her thoughts, wondering if she could trust me or not.
“I can’t help you if you don’t tell me what happened.”
“It’s not a monster,” Cora said softly, “It’s my mom.”
“This is your mom?” I tapped my finger on the drawing of the monster.
She nodded.
“Who is this?” I moved my fingers to the stick legs sticking out of the monster’s mouth. I already knew the answer based on what Carol had told me when I’d arrived but I wanted to hear Cora say it.
“My dad,” her lips quivered as she spoke and I could see tears forming in her eyes.
I walked over and knelt next to her chair and held my arms out to her, she leaned into me and began sobbing.
Getting to the bottom of this case was going to be harder than I thought.
***
“I told you it was crazy,” Carol said.
Once I’d gotten Cora to calm down, I’d joined Carol in the observation room on the other side of the mirror.
“That part about the monster being her mother is new,” she continued, “That makes me think she really might’ve had something to do with her husband’s disappearance. Why else would Cora think of her mother as a monster?”
Because she might really be a monster.
Carol didn’t believe in things like that so I kept the thought to myself. I’ve never told her the truth behind the cases I’ve helped her with. I didn’t think she’d be able to handle it. As far as she was concerned, I was just a really good child psychiatrist.
“Can I talk to her mother?” I asked, “Alone,” I clarified, “As doctor to patient. I might be able to get her to talk more openly that way.”
Carol considered my request. It was technically against protocol for family members to be interviewed without a witness present.
“I’m willing to try anything at this point,” she sighed, “But you’ll have to make it quick.”
“It will be,” I promised.
***
“Who’re you?” Mrs. Dodson asked as I entered the room. She was cradling an empty Styrofoam cup in her hands.
I took a seat across the table from her, setting my purse on the floor beside me.
“I’m Dr. Morrigan,” I answered, “I’m a psychiatrist. I was wondering if I could ask you a few questions about your husband?”
“How many times are you people going to ask me the same questions?” she looked from me to the two-way mirror on the wall.
“There’s nobody back there,” I said, “I’m here as a doctor. As such, anything you tell me is considered privileged information.”
She eyed me skeptically.
“I promise you this is not a trick,” I insisted, “I’m here to help you and your children but I need you to be honest with me.”
“Have you seen them?” she was referring to her kids.
“I have,” I admitted, “I was with them before I came here.”
“How are they?”
“As good as can be expected,” I said, “Given what they’ve been through.”
She bowed her head and looked down at her hands while she fiddled with the cup.
“Whatever I say stays between us, right?” she asked, looking up briefly before returning her attention to the cup.
“Absolutely.”
She took a deep breath and let it out as a shuddering sigh, “I don’t remember what happened last night.”
“What’s the last thing you do remember?”
“Arguing with my husband,” she said. As she spoke, she began tearing off little pieces of Styrofoam from the cup and letting them fall to the table.
“What were you arguing about?”
“Money.”
“What happened after the argument?”
Mrs. Dodson shrugged, “I don’t know. I blacked out in the middle of it. When I came to, I was lying on the floor in the living room.”
“Did you notice anything odd right before you blacked?”
“Like what?”
“Any strange sensations. Blurry vision, tremors, weird smells, stuff like that?”
“No,” she shook her head, “Nothing like that. But my body did hurt like hell when I woke up.”
“Had anything like that ever happened to you before?”
“No, that was the first time.”
If she is a monster, I don’t think she knows it. But I needed to be sure before going any further.
I reached into my purse a pulled out a small leather pouch, setting it on the table.
“This is going to seem strange,” I said, opening the pouch and pulling out three items, “But I need you to look at these things and tell me what comes to mind while looking at them.”
I set the items in front of Mrs. Dodson. There was an iron key, an old silver coin, and a small figurine of a bird carved out of wood from a Rowan tree.
“Seriously?” she asked, “I don’t see the relevance.”
“Please, just indulge me.”
“Okay,” she sighed, picking up the coin first, turning it over in her hands, “Nothing comes to mind,” she said a moment later, putting the coin back and picking up the key.
Silver doesn’t affect her, I noted.
“This reminds me of my grandmother,” she said, holding the key up by the bit, “She had a key like this that opened the doors in her house.”
Iron doesn’t either.
She picked up the wooden bird, “This looks like something Cora would like.”
None of the items affected her. I had hoped one of them would cause a skin reaction when she touched them, which would have brought me one step closer to figuring out what she was. But things weren’t going to be that easy for me.
Disappointed, I collected the items and put them back in the pouch.
“What now?” Mrs. Dodson asked.
Before I could reply, an alarm sounded.
“Sorry,” Mrs. Dodson quickly apologized, picking up her purse and setting it on the table. The sound was coming from inside of it.
She pulled out her phone and disabled the alarm, put it back, and then pulled out a pill organizer.
“I don’t suppose I could ask you for a glass of water?”
“Of course.” I left the room and walked down the hall to Carol’s office.
“Done already,” she asked.
“Not quite,” I replied, “I need a bottle of water.”
Carol retrieved a bottle from the break room and handed it to me.
“Thanks.”
When I returned to the interview room, I set the bottle on the table in front of Mrs. Dodson and then returned to my seat.
“What are those for?” I asked, gesturing at the assortment of pills she had dropped into her palm.
“Kidney transplant,” she said before popping the pills into her mouth and washing them down with a big gulp of water.
Kidney transplant?
“If you will excuse me,” I said, retrieving my purse as I jumped to my feet, “There’s something I need to look into.”
“When can I see my kids?” she called out before I could leave the room.
“Not yet, I’m afraid,” I turned and gave her an apologetic look and then quickly left the room before she could protest.
I didn’t want to give her any false hope by giving her a timeframe. Without knowing what she was, she was still a threat and shouldn’t be left alone with anyone, especially her kids.
***
“You want me to release her?” Carol sounded surprised.
I wanted Mrs. Dodson back home, someplace where she felt safe and would be less likely to repeat whatever had happened with her husband.
“I do,” I replied, “I don’t think she had anything to do with her husband’s disappearance,” I lied.
She placed her hands on her hips as she considered my advice.
“She’s not going to leave the city,” I insisted, “If she did, she wouldn’t get far.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“She’s on anti-rejection medications for a kidney transplant,” I explained, “She doesn’t have the energy to run. Plus, she won’t go anywhere without her kids.”
“Fine,” she relented, “But the kids stay with us until I deem it safe for them to return home.”
“I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
***
After I left Carol’s office, I drove straight to Eastside General Hospital.
“How can I help you?” the receptionist at the records desk asked when I approached.
I pulled my hospital ID out of my purse and showed it to her, thankful that I was still welcome there after the fiasco with Franny and the Weird Wolf.
“I need a copy of everything you have for a new patient of mine,” I said, “Her name is Patricia Dodson.” I spelled out her last name.
“Do you want me to email it to you or would you prefer a hard copy?” the receptionist asked.
“Hard copy,” I replied.
The receptionist turned her attention to her computer for a moment, “I’ll let you know when it’s ready,” she said, politely letting me know I should take a seat in the waiting area.
While I was sitting there, I tried wracking my brain for any idea that might give me a clue as to what Mrs. Dodson was. Right now, the only information I had to go on was what Cora had told me about her mother turning into a monster and eating her father.
The only thing I could come up with was that Mrs. Dodson must’ve had a near-death experience and brought something back with her. That would make the most sense, given her medical history. The problem I was having was that I couldn’t think of a single entity capable of coming back with her that was also able to devour an entire human body without leaving anything behind.
“Dr. Morrigan.”
I looked up and saw the receptionist standing in front of me, holding a manilla folder in her hands. She’d called my name a few times from the reception desk before bringing the folder over to me in the waiting room.
“Sorry,” I apologized, getting to my feet and taking the folder from her, “It’s been a long day.”
“Is there anything else I can help you with?” she asked.
“This is all,” I placed my hand on the folder, “Thanks.”
She gave me a thin-lipped smile before turning and heading back to her desk.
***
“What are you doing back here?” Sergio asked.
I was sitting at the desk that once belonged to Thane when he was the owner of the funeral home.
“I needed a place to work and this was closer than my office,” I replied.
I didn’t feel like driving back across town. Plus, the funeral home was closer to Mrs. Dodson’s residence should I need to go see her.
“What are you working on?” he took a seat across the desk from me.
Under normal circumstances, I wouldn’t have involved him. But I was stumped, so I told him everything I knew.
“I thought maybe she’d picked up a near-death hitchhiker, but she didn’t have a near-death experience. In fact,” I gestured at one of the sheets on the desk before me, “According to this, the kidney transplant was performed without a single complication. Weirder still,” I picked up another sheet, “All of her follow-up bloodwork has been absolutely perfect. That’s not typical with transplant patients.”
“How long ago did she have the surgery?” Sergio asked.
“That’s another thing,” I said, slapping my hand down on the surgery paper, “The transplant was performed over 6 months ago. If it was the cause of whatever she’s become, why did it wait so long to show itself?”
I was beginning to think I was looking for answers in the wrong places.
“Does it say who the donor was?” Sergio asked.
“That’s the first thing I looked at,” I shuffled through the paperwork until I found the sheet with the donor information on it. I pulled it out of the stack and handed it to Sergio.
He only looked at it for a second before he said it on the desk.
“I know what happened,” he said softly.
“Seriously?” I was skeptical.
He nodded.
“How?”
“I know who the donor is,” he pointed at the sheet, “And so do you.”
I grabbed the sheet and looked at it again, “I don’t know anyone named Iliana.” I said.
“Read it again, but slower,” Sergio said.
“Il…I…Anna,” I did as he suggested, drawing out each syllable of the name.
Anna, my brain echoed the final syllable. Then I made the connection.
“Holy shit! You think this is Anna?” I declared.
“I don’t think it is her,” Sergio said, “I know it’s her.”
Anna was the Doppelganger who was being used by Mr. Nobody to lure my brother Mark and me into a trap. An act that would ultimately lead to her death in an abandoned clothing store at the hands of a shade. One of Mr. Nobody’s minions.
When Sergio was helping me track her down, he’d told me that she’d always use aliases that contained part of her real name. When I met her, she was using the name Susanna.
“How can you be so sure it’s her?” I wasn’t convinced he was right based on the name alone.
“Because it would explain what’s happening to that woman.” He gestured at Mrs. Dodson’s patient file.
“I’m not following.”
“What do you know about the Wendigo?” he asked.
I knew what most scholars knew and said as much to Sergio, “It’s a shapeshifting cannibalistic boogieman from various Native American legends…and it’s not real.” No reliable source has ever documented an encounter with the alleged creature.
“It is real,” Sergio said, “But it’s not what you think it is.” He took a deep breath and sighed, “What I’m about to tell you is one of the best-kept secrets of my kind.” He was referring to Doppelgangers.
I leaned forward in my chair and rested my elbows on the desk, waiting for him to continue.
“According to the legends, if you were to eat the flesh of another person, you would become a Wendigo. But if that were true, there’d be a lot more Wendigos running around out there. The reason there isn’t is because the legends are only half right. The only way a human can become a Wendigo is by eating the flesh of a Doppelganger.”
“Or by getting a transplant from one,” I said, finally understanding.
He nodded, “The reason everyone thinks the Wendigo is a myth is that there hasn’t been one in over 200 years. We’ve done a good job of not getting ourselves eaten since then.” The corner of his mouth turned up, forming a wry smile.
“How does something like this even happen?” the more I thought about it the crazier it sounded. “I would’ve thought that she’d be an incompatible match for the kidney when they did the tissue typing. Doppelgangers aren’t human.”
“She shouldn’t have been a match,” Sergio agreed, “Whoever performed the surgery knew what they were doing.”
“Can we reverse the effects if we remove the kidney?”
Sergio shook his head, “Once she’s changed there is no changing back. And that’s not the worst of it,” he continued, “Now that she’s eaten, she is going to want to eat again and soon. From now on, she is going to be in a constant state of hunger.”
Feeling helpless, I let my emotions get the better of me and flung Mrs. Dodson’s paperwork onto the floor, “Whoever is responsible for this is going to pay.” I promised. “But that’s going to have to wait for now.” I pushed myself up from the desk.
“Where are you going?” Sergio asked as I walked by him on my way out of the room.
“To find a way to end this woman’s suffering before things get out of hand.”
***
The first thing I did after I left the funeral home was call Carol and asked her how Cora and her little brother were doing. She said she had placed them into foster care with the Coleman family. I knew the family well and the kids would be safe with them. When I first started consulting on cases for the Department of Child Services, I helped them vet their foster families. Having once been a foster child, I knew the horrors that awaited many kids in foster care and wanted to prevent that from happening.
After talking to Carol, I tried calling Theodore Alexander, but he didn’t pick up so I left him a detailed voice mail explaining what was going on.
By then, I’d made it to my destination, the Salt Creek University campus.
“Hey, Ellie,” Yasmine said when she noticed me standing in the doorway of her office, “What’s up?” When she saw the way that I was looking at her, the smile dropped from her face, “This isn’t a social call, is it?”
I shook my head and then explained my dilemma to her.
An hour later, we stood together at one of the tables in the university library, all of the books about Native American folklore and Wendigos we’d scoured for the hope of a cure stacked before us.
“Nothing,” I slammed the book closed. Frustrated at not finding something that I could use to help Mrs. Dodson.
“I’m sorry,” Yasmine apologized, starting to gather the books together to return to the shelves. “What’re you going to do now?” she asked.
“There’s one more person I can talk to,” I said, grabbing a couple of books, intending to help her put them back.
“Leave them,” she insisted, “You’ve got more important things to worry about.”
I thanked her for her help and returned to my car. Along the way, I got a text from Theodore that further confirmed what I already knew in my heart to be true. It said:
The church has no evidence that Wendigos exist, let alone a way to cure them. If she is indeed a Wendigo, our advice is to make it as quick and painless for the woman as possible.
The tears threatened to come but I held them back.
Not yet.
There was one last person I could talk to. If you could call him that.
***
“What’s up, Doc?” Natalie said from the counter as soon as I’d walked through the doors of Casting Shadows, the new age shop that once belonged to my brother but was now mine.
“I need to talk to Ivan,” I said.
Natalie pulled a pocket knife out of her jeans, unfolded it, and held it over her index finger, “You know how this works,” she said.
I walked over to the counter, “Do it,” I said.
Natalie run the blade across her finger, “Open up,” she said, holding her bloody finger out to me.
I closed my eyes and opened my mouth, letting her squeeze a few drops of blood onto my tongue. When I opened my eyes again, she was wiping the excess blood off of her finger which had already healed.
“You wanted to talk to me,” Ivan said, materializing next to me.
“Have you ever encountered a Wendigo?” I asked. If anyone had, it would be the vampire.
“Why do you ask?”
I explained the situation with Mrs. Dodson to him.
“I have encountered one,” Ivan admitted, “In the late 1700s. It is not an encounter I wish to repeat. It was only through sheer luck that I was able to walk away.”
“Did you kill it?”
“No.” His eyes darkened at the memory, “It’s one of only a few times I’ve had to run from a fight.”
I didn’t like the sound of that. If a vampire wasn’t able to kill a Wendigo, what hope did I have against one?
“Do you know if they can be cured?”
The blood I had ingested allowed me to speak with Ivan directly instead of having to go through Natalie to talk to him. It also allowed him to read my thoughts.
“I know I was your last hope at helping this woman,” Ivan said, “But I’m afraid you’re going to have to accept the truth you already know.” He gave me a sympathetic look, “You can’t save everyone.”
The tears I’d been holding back poured from my eyes. I turned to leave, stopping when Ivan called out to me.
“Be careful with that one,” Ivan warned, knowing where I was going next.
***
“Back so soon,” The hag smiled, showing her blackened teeth. “I thought your first delivery wasn’t due until next month.” She was referring to the deal I’d made with her to save Patches and her kittens.
“That’s not why I’m here,” I replied, “I need your help with something else.”
“Is that so?” she hobbled across the dirty floor of the cistern she called home until she was standing face to face with me, “It must be serious if I’m the only one who can help you.” Her smile grew wider.
“I need you to make someone disappear.” Saying those words made me feel horrible.
“I’m listening,” she said.
I explained to her what was going on, something I was getting tired of doing. Hopefully, this would be the last time I had to talk about it.
“I can help you,” the hag said, “For the right price of course,” she winked.
Of course. A hag never did anything for free.
“What do you want?”
“I’m afraid this is going to be one of those help first pay later situations,” she replied.
“What does that mean?” I was sure I wasn’t going to like the answer.
“It means I won’t know the price until I’ve done the task,” she explained.
“What if you fail?”
The hag cackled at the thought.
“I won’t fail,” she said when she could talk again, “Do we have a deal?” she spit onto her palm and held her gnarled hand out to me.
I stood there considering the implications of what I was about to do, wishing there was some other way to fix things.
“I don’t have all day,” the hag said, presenting her hand again, “You can take the deal or you can leave.” She paused and studied my face, sensing my struggle, “You have my word that no harm will come to you or those you love as a result of our deal.”
“Deal,” I sighed, spitting onto my palm and shaking her hand.
***
A few hours later, I knocked upon the door of Mrs. Dodson’s residence.
“What are you doing here?” Mrs. Dodson asked after opening the door to find me standing on her doorstep.
“I need to talk to you about your kids,” I lied, “Can I come in?”
She stepped back and gestured for me to enter. Once inside, I followed her to the kitchen where she took a seat at a small breakfast table in the corner of the room. With a shaky hand, I pulled out the chair opposite her and sat down.
“Talk,” she demanded.
“There’s no easy way to put this,” I began.
“Just spit it out,” Mrs. Dodson said.
“After reviewing your case, the Department of Child Services has decided it’s in your children’s best interests to place them in foster care until a more permanent solution can be found.”
“You’re taking my children away from me?” she spat. “Why? I didn’t do anything wrong.” The veins in her arms became visible as she balled up her fists.
“I’m sorry,” I apologized, “I truly am.”
“You don’t look sorry!” spittle flew from her lips as she jumped to her feet, knocking her chair over in the process, “But you will be sorry,” she pointed her finger at me, “You and everyone else.”
Here we go.
Mrs. Dodson began to change. Her arms and legs began to lengthen while her hands and feet quadrupled in size. Her abdomen swelled up, giving her the appearance that she was pregnant with some monstrous fetus. When she unhinged her jaw and opened her maw, I knew it was time to make my exit.
I had intentionally provoked her into changing because I needed to be certain I was making the right choice. After seeing what she’d become, and knowing her daughter had seen it too, there was no doubt in my mind that Mrs. Dodson needed to be put down.
“Anytime now,” I yelled, getting to my feet and backing out of the kitchen.
I got a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach when I didn’t see the hag. She was supposed to have followed me inside and then taken control of the situation after Mrs. Dodson changed but I didn’t see any sign of her.
Mrs. Dodson lashed out with one of her spindly arms, grabbing hold of me with her oversized hand.
I struggled to free myself as she pulled me towards her cavernous mouth but her fingers were wrapped around me like a vice.
I happened to turn my head just in time to see the hag open the front door, and start shuffling her way towards the kitchen.
“Nice of you to show up,” I managed to croak out, against the suffocating grip.
“Let’s see how fast you walk after you’ve been alive for a few millennia,” she snapped back, “Maybe if you’d parked closer, I would have gotten here sooner.” As she spoke, she reached into the folds of her clothing and retrieved a pouch. “Catch,” she said to me, lobbing the bag into the air.
I watched the pouch sail towards me, stretching my arm out as far as I could. I felt the pouch hit my palm, and then roll away before I could close my fingers around it. Luckily, the pouch had a drawstring dangling from the top of it which I was able to grab hold of.
“What am I supposed to do with this?” the pouch dangled from my fingers
“Toss it into her mouth,” the hag instructed.
“Why couldn’t you have done that?”
“You were closer.”
Mrs. Dodson lifted me, intending to drop me into her mouth, but she didn’t get the chance. As soon as I was sure I wouldn’t miss, I released the pouch, watching it disappear down her throat.
This better work.
Whatever was in the pouch took effect quickly. One moment I was suspended in the air, the next I was crashing down to the kitchen floor. When I turned and looked towards Mrs. Dodson, she was also lying on the floor, no longer in her monstrous form.
I pushed myself up to a sitting position.
“Why is she still breathing?” I asked after seeing the steady rise and fall of her chest.
“That’s not the deal we had.” The hag replied.
I opened my mouth to protest but she cut me off before I could say anything.
“You said you wanted her to disappear,” the hag said, “And disappear she shall. That was the deal you made.”
“What happened?” Mrs. Dodson groaned from the floor.
“I’ll explain everything once I get you home,” the hag said to her, helping the woman get to her feet.
“You can’t do this,” I protested.
“I can and I will,” she growled. To Mrs. Dodson, she said, “Go get dressed, dear, we need to get going.”
Mrs. Dodson got to her feet and stumbled down the hall.
“What did you give her?” I asked.
“Something to make her a little more compliant,” the hag answered, “You don’t have to worry about her any longer. she’s my problem now.”
I didn’t have the energy to fight the hag, plus, I couldn’t fight her if I wanted to. We’d made a deal. One I was bound to uphold. I couldn’t do anything but watch as the hag led Mrs. Dodson out of the house.
“You can consider your debt paid in full, both of them,” the hag said to me before she left.
Ivan’s words echoed in my mind as I watched them disappear into the night, Be careful with that one, he had warned. I should have listened.