Salome: part 2.
Chapter 8ii: 'I remembered back to the muffled sound of a heated discussion, and I felt the unease squeezing my stomach. I did not trust them.'
Welcome to chapter 8 of Salome. This is a Gothic Horror novel set in the 1880s and introduces Sister Salome, a young Italian nun who will appear in the 3rd Muldoon book. I started this serial to help you get to know her before the events of the next novel.
Last week, Sister Catherine revealed to Salome that she’d been having a similar dream.
I woke up on the sofa in the private dining room, Mother Hildegard’s concerned face hovering over me as someone else checked my pulse. The sulphurous scent of the salts faded as Mother Hildegard withdrew the bottle and put it away somewhere. Another face appeared before me; it was one I didn’t know.
“The doctor, Salome,” Mother Hildegard said, probably seeing that I was disorientated. “Dr Boughie.” Her face, still stern, seemed more patient than usual. Dr Boughie nodded and stood back up.
“Good morning, Sister. You happened to faint on a stone floor, so there may be some bruising, but you seem alert now. This is good. Nothing is broken.” The little white-haired man smiled and removed his spectacles to polish them.
I tried to sit up, but my arms couldn’t support me. “None of that, Sister,” said the doctor, waving a hand. “You need to rest.” He bent down and closed his bag with a click.
“How did I…?”
Mother Hildegard said nothing, and lowered her head. The doctor continued chuntering, clearing up his things and insisting on rest. Something about being no use to anyone. “What good’s a doctor?” he muttered.
Mother Hildegard squeezed my shoulder, “Excuse us, Sister,” she said, leading the doctor out of the room. They talked privately in the corridor, but I couldn’t hear any words.
My next visitor was Sister Bridget, in her hand a mug of beef tea. “Please drink this, Sister,” she said quietly. She sat down in a chair beside me as though waiting for me to finish. “Don’t rush!” she said, sensing my unease. “It was quite the fall you had.”
“Where is Sister Catherine?”
“She is cleaning the dormitories. She will be down to see you soon.”
“I must have frightened her.”
Sister Bridget nodded and crossed her legs. “Think no more of it. I am sure that Sister Catherine has seen more frightening things in her time.”
I drank some of the tea. It was yet another beverage the English had introduced to me. Mother Hildegard returned and stood over the both of us.
“When you can stand, we will escort you to your room, but for now you can stay here,” she said.
Sister Bridget looked from Mother Hildegard to me.
“Please may I speak with Father John?” I asked.
“Yes. He will be back by morning. Is there anything we can help you with in the meantime?”
I froze. They both looked at each other and then to me. “We can advise, Sister,” Sister Bridget said quietly. “Nothing is unusual here.”
“I had a strange dream.”
Their eyes met. Mother Hildegard closed the door and perched on the end of the sofa.
I hesitated. “Father John already knows.”
Mother Hildegard folded her arms. “You do not have to say what exactly… but what is this about?”
“The dream...” I lost my train of thought in the battle with the fog in my head.
“You can tell us about a dream, Sister,” Sister Bridget said kindly. “They are important.”
I hesitated. I remembered back to the muffled sound of a heated discussion, and I felt the unease squeezing my stomach. I did not trust them.
Mother Hildegard watched me, her features softening. Perhaps she knew.
“It is nothing,” I said, frowning. I did not want to talk about it. I wanted to talk to Father John, and only him, but I did not know how to tell this to them without appearing insubordinate or worse… distrustful.
But I had them both in the room with me, and judging by their manner, they were eager to apologise for my brutal treatment and exhaustion. There was no time left for subterfuge. I had to risk it. I decided that I would ask the questions. “Mother,” I began, steading the terror rising in my throat, “do you have powers like me?”
She seemed taken aback, but she did not look displeased. She tilted her head slightly in thought, “Not as strong as you, no. I can sense, but I cannot see.”
“And you, Sister Bridget?”
“Not at all,” she said, “unless sensing God’s presence counts. I am here as support, and I provide structure and moral guidance for the trainees.”
I digested the words, and wondered why none of this was explained to me at the beginning. I dared to ask.
“Why is everything so secretive, even though I have been here for weeks?”
“Sister Salome,” mother Hildegard said, folding her hands on her lap, “you must understand… What we ask of you is a great amount, and there is always a chance that you will not be suitable. The less you know, the easier it is for us to send you back to your old life. It is like this for everyone who comes here.”
“Why has Sister Catherine been here for so long?” I asked. I do not know where I found this assertiveness, but I was not disrespectful, and I felt that they were unguarded for once.
“Sister Catherine…” Mother Hildegard said, tight-lipped and looking down at her lap, “cannot ever return to normal services.” She looked at Sister Bridget, who offered me an apologetic smile. Mother Hildegard continued, looking right at me this time. “Sister Catherine… she originally came to us…” she lowered her voice, “as the victim of demonic possession.”
If I was standing, I would have collapsed with the shock. I remained still, watching her mouth move while my ears failed to process the full depth of the information.
“Sister Catherine was no ordinary child, as I’m sure you know. You are close to her. She was like you, but unlike you, she was not able to defeat the demon.” She cleared her throat, “The demon did not befriend her. The demon lived within her.”
I heard my own breathing in the silence of the room.
“But the demon was exorcised. She is cleansed, now… according to a letter from the Church,” Mother Hildegard said, looking up at the ceiling, “and I have never heard of anyone being possessed more than once in their life… but for our kind… it is a wound that doesn’t heal, so to speak. Sister Catherine… if she had been a normal child without these supernatural sensitivities, she would have returned to her family and probably been the wife of a farmer by now. But… the fact of the matter is that she was once possessed, and it would be too dangerous to release her from our care.”
“Can she fight demons?”
“That is unclear to us right now. She has undertaken your training programme seven times, and seven times she has failed.”
“Why?”
They looked at each other, and then to me. Mother Hildegard sighed. “We fear, Sister Salome… the remains of the demon still linger, and they seek to make her fail.”
“No!” I said, my animated reaction shocking them. “That can’t be true.”
“Why not, child?” Sister Bridget asked.
“She must be able to fight them.”
“Why? Why do you say this?”
“She… we had the same dream.”
Mother Hildegard learned forward, intrigued.
“I went to a strange place,” I said. “It was home, but not as I knew it. Everyone was gone.”
They encouraged me to continue. I told them of the altar, and the shadow. I told them of the hooded figure who grabbed my wrist and when I pushed up my sleeve to show them, they gasped.
“When was this?” Mother Hildegard asked, studying the scratches.
“Last night.”
“Yes, you slept and nobody could wake you,” she said, giving Sister Bridget a knowing look.
“But that was not all, Mother,” I said.
“Go on.”
“The hooded figure… it was in my room, and when I woke, Sister Catherine was there.”
Mother Hildegard hung on my every word, with a ripple of excitement running through her voice when she said, “Go on.”
“Catherine… She had the same dream. She was there, too.”
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If you’re enjoying Salome, you really would enjoy The Muldoon Mysteries series. There are currently two books (standalones) in this series. Click the image below to find out more about them, and find them on Tiny Worlds.
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Oh now that's a superb piece of intrigue that is! Introduced with perfect timing. Now the question in my head is whether Catherine and this hooded figure are one and the same, or of course, she is simply a sort of vehicle for the same entity which Salome encountered back in Italy.
Excellent writing - making me ask all these questions! Such classic gothic horror. Masterful.
This is getting spookier by the episode!