Cleansings. Blessings. Murders.

They were one and the same, weren't they? Especially for a man like me.

Following Victor and Abigail only reminded me of the type of monster I truly was. I'd always known it, of course, but through her eyes, I was the Devil himself—and she loved it.

I wasn't sure exactly when Charlotte made herself scarce, but she couldn't handle listening to my stories retold. The days of my past, the memories I couldn't recall—how I'd round up pagans and tie them to trees. I had forced my blood down their throats and watched them die. If they wouldn't willingly submit to his Lord Almighty, I'd rip their throats clean open.

I was her muscle, her right hand. I'd done more for her than Victor ever could, and by my blood alone, a hundred years brought on fifty of the purest Evergreens.

Those were the men and women I passed by within the halls that I recognized. They looked at me with the utmost respect. I was their savior, the man who granted them eternal life and access into heaven.

If only they'd known the truth, and that I did no such thing. I'd done nothing but slow death the very second my blood touched their lips. They'd die eventually, and it wouldn't be a sad day in heaven when the gates stay closed in their faces.

When Victor took his turn to leave us, we'd already wandered outside into her 'Garden of Eden.' I'd asked him not to leave me with her, but he said he had other plans. He made sure to emphasize the word—plans.

I scowled and inhaled the cool, afternoon air. I hadn't forgotten about what we needed to do.

Abigail circled the trees, her fingers sliding against the dying bark. She looked at me with a smile, one that brought out the creases around her eyes. "John, you haven't the slightest idea how happy I am that you're here."

I clicked my teeth. "I don't?"

The garden connected the manors in an awkward diamond shape, intertwining the backyards with old trees and flowers that had yet to grow. Her manor sat in the center. Beside its back doors were benches made of stone, four to be exact. I made one my home, leaning back against the cold seat as she danced around another tree.

"Don't you remember when you were a boy? How we'd run through the fields?"

Close, but no cigar, Abigail. "Of course," I lied. "Why bring it up?"

She paused. The sunlight hit her face in a way that brought upon some youth; the other side, however, was masked in shadow. "Because you were so young and keen. You listened to me so well, like now." She spun around a tree just once more before crossing the dying grass to stand at my feet. "Do you remember the last thing you ever said to me?"

I lifted my top lip slightly. "Again, why bring it up?"

She smirked and shook her head. "Your humor hasn't changed."

I shrugged and motioned my hand for her to continue. "Please, enlighten me."

Her hand slowly made its way to my face. Her fingers were cold against my skin. "You're right. Why bring it up?"

Because, now, my curiosity had got the best of me.

I brushed her hand away with my hand, my eyes never leaving hers. She seemed calm, normal, and a part of me wished she wasn't. "Because you decided to open the pages." I let my tongue trail over my teeth as I leaned forward, and she stepped back. "So, tell me—what did I say? Two hundred years ago was so long ago."

She let the seconds slip into minutes, wandering the garden to stall her answer. She made comments on the flowers and dying trees, but I didn't listen, as those weren't the answers I wanted to hear. I wanted to hear why she'd tried to kill me; why she submitted Charlotte to such torment.

"I'd heard the rumors," she started to say before she looked at me with dark eyes, "I believe it was Ron who mentioned it."

I sat upright. "Beg your pardon?"

"Ron," she half-smiled, "my lapdog, my sweetheart. He'd do anything for me, you know. Unfortunately, it was his fault I lost my pride in revenge. Scarlett was absolutely perfect."

I no longer sat and met her where she stood. Standing in front of her, I could see the size difference between us. She may have not been much shorter, but I'd snapped a rib cage or two without much effort—easy.

"Right." I completed her smile with a smirk of my own. "They watched me for years, didn't they? Obsessed over my ever move?"

"You think you could live so freely?" she laughed. "I needed to be sure you weren't going to be a problem."

"A problem?" I lessened the space between us. "You mean, this church?"

"Precisely." Her hands reached for my face again; two cold palms against my cheeks. Mentally, I thought to pull away, but my feet wouldn't move. Her fingers dug into my skin and tore a small hole within my sanity.

At that moment, I didn't see her but saw through her. Behind her, I saw pews made of dark oak, and the grass replaced by broken stone. I saw a woman with braided red hair; a woman who turned and looked at me with the brightest of green eyes.

"John," she extended a hand to me, stilling my heart, "you cannot allow this to go on. She's killing innocent people. No one is damned in hell but us and her. Please, my John, tell me you see it."

My breath stopped, stuck against a growing ball in my throat. In front of me, Abigail spoke as though she hadn't noticed my obvious detachment from the world. "You did everything you could. You did everything right. It was I who was wrong. How—how could I have known?" Her thumbs brushed my cheeks, yet still, I couldn't see her. "I tell you, John, if I had known he had such a plan for you, I would never have done it. Which is why I asked you if there were any hard feelings. Clearly, there are. What can I do to be forgiven?"

I inhaled sharply as the red-haired woman clutched her gut. The bright of her eyes faded to black and she ducked back against the pews she stood beside. Her bottom lip quivered, and tears fell from her eyes. She spoke again, "You've got to stop her, John. I've already lost Henry. I cannot lose you, too."

"Dear John, you're crying. Why?" Abigail's voice echoed in my ears as the woman in my memory covered her face. She whispered my name over and over, and that's when I knew who she was. She was the woman I'd seen in many dreams; the voice that called me John, even when I couldn't remember.

It was Catherine, my mother. My actual mother.

"Your memory is absolutely terrible, isn't it? Is that why you cry?"

"Don't touch me," I hissed, pulling her hands down from my face.

"John!" Abigail stepped back, and in my eyes, she had vanished. She appeared as a shadow behind my mother—dark, tall, and towering over her. Her hands rose high above her, my mother unbeknownst to her and the rock in her hand. It came down on her head, and like that, my mother crashed down on the floor.

Abigail's shadow looked at me with hollow eyes. A raspy voice escaped her, "Help me, John. We can't let Victor see this."

I stepped backward until my calves hit the stone bench. Memories suppressed by hundreds of forgotten years welled up inside my chest and seeped into my lungs, suffocating me cold. I could picture it, all of it, as if I stood in the same church that filled with my mother's blood. It was more than the head wound; there were slices made on each of her wrists. That's what bled her dry.

Abigail had done it all to make it look it look like a suicide. It wouldn't have happened if I hadn't told Catherine to meet me in that church. She'd lived, and I wouldn't have been riddled with guilt every waking morning.

It was all my fault.

"Abigail." I rubbed my eyes until I saw the decayed garden. The space around me was cool and empty. Abigail was gone.

"Abigail!" She wasn't to my left, nor my right. Sometime between my flits of memories, she'd left me standing alone and cowering to the blood that didn't exist. But why? "Abby!"

My feet were heavy, like boulders attached to the bottoms of my legs, and when I turned to push open the back door, I nearly fell over. I gripped the door handle as I scanned the hallway flooded with sunlight. Images of the manor within my present and the church of my past blurred together before my eyes. I swayed, left and right, swallowing the bile that crept up my throat.

Now was not the time to drift out of reality. If Abigail left me out there, she knew—somehow, she knew—and I needed to warn everyone. "Victor," my voice was hoarse, barely above a whisper, "Charlotte."

There were footsteps above me. I looked up at the ceiling, wondering who to call out to. What if it wasn't anyone who mattered? What if it was an Evergreen, loyal to Abigail and all her shit? They'd cut my throat and bleed me dry at her orders, I bet. I couldn't be caught like this.

With my eyes squeezed shut and my hands along the wall to guide me, I forced myself forward. I remembered the hall before we stepped outside—we'd passed a large kitchen and three closets. The first floor was empty, with everyone preparing for the night's blessings, which meant I could hide in any of the rooms.

As the pain grew between my eyes, my hand pushed open a door into one of the closets. My knees hit the floor before I could even make a sound. I was drifting faster than I thought I would, and it was then that I knew I'd always taken those who loved me for granted. The nights when Charlotte kept me nestled against her chest, wiping my sweat away with a towel; or, the times when Nathan would lead me back up the stairs and into my bed after my dreams left me wandering the streets with blind rage.

There I was, laying on the floor without anyone to catch me.

With a roll, I dropped down onto my shoulders, sprawling out on the cold, tiled floor. I looked up at the ceiling but could not see it. There were no windows or light, and as the door slowly closed on its own, I squeezed my eyes shut. The sound of creaking wood was replaced by rushing water, and I hadn't the strength to fight the darkness that clouded my eyes.