She was as striking as ever, though perhaps more ghostly and ethereal in this dark cellar with the lantern light hanging over her head. The way Catherine stared at Margaret without blinking made her as afraid as the situation she found herself in. Margaret jerked back as far as she possibly could in her chair, leaning away from her.
“What happened in here?” Margaret looked back at the manacles behind her. “What was this place?”
“A wine cellar,” Catherine said simply. She walked around Margaret, her eyes shifting from Margaret to the manacles.
“It served another purpose. Clearly,” Margaret declared frantically. “What happened? Who was chained up there?”
“The demon.” Catherine’s voice had quietened. “It was necessary. To frighten the devil out of him, but it never worked. Oh the screams. A small boy can scream very loudly, you know.”
Margaret closed her eyes in horror, scarcely able to believe her ears. Was it all true? Had Catherine chained Theodore up in this room as a small boy? Had she brought priests to exorcise the devil out of him then hurt him when she saw no sign of a spirit leaving him?
She is mad. She has no sanity left in her!
“Did you hurt him?” Margaret asked, her voice quavering.
“I had to.” Catherine looked around with a deep frown, as if Margaret was the mad one in this room. “Do you not see that? It’s the only way to control the devil.”
“He was a boy! How could he have been the devil?”
“Because he had too much of his father in him. He looked just like him, even as a child. He stopped screaming eventually.” Catherine stared at the iron chain. “As he got older and the scars built, when blood was drawn… he no longer shouted. The demon had taken hold by then. There was nothing more I could do.”
She turned sharply to face Margaret. “This is why I had to come for you. I had to get you out of his clutches. I had to save you.”
Margaret was blinking madly as she thought through everything she knew about Theodore. Suddenly, some of the things that had passed made sense. She understood why Theodore claimed he had a heart of stone. He’d learned that cold heart, learned to adopt it and not to reveal any pain, in order to prove his mother could no longer hurt him.
“He was just a boy,” Margaret whispered. “Who cares if he looked like his father?”
“He was the devil’s spawn.” Catherine frowned again, clearly not having expected Margaret to utter these words.
“What harm did he do you? Did he ever hurt you? Ever raise a hand to you?” Margaret knew the answer, even without having to see Catherine’s lips part in confusion. “Theodore has never hurt me. Not physically.”
He only broke my heart, but he never raised a hand to me.
“You do not know him as I do. That is all.”
“He’s not who you think he is.” The words were pouring out of Margaret in a rush now. “He saved me. The day I fell from a ladder, he was there to catch me. He carried me. He urged me to eat. To take care of myself. What demon would do that?”
Catherine shook her head then laughed, in a scoffing tone.
“You do not know him as I do.”
“Or maybe you just saw what you wanted to see.” Margaret leaned back in the chair, straining so much against her ropes once again that they cut in, drawing more blood. “Did you hate your husband so much that anything which looked like him was doomed in your eyes?”
Something fleeting passed over Catherine’s expression. It was some sort of recognition, before it was shut down fast.
“It was his spawn.”
Margaret felt sick, with bile rising in her throat. Catherine had called her own son,it.
“Did it not matter he was half ofyou?”
Catherine walked around Margaret, laying a hand on her shoulder. Margaret tried to lean away from that touch, disgusted by it.
“The day they handed that bundle in my arms, I knew what it was. I never wanted it. Never wantedhim.Yet he was forced on me. I had to look down at those little eyes and see my husband staring back at me.” Catherine was shaking, her hand trembling on Margaret’s shoulder now. “No, you must be protected from the past. The past can’t be allowed to repeat itself again. I shall take you away from here.”
“Away? Where?” Margaret managed to move out of her hold. Catherine walked around her, wringing her hands together now.
“Yes, yes. We shall go far from here,” she was talking to herself, practically ignoring Margaret. “The journey will be long. It’s not ideal, to keep you tied up all that time, but in time, you’ll come to see it is for your own good.”
