Chapter Text
In her restless dreams, Grace is trapped. Pinned against the ground, her mouth full of blood, her heart wild with fear. Looming above her is a woman. Her eyes are pale, her hair paler, and she stares into Grace’s eyes as if she might find the thing she has been searching for all her life.
Her thumb strokes over Grace’s chin. She smiles. “See you soon, Grace.”
“How do you know my name?” Grace wonders, but suddenly the ground is gone and she is drifting in a black space without light or breeze. She knows she is falling and doesn’t know what waits below, but somehow it doesn’t matter to her.
“Grace? Can you hear me?”
Reality hurts a fuck of a lot worse than her dreams.
Grace’s eyes snap open and she hisses, sucking in a ragged breath as sensation comes back to her - primarily a sensation that feels like the leftover wound of a shotgun blast to her left shoulder.
The room Grace finds herself in is small but comfortably furnished and full of light. Beneath her is the soft green fabric of a chaise lounge chair that looks like a Victorian decorator’s wet dream. It’s comfortable, though not overly so and she groans she grabs the back of the chair and leverages herself into a semi-sitting position.
“Easy,” Alyssa warns, placing a hand between her daughter’s shoulder blades to steady her. “You need time to adjust.”
Grace presses the butt of her palm into her suddenly aching head. “Mom…what…what happened?”
Alyssa sighs. Her skin is pale, dark smudges under her eyes like bruises. She wears the same clothes and the coffee table nearby is littered with dirtied tea cups. “I don’t know. Something…attacked you. The owners of this place,” here she gestures expansively, casting her gaze around at the fancy molding and high ceiling, “took us in and bandaged your wounds.”
Grace closes her eyes and holds her head, her jaw clenching as she tries to think past the throbbing in her temple. “Was it them? The one from the letter?”
“No, someone else. Grace, they are strange. This whole thing is very odd.”
Grace winces. “Yay, nothing new then.”
She looks down at herself, noting thick bandages wrapped around her upper arm and shoulder. Someone has removed her dirty, bloodied shirt and replaced it with a white t-shirt from her bag. She wears the same jeans and boots from before, though her pockets are empty.
Alyssa gives a soft smile, brushing Grace’s hair behind her ear. “We were invited to breakfast. I was sure you would sleep for hours, but it’s almost as if they knew exactly when you would wake up.”
“Ooo spooky.”
“Exactly.”
“Here,” Alyssa says, one arm supporting Grace as she pauses before an ornate wooden door. It looks the same as nearly every other door they had passed, but she is certain Alyssa knows the way and is embarrassedly grateful that they do not have to make their way down the vast, sweeping set of stairs leading down into the foyer. Her body is stiff and uncooperative, each jostle reminding just how much skin she lost.
Alyssa knocks. A murmur comes from beyond and the pair exchange a glance, both steeling themselves as Alyssa opens the door.
Grace did not expect four women in sweatpants and an extra draped in a black shroud, but that is exactly what greets her on the other side of the door.
It’s an unexpectedly homey scene. Everyone is scattered about the large, book filled room. Their hair is messy, and no one seems particularly interested in what anyone else is doing. The coffee table is laden with food no one is eating and the air smells like good coffee, strong and dark. Every head snaps up as the door opens. Five pair of eyes stare as Grace hobbles in supported by her mother.
A young, blonde woman is the first to rouse herself, moving towards Grace and Alyssa with sure, deliberate steps that somehow seem mismatched with the grey sweats hanging off her hips. She moves like a dancer.
“Good morning, Alyssa,” she says, but her eyes are on Grace. She ducks under Grace’s uninjured shoulder, taking the weight of her from Alyssa. She flashes a quick smile. “I’m Bela.”
“Grace.” She shoots a questioning look over her shoulder at her mother. Alyssa gives a half shrug and tiredly makes her way to a sofa.
Bela deposits Grace on a couch next to the shrouded woman. Grace gives her a pained smile, her eyes flickering with brief confusion as she notices a doll perched on the woman’s knee. It’s a morbid little thing, thin and veiled, it’s face a patchwork of odd textures.
“What’reya looking at, dummy?” the doll demands.
Grace blinks. “Uh -”
“Wow, we’re in the presence of a world class mind, girls.”
“That’s enough,” someone says and the doll chitters. Grace nearly chokes as a little doll hand raises and flips her off.
“Cool doll,” Grace tells the shrouded woman, eyeing it nervously.
The woman dips her head in acknowledgement.
“This is Donna. Her doll is Angie.” The woman speaking has the clipped drawl of someone accustomed to others listening when she speaks. She nods her head at each woman as she names them. “My daughters - Bela, Daniela, and Cassandra. And I am Alcina.” She leans forward, her gaze narrowing onto Alyssa. “Now. Kindly tell me why you are here.”
Bela, lingering near Grace, piles a plate high with too much food. She offers it, lowering her voice to a murmur. “Eat if you can. You will feel better.”
Grace hesitates, more from surprise than anything else. She looks up into Bela’s face and takes the offered food, nervous under her scrutiny. She thanks her and shoves an orange slice into her mouth. It’s bigger than she realizes and she nearly chokes. Her hand flies over her mouth, and her body shakes with a wracking cough. Her eyes widen with mortification as the others glance at her in concern.
Angie The Doll smacks an ineffective hand against Grace’s back. “Breathe, fatass.”
Something that sounds suspiciously like a titter trails out from under Donna’s shroud.
“Oh god,” Grace gasps, fanning frantically at her red face. “I am so sorry.”
Alyssa swallows a laugh and produces a letter from her jacket pocket. “We’re here because of this.”
It is Daniela who takes the letter and carries it to Alcina, depositing it into her waiting hand with an accompanying peck on her mother’s cheek.
Alcina barely glances at the letter before her eyebrows raise dramatically. She reads quickly, a twitch of her lips betraying some deeper emotion that doesn’t display on her face. She stands and Grace nearly drops the toast in her hand, startled by her extraordinary height. She quite literally looms, towering Alyssa rises to meet her and takes the returned letter.
“We must speak,” Alcina says. “My daughters will remain with yours while we do.”
Grace and Alyssa exchange a glance.
Be careful, Grace’s eyes say.
I have a big gun, Alyssa's smirk replies.
The door shuts and Grace is left alone with the sisters and Donna and Angie the odd little doll.
Grace nervously chews her toast. She turns to Donna. “So about the talking doll…”
“I’m right here,” Angie scowls.
Donna’s hands raise to the shroud draped around her face, lifting it away. Her eyes are as dark as the brows above them and her smile is small and sweet.
Grace’s gaze flits from Donna to Angie and back again. “Is this like a neurospicy thing or?”
Cassandra, having spent the last few minutes attempting to glare a hole into Grace’s face, gives an unexpected snort. She seems startled by her own reaction and shifts uncomfortably, refusing to meet Bela’s curious glance.
“I will cut you, lady,” Angie declares.
“Please don’t.”
“So why are you here?” Cassandra demands. Amber eyes, hard and unreasonably resentful, bore into Grace.
Grace sits her plate aside. Her fingers tangle nervously together as she gathers her thoughts, unsure how much is wise to say. “My mom has a sort of…off the books job. She investigates potential threats - think bioweapons, crime syndicates, whatever. Four days ago, a man knocked on our door and handed her a letter. The writer claimed to have information linked to Umbrella, but would only share in person. They left the name of this village and said to meet at the church and…well. The weather slowed us down. By the time we got here, it was dark and…”
She trails off, her thoughts slipping back to the dark and the cold and that awful, oppressive fear that had nearly smothered her mind. Her eyes dart up, jumping between the faces watching her. “What was that thing?”
“Lycan,” Cassandra says simply. “One of Heisenberg’s bastard experiments.”
Grace frowns. "Lycan? Like...like a - holy shit! Like a werewolf?"
“Who sent the letter?” Bela interrupts.
Grace shrugs. “No idea. They signed it M.”
Silence follows, and Grace frowns to see the troubled expressions shared amongst the sisters.
“Damnit,” Bela mutters. She stands at a window overlooking the courtyard below, her gaze fixed on something outside. “They’re here.”
Grace opens her mouth to ask who “they” are, but is interrupted by a hand on her arm, pulling her up.
“Come along, babyface,” Daniela says. “Mother will be - how do the youth say it these days? Pissed the fuck off? Yes, that seems adequately expressive. Mother will be pissed the fuck off if we allow anything unsavory to happen to you. Toodles Donna, Angie!”
Grace protests as she is pulled along. She glances over her shoulder, noting both Bela and Cassandra falling into step behind her. They watch her with their golden eyes, Bela’s expression serious, Cassandra glowering as if one breath away from spitting.
“Where shall we take her?” Daniela saunters as she walks.
“The dungeons,” Cassandra says.
“Library.” Bela cuts a warning look her sister’s way.
“Do I have a say here?” Grace asks.
“No,” all three reply in unison.