Chapter Text
The fire burnt to embers and cold creeping in through the imperfect seals on the cottage windows, Mary Wardwell was gradually lifted from sleep by the chill, which started at her ankles and worked its way up. She stirred, her body attempting to throw off the stiffness of sleeping on a couch... and could not.
She startled fully awake, fear shooting through her, as she found her arms and legs bound, her mouth gagged. Past the fabric, she screamed, called out for help, but she knew it was pointless, given the isolation of her home. Her mind raced, trying desperately to hold back panic as she wracked her memory for clues as to what had brought her here. But despite all her straining, there was nothing, a long stretch of nothing, merely a milky blur that shimmered around the edges. She clenched her jaw, growling with frustration, until the whiteness slowly resolved itself into a carnival, to herself wandering around the place, considering the games...
But that had been days ago! It was of no use to her now.
Desperation mounted as she tugged at her bindings, her weeping growing stronger with every moment, and she begged her mind to be still, to be logical, and escape this situation, lest it somehow worsen. She ran through what she knew for certain: she was at home, where the fire had evidently been burning, meaning she had set it with the intention of sitting down to her evening's reading; the bindings on her limbs — she had almost worked the ties on her legs loose around the knee, but her elbows were still painfully locked together — were made of a fabric she hadn't kept in her home, meaning that whomever had tied her up had brought it with premeditation; from the scent on her gag, it was one of her own scarves, draped in the same subtle fragrance that her mother had worn throughout her childhood, meaning that it probably had been a spur of the moment addition to her imprisonment.
All this pointed to (bile rose up the back of her throat) a home invasion. But the valuables around the room all seemed undisturbed— what little she could see of the house anyway. And so the only target left was... herself. She felt no pain other than the bindings, and there was no sign of damage to her clothing. The creeping cold dread was rising up her face, numbing her ears. Had somebody tied her up, drugged her, and had their way with her? It would explain the amnesia, assuming it was unrelated to her regular blackouts of the past few months.
The burning in her throat was increasing fast, and her diaphragm had begun to spasm in terror and nausea; but she knew she must not vomit, or the gag in her mouth would likely choke her, leading to an even uglier death. Tightening her eyes, locking her jaw, clenching her fists, she took deep, pointed breaths, pictured herself in her beautiful places: the forests just outside of Greendale, the little wooden bridge across the river where she had skipped stones as a young girl...
With this concentrated effort, she calmed her body, reigned in her mind enough to become diagnostic once more. She was not bound to the couch, and so she could find her way to the kitchen, given enough time, and perhaps somehow use a knife on the bindings. Rolling carefully, she soon learnt that gravity had little interest in her comfort, and hit the wooden floor with a hardness that told her exactly where and how big her bruises were going to be. She took a moment to seethe, bringing up her knees to curl against the pain and consider how to proceed; it wasn't going to be graceful, but it could be done. Whatever horrible things her mind had blanked from her, both now and before, she had survived them. And she would be damned if she was going to give up now, lying like a worm before her couch.
But before she could begin her awkward manoeuvring, a low female voice sounded from behind her:
“Well. She really is a thoughtless brat, isn't she?”