Reckless

Chapter 3 Part 2

Character POV: Roxanne

1661 A.D.

I walk out of the building, the physician following behind me. I hold three vials of liquid in my hand as I ask him uncertainly, "You're sure that this laudanum will help?" I have visited the future only a few times, just enough to pick up their language, not enough to pick up anything useful as far as medical advances go.

"I am. It will cure your ails, Mistress," he promises. "And should you need more, I shall be here and can give it to you." He smiles kindly, ever trying to help his patients with the limited knowledge of the day. I incline my head to him in farewell, heading off down the road away from his abode. My cottage is on the outskirts of town, to try and avoid drawing unwanted attention. But I may have to move. An old pastor has moved into town, bringing with him the zeal for the witch trials that are sweeping England and Europe. It won't be long before he hones in on me, an unmarried woman who does not attend church and yet is able to support herself and lives by herself. If I were wiser, I might have chosen a mortal husband and masqueraded as a normal person, putting up with him until he died. But it didn't feel authentic to who I am. It would be a slow suffocating death of my soul. But is this any better, this laudanum? The physician swears by it. So, I might as well give it a go.

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It's after about six glasses of liqour mixed with this laudanum that the memories that haunt me beginning to fade a little bit. Everything around me slows down and stills. I look around the room sluggishly, feeling like a bug trapped in amber, fixed in this moment that I never have been as an immortal being. And if the physician was here, I might kiss him for this. That's the last thought that enters my head as I begin to grow very sleepy. And I know, deep down, that I will be back for more.

When I come to, the morning rays shining through my window, it takes me a few moments to get my bearings as I wince against the throbbing headache assaulting my senses. I see the stack of envelopes with my leader, Analize', neat script scrawled across them. They are orders, assignments she has for me, but I have no desire to go and protect magical creatures from Vampires who might use them to gain more power for their kind. I have no desire to do almost anything.

Except one thing. I have the extreme desire to never be put on a pyre again by a man who thinks it is his divine right to tell a woman how to live her life, and if she refuses, to put her to death for daring to stand up against the biased rules of the patriarchy. And maybe it is the fake courage given to me by the medicine, but I rise from my chair with a plan on how to make sure that these monsters don't do what they did to me to anyone else ever again.