Foxfire: Veil of the Nine Phantoms

22: Whiteout VII - The Don Jail

December 25 - Melanie

We flew silently above the masquerade enforcers, watching them as they walked the yuki-onna north toward the nearest portal to the retroscape, which was a short way up in Corktown, an old working-class Irish neighbourhood with an industrial Victorian-era character. Soon we landed on top of a three-storey antiquated red brick building across from Little Trinity Anglican church, the oldest surviving church in the city. We watched the enforcers enter the building and decided to wait for a few minutes to think of how to follow them.

There were two people left outside the church's door, most likely also masquerade enforcers who were there to guard the portal to the otherworld.

"I'll cloak us with an illusion so they'll think we're part of them," Hoshiko said. With a wave of her fingers, the fox woman's illusion magic made the three of us appear like young neatly dressed Caucasian women dressed in retro fashions, each of us holding long magic staffs.

We dropped down from the roof of the red brick building and walked toward the church's door where the two men eyed us directly. They were both robustly built, with stoic expressions and cold glares that expressed a no-nonsense tough-guy mentality.

Hoshiko casually showed them a badge and walked towards the church door, but one of the guards blocked her path.

"I haven't seen you around these parts before," said the guard. "Who are you?"

Hoshiko flashed a smile, "You have seen me before. In fact, you have seen me multiple times. I've been serving as a masquerade enforcer for five years."

The guard stared at her suspiciously, and I stole glances at both of the guards, apprehension welling inside me. Would they buy her lie?

The man's expression brightened, "Right then, you can come through," he said in an oddly cheerful voice that was a sudden departure from the serious tone he used before.

"Thank you very much," Hoshiko said, waving to the guards joyfully.

We went inside the church and after Hoshiko said the magic password we were out into the retroscape. There was a faint, but distinct energy in the air here, one that I had not initially noticed, but now that my magical senses were becoming attuned, I could feel that subtle shift in atmosphere, like I was wading through a light fog of magical aura that pervaded this parallel dimension's cityscape.

After a brief flight, the three of us arrived in front of the Don Jail, a grand building made out of rusticated stone that stood east of the Don River which was its namesake. I'd passed by the building many times in my youth since it happened to be right next to East Chinatown, so whenever my dad wanted to eat at his favourite Asian restaurants, I would always end up seeing the old jail's Renaissance Revival facade, and I'd look at it and ponder the grim stories of the many people who had been locked up inside. I had to wonder, of all the buildings in Toronto, why architects had decided to make the jail so pretty on the outside. Or perhaps architects back then simply made any building beautiful regardless of its purpose.

But while I thought the building was beautifully imposing previously, tonight there was a sinister air that I hadn't felt before. In my world there was nothing scary about the old Don Jail, it was part of a hospital, but the building I now approached had a menace as if to say all who entered had no hope of escape. Above the entrance, the carved face of Father Time silently judged criminals for their sins. Another pair of guards stood in front of the jail's door, but they weren't like the ones we met earlier. These had tired eyes and faces roughened by years of stress, and one of the guards had a large half-healed wound on his cheek, which I imagined was recent and most likely an attack by a violent jailbird who felt like lashing out.