Distract and Sedate | Hemlock Grove |

Chapter 24 | Monster |

Emma triple checks the kitchen floor for any hints of blood. They've scrubbed it until the linoleum and carpet are clean, but she still worried they'd missed something. It's only a half-hour before the sun rises that Finn leaves with the body. He hadn't told her what was going to happen to it, and she didn't particularly care.

"You good?" He asks.

"Yeah, yeah."

"Do you want to grab some things and go? I'm sure you're tired..."

"I'm going to come later," Emma says and rubs at her face. "I am tired, though."

"Are you sure it's safe?"

"My mom will be home soon," she assures him.

Her mom is home soon. Roman is long gone before she unlocks the front door, and Emma hides in her bedroom. Her heart beats so fast she swears it could give out. She listens as Kay locks the door and kicks off her shoes. She can hear her walk to the kitchen, then the subtle noise of the fridge opening and closing.

There's a silent moment where Emma fears that they had missed something. Some speck of blood or a footprint. Then the stairs creak and her mother's bedroom door closes. Emma lets go of the tension she had been holding and falls back into bed.

Finn had repeatedly told her not to worry about her mother. It didn't work. She covers her eyes with her hands and thinks. Nothing comes to mind and she feels helpless. If anything happened to her mother she'd never forgive herself, that much she knows.

At some point she drifts asleep, only to wake in a panic. Emma's drenched in sweat and with a strange taste in her mouth, but she's unsure why. Whatever she had dreamt about left her feeling anxious and stressed.

She should have gone to see Destiny before doing what she'd done.

There was a tinge of a memory from her last class in school. Something from a book she never finished reading. Dr. Lowenstein's class was equipped with a long list of books for the semester. Most of them were for later in the semester, long after her injuries.

Emma hadn't tried to read a book since she had gotten back home. She hadn't expected to her casted arm to be such a nuisance. Gripping the old tattered book with one hand, she flips through it. Nothing, nothing, nothing, aha!

[ Druids also made a "hedge," the airbe druad, round an army, perhaps circumambulating it and saying spells so that the attacking force might not breakthrough. If anyone could leap this "hedge," the spell was broken, but he lost his life. This was done at the battle of Cul Dremne, at which S. Columba was present and aided the heroic leaper with his prayers. ]

She'd be embarrassed about her attempts had she not been so desperate. She has to try something. So, she does the only thing that has ever made her feel a little closer to Peter and Roman's world.

If anyone walked in, they surely would believe she was performing some Satanic ritual. There are strange doodles on the walls of her bedroom- odd shapes from the fairytale books her professor had lent her. She doesn't know what they mean- if anything at all. Instead, a gut feeling guides her shaking hand to copy them. When her cuts seem to exhaust, she moves a few inches at a time until reaching her palm.

[ "The person that was crying abroad is the villain who has your cattle bewitched; I brought her to the house, but she was not able to come to the door on account of that horseshoe." ]

If all the strange things Destiny had done worked, why wouldn't this?

When she comes it's later into the afternoon. Roman's still at work, and the only person there seems to be Anna. Emma lets herself in and is greeted by a grumpy 'humph' from the kitchen. She moves past it, unfazed, and upstairs.