Judith Goodhope || Mother's House of Horrors

The Queen of Swords

It took weeks for any memories of that night to come back at all.

Crashing through a second-story window onto a dusty carpet.

Stalking the halls of the house. The house somehow there and not there.

Confronting Mother. Mother somehow there and not there.

Judith Goodhope, the Queen of Swords, in whatever monstrous form Mother had made of her, had found her path through Mother's maze. She had seen where her journey would end. By the time she found Mother she had seen how things would go.

Mother a monstrous figure herself. Itself.

Mother's eyes.

Judith had known. Mother could not be stopped, could not be killed, certainly not by sad and mournful Judith Goodhope.

Judith's eyes. All three of them. Triangulating light, and darkness, and time.

But Mother also couldn't be killed because Mother was already dying. Mother's power was great, but it was temporary. And collecting her children here, transforming them, calling them, willing them to acts of violence and bloodshed, all of that had spent Mother's power. For this year, at least. 

Across the house, the others called were confronting Mother too, confronting each other, trying to fight or trying to fawn. Judith saw them all. The cards rarely predict the future. They moreso reflect the present. Judith's sight opened to take in a picture of the present so full, so complete, that she saw them all.

Mother's wicked, wicked smile.

Mother had gifted Judith this sight. This sight so complete that she could even see Abigail.

No memories came back after this moment. Not until Judith woke the next day. By then, Mother was dead again, though she would be back. She always came back.

But Abigail would not come back.

Abigail, too, Judith knew now at long last, was dead.

The Queen of Swords: a woman of power and courage, but a woman of war, and thus, a woman of mourning.