hisviciousvixen

[hisviciousvixen]

Hell's feminine upper echelon.

[hisviciousvixen]

Door Twelve: The Sciences

“The certain prospect of death could sweeten every life with a precious and fragrant drop of levity; and now you strange apothecary souls have turned it into an ill-tasting drop of poison that makes the whole of life repulsive.” ― Friedrich Nietzsche

~1633 - 1659 Palermo, Sicily.~

[Thofania d’Amado swung from the end of the hangman’s knot, the eyes of her daughter, Giulia Tofana watched the final twitch before she watched her mother’s shoes sway in a slight circular pattern. The crowd was finally starting to disperse and she knew she couldn’t stay there any longer. She turned away from the gallows and walked back toward her home. It was time for her to move on, to move away from the wretched place that had claimed her mother’s life. She had been convicted and sentenced to death for poisoning her husband, her father. But he indeed had it coming.

Women were treated like possessions, bought and sold at auction. They were sold into loveless and abusive marriages, typically to older, wealthier men. Women had no financial or social power and often were left with very few choices where their future was concerned. They could get married, they could remain single and use sex to make a living or become a widow. And like her mother, most women chose the last option. Just a few short years after her mother’s death, she had found herself in one of those abusive and demeaning marriages. Her husband treated her like an object, he treated her like a thing that he could take out and play with whenever he wanted. When she became pregnant, she believed the abuse would stop, but it hadn’t. Her husband had caused her to have several miscarriages before she successfully gave birth to their daughter. While he was away on business, she managed to perfect what her mother had started. It had taken her years and now that her daughter was nearly at an age where she too would be considered for marriage, she put her plan in place. It took several doses and the performance of a lifetime, but her husband was dead. A terrible illness had befallen him, something he indeed contracted on one of his many trips abroad. Now a widow, she went with her daughter, Girolama Spara, to Naples and then Rome. The two of them opened a small apothecary in the city where they sold cosmetics and tinctures to the women of Rome. Their small business had grown to also take on three additional employees. All women who were looking for a way to make ends meet. She gained a reputation as a friend to troubled women. The poison she perfected had been colorless, odorless and tasteless. Not an ounce could be detected after death. But those men…they deserved it. Aqua Tofana, became the name of the face cream she sold to the women who needed to escape. All it took was three or four doses and the women who suffered would be free. The first doses induced weakness and exhaustion. The second dose caused symptoms such as stomach aches, extreme thirst, vomiting, and dysentery. The gradual decline, however, would give the victim the chance to get his affairs in order, which usually meant ensuring that his soon-to-be-widow would be well taken care of after his death. With a third or fourth dose given over the next several days, the man would meet his fate. She saved countless women with her “skin cream.” And she never would have guessed she would have been betrayed by a woman with a bowl of soup. A young woman had come to her, begging for her assistance. She said her husband had been having an affair, they had been forced to marry and she hadn’t loved him, but she wanted to be free. She told her that she found love elsewhere, but leaving wasn’t an option. So, she sold her a bottle of Aqua Tofana. Once the bottle left her shop, it was in God’s hands. She didn’t want to know who or what became of either the husband or soon to be widow. Except this time, when the wife served her husband the bowl of soup with his first dose, she had a change of heart and begged him not to eat it. With the husband’s suspicions growing, he beat her into a confession that she had poisoned him. He took her to the authorities where she had been tortured again and finally she gave up the name. Giulia Tofana.

Attempting to flee, she, her daughter and their three workers fled the area, but stopped at one last point and emptied the last of the containers of Aqua Tofana into the town’s water supply. They fled to the sanctuary of the church, but it had been stormed and the five women were arrested and sentenced to be executed.

The night before the execution, while she was awaiting her fate, she heard a gentle, feminine voice coming from the other side of the door. Her voice was sweet, as though she could sing her to sleep with a comforting song if she wished. She said she was there to help her, she said that she was special, she said that she had known her from the time she was a child, but surely the woman would sound much older if that had been the case. Still, the voice had told her that she had a skill for science, for knowledge, awareness, understanding, but most importantly, she could ensure that she would live to see countless wonders in the future. But the price would be pain, pain that she was told she could endure because she was special, all she had to do was say yes. And so she did. She didn’t know what would await her, but when morning came, the five of them had been taken to the gallows, had ropes placed around their necks and when the floor opened beneath her, she expected to feel the pain come from the rope tightening around her neck, but that hadn’t been the case. She continued to fall, her scream echoing around, there was heat starting to blaze around her. She could feel her skin blistering, her nose filling with the scent of sizzling flesh and then she felt her body hit the ground and it felt as though all of her bones shattered at once. Her eyes opened slowly, the sounds of tortured screams could be heard all around her, but there was someone standing over her. He was tall and slender and his eyes were as black as pitch.

He grinned down at her and then she heard the soft voice she had the night before. “Berith…don’t be gentle.”]

~Present Day - Hell ~

[Another trip into the black sludge hall, she stopped at door twelve. It was covered in mold and decaying organic material and the smell was pungent and musty. She smiled as she pushed it open. Each of the four corners held something personal to Giulia. One corner contained her bed, her table and old-fashioned lamp and picture of her daughter. Another held several large bookshelves filled with books, journals and ledgers. The third was a scrapbook of pictures of her work, of her greatest hits throughout the years and each had names and dates scribbled beneath it. Nestor Lakoba Died:1936. Abram Slutsky, Died:1938 - Soviet spy. Nikolai Koltsov, Died:1940 - One she had been particularly proud of. Nikolai Koltsov was an esteemed Russian biologist and geneticist during a Marxist regime that rejected the field of genetics by claiming that it supported fascism, racism, and eugenics. He died unexpectedly. And Jonestown. In the last corner of the room was where Giulia could most often be found. She was standing in front of her tables and shelves which had lights, tubes, liquids, specimens and all sorts of things that she couldn’t even begin to understand.] Hello, my dear. [She watched the dark-haired woman's head lift and she turned to look over her shoulder. She smiled and the gesture was returned.] I think it’s time we get you out of the basement. [She could see the excitement grow in the demon eyes of her deadly scientist. “A job?”] So much more than that, love. You’re going to be responsible for broadening the minds of some very gifted children. [She watched Giulia’s smile grow even wider and she knew she didn’t need to do any more convincing. She allowed the location of her school to invade her scientist’s mind before turning to take her leave. The door remained open, the contents of the room relocated to the school. Another room to be claimed. Another position filled. Eleven more to go.]

#TDATD #Diabolical

[hisviciousvixen]

Door Thirteen: The Caretaker

“Evil is a point of view.” - Anne Rice

~ December 30, 1884 - Austin, Texas ~ [It was late into the night when he walked along the shadowed street, just west of Shoal Creek. Not a single human being walked those streets, but the demons in his head were loud. The whispers started to increase in volume and he knew the moment his feet stopped in front of 901 West Pecan street, he had found what he was looking for. The single story building was easy enough to enter without too much noise and as he walked along the hall, he stopped to open one door and then another. The voices in his head silenced the second he opened hers and saw her asleep in her bed. She had been the only one home that evening. Mollie Smith, early twenties, mother of two Widowed.. She looked entirely too peaceful when he considered what she had done. He made his way over to her bed and lifted his right hand high above his head. The ax came down, he cut through the air and landed the edge in a wet thud, her shoulder gouged. Her eyes popped open, he could see the light hues even in the dimly lit room. She didn’t even manage a scream before the ax was up, and came back down and connected with the center of her chest. The walls were covered in a thick, dark red spray by the time he had finished And those voices were silenced at last. He reached down, grabbed Mollie by her wrist, dragged her out of her bed, down the hall and out into the backyard. He positioned her just the way he wanted her before he wiped his ax clean and left through the small wooden gate in the back of the house.]

~ May 7, 1885 - Austin, Texas ~ [On another one of his late night strolls, he walked along the central railroad track that led into the southern part of the city. He came up along San Jacinto and Cypress streets, those voices told him to turn his head. A small cottage sat right up along the track. He turned and walked through the yard and entered through an unlocked door in the back. He passed by all three of the children that were fast asleep, but he stopped once more in front of the final door. It was to be Eliza Shelley’s turn. Every swing of his ax took another chunk of flesh out of Eliza’s twitching body and he hadn’t stopped until the edge of his blade tore through the mattress beneath her. He spent several moments alone with Eliza before he positioned her, turned and left the house as quietly as he had entered it. Eliza hadn’t screamed nearly as much as the two servant women he had brutalized the month before. Clara Strand and Christine Martenson, both in their twenties, stabbed multiple times, but he left them alive.]

~ May 23, 1885 - August 30, 188 - Austin, Texas ~ [He had visited several women during the span of the last few months. Irene Cross, mother to John, stabbed repeatedly, dead. Rebecca Ramy, mother of Mary, murdered by ax. He was torn between his beloved ax and the closeness the knife guaranteed him. He enjoyed both even though he knew he couldn’t take his ax every time. His midnight strolls had begun to draw attention and that would surely get him caught.]

~ September 28, 1885. Austin, Texas ~ [He had waited and agonized for four long months. He couldn’t take it anymore. He didn’t care if the law would catch him. The voices had become desperate and although he was a strong man, he couldn’t fight them off any longer. Orange Washington, twenty-five, met his demise at the end of twelve blows from his ax. Gracie Vance, twenty, Orange’s girlfriend and mother to their two year old son, died from a single blow from his ax to her skull. Lucinda Boddy and Patsy Gibson, guardians of four children. Multiple stab wounds to the head and body. When he retired to his home that evening, he felt as though he had been able to breathe for the first time in a long time. All of those horrid people were gone. The world was a better place.]

~ December 28, 1885 - Austin, Texas ~ [Susan Hancock, forty-one, wife of Moses Hancock, mother of Lena fifteen and Ida ten, struck with an ax while she slept, dragged into the backyard, posed and left. He knew that he needed to end their lives or terrible things would happen.]

~ December 24, 1885. - Austin, Texas ~ [Eula Phillips, mother of Thomas, wife of James Phillips Jr. Struck with an ax while she slept, carried into the backyard, posed and left. Once he had returned home, he had cleaned himself up and had laid in his bed as he enjoyed the silence in his mind. He wondered how long he had bought himself this time. But then he heard a laugh coming from the corner of his room. He lifted his head, the woman sat there and stared a hole through him. She was pale and had the lightest blonde hair he had ever seen. It hadn’t been pulled up like most of the women he had known. It was wiry. And her eyes were the palest shade of blue. They looked like ice. She had said that he was special. That he could see things others couldn’t. She told him that she had a job for him, but if he agreed, he would feel pain and agony, but it would make him stronger, it would teach him loyalty and love. She said she had a place for him. The decision seemed like an easy one. And so he accepted her offer.]

~ Present Day - Hell ~ [She walked along the scorched hall, keeping to the center. The walls were covered in a wet black sludge that she wanted no part of. She hadn’t always cared about things like that, but she had intended on seeing her Knight after she was done and she didn’t want to be dirty. She much rather his hands cause those marks. She walked past twelve doors. Each had precious hidden gems, but tonight the one she was looking for was lucky number thirteen. Was he the worst she had in her collection? Absolutely not. But he was devoted and loyal. A set of old keys appeared in her hand and once she turned it in the lock, she heard the clanking give in and the seal on the door broke and started to open. It might have looked like a dungeon on the outside, but the inside was just what he wanted.] Hello, Cecil. [She grinned as he stood up and started to walk toward the center of the room. She met him halfway. “Do you have any use for me, ma’am.?” She smiled and nodded.] Yes, my friend. I certainly do. And we’re going to be leaving your ax behind. [She grinned. “Ma’am?” She nodded.] Indeed. You did so well protecting those children back in Austin, Cecil. And I need you to look after mine. They must be protected at all costs, do you understand? [She smiled. “I did what I had to. Those mothers were horrible. They didn’t care for their children. They didn’t give them the love and attention they needed. It wasn’t fair!” She brought her hand up and shushed him softly.] I know. I know all about what you did. You were just the protector those babies needed. And now, I need you to go to my school and watch my babies, Cecil. I need you to make sure they’re loved and cared for. I need you to make sure no harm will ever come to them. You must be willing to die for each and every one of them. [He nodded. That devotion in his eyes was so welcoming. “Yes, ma’am. No one’s gonna hurt them. I promise. Whatever you need, it’s done. Whatever they need, they’ll have. I’m willing and ready to give my life for them.” She smiled.] That’s what I wanted to hear. [She lifted her hand and touched his temple. The location of the school appeared in his mind and he bowed his head and vanished. She smiled.] Caretaker done. I will have my dream team.

[She smirked, vanished from the hall, the door left open, the room now vacant and waiting to be filled. But not tonight. She wouldn’t be late to see her Knight.]

#TDATD #Diabolica