Snippet #1940579

It had been but three hours since that arrogant wolf gust had left. The snow had stopped falling but the wind had picked up. She doubted that he would be back for the night and would probably return early morning if at all with her herbs. His arrogance and just plain idiocy is going to get him killed because Cordelia doesn't appreciate it when you disobey her.

It is not very known, not even within the wolf community, but her little charms are not the only thing she crafts. Using the bones of children, as they are most potent, she carves symbols and sculpts them into different shapes. They create disfigured objects that she uses for death curses. As soon as Gust had left she went outside to the back of her house and entered her secret cellar. It isn't large but its able to hold at least 6 people. At this point in time she had run out of her little ossa's and needed fresh bones.

As she opened the cellar door the wind picked up causing snow to flurry around her and sweep her coat up. Her hair that looked ghostly white in the light was swirling around and as the wind whistled through to the ones inside she probably looked like a banshee. Inside each in their own little cage sat 4 scruffy, shivering children. They had been the kids of a travelling merchant passing through. Because they had camped on the outskirts of the village she was given the chance to one by one steal the children. It caused distress among the party and they went to the villagers demanding to know who or what stole their children. Of course the villagers were too terrified to do anything but the merchant was beginning to go mad so went out by himself in search of them. In the end he met his demise at the jaws of another wolf.

These children had only their thin dresses, tattered coats and some old boots on. They were freezing but not enough so that they would die. No Cordelia needed her bones fresh and from one forearm bone she could carve four ossa's. As she descended the stairs the three girls and their young brother started to whimper. They each scurried to the back of their cages and held the other tight through the bars of their cage. Cordelia would never allow them to soil this place so a little pot was placed in each cell which she regularly disposed of. To Cordelia, being slightly insane, this was only natural and felt no disgust towards them when emptying the pots. Although it wasn't through kindness that she did anything for them. She would give them a fresh loaf to share each day to keep them alive. She took the small key from around her wrist and unlocked the cage that held the oldest child. The girl started babbling incoherently, her voice slowly rising in crescendo as she began to get more hysteric as Cordelia progressively unlocked the door and made her way inside. She held a basket with some items inside in the right hand and a glinting steel knife in the other. She placed down the basket and and knelt down. She waved the child over, of course the thing was terrified and shook her head vigorously.

"No!" she screamed in a nordic accent, "You are going to kill me! Take us home. I WANT TO GO HOME!"

Cordelia frowned. The child had no home to go to. How can she go home? Besides, Cordelia needed their bones. In a stern voice she told the child to come to her.

"You have no home to go to. I need you. Come here and it won't be painful. Disobey me and you will find yourself in unimaginable pain."

It wasn't the voice of someone cruel, just matter-of-fact. The child didn't know what to do so she pulled herself into the cradle position and cried into her knees. Still frowning Cordelia grabbed the child's arm and pulled her into her lap. At first she struggled but Cordelia's warm hands soothed her and she was crying into her dress. Taking a herb from the basket she lacquered it along the blade above the child's head. The child seemed to have given up, resigning herself to her fate. Gently she extended the child's arm out and laid it on the cold stone floor. She placed her free hand firmly on the child's arm to restrict her movement. Without even pausing she pressed the knife down at the elbow joint and severed the arm. The child screamed and convulsed but the herb quickly did it's job and numbed her body. She stopped thrashing and just lay there loudly sobbing. Swiftly he grabbed the bandages out of her basket along with some other leaves. She placed them firmly on the knob to stop the bleeding and deftly bandaged the wound. Blood had seeped onto the floor and was still flowing from the cut off limb. Taking a large folded sheet from the basket Cordelia placed it over the bloody spot and using a corner dabbed the severed end of the limb. She placed it into her basket and carefully removed the girls head from her lap. She would leave the sheet their as a reward for the girl for her limb. The others were in silence, trembling in the corners farthest away from her. They didn't dare speak. Cordelia stood up and exited the small cage and relocked it behind her. She had become so skilled at her task that she didn't even get a spot of blood on her clothes. Her hands were another story but that was unavoidable. She returned to the warmth of her cabin and went to work at creating the first ossa. She removed the hand first and placed it in a jar for another time, then she skinned the arm and went about cleaning it up. It wasn't long before all she had was the forearm, a clean white bone.

One fully complete ossa lay on her crafting table next to rest of the bone. Cordelia was standing over her cooking pot brewing a small meal with some of the flesh from the child's arm. She wasn't one for wastefulness. She spooned a bit of the broth into a small wooden bowl and sat down to her meal. Cordelia was a woman that because of her madness just did a job. She liked and disliked things but felt no emotion of an action completed. Her mind and emotions were things that she could control. Although lately the only emotion she had felt was irritation. And now with Gust still not returning she had started to fiddle with one of the ossa's. As she finished up her meal she had taken the steel knife from before and had the tip pressed gently into one of the symbols. She didn't know what she was going to do but it didn't take a psychic to figure out what would happen to Gust.

All of a sudden the knife was plunged straight into the ossa and Cordelia knew that Gust was dead. While she is carving the symbols she is in a state where she can't comprehend what she is doing. Once something has occurred to the ossa she is able to then read the symbols and determine what happened. As she was reading she raised an eyebrow. The one who killed Gust was coming here. The fool. They killed him with a steel knife, only achievable through a stab to the head. As she twisted the deformed bone she saw another symbol that represented voice and realised how the hunter managed to kill Gust. This person was a siren and if she was coming here Cordelia needed to know that she wouldn't be seduced. Rising from her chair she went to prepare herself for her guest. She grabbed the purple Isila flower and crushed it, she applied some rosemary and crushed some bamboo. She acquired the bamboo from one of her rare travels. She was gone for three months and it was very difficult to get a hold of this powerful plant in which she uses it sparingly. Finally she was left with a messy pulp. The last step was taking a red velvet pouch and placing the mixture in with a touch of sea salt. Complete she took the pouch and hung it from her neck with woven hair of some of the wolves that had died.

Now she was protected and she didn't have to wait long before she smelt the newcomer. It was female. This would be interesting