HERETIC'S CRY
ACT ONE, CHAPTER ONE
" THE ACT YOU CALL LOVE."

GOD, LIKE MANY OTHER PARENTS, PLAYS FAVORITES. Some he nurtured with the soft skin that covered the curvature in his palm. Holding the cheeks of his children as their skin was swallowed in his grip. Soft, silent comforts were placed upon them as they knelt on their knees in the name of their father. Some felt his warmth, the comfort of his being, as he wrapped himself around them. The feeling of suffocation that smothers over your skin, warping it tighter over your bones, is lost in his presence. It's lost in the act that you call love.

Elizabeth Hawthorne lies in the cold, the heat of her breath fogging the glass of the door as she gazes in. Aching for the heat of the fire that billows softly. Low pleas rip from her throat despite her barely making a penetrable noise. A dirt-covered palm festering with dry, cracked skin hovers over the door handle. She doesn't try to open it. It's never been open, at least for her.

Aching for her father's comfort, the mere thought of his warmth subdues the pricks on her bare skin. Although the only heat she will feel is the rash of the sun-blistered skin—it's an insatiable fever that runs through her. Like a mutt, no matter how many times she has been kicked down, she always comes crawling back. Bloodied and bruised by god's brutal treatment she believes is love, yet with each scrape and cut, she's starting to lose her faith.

The splint wood of the back of the pews bites into the skin of her wrists. Nails pinching her palm as her hands tighten together. Grime of dirt painted with blood finds comfort under her nail beds.

Bridge her nose nestling into the gap between her joined hands, almost moulded for her moments of repent. A tingle spreads over the space her mouth opens against as a soft exhale.

"forgive me father, for I have sinned."

It's a momentary warmth, a temporary comfort. A feeling Elizabeth hadn't fully understood if she had felt before.

There was always a weight on her body, curving at her spine, printing the soft skin of her back as a child. It contorted her in a way that she felt so young, that she would never truly recover from. No amount of time or effort or blood would fix her.

But it was enough, residual warmth of her body and blood of other people that she wore in penance — it was kinder than the Texas heat that cured her skin when she was a child.

She wasn't the one being hurt this time , and that's all that mattered.

Wind shakes the weathering structure of some church she had found on her way. Even the once white coloured walls losing their faith, as its coated with a bitter tarnish.

Severing itself from the dying wood, yet it still hangs there, or it falls onto the floor. It never truly escapes, you never do.

Elizabeth's stomach doesn't churn as viciously as it should, her mind replaying the last few hours of her life.

The only thing that draws sick up her throat is the image of those girls — their eyes as wide as hers once were. So much fear, too young to feel it. She recognised it because she knew it.

She had killed those people because like her, their father didn't protect them. Instead he cradled the faces of the men who had hurt them, he kept them safe instead. It's a blur, she never truly remembers what she does — in hindsight, it doesn't matter.

They're dead, and they're free.

Her body doesn't quake as she can feel the tension of the wooden seat tighten under new weight. Elizabeth's confession rings out in a soft breath,

" how young this time?" the monotone voice hums, the brunette pulling back her head and letting her hands slip down to sit on her lap.

Flecks of desert dust brush against the denim of her jeans as she shakes her head. Eyes fixed on the crooked cross that sits at the front of the altar.

"twelve at the youngest, if I had to guess." she breathes out, the bile of nausea crawling up her throat. It's not her face that gives her away, it's the soft crunch of her mouth as she forces it away.

Amanda Waller turns her head, looking at the bowed eyes of the woman beside her, " hits a little to close to home, I see?"

The sound of a whine parading in the muffled scoff she lets pass through the small gap between her pursed lips. She doesn't talk about it, people guess and some lie closer to the reality than others. But Elizabeth Hawthorne made a vow to herself. Just stop it from happening to others.

" remember how I said I would turn a blind eye to your...extracurricular activities if you helped me out once in a while?" the older woman hums, voice pointed as the younger turns to her.

Eyes pinching slightly, as she exhaled.

"what do you need?"

ELLIE SPEAKS
happy first chapter!! hope you enjoyed

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