Annalise 

Annalise and Dawn scoured the garden for anything, any sign of her body. But there was nothing. The garden was well polished, no hide nor hair out of place. No signs of disturbance. If Vitus had actually buried her in this garden, he'd gone out of his way to make sure no one would find her.

Which she guessed made sense, but still he could have been kind enough to leave a hint or something. It was her own body he was hiding. Annalise followed Dawn around the garden, not really too sure what to do with herself.

Dawn seemed determined, self assured and like she knew what she was looking for. Everything Annalise, currently, was not. Besides, Anna was finding it hard to block out the noises coming from the house.

For the past few minutes, the sounds of scuffling, loud bangs and the occasional loud grunt or scream resonated throughout the garden from the cottage. With each noise Annalise would anxiously look back, like she could see through the walls to make sure they were okay.

She winced as a particularly loud bang rang out, echoing in her ears. The anxiety must have shown on her face, as Dawn stopped what she was doing suddenly. Turning to face her with a seriousness that didn't sit well on her face.

"Its fine," Dawn explained, with a look to the cottage, "If anything happens i'll be able to hear it, and i'll go help," A second loud clash sounded out, like a bunch of pots and pans falling at once. "See, they're fine." Dawn said, as if that brought any sought of comfort.

"Besides, its not exactly like we've just sent in a bunch of babies to get your friends back. They can handle their own," She continued. She then turned back round to the bushes she had been rummaging through, brushing her ponytail off her shoulders.

"What exactly are we looking for?" Annalise asked, curiously peeking over Dawn's shoulder. "Apart from my dead body. I meant, like, how do we find it?". Dawn straightened up, brushing the dirt off her hands. She began to wander over to the flower beds, looking over her shoulder to make sure Annalise was following.

"Typically, I'd say we'd be looking for fresh dirt, flies, maggots, any disturbance in the ground. But as you know, this isn't exactly a typical situation is it? Besides. Vitus is good at what he does." Dawn explained, as she marched the lines of flower beds. Scrutinising each one before moving on.

Annalise nodded for her to continue, even though she couldn't see it. "Vitus has a flair for the dramatic, his ego is about as big as mount Everest. It constantly needs feeding. So no doubt he's done something stupid to hide your body. There will be some sort of sign. It's just finding it," Dawn murmured, distracted with the flowers.

Unexpectedly she stopped in front of a bed of small lilac flowers, each petal crinkled in slightly, almost like a tiny star. "What's wrong?" Annalise asked, with a sense of foreboding tightening her chest.

"Petunias." Dawn whispered, kneeling on the ground in front of them. "..Hatred and resentment, that's what they mean in the language of flowers," Delicately Dawn brushed her hand against them, before she violently began to yank them up.

"Of course he would do something as stupid as this." Dawn cursed, her hands moving blindly quick to pull up the dirt. Thank god for her vampiric speed, cause Annalise didn't really feel up to helping right now. Her hands were shaking as she crouched down besides Dawn.

Within moments, a pile of discarded dirt and flowers laid beside them. Dawn, uncaring of how much dirt she was now covered in, kept going. She stopped abruptly, and Annalise closed her eyes for a brief moment.

"Anna," Dawn called softly, sitting back on her heels to look at what she uncovered. Baring all the guts she had, Annalise slowly opened her eyes to see what Dawn had found.

In amongst the scavenged dirt, just peeking out, was a lithe, pale hand. Annalise felt all the gusto leave her, and she deflated. "Jesus Christ," Annalise muttered, falling to her butt on the ground.

"I sure hope its not," Dawn uttered, trying to inject as much humour as she could into her voice. Which wasn't much considering the situation. Dawn reached out to touch the hand, removing the fingertips from where they were still encased in mud.

Quickly, she looked to Annalise's hands and back to the one in the ground. "We finally found you, Annalise.".

Annalise inched closer to inspect it. "It's me." She confirmed, feeling too much at once. On one hand, she had never seen a dead body before, the very first one she would see, is her own. On the other hand, god she wanted this all to be over with. To have a real life form, to be able to touch things again without having the chance of phasing through it. To eat real food.

She missed it all. She missed her mum too, and her brother, most of all. And maybe it was a pipe dream. But when they recovered her body and her soul returned, she could see them once again.

A piercing scream punctured the silence, stabbing her heart. She knew who's scream that was.

Mia.

There was a catastrophic loud noise, people shouting all at once. Without even thinking about it, she rushed to the cottage. Leaving Dawn behind with her body.  She could hear Dawn shouting for her to come back, but it wasn't enough to get her to return.

Annalise dashed past the dead guards, throwing open the two wide doors and storming through. She paused for a moment, stood in a quaint and delicate kitchen that had obviously been upturned in a scuffle. She took a moment to hear where all the noise was coming from, following it till it led her to a bunch of descending stairs.

When she finally got to the bottom of it, she rushed into the room. Eugene and Cassius  were standing closest to her. The room itself was very dungeon-esque, and it took a second for her to take it all in. Around the floor was a bunch of scattered bodies, blood draining into the tiles like rivers. On the furthest end of the room, stood a tall broad man, with 5 other people besides him.

He stood atop them all, towering with blonde hair so light, it was almost white. A scar crossed over his lip, giving him a more intimidating stature. Before she could think too much about who he was, her eyes glistened over to two people tied up in the far corner of the room.

"Mia, Noah." Annalise whispered mournfully, gazing at the bloody cuts on their wrists. A woman stood besides them, a long silver knife in her hands, dripping with blood. The few words she did speak seemed to gather the attention of everyone in the room.

"Annalise!" Eugene snapped. "What are you doing here!".

Mia looked up at the name, a dry speck of hope in her reddened eyes. "Anna?" she whispered. 

Authors Note:

Hey all! How are you? I hope you had a lovely Christmas, or a happy holidays. And Happy new year! I hope you liked this chapter, i took a tiny break for the holidays myself, just to celebrate. But now im back, better than ever. 

Love,

Sam.E

Word Count: 1263