Author's Note: First of all, my apologies for not having this in the Times for a few weeks . . . it's summertime and I've been busy. In case you have forgotten what's happened, here is a quick recap.
Marie's sister Anya comes down with the plague and soon dies from the posses physician letting to much blood. Marie's mother is furious with her after Marie tells her that she made a deal with God that she would trade her sister's life for Marie's sin to be forgiven and the plague to be no more. Her mother yells at her to get out of the house and Marie is left with no money or nothing, forced to roam around her village . . . we join her now just after she has been thrown out of her home.
I walked down the cobblestone path in the dim morning light. Fog hung heavy over my head. The sun was just starting to rise.
Children were in the streets dancing around singing.
"Ring around the rosie. Pocket full of posies. Ashes, ashes we all fall dead"
The children chanted as they fell to the ground.
There were doors marked with red x's to signify where plague victims were. No one could enter or leave the house aside from priests and physicians.
I was starving. I had no money for food. I walked past the few shops that were open, delicious scents filled my nose as I passed a bread stand.
I looked around, no one was around . . . and the bread was just right there. Surely the owner wouldn't notice a loaf or two gone . . .
After making sure no one was looking, I grabbed two loafs of bread and stuffed them in my apron.
"Hey! Arretez!(Hey! Stop!)" A man shouted from behind me.
I looked back to see a market guard running toward me.
Picking up my long dress, I bolted as fast as I could down an ally. I lost the guard for a moment but I could still hear his cries from a little farther behind me.
Just before he rounded the corner where he was to spot me, I ducked into the closest house not noticing the red "x" on the door.
I watched through a crack in the door as the man stopped in the ally where I was just standing, looked around, and ran off in the opposite direction.
I let out a sigh of relief.
Turning around to get a look at my surroundings, I smelt the horrid odour I had smelt when Anya was sick. The smell of death. Walking into the bedroom of the house I was in the smell grew stronger and stronger.
Then I saw them. A mother, a father, and a baby.
Dead.
Their bodies eaten away by the disease were black.
That's when I knew that I had entered a plague house.
Then I smelt a different scent . . . it took me a moment before I realized what it was.
Gasoline.
They were about to burn the house . . . with me in it!
-ocean10kv
Author's Note: In the time of the plague, they would often just burn the house with the dead plague victims inside to stop the spread of the disease.
