Chapter 25: The Thing In The Hall

She gripped the arm above where it had turned dark and massaged the arm until it oozed a stinking black liquid, then squeezed it again and again until it began bleeding red. "I need whisky," she said. Someone put a bowl beside her. She ran some thread through the whisky and threaded a needle, then put needle and thread in the bowl. Cherry took a knife and splashed it with whisky before cutting away the ragged ends of flesh hanging from Igor's arm. Powder from her bag dusted the cleaned end of the arm before she used the needle and thread to sew the wound closed. She ran her hand across Igor's forehead before putting everything back in the bag.

Wolf looked a Cherry, and for a brief instant he saw a very different person than the spoiled girl he'd first met.

"Are you going to tell me that a girl has no place here?" she said.

"I couldn't do what you did," Wolf said, "you belong here more than I."

She gave him a strange look, then walked away still carrying the bag.