Introducing Mademoiselle Moore

[Madeline Heather Moore]

Never before had Maddie been so pale. She seemed so fragile, just a weak doll made of porcelain with no one to hold her aright. Her long curls whipped around her body; coiling and unraveling as her large haunted eyes stared up at the large iron gates in front of her. Nanny had tried to make her wear her bonnet but she had refused so now the mist was beginning to collect on her thick lashes and blur her vision, or were those tears? Madeline had never heard anything so cold as the sound of those gates closing behind her. She felt dead, cold and lifeless, but there was also a terrible rage and desperate sorrow in her heart. Maddie feared that if she parted her dry lips that all of these emotions would come screeching up her throat like a clan of murderous banshees and break the eardrums of all who heard. She and Nanny stepped out of the carriage, her heels clicking on the damp ground as the front door opened.

[Estrella]

Estrella walked through the front room, her short hair dripping chilly water down her neck like icy fingers giving a cold caress. She had just had her weekly shower, and the guard who had been charged with escorting her group back from the Bathing Court had sent them away with a sleepy wave of the hand instead of escorting them back to their cells; he must have had the night watch yesterday. Estrella didn’t think anyone slept much the night before, as one inmate had kept the entire Asylum up with a manic screaming fit. She had been sent to the padded cell long after lights out had been called, and as a result, everyone, including the guards, had been a little more lethargic than they usually were.
Now, however, Estrella’s senses had been blasted awake after a spraying of freezing water. This morning she had been falling asleep in her watery soup; now she didn’t think she could fall asleep if someone offered her freedom. Too bad; she had been looking forward to taking a nap in her cell. Now she supposed she would just have to stare at the cracks in the wall to pass the time…
In fear of getting in trouble, the girls in Estrella's bathing group had decided to walk to their cells by themselves. The rest of the group had been Ward A residents, and Estrella had since been separated from them. Estrella was passing the large front door when she heard it; the clanging of iron gates slamming shut. Estrella jumped; she knew that sound very well. She had heard it thrice when her carriage had dropped her off here. Could that mean…
Estrella waited a moment, looking around. No one seemed to be coming, and she couldn’t hear anything. She was all alone.
She heard the clanging again, louder this time. Someone was coming to the Asylum, all right; they would be here in a matter of seconds.
Estrella looked around again; still no one. She bit her lip. Who was coming? Nobody usually arrived at the Asylum except for new inmates and staff members, and the staff members usually arrived in the morning to switch out with the night guards. It was late afternoon, which meant that… yes, a new inmate was arriving.
The clanging rang again; even through the thick wood, Estrella could hear it, louder than ever. The last of the gates had shut; the new arrival would be at the threshold of hell within seconds.
Estrella wrung her hands, looking around for a third time. Still nobody. Tears welled in her eyes; what should she do? She didn’t want to get in trouble, but… oh, how she wished someone had warned her. Maybe Estrella could help her escape her Chaser, maybe they could climb over the gates, run back to the city together…
Before Estrella could stop to think about the consequences of what she was about to do, she grabbed the large handle and pulled the heavy door open.
A beautiful young girl of about seventeen stood there, with an older woman clad in gray. Estrella didn’t know who or what they had expected upon arrival, but she didn’t care; she only wanted to warn.
“Leave,” she whispered before they could say anything. Estrella stepped forward and took the hands of the younger woman in her own. “Get out; leave, now, get out!” she said, tears running down her face. “This place… it’s not what you think. Es infierno. ¡Vete, vete!”*

//OOG: * “It’s hell. Go, go!”

[Wynter Willow]

Wynter was just coming in from her walk having heard the crashing of the gates. Her hair loosely tossed around her shoulders, her navy frock slightly wrinkled and her bare feet dirty from sitting in the garden.
She had just rounded the corner of the asylum when she heard a scream and saw Estrella, whome she had not seen in weeks, grab a hold of the girls wrist speaking hastely to the girl and the older woman. "This isn't going to turn out well," she murmured to herself as she walked at a faster pace to grab Estrella before Madam or her own husband got there.
"Estrella!" she called out to her when she was within ear shot.

((OOC: Might as well make one entry into the asylum really interesting and include most of our cast of lovely characters. If bramsfield or Madam would like to step in please do.))

[Madeline Heather Moore]

Madeline looked around her. These girls seemed so pale. They reminded her of Willies, ghosts of girls who had been betrayed by lovers and killed themselves. But instead of being betrayed by lovers they had been betrayed by the world. This is where most of them came to grow up, where they came to die. This fact hit the frail girl and she let out in a shaky whisper. "Who are you? And what is this place?" She looked round and looked at Nanny. "Nanny take me home... take me home to Sasha and Papa." When the older woman began to shake with sobs Maddie's eyes turned dark. "Dieu damn you, you insufferable bitch! Me prendre la maison! Me prendre la maison!" She reached out and grabbed the woman by the hair and shook her as Nanny twisted to the ground in a storm of wails and cries. When Maddie finally let go of the undone woman. She collapsed to the soil as well her hands grasping the ground and her shoulders heaving. "SASHA!!!!! SASHA!!!!! Sasha mon amour vous m'avez condamne aussi!" Nanny crawled forward and held the girl to her, letting her dress be soaked through with her tears.
"This was not my choice... please forgive me Mademoiselle. Forgive me!"
Madeline did not look up but let out in a hoarse voice, "I hope to someday forgive you Nanny, if I can find it in my heart. The only problem is my heart was Sasha and he is dead. I have damned everyone I have ever loved and I have loved you as a mother as you have loved me as a daughter. So you are damned too." She pushed herself away from the woman. "Leave me..." The woman rose and, as she continued to sob, left her charge there and rode out of the hellish gates.


//oog: * God..., Take me home!, Sasha my love you have damned me too!(french)

[Dr. Edward Gideon Bramsfield]

A soft hand laid itself against the sobbing girl's shoulder, but it was not that of the old woman who had until moments ago been caressing the young new inmate. The hand was cold. Cold, bony, and smeared with dried blood.

"Poor girl... do come inside and share some tea with me..." A soft, high voice, characteristic of a noble englishman but also not unfitting of the irishman to whom the tembre and accent belonged, drifted across the air as light as a newly hatched butterfly.

Softly, Doctor Bramsfield turned the girl to face him, and hauled her up from the grass. "Of course, this is not a question or a matter of whether you want to or not. Follow me. Or I will find many pleasurable methods of making you... well... pleasing to me at least." He laughed hauntingly as she got the first glimpse of the terrible doctor.

Dressed from head to toe in pristine white, the only colour other than his shocking ginger hair was the deep, unmistakeable red-brown of human blood that drenched the cuffs of his jacket and splattered itself on almost every visible surface of his lab clothes.

[Wynter Willow]

Wynter sighed as she grabbed a hold of Estrella's hand. "Come on chica, let's get you to your cell," she said kindly to the girl. God knows what she had gone through in the asylum when she was not near her and she didn't want some chaser to see it fit to punish her because of her outburst. She hoped her husband would be too wrapped up in the new girl to notice her taking Estrella back to her cell herself.
She gave the new girl a sympathetic look and began to pull Estrella towards the asylum doors.

[Madeline Heather Moore]

Madeline watched the girls turn to leave. They were so different, were they insane as well? They didn't look it, just haunted and tired. But then again if you looked at Maddie she wouldn't either. She then remembered the presence in front of her. As she lifted her heavy head to look at him her body stopped trembling in fact she went stone still. The copper hair looked so much like her fathers and uncannily like the blood that had spilled out of Sasha's lips as she kissed him one last time. The color of her death and her hate. She lifted her head and looked him dead in the eye. He was so cold and he strangely reminded her of a grandfather clock, tall, strong, and foreboding, filling one with a sense of anxiousness, like sneaking out of bed at night praying you were not caught. She was curious about him. Would he hurt her? In more ways than one she supposed. She began with a voice stronger than before, "Excuse me if I ask for your name Monsieur. You are a doctor, non?"

[Wynter Willow]

((OOC: We haven't left yet.))

[Madeline Heather Moore]

//oog: Sorry! I thought you did. I changed it.

[Dr. Edward Gideon Bramsfield]

"My name is of no importance to you. You need only call me master." He instructed in a firm voice as a leash was clipped to her slender neck, smelling of pheromonal fear and of blood, and he tugged her along at a close distance to himself, a pair of manacles dangling from his free hand to imply that he would gladly use them given the chance. She was just another girl. And as badly as it would hurt his aching, destroyed body, he knew he'd have good fun with her in the absence of his wife. After a few long yards wandering up the staircase to his office, he paused and turned to her.

"And to answer your question, no. I am not a doctor. Nor am I a master. I am YOUR doctor, YOUR master, and furthermore, the proud owner of this fine establishment. Welcome, you wretched whore, to The Asylum for Wayward Victorian Girls." He gestured upwards to the wall of the front hall, upon which hung two large portraits, the first of which depicted a cruel, raven-like young man, evidently named "The Late Doctor Montmorency Stockill," and the latter portrait portraying none other than the chiselled, worn down old, proud lion who was currently tugging the girl along up the wide and polished wooden staircase.

[Estrella]

Estrella let herself be led away by Wynter. Her whole body felt numb, from the adrenaline rush of warning the girl to the terror of seeing the doctor and worrying if he would punish her. The nausea and dizziness that was accumulating in her small body let her know that an anxiety attack was coming on; she tried to fight it. She muttered the Hail Mary prayer under her breath, focusing on the words, trying to numb out her brain. But it was no use; the anxiety was upon her. The worrying, the fear, it sent her mind into a frenzy. She sank to her knees, grabbing her head and crying. Aye Dios, what would happen to the poor girl behind her? Or her, for that matter? Why was she here, why would God do this to her? Estrella continued to sob, and the cold wind continued to blow.

[Wynter Willow]

Wynter sank to the steps with Estrella taking her into her arms. "It's ok sweetie," she whispered to her. "You'll be okay, nothing bad is going to happen from this."
She huged the girl tighter just to make her realize she was there for her. She pulled back a bit noticing Estrella had recently been given a bath and because of that was still soaking wet. "Let's get you dried of and back to your cell, Okay?"

[Estrella]

Estrella swallowed and tried to slow her breathing. She began to take deep, slow breaths that came from the bottom of her abdomen. She chanted her familiar prayers under her breath, willing herself to focus on the words and the words alone. Eventually she gathered enough energy to lower her hands from her damp scalp and stand up slowly, giving Wynter a small smile. If the redhead said things would be okay, they would.
“Gracias, mi amiga,”* she said to Wynter. And she began to walk through the doors back to her cell.

//OOG: * “Thank you, my friend.”
We’re not allowed to control characters, so I’m assuming that Wynter is escorting Estrella through the doors back to her cell. Just tell me if you'd like something changed.//

[Jinny]

Jinny watched the whole scene take place from under a small shrub in the front courtyard. She watched the new girl and matronly woman arrive, the young dark-haired girl speak to them, the new girl’s outburst and the departure of the older woman, and the arrival of the redhead and the doctor who had smelled of blood. What had intrigued her most, however, was the fact that the youngest girl had tried to warn the newcomer about the horrors that took place in the Asylum; she had risked her own safety and sanity (or what remained of it) to try and help a complete stranger. As the girl and the redhead turned to leave, Jinny decided to follow them; she snuck into the Asylum through one of the many cracks in the walls and proceeded to sniff the air, eventually catching the girl’s scent and letting her nose lead the way.

[Wynter Willow]

Wynter stood with Estrella and led her inside the asylum back to her cell, stopping once to grab a dry slip and a blanket for her.

((OOC: Make a thread as your cell Estrella))