Lightning lit the sky outside of the monastery, marking the hour for everyone to retreat back into the resting quarters. The abbess granted goodnight blessings, daring to let each lady and child kiss her delicate, but strong hands. After receiving her blessing, Theodora left the dining hall, hiding under the cloak. The rain poured heavily from the sky, like sharp, liquid bullets, seemingly designed to kill just like the disease plaguing the land. The darkness of this age deemed to be deadly and morbid, no matter the location, city, town, or country. This left Theodora disheartened as she made her way to her room for the night.

Although, she typically repressed her feelings, in such weather, she did not mind having small tears trickle down her rosy cheeks. Small sobs could not be heard through the weather. Her hand clutched her prayer rope, tightening her grip as she tried to control her tears, to make them stop dribbling down her face. She tried to think in prayer, but the dreary atmosphere kept haunting her thoughts, driving in ghosts of the past through her memories. It had been almost a year since she left for Hohenwart, and her mind had still not found a cure for herself. She felt alone, especially since the knowledge of the death of her family was still a fresh wound in her heart.

As her boots slushed through a puddle, she noticed a huge blaze, a fire. Bodies burning, most likely. Or a house had been struck by lightning. The cloud of smoke drank the rain water from the sky, and boiled through the night's landscape. The smell did not reach her, but she still wondered in fear. She continued walking, trying to think nothing of the fire. Her cloak began to soak, absorbing the heavy water crashing from the storm clouds overhead. Her hair was tucked nicely behind her scarf and cloak, but she could still feel the fingers of the rain knocking at her mind.

Most of the women hurried to their quarters. The nuns moved exhaustingly quickly. A few children cuddled close to their mothers, afraid of the demon night lurking around them. Theodora picked up her pace, casting her eyes away from the naive, innocent children. They did not understand the true nature of the disease and sin that viciously ate away at the heart, minds, bodies, and souls of the people around them, but nonetheless, they still hoped for a solution, a way to come out alive and loved. If it were not the fighting happening outside of the walls, it was the plague frothing the West or the weather drowning the lower village or casting fires from the sky. This was torture to these children, they knew no security besides the hearts of their mothers.

As Theodora reached her cell of a room, she opened the door, immediately dropping her body into its presence. She removed her cloak, and found herself in the most immodest clothing as possible. The night was cold, and so, in her dear immodesty, she was still heavily clothed. Her cloak was hung to dry, and her hair was let out of the scarf, but kept in a braid. She removed the blanket from her bag and some lavender oil. She draped the blanket around her and sniffed her nose over the now opened container of lavender oil, letting the aroma out her into a calming trance, as to better think straight. She wiped her damp face, from tears and rain. Tonight would be long.

Before going to bed, she brought out her pocket prayer book and began with the Trisagion. Her body bowed down several times throughout her prayer, to touch the ground, in metanoias. Her body quickly lingered into the bed after her prayers were completed. She let out a deep sigh and hoped she would be able to sleep. She had been needing less and less sleep as which by the days went, and admittedly, she was beginning to miss sleep and the need for it. She was starting to feel more like a monster than a human, and this, of course, worried her. 

She stared up at the ceiling, seeing the lightning flash through the sky, followed by loud hollers that roared across the heavens. The small pre-lit candle danced with the shadow demons tempting the poor, young maiden witch, and all Theodora could do was watch in an exhausted manner. So badly, she wished to play with the shadow people and leave this land to make more magic, but she knew it was wrong, she knew in her heart not follow the shadows. However, the scary fires gripping at the sky and the lightning scratching their bodies into the clouds made it harder for her to follow the light.