With the exodus of the last of her house guests, Isolde slid the chain in place and locked the door. With a sigh of relief, she leaned against the cold wood and closed her eyes. When she arrived at the clinic in the morning, she was going to have a stern lecture for those who were still fortunate enough to show up for work.  Isolde walked through the room and turned off the lamps. How dare any of them tamper with resistance type activities so close to where innocent lives could be effected! she thought, angrily as she went into her bedroom. She jerked the pins from her hair and viciously began to untangle the snarl that lived on her head. How dare Erlind come in here like butter would melt in his mouth! she thought as she snatched the apron from her and wadded it into a ball. Her fingers tightened around the fabric as if they were tightening around his throat.<br/>"Okay, Isolde, " she muttered to herself as she washed her face in front of a cracked mirror, "admit that you wanted to find what you had had with Malachai" and be damned that she wasn't supposed to mention his name anymore. "You didn't. You were stupid and selfish when you cast the spell to conjur him back and when you to selfish spells, you know you reap the consquences three fold." She scrubbed her face dry with relentless strokes of the coarse white towel.<br/><br/>"You have no one to blame but yourself. He never promised he cared for you. You were just another morsel, no more than a bite of bread to feed his demon appetite." She scolded as she turned down the bed and slid into the cold white sheets. "Now, go to sleep. You are not a crusader. you are a nurse and you will not be any good on that front if you don't go to sleep. The whole world is on fire and going to hell in a handbasket. There is nothing you can do about that. So shut up and go to sleep."<br/><br/>Isolde was so tired that her back ached and her head ached and worst of all her heart ached. She plumped her pillow and turned out the bedside lamp. Laying rigidly on her back, Isolde didn't try to stop the scalding tears that coursed down her cheeks, wetting her thin pillow. Finally she fell into an exhausted sleep only to be haunted by dreasms.<br/><br/>"Now, Hiram, careful. In here,"<br/>Isolde turned over and listened groggily for a bit but soon drifted back to sleep.<br/>The creak of a cabinet. The shooshing of something scooting across the floor.<br/>Flashes of intermittent light.<br/><br/>"Now, Mishel, the book. Put him here."<br/>"Shalom"<br/><br/>Isolde sat bolt upright and looked all around but no sound, no heavy breathing.<br/>"These dreams. Erlind and Kristoff must have left evil energy around and it is haunting my sleep."<br/>She lay back down and immediately fell back to sleep, to dream.<br/><br/>"We go."<br/>More shooshing<br/>The loud click of the door.<br/><br/>This time, Isolde knew she had heard something. She turned the light on. Isolde was an immortal witch and had the power to blast an assailant to small bits as she had the soldier/demons in Darcy's castle. There was little she feared. Tossing back the blanket, she padded into the living room, switching on those lights. Nothing was out of place. Nothing had been disturbed. shaking her head, Isolde turned to go back to bed for a final time when she noticed the chain on the door, swinging freely.<br/><br/>With the dawn, Isolde rose from the remnants of a fitful sleep and made some tea. Today she would get to the bottom of this food and supplies as well as find out about the Reichmarks. She frowned into the mug. Both of these details, she suspected were lies, made up to frame her. She sat the mug down abruptly, making the air ring with the insult of intrusion .