witching hour prompt 2!

TW: CHILD ABUSE, ATTEMPTED MURDER (STRANGULATION), LOSS OF JOINTS.

“You…”
The girl looks towards Emily, fearful. “Please don’t-” She starts, crawling backwards on her hands and knees. “Please don’t tell anyone that I’m alive. Please, please don’t tell him that I’m alive. I’m begging you. Please.”
Emily, confused, walks towards her. “I promise that I won’t tell anyone! Someone tried to kill you? Why? Who did it? Who did it, I’ll make sure that they pay for it, trying to kill someone is such an awful thing…”
The girl seems confused, squinting at Emily while shuddering, holding herself and trying not to be sick. “...What’s your name?”
“Emily. Nice to meet you!” She holds out her hand to shake, but the girl doesn’t take it.
“Emily…” The girl pauses for a long time, trying to figure out how to say what she wants to say. “Emily, my name is Amity. And it was you. You put your hands around my neck.”
~

It’s so late, and Amity is so tired.  She’d been brought to the horrid room by the leader and his cronies, left there to wait for whatever fate she’d been dealt. This is all a bad dream, she thinks, isn’t it? All I need to do is close my eyes, look down at my hands and back up again, go into a coughing fit, hear…
A scream.  It pierces the air, bringing her back to reality. It’s agonizing, it’s drawn out, and she fears that it’s a warning. A warning of what comes next, a warning of what she’ll be going through.
As they open the door, she can smell something burning.
The door is locked, priests standing guard behind her. The room is lit by candelabra, making her eyes that were once so well-adjusted to the dark burn. She squints.
Out of the corner of her eye, she spots a child. They can’t be more than nine or ten, she thinks, and as they draw closer the burning smell intensifies. They’re holding hands with the leader, in a somewhat peculiar way.
When Amity’s eyes widen, she realizes why. One of the kid’s fingers are missing.
“What did you DO to them?” Amity screams, knowing full well it won’t do any good. “What are…” She walks closer to the child, “Are you okay?”
The leader smirks.
And the child’s hands wrap around her neck.
~
	“I- I what?”
	Amity gives them a strange look. “Do you… do you honestly not remember?”
	Emily shakes her head. “I’ve always had a bad memory, but I’ve never… I would never try to kill anyone. I promise. There’s no way… there’s no possible way…” Emily shakes slightly, looking down. “It couldn't have been me. You have to have got something wrong. Maybe someone who looks like me, or maybe someone…”
Amity slowly stands up, still facing them. “Fine, then. I believe you. It wasn’t you who tried to kill me. But, uh, do you know any way to get out of this place? Maybe… maybe we can help each other. Can you try and help me, Emily?”
Emily nods. “I’ll do anything to help you. This place…” She looks around, “Is dark. And eerie. I don’t like it any more than you do.”
“Do you know any way to get out? Any way to leave?”
“I, um, I don’t, I’m sorry, but…”
“That’s okay. That’s okay, Emily. And oh- by the way, are you alright?”
“Am I alright?” … “Of course I’m alright, why wouldn’t I be?”
“Because, uh…” Amity gestures to Emily’s hand.
Emily looks down.
One of her fingers is missing, whittled down to a nub. It’s not an open wound- it’s nicely stitched up, but it doesn’t change the fact that that finger is gone.
And that’s when Emily faints.

~
Emily wakes up in her bed, safe inside her Disciples-issued apartment. All of the details of that night come flooding back to her, but she brushes them off as simply a dream. Just to make sure, she looks down at her hand.
The nub is still there, the same finger that Emily remembers gone in what had seemed to be a dream, but now may not have been.
And Emily hopes to God that Amity made it out.