“You must pay”, she yelled. Mary Joseph ran through the city streets wild as she lit fires at random. She loved fire to begin with, but having a reason made her feel that much more exhilerated. She felt like she had a purpose, and her revenge on the city that had killed her sisters would pay.

Her sisters had been persecuted as witches and hung in the town square. She watched as the preacher and jailer pushed and prodded her sisters onto the gallows. They were of course not witches, but the priest didn’t care. He merely wanted revenge on her father for telling the truth about his indiscretions with young children in the city.

“People I tell you these witches have been the curse upon our city, and must be removed by death. Today I have helped to save this city. I have made it my own personal crusade to make sure they hang by their necks and rot for all to see.”, the priest said. The people in the village began to cheer, and this it made only clearer to Mary that they all had to pay.

The hanging was complete within minutes. Her sister’s bodies hung and flopped around on the end of her ropes until they no longer showed signs of life. Once the show was over everyone walked away like it was just another day, nothing to see here.

Mary walked over to the bodies and began to weep, but she also began to plan. She looked up at them and said, “I will exact my revenge on them for you sisters.”, and stomped off. She knew what she had to do, and she knew it must be done quick.

She first went to her house and pulled the torches she had stashed away in the barn and doused them in oil. She looked into the flames and began making her way back to town. Once she got into the square she looked around cautiously and snapped her fingers, and the torches lit. Yes, her sisters weren’t witches but she was and this town was going into chaos tonight, every building would burn, and the priest would die.

She walked and lit everything she saw with the torches. The thatched roofs went up in a blaze, and people began running and stampeding each other to escape the building. She waited for them to come out and snapped her fingers again, and they burst into flames. She was indiscriminate and little woman and children, boys and girls, old and young. She had no remorse and felt no moral obligation to these people. In fact it is something she had wanted to do for years.

As she walked through the town she approached the church and summoned the priest to come out with a spell she had cast upon him. When he wandered out in to the courtyard she lifted him into the air, set him on fire, and threw his body back against the church door. She smiled and turned away lighting everything in her path on fire.

As she left the gates of the city she looked back, sneered, and said “You all got what you deserve. I had been planning this all along and now it is done.”. She walked away not looking back whistling a happy tune to find herself a new home. This one she hoped would be much more tolerant.