Alice laughs, it's an achingly empty sound. Echoing off the stone walls of the Caldarium, swirling up and around. Snaring into the Haunt's ears, and living there. "Once, years ago, I didn't believe in anything." Except for stories, but even those let her down. Or her personal one. Fairy Tale, turned horror show.....maybe she should have learned her lesson then, but it always took more for the Doll to truly learn. "Then the Bishop, my Priscus invited me to a lecture at the Moore House, when he Acknowledged me. I couldn't say no." Surly her Cousin could see why, no Haunt survived long was blind to the politics of that. "I went, I listened. I asked questions, and....I realized that maybe I could believe in something."
She returns to silence before sound once more, "You have your faith and I have mine. We might not agree, but we both believe." is what she offers Patience, it was what she felt with Robert, though, of course, there was more to it with her Burned Man.
The Doll stands to address her next question. Moving closer to the tealights, even as the Wraith rattles and hisses, clambering and crying.
"I know what it is like to have something of your Faith's....blasphemed." Remembering the fire, the Brood, the smell of gas and the terror, seeing David Silver continuing through ash and burns, the confused horror, when she couldn't understand why he was continuing.... she had been sure that in that moment, she was going to run, and never embrace the Crone....but -
"My eyes. One night I woke, and couldn't see. They were gone, and I felt their ash on my cheeks," feeling an echo of that soul biting, gnawing terror. Waking to the black. Feeling her fingers finding her lid then sliding passed them. Patience might be Family, but she didn't trust the Haunt with something as...irrevocably tied to her as this. Not beyond the basics.
"Now, questions for you, Cousin." was it selfish of her to want to speak long into the night of the history she had been a part of...? THe Doll had to remind herself that Patience, was more than just a soundboard eager to ask, and know. "Why come to Sacramento?"