A couple of months late, but I really did want to have the entire mini-series, so let's look at the third issue, after I've already read 4 and 5.
After he failed attempt to drive Corson away, Sarah tries to get Ortensia ready to get the hell out of town. Ortensia is not inclined to listen, feeling Sarah's been controlling her entire life. Sarah explains what Corson gave her, and what he took, when he approached her centuries ago, but it's unclear if Ortensia fully buys it. I think she does, and she's just frustrated she can't get clear of this life of killing. That's how I'm reading the almost pouting look she gives, combined with her "I think that I hate you, Sarah."
Sarah goes for the horses and meet a posse of the New West's common clay. You know, morons. They aren't much against her, and maybe, after Corson made her feel like a helpless child again, she drags it out longer than necessary. Revels in her power against the outmatched goobers Corson sent to die. Maybe if she just turned them all to stone right off, she could get the horses and ride with Ortensia.
Or maybe not, because Corson steps into the barn, brushes off her attack, and snaps her neck. Notably, Ortensia does reject him before the Plague Doctor shows up and does, whatever lightshow he did to get her out of there. So at least some of what Sarah told Ortensia sunk in, and while unconscious, she sees a vision of herself as she will be. The Woman in Black. Not sure how to interpret that. It isn't how the Plague Doctor would see her, so it doesn't feel like strictly a function of his spell, but if the spell bent time in some way, maybe she glimpsed her future.
Other than Ortensia being wary of Corson even before figuring out he killed Sarah, most of this could be inferred from the subsequent issues. The most interesting bit is at the start of the issue, which is set a few years earlier, highlighting a brief spat between Ortensia and Sarah. It shows Ortensia still thinks of her dead father and her family back East, and that Sarah's not at all sure what she's doing. She actually says "Whew" when Ortensia says that no, she doesn't want to talk about it being her father's birthday. When your response is something I would say, you might be a bad parent.
The part I found really interesting, in light of things we learn in issue 4, is when Sarah tells her she can't wait to see Ortensia grow up and become the person she was always meant to be. That could be taken a lot of ways, but I keep thinking of the revelation that Sarah and the Plague Doctor have known of Ortensia's coming for years, were looking for her, and had their own ideas of what she was going to become.
It also makes one of the last things she tells Ortensia before going for the horses more significant. She tells Ortensia to wait there and, 'think about who you are and what you want.' The font does bold both "you"s, so Sarah really emphasized them. Was it just something she said, to make Ortensia feel like she was getting a choice, or to emphasize the notion Corson wouldn't offer her that option? Or had Sarah's opinion changed in the three years since the flashback, and she was thinking of how to help Ortensia avert becoming what she's "destined" to become?
Based on Ortensia's conversation with the Plague Doctor at the end of the mini-series, she's definitely not of the mind that it's the last option. But she's still angry with a lot of people, so I'm curious if her opinion on things changed by the time of the original mini-series.
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