Page 6 of Little Doll

“Is he going to get the carriage, Mother?” I pleaded. I continued to shake her, but she kept her eyes slammed shut, scream crying. Surely, she wouldn’t keep me here in this state, using one of her many maladies and excuses for why she couldn’t leave Blackmoth House. Certainly,this one time,Mother would set her unreasonable fears aside and TAKE ME TO THE FUCKING HOSPITAL.

A renewed jolt of lightning shot through my veins, and I reeled backwards, pushing off mybereft mother and sprawling backwards onto the floor. My head crashed into the wood and blissful darkness swept in and took it all away.

Later I would learn that it took three days.

But at the time, I had no concept of that. I could no longer tell if I was dreaming or awake. I burned with fever, and I tossed and turned in violent pain. At times, memories replayed in my mind. Sunny afternoons in the Blackmoth House garden as a little child, and my beautiful brother Draven pushing me on the swing. My mother holding me in her arms, reading me books or singing me sweetly to sleep. My grandmother Cleo in the kitchen, shooing away the servants to fill it with her own incredible smells of baking, spices and creamy sauces.

Other times, memories came to me I thought were not my own. Images of an ornate trunk in an attic. A handsome and dark man, bending a lady backward and bending to sink his sharp teeth into her neck. A blonde curly-headed girl with empty terrible eyes.

Sometimes my eyes would struggle open, and I would see that I was no longer in my room, but in a bare room with a rough wood floor and stonewalls. A room I didn’t recognize. And I would see my mother across from me, dressed in a plain black gown, on her knees and bent her face down, touching the rough wooden floor, weeping and praying. The only things in the room were the bed I lay on and three upside down crosses that hung on the wall above where Mother prayed.

In the quietest moments of the awful time, the masked man visited me. We relived the events of the night of the masquerade party and also, we did so much more together. In real life, in the sweat filled dirty bed where I lay, I arched my back and screamed in pain. But in my dreams, he drove into me to make me arch my back and scream in ecstasy. He came to me and dried my tears, undressed me slowly, undressed himself. He stood before me nude except for the frightful mask. I studied every curve and crevice of his flawless hard body. I ran my black veined fingers over his hot skin. He took me in every way imaginable.

Still, more images came to me. Nightmarish things. My brother’s malignant upside down smile when he stared at me while being fucked by the peacock woman. And more images, worse still. Of sharp fanged demons, dark and beautiful, hungry and evil. Fucking people who cried, who begged. Fucking them while biting them. Fucking them and feeding.

All of it ran together in one long feverish blur that sometimes was a beautiful daydream and other times was a hellish night terror.

And then, my eyes snapped open, and the pain was gone.

Chapter 4

Fane

After I broughtthe little doll home, bloodied and fainted dead away, I deposited her swiftly into her bed and decided it would be best if I disappeared for a few days. It would only be a matter of time, maybe only minutes, before they learned what had happened to Nova. Undoubtedly, not long after that, they would discover I had something to do with it.

Best if I made myself scarce when that happened.

But as I stepped out of her bedroom, Grandmother Cleo stepped out of the shadows in the corridor.

I gasped and leaped back, my back ramming into the wall next to Nova’s door. “Bloody hell, woman!”

Cleo’s wrinkled face darkened as she glowered at me. “Such language is unbecoming,”she snapped. Her voice was quiet and shaky. Even though she wore an elegant lavender gown, and her silver hair was in a perfectly coiffed updo, she seemed tired. Bedraggled even.

Maybe it was because she was lurking around in the wee small hours of the morning like a ghost.

“Fane,” Grandmother Cleo continued, looking at me through narrow eyes. “What have you been up to?”

I gave her a charming smile, pushed off the wall, and danced a little jig. “Can’t a fellow take his young sister out for a night on the town? You know, to celebrate the last night before you all ruin her life forever?”

Cleo crossed her arms. She tapped one long bony finger on her crossed forearm. The finger dripped with a jewel encrusted ring, and it caught the light of flickering sconces on the walls and glinted in my eye. “You know we are just trying to protect her.”

I smirked. “Whatever you say, dear Cleo.”

“I’ll ask you again, Fane. And do not trifle with me. What. Did. You. Do?”

My smile faded, and it was my turn to scowl darkly. My God, this family could suck the joy out of absolutelyeverything.“In three days, we can ask Nova whoshethinks was protecting her, alright Grandmother?”

Cleo’s face grimaced. “God, Fane, no. Please tell me you did not…” Her tired eyes sparkled with unshed tears. Tears! From Cleo! A concept wholly unheard of. My smile returned.

Cleo hurried forward to close the distance between us. She was more than a foot shorter than me. I noticed how frail she’d become. She reached up and placed her hands on my face. The warmth of her soft hands enchanted me. “You need to get out of here until the dust has settled, Fane.”

I nodded. “That was the plan, Grandmother.”

She stood on her tiptoes and kissed my cheek. “Be careful, my boy.”

On the way through the kitchen, heading for the back door out to the path that led to the stables, I encountered Draven and stopped short.

The first hint of dawn had crept up outside the tall windows and the bastard was already awake and dressed, seated at the servant’s table with a young maid, having tea. His long blond hair was swept back in a low hanging ponytail and not enough of the day had passed to muss it. Probably wouldn’t do anything interesting to muss it, anyway. He wore a velvet suit of a rich huntergreen with bold golden stitching. His face looked tan, with a spattering of freckles. He favored Arcane, whilst my sister Nova and I bore the pale and dark looks of the Westminsters.

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