Ilara Grisamber's Arc

Chapter 1 of 2

Ilara Grisamber needed one fresh visitor to fill the empty bed in her dollhouse, and tonight she had none. She stood outside her puppet workshop and counted the crowd. Voodoo dolls swung on their strings behind her, wearing tiny torn dresses she had stitched herself. Her painted face cracked into a smile. A woman in a red coat drifted close, curious, near enough to touch. Then a tall shape stepped between them. Vane Nex bent low over the woman's wrist and turned it in the light, admiring the bones beneath her skin. "Such lovely architecture, dear visitor," he murmured. "Come. Let me show you where music lives." The woman followed him toward the tent with black and white stripes. The empty bed in Ilara's dollhouse stayed empty. It was the third time this week. Vane took every guest before Ilara could speak a word. She dug her long nails into her palm and followed him down into the underground hall. "You steal what is mine," she said. Her voice scratched like a nail on glass. Vane turned. His red eyes found her painted face. "Mine, yours," he said. "Bones don't belong to anyone but the grave, sweet keeper. And you're not a grave. You're a dollhouse." "Then stop feeding it your leftovers." He laughed, low and warm. "You watch me. Every night, in the dark, at the edge of my crowd. I feel your eyes like cold fingers on my spine." He stepped closer. "I like it." Ilara meant to deny it. Instead she lifted one hand and pressed her fingertips against her own eye, digging until it watered and reddened. She held his gaze the whole time. Let him see the pain. Let him see she chose it. Vane went still. He caught her wrist, gentle, and drew her hand from her face. "You hurt yourself so I'll look," he said. "How wonderfully sick." "You talk too much," she said. But she did not pull away. They stood close under the striped canvas. Her anger had not cooled. It had turned into something worse. She wanted to keep arguing with him. She wanted him behind her walls, not as a doll, but as company. The realization landed like a stone in water. "I came to take my visitor back," she said. "You came for me," Vane answered. "Admit it, and I'll give you the woman." Ilara looked at the empty tent. The woman in the red coat was already gone, wandered off while they fought. The prize she'd chased all week meant nothing now. She had stopped wanting it. "Keep her," Ilara said. "I've found something better to catch." She walked back up to her workshop alone. But her dollhouse felt different now. She no longer wanted to fill it with strangers. She wanted to fill it with him. And a man who collects bones is not easy prey.