She was nude, petrified moths breaking off at their feet and crumpling as they fell back between the baseboards at the slightest disturbance.
Brittle blood crystallized around a hole in her chest. Black stains trailing like a starburst from the wound. Her skin was so pale, yet the cavity seemed full. It was such an unnatural gray-and-purple hue against the dry, tangled hair.
Something glimmered from beside her, hidden in the darkness of the narrow grave.
I used my hand to touch her stomach, and she leaked a diluted rusty liquid from her puncture. The contents of my own stomach nearly joined in.
Then again when I saw the bottles of arsenic pesticide tucked around the body. All the evidence discarded in one place.
My back hit the wall as I scrambled away, pressing as if I could run from the sight before me. With every breath, the smell was stronger, richer, now that I knew what was causing it.
With my arms crossed, I tucked my knees to my chest. It wasn’t something I wanted to believe; I wished there were any other option to offer as reality. It was like witnessing a quiet creature finally snap. Sure, anyone could be capable of anything. Great joys, explosive anger, you could probably even imagine someone you know killing someone, perhaps even the way they’d do it, deducing from their individual personality.
I’d witnessed people harm children, terrible accidents in factories. I’d seen the fire in a woman’s eyes when she discovered her husband had cheated. I’d seen the wrath of men who struck women who questioned them, police beatings for daring to look at them sideways.
I’d killed. I’d seen Petronille’s attempt at self-preservation. I’d seen my dear friend Kostya exhume a body for autopsy.
What I couldn’t imagine was my wife attempting an embalming at home.
A blanket of red-eyed moths covered the body, stuck to the skin and sheets like they served as some final barrier of divine modesty. They were like sprites looking to carry her to the next realm, bite by bite, until they’d consumed the body, and none was left for the world to defile, if the arsenic didn’t get to them first.
This would forever be known as Lorelei’s finale.
Petronille ... what have you done?
Chapter Thirty-Nine
The Performer
My fist was becoming numb from banging on the front door. My hair stuck to my face, and so did my clothes. It wasn’t raining in any considerable volume, but I was kept waiting so long, it had completely soaked me without the protection of a coat. There was a light somewhere from deep within the heart of the home, sosomeonewas present. Though, the service staff wouldn’t keep only one light on, so they may have retired already.
I looked down at the intricate handle of the door. My aching hand wrapped around it, squeezing before a slow push.
It opened.
What had once been a richly lit abode of gold and marble was now a dark and tumultuous landscape of dull brass and plain rock. Without an audience, there was no need to posture, not even for the house.
Past the grand entry, a light flickered from beyond an archway.
The ballroom was larger than life or, at least, larger than any single family needed. It seemed bigger when empty. The tall windows allowed you to see almost as many stars as if you were standing outside. The night cover painted everything in an illusion of blue and purple shades.
One single source of light, the fireplace at the other end, and a silhouette feeding it little by little, pausing in between paper tossings.
The tapping of the raindrops on the grand windows nearly blended in harmony with the snapping and crackling of paper in the fire. Two opposites that seemed to have an understanding.
“Bold of you to come.” My mother’s voice was grave.
I approached slowly, each click of my heels more awkward and unsure than the last. My skirt was soaked, releasing moisture drop by drop to mark my trail.
My mother held up a photograph. The light of the flames flickered across her face, highlighting every crease at the corners of her eyes, the hollows beneath her cheekbones, and the tired skin of her neck.
She smiled briefly, like a glimmer of a memory presented itself to her through the photograph, before tossing it directly into the fire.
Beside her was a box full of papers and photographs. The one from my home.
“I heard you were going to disappear,” she said. “I thought I would give you a head start.”
“I’m not disappearing.”
