Hieros Gamos

Janet curses the corpse below her. Her back itches, where her blood tattoo is, like wings flexing. Like she is trying to flee the cage of her ribs. Were that she could shed her skin and let pinions poke through fierce and mighty, taking her aloft to the skies. There is nothing on the ground to tether Janet here anymore, not with her father gone.

Janet’s mourning veil drifts in the stormy wind. The roses she carries wilt, white as the touch of death. Her breath mists like a ghost. She waits at the mausoleum’s steps.

“I know you’re there,” she whispers.

A crow caws in the dripping pine.

She draws the china doll from her purse, her hands clad in calfskin gloves. The shadow takes it from her, his horror and agony brushing against her skin. His touch is like winter’s bone.

“Such a fragile thing. How charming.” The thick shadows recede. They reveal the pale cold one. Sam Hill grins back at her. He holds the china doll, places it atop her father’s coffin. “We will bury her, but not yet. It is