Page 39 of Ashen Torment

He is watching me.

My jaw tightens. I don’t look away. The longer I hold his gaze, the more an insolent heat creeps under my collar, down my back, until it melts away all reason.

It’s irritating and persistent.

I tear my gaze away from him and wipe my lips with the napkin.

“Excuse me,” I mumble to the guests.

I rise from my chair. The room continues to live around me, but my body only wants to get away from that table.

7

Bisque Dolls

Evander

Imake my way down the corridor leading to my mother’s chambers. Behind me, Étienne moves with his usual lightness.

“Souriez, Vicomte.”

I sigh, holding back any emotion, and stop before the door. I raise my hand against the wood.

“Mother, it is I.”

The door opens, and I am met by one of my mother’s maids.

“Viscount, the Viscountess is expecting you.”

She steps aside to let me pass.

“Thank you, Prudence.”

I cross the threshold into the room.

“You wished to see me?”

The smell hits me before anything else, the stinging alcohol of tincture burns my nostrils, accompanied by a sickly, earthy, almost medicinal scent. Someone has tried to mask it with eau de cologne and heavy perfumes—camellias or roses, I believe—but the result is a cloying mixture that clings to everything.

My eyes slide to a small bottle of dark glass, translucent amber, resting on the cabinet beside the bed.

Laudanum.

“I need to speak with you,” she says, without looking up from the papers scattered across the bed.

I try to focus on her, but my attention is caught by the dolls.

They are everywhere: sitting, standing, draped over cushions. Some seem to watch me with curiosity, others with a grave, melancholy air. Their gaze makes me shudder. All of them have blue eyes and black hair... exactly like me.

It is impossible not to notice the contrast between their motionless perfection and the acrid scent lingering around my mother.

“You must sign these.”

“What are they? I was not informed.”

“For the inauguration of the winter garden, Evander. We celebrate it every year. It is nothing new.”

I stare at the papers, my thumb brushing a folded corner.