1

Anastasia was woken up by a bump. The wagon ran over a rough road covered in ice formed by trampled snow. In the nights leading up to this, she had difficulty sleeping through the wintry wind seeping through the window and the inescapable motion sickness contracted from a long journey.

“You’re awake.” A girl with a tightly wrapped winter jacket and muffler obscuring her face called out from the dark corner of the wagon. Her name was Maria.

“Seems that we may never arrive.” Anastasia said. “I checked the storage. We’ll be out of food in a few days.”

“You should be relieved.” Maria remarked. “In spite of our circumstances, we’d still keep a noblewoman like you fed.”

Anastasia was the first of her family to be born as nobility. Her father had earned the title after fifteen years of working in the civil service for the late monarch, which was then transferred to Anastasia, as the oldest child. The system had been enacted in spite of substantial protests from the existing ruling class and was followed by a large increase in the number of nobles on the imperial registry. While she was now a member of that ruling class, all she had to show for it was a patch of land in the middle of a snowy forest wasteland, where she and Maria had grown up.

Maria peered out of a small window towards the driver. A driver and horse plodded forward, composed of a fused amalgamation of ribbons and wood. It was nothing more than a set of lifeless mannequins spurred forward by unknown forces. One of Anastasia’s creations.

“If we’re out of food, that means the journey will soon be at an end.” Maria sullenly proclaimed with a smile. “Don’t worry, we will arrive at daybreak.”

2

The village was similar to how Anastasia remembered it from months ago. It was her hometown. She and Maria had spent their childhoods playing in the summer forests and attending festivals with the villagers. They’d known each other since they were very young, when Maria was adopted as a second child.

Somehow, the atmosphere seemed bleak, even for winter. The morning sun cast its glow on a few scattered old men, barely moving in the cold. Soon to be dead and buried, Maria thought to herself.

“We shouldn’t waste time. We’re here to see my father.” Anastasia pointed to the far side of the village. In the distance, an aged home barely large enough to denote the estate could be seen.

“We’re in no hurry,” Maria said. “After what we saw at Snowbank, perhaps we should go to someone else first.”

“Did you not say there were enemies both inside and out?” Anastasia rebuffed.

“I did, but I know the people well, as do you. We can trust them. During the time where we do not know who to trust, it’s most important to keep our allies close.”

“Never thought I’d hear an empire’s doll telling me to trust the people.”

“Wait here.” Maria waved to Anastasia and quietly darted away.

Anastasia retreated back to the wagon and peered at the snowy landscape. It was dotted with houses fashioned with stone and dirt bricks. Morning sunlight reflecting off of the freshly-fallen snow cast a bluish glow far in the distance. A few more people, some younger, had come out of their homes to shovel the snow off of their rooftops.

The two of them had been hastily sent off without explanation after a decisive battle in an ongoing military campaign. A faction of eastern nobles had taken advantage of a number of mysterious deaths in the royal family as well as a distant blood relation to make their claim to the throne. The ensuing civil war had lasted over six months, and showed no signs of ending.

Maria’s unit had played an important role in the annihilation of an enemy fortification. It seemed strange that a soldier of her rank and Anastasia’s status should be discharged abruptly and with no warning.

Maria was a special soldier in service of the crown, colloquially known as a doll. Skilled in one of many forms of manipulating the elements, dolls formed an important part of enforcing the imperial will. Anastasia was similarly well versed in these crafts, but unlike Maria, wasn’t required to swear her allegiance to the crown as part of her military service.

Anastasia munched on a piece of half frozen bread, kindling a small flame in the palm of her other hand to warm it up.

“I’m back,” Maria said as she crawled back into the wagon.

“So, what’d you find out?” Anastasia asked.

“Nothing good. Your father isn’t home, and might never return.”

“What?” Anastasia exclaimed in a worried tone.

“Some soldiers entered and threw him into a windowless wooden cell before hauling him off,” Maria explained. She didn’t see any point in beating around the bush. If they’d carelessly entered the estate, they might have met the same outcome.

Anastasia put her hands up to her face to obscure her pained expression. It was a well known expression that a “dollhouse” was an empty house formerly inhabited by someone who’d been whisked away by dolls. They would rarely, if ever, be seen again.

“We must go home in any case,” Anastasia adamantly declared. “My father’s study. It likely holds some answers, regarding both his fate and ours. He’s no fool. Even if he would be stricken by a terrible misfortune, he’d leave us something to keep hope alive.”

“I’m pleased with your optimism. But even the bravest fighters don’t expect their death when it comes. I agree that we should search your home, but don’t expect anything more than discarded letters.”

Maria was noticeably displeased.

3

The door to the three-story home opened with hardly a sound. “There’s no one here,” Maria remarked. The rest of the house smelled of dust and was nearly as cold as the air outside.

A narrow hallway lined with rooms snaked towards the entrance alongside a flight of stairs leading to the second floor.

“It’s been a while since your father was taken. All of the doors are open. It’s likely whoever was here searched the building.”

Anastasia didn’t respond. She was resolutely focused on keeping her composure. The loss of her only living relative was a constant tug on her throat that sucked her breath away.

Maria turned to face her. She removed her frosty mittens and wrapped her snow-white arms around Anastasia’s shoulders.

“I’m scared.” Anastasia muttered as glistening tears rolled down her cheeks. “The instant we left this town, it became a different place. I barely even recognize the commoners here. And you’re the only one I can speak to. I can’t even call this place home anymore.”

“So you’re back.”

An unknown voice came from a dark corner next to the fireplace. It was shrill and scratchy, similar to a poorly maintained violin.

“Stay back!” Maria shouted and held out her bare hand. The air around her grew thick with icy flower petals, ready to engulf anyone who approached.

The figure appeared around the corner and immediately fell to the ground. It was a woman in a torn, dark grey military uniform with several buttons missing. Clotted blood covered their neck and a deep cut on her chest.

“Captain!” Anastasia immediately stopped crying and rushed to their side.

“What happened?” Maria called out from beside the doorway.

“Put your petals away, Maria. It’s the captain.”

“Swallows travel in groups. I’ll keep watch.” Maria replied. Regardless of the captain’s fate, the likelihood of hostile soldiers nearby had increased significantly.

“Don’t worry about me. On my way here, someone fired an explosive at my horse and a piece of shrapnel lodged itself in my neck. The bleeding has already stopped, but I could use some better bandages and a drink.” The captain explained. Her expression was nonchalant, but it was clear from the lack of color in her face that her consciousness was fading.

“Your injuries. They look very serious,” Anastasia stated the obvious.

“Then take me somewhere to patch me up. And let me ride in your wagon.”

The captain’s name was Fyodora Severnaya. It was quite a mouthful, so even those ranking above her referred to her by “captain”. She was the highest rank of the three.

“Someone is approaching!” Maria glared at the two. “The wagon is in the back. We’ll head out the back door.”

“Understood.” Anastasia grabbed an arm and tried to hoist the captain’s full weight on her body, but her small frame was not nearly enough to support the captain.

“I can walk. Just lend me your shoulder,” the captain responded. The two of them limped down the hallway and disappeared around the corner.

A tall, slender man in overbearing formal dress approached the front entrance, putting one foot in front of another and avoiding eye contact.

“Ha…”

“Hello, Maria.”

He turned to look Maria in the eye. His eyes were a web of gold and black, irises deeply set like spiders trapped in a marble. Simply enduring his stare was enough to make her dizzy.

Maria clenched her teeth and furrowed her brow. She instinctively fought his mental assault with a sharp gaze of her own.

“Hm!” Maria uttered a command without opening her mouth. The frozen flower petals surrounded the man in a beautiful blizzard, whizzing past as they etched thousands of tiny cuts in his flash. At his feet, a pool of crimson blood extended and froze upon contact with the frigid ground.

The frozen flower petals cleared to expose the remains of the man’s body. It was unrecognizable with chunks of flesh and gore scattered atop a layer of red-stained snow. Scattered bits of bone poked out of the mangled body.

“…”

The mound of flesh quivered and shook. Bits of skin, teeth, and eyes pulled together and rearranged. The man's head pieced itself together, first eyes and mouth, then the rest of the skull, and then ears, nose, and skin. His dark hair, wide smile, and uncanny black-gold eyes sat atop the leftover pile of ruined remains.

He wasn’t smiling anymore.

“Could you wait to hear what I have to say before resorting to violence?” The man’s head exclaimed.

“Why aren’t you regenerating the rest of your body?” Maria asked. “It should be easy for you.”

“It’s the cold. With the blood running through my veins nearly frozen solid, it takes more time to thaw before I can come back. For now, I’m just a head. I pose no threat.” the man said. He raised the edges of his mouth in a fake smile, ignoring the pain of consciously being a decapitated head.

“So, what did you come here for? To use our captain as bait so you could arrest us all?”

“If I had wanted that I wouldn’t have come alone.”

The man blinked and his eyes were replaced with normal brown ones. Discounting the fact that he was still a lone head propped upright, passerby might mistake him for an ordinary traveler.

“The girl’s father is dead. There’s nothing left in the home that hasn’t been taken or destroyed. Everyone in your unit besides you three was executed on suspicion of treason.”

Maria stared at him, motionless. Her dull blue eyes stared intently at him as he continued to speak.

“Go to the capital. There’s a councilor named Reshevsky there who has all of your answers. Tell him that you were sent there by his worst student.”

Maria stood up and put her mittens back on. “Thanks lieutenant. I’d never thought an abyssal like you could show kindness to humans.” Maria turned around to leave.

“Wait! Could you put me next to a fire?” The man cried out.

Maria didn’t respond and disappeared down the hallway, leaving the door open.

4

The three sat around a fire. Anastasia had gathered an abundance of kindling and fuel, so it burned brightly. Even in the presence of the brisk evening winds, it left the ground they sat on moist and warm.

After a bit of struggle, Maria had washed and dressed the captain’s wounds on her neck and torso. Most of her upper body was wrapped in bandages, leaving only her hands and face exposed.

Anastasia wrapped her arms around her knees and placed her chin atop them. Since gaining her regular voice back, the captain had spared no time in spilling everything she knew.

After the capture of a long-held enemy fortress at Snowbank, the captain had left their unit’s celebratory dinner to attend an urgent meeting at immediate notice. There she received a capture and dispose order for every soldier in her six-person unit, except for herself and her second, Maria. Instead of luring them into the forest one by one and stabbing them in the back, she instead had them secretly sent away. However, when it was noticed that two carriages were missing and there were no bodies, she was captured and thrown into an interrogation room. She escaped by gouging out the eye of one of the jailers and stealing his keys.

She then stole a horse and rode off but was injured in the process. She knew little about what the charges on her unit were, but she never had a chance to ask about it.

“So that’s it. We’re wanted by the crown on unknown charges.” Anastasia concluded.

“They’re not unknown. It’s supposedly treason. I had that much from our pursuer,” Maria replied.

“Oh? That’s new. I’d never heard about that from the old stand-up.” the captain remarked.

“You knew the abyssal?” Maria asked with a surprised expression. “If you did, why’d he leave you for dead?”

“It’s part of his kind’s personality. Their sense of humor added on to their lack of empathy for human mortality makes it surprisingly difficult to ask for help.”

“So he’s an ally who doesn’t offer his aid.” said Anastasia sourly. “The point of that is?”

“He also doesn’t offer aid to anyone else. And just like what he told Maria, he comes and goes and tells us useful things sometimes. He might also tell enemies useful things, so you could call him everyone’s friend. Or everyone’s enemy.”

“And we’re the ones being arrested for treason.”

“Yes, we are.”

“That’s not the only thing he told me.Captain, does he have a name?” Maria interjected.

“I think he calls himself Canary. He goes by Ivan in the registry.”

“Understood, I’ll call him Canary then. He recommended we find a Councilor Reshevsky in the capital,” Maria said.

“That’s High Councilor for you. There’s only a handful.” The captain replied with a smirk. “Getting an audience with him isn’t going to be easy, nor do we have any reason to trust him. Plus, the capital is also more than two months away by horse.”

“It’s better than freezing out here and waiting for a squad of dolls to murder us in our sleep.” Anastasia shot back. “We may as well head south and get away from some of the snow.”

“I agree with her.” Maria said. “We can get in some sightseeing. I’ve always wanted to travel off of the main road.”

She smiled.

5

The man laid under the full moon, exhausted. After more than twelve hours of basking in the frigid air, he was finally whole again.

“That kid…” He muttered to himself. He knew Maria had a short fuse, but expected some kind of warning. While he had grown somewhat used to the icy climate, he was completely naked. His body wasn’t the only thing Maria had torn to shreds.

Canary stumbled along the road in nothing but a pair of shoes. His horse was parked not far from the village. It wasn’t his, but the one the captain had left behind when she rode off with the two fugitives.

From a distance, he knew something was wrong. The horse laid motionless on the ground. As he ran up to it, he noticed the frozen blood that had long stopped flowing from its neck formed a wide pattern at the side of the road. The horse’s head was lifeless, its eyes frozen over and not a whisper of breath escaped its mouth.

“Damn it!” Canary shouted into the woods at the side of the road. No answer. It’s time to walk back to the village, he thought. While it was unpleasant to sleep in a barn with no insulation, it was better than sleeping in the open where one might wake up to find a pack of wild animals tearing off an arm.

He turned around. The horse he’d ridden to this village was dead, and now the horse he was planning to ride out of the village was dead. A mysterious horse-killer had to dwell here. There were no other answers.

He stopped when the sound of the horse’s body, shifting and moving, reached his ears. Coming out from underneath the horse carcass, a man emerged. His skin was deathly pale and his body was covered in a feathered jacket that stretched to his knees.

Canary took a step back. In the place of eyes, empty black sockets peered at him. For the first time in many years, he recalled a sensation that he had long forgotten: a sense of death. The man’s head turned, twisting around until he could see the skin of the man’s neck straining then tearing from the tension. It extended farther and farther outward, connected by sinewy tissue oozing with necrotic black sludge.

He ran. Spirits that roamed the forests of the night were not to be fought. Rows of trees like spindly hands encroached upon each side of the narrow forest road.

He felt a brief sigh of relief as his footsteps were the only ones reverberating into the forest. That relief quickly melted away as he turned around. No matter how far he was to run, like a mirage, the distance between them was getting smaller, inch by inch. As it approached, he could see its teeth, yellow and rotten with wide spaces in between them, clicking against each other.

The village came into view. In the depth of night, only a single yellow light emanated from the main square.

“Quick! Get behind me.” A raspy voice called out to him. It was an old man, a real one. His skin pulsed with life and his eyes twinkled in the dim light cast by a glass lantern at the end of a stick.

Canary passed him and stopped, catching his breath with his hands on his knees. The ghastly creature stayed at the edge of the village, stopping at a burnt-out lamp post. When the old man came closer, holding the lantern to expose it to light, it recoiled and melted away, releasing the sound of dust blowing in the wind.

“I’d never had the chance to talk to you,” the old man said. “I’ve seen you sneaking around the village. What’s your name? What are you doing here?”

6

“Welcome to my house. Cover yourself with this.” The man handed Canary a woven straw sheet. He fought an urge to scratch his leg as its prickles brushed against the skin of his bare legs. The two of them sat at a pair of rocking chairs facing a charred stone fireplace. A quiet flame burned inside, casting long shadows against the walls. The inside of the hut was composed of stone bricks with wooden beams running along the corners and ceiling.

The old man set down his lantern beside him. Taking a closer look, Canary noticed the web of wrinkles running along his bald head sunken eye sockets. The faint bristles covering his face and chin suggested he shaved every couple days.

“You never answered my question,” the old man said.

“Ivan. I came here to find an associate of mine.” Canary used his human name. “They’ve got something that’s important to me, and I came here to get it back. But they’re gone, and I’ve got no way to leave the village.”

“Hm? Then how’d you get here?”

“A horse. A horse that died.”

“Ah. Those ghouls will do that if you leave your horse out alone.” The man replied with a chuckle. “I’m Yair. The oldest villager, and the only thing standing in between you and the terrors that roam the night.” He held out his hand.

“Thanks for your help, but I have to go. There’s no time to lose.” Canary declared.

“At least stay the night. You’ve got nothing to gain by venturing out naked in the cold.” Yair took a look at his naked upper body and sighed. “My clothes won’t fit you, but I can find you something to wear that doesn’t leave you looking like a street performer.

Canary sat back down and reclined in his seat. “Do you have any family?”

“Ha! They’re all dead.”

“You sound surprisingly happy about it.”

“I might not look like it, but I’ve been living here for…” Yair paused and tried to remember. “When was Katarina crowned?”

“More than a hundred years ago.”

“I was forty-five when that happened. It was the last time a royal procession came through here,” Yair recalled. He grabbed a Wooden bottle lying above the fireplace and took a long sip. “My descendants lived long lives and died peacefully. Most of them, anyways. I’ve got no one to mourn.”

Canary licked his lips to realize that his throat was parched. He held out his hand and Yair handed him the bottle. He braced for a foul-tasting alcoholic drink but relaxed when all that touched his tongue was water. A bit stale, perhaps, but still water.

“I’d never thought humans would start acting like us after long enough.” Canary remarked.

“You talk like you aren’t one.”

“Because I’m not.” Canary revealed his black-gold eyes and looked back at Yair. His eyes briefly widened in surprise, then retreated back to their relaxed position.

“Ah. So that’s why the ghouls seem active lately.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“They hunger for life, especially the lives of the long-living. They likely killed your horses smelling the scent of one.”

“So how should I leave? Won’t they pursue me until I stop to rest?” Canary asked condescendingly. Even the thought of the sickly creatures was enough to make his heart skip a beat.

“That’s easy. Leave at first light and leave the forest. They can’t leave the forest. They’re bound to it.”

“Thanks, old man.” Canary smiled and took another drink of water.