The Nutcracker Bleeds (31 page)

The
moment passed, however, and as she’d predicted, he turned and walked away.

Armand
moved back to where he’d left his weapons, taking the screw rapier once again
to clean out the gloves.

“I’ll
be done soon,” he said as if he’d not just been observing her skin. “You should
try to dry yourself while you can.”

Anne
had followed him to the spot, watching as he’d so easily become engrossed in
his work once again–as if she wasn’t even standing there. The woman felt sudden
desperation.
Heartache.

“Why
do you want Olivia?” she blurted. He looked up at her words, but had no chance
to speak before she was going on.

“What
is it that this
child
has that I will never achieve? Why is she so much
more desirable than I am? I’ve looked into the mirror and seen nothing wrong.
Is it a dream? No one else sees it but myself? And despite what you might
think, I do have feelings beneath this skin!”

She
hardly looked at him when she spoke, talking mostly to the countertop. He only
watched her, letting her speak as she wanted.

“You
know, I’d wager that you treat her with amazing care…” Anne considered, chewing
her lip. She shook her head. “And I’m nothing. I’m like a doll to you!”

She
looked directly at him after that accusation. Then it was his turn to look
away.

“You
don’t understand.”

“Oh,
I do understand,” she insisted adamantly. “I understand it very well. This
world is just like the last one. I’m exactly the same in it! Olivia is a queen.
I’m not a princess, despite what Brooke thinks about me. I’m a toad. I get the
kiss, but not the ‘happily ever after’. That’s me. That’s not only what I’ve
become, but what I’ve always been!”

“You’re
wrong,” he interrupted, surprising her to silence. “You play a role here but
you’re not a part of this world. You live in it now, but not within its rules.”
He paused a moment, then added: “You’re like me.”

Anne
had known this all along. She’d accused him of being different and he’d shunned
her–pressed him and he’d refused to speak of his circumstances. Her defenses
fell, and she lowered herself to sit at his side.

“And
I don’t want Olivia, as if it matters,” he said quietly, looking away from her.
“I can hardly bear to stand before her.”

Anne
looked at him with concern in her eyes. She wanted to know his desires; his
fears; his reasons. Now, she would have his truth.

“What
happened to you, Armand?” she asked softly, gripping his wrist in an
affectionate gesture.

He
shook his head, denying her once again. “I don’t want you to pity me.”

“I
already do and I don’t even understand what’s going on,” she insisted. He
couldn’t look at her.

“Pity
is not the same thing as distaste.”

“I
don’t hate you, Armand.”

She wished
he would stop trying to keep her at such a distance.

He
wished she would stop saying his name.

Anne
tilted her head, wearing a look of concern.

“What
did your enemy do to you to make you crave his death so much?”

She
asked–as if she couldn’t have guessed. Of course it was that Rat King that had
made him this way.–had brought him to life or, rather, had stolen his real life
away.

Armand
sat in silence, his face as expressionless as always. She searched for
something, anything, but there was nothing, as if he were completely lifeless.

Almost
absently, her hand found its way to his chest, slipping inside the coat to the
blue wooden suit that covered him as skin. She felt the heartbeat pumping
against her hand.

“You
haven’t always been like this,” she claimed, staring into him. “You used to be
a man, didn’t you?”

Armand
sighed. “It was a long time ago,” he began, looking off into memory as he
spoke. “I remember it without much trouble, but I haven’t thought about the
broader details in a very long time.

“In
a body that I lived in for a tiny fraction of the ages spent in this one, I was
like royalty. The kind that most toys are designed to be.

“A
castle, riches, servants, horses, land…all that. I don’t recall any certain
details of it–perhaps because I have chosen to deny it. Now, I only have the
story.”

Anne
wondered what it was like for him to look at his own life as if he hadn’t lived
it–to push it so far away that it was like was someone else’s tale? She
wondered these things, for this was what he described to her. She attempted to
understand.

“My
father was a Lord. My mother:
gone
. I don’t recollect how or why, and I
don’t remember either of their faces. But there was a tiny princess. Very
young; so full of goodness. Her name was Clara.”

“Clara!”
Anne exclaimed, her eyes growing wide. “But that’s the name of the doll that
I–!”

“That
doll is not my Clara,” he proclaimed unwaveringly, shaking his head.

There
was his missing emotion. Even though he didn’t have much feeling for what his
life had been before, or what he had been in it, the memory of the girl named
Clara stirred him deeply. There was anger and a hint of old sorrow there in his
voice.

“She
was once…I…” He stopped, trying to find the proper explanation. “It’s hard to
put to words, but I will attempt to.”

Anne
tried to calm herself over hearing this, but he would explain. He was good at
that.

“I
remember her more vividly than any other thing in my past. I have not allowed
myself to forget her, for everything is because of her. I remember dresses she
used to wear; how she whined over her curls. I remember her standing on a chair
and still not managing to be as tall as I was.” There was a faint smile on
Armand’s lips at these words, and Anne found a small smile as well as she
listened to them.

“But
most of all,” he began again, his smile fading suddenly. “I remember what
happened to her.

“It
started slowly–girls disappearing throughout the village. All lovely girls of
varying ages. Simply gone. I was involved in the search along with several
other men. We uncovered nothing. There was no trace.

“Eventually,
Clara became one of those missing girls–though I can’t say she was the final
victim…”

He
stopped then, and Anne allowed him to be silent, to gather his thoughts before
he went on.

“Olivia
reminds me of Clara,” he said, veering a bit from the subject on a whim. “That
is why I treat her as I do.”

Anne
would agree. When she’d first seen Clara, she’d thought it was Olivia.

“She’s
older, yes,” he went on, “but with such innocence. I also know that she–like
that doll you met–is also not that little girl that I loved.”

“Your
sister,” Anne confirmed with a nod. “So all this is for her.”

She
watched him breathe a moment. Then she saw his wooden brow darken harshly–
painfully
–and
he opened his mouth again.

“She
was mein Töchterlein.”

Anne
shook her head, not knowing the tongue that word had come from. “I don’t
understand.”

The
nutcracker looked into her eyes.

“My
daughter
.”

Anne
gasped shortly at his words, unable to hide her surprise. A child? Yes, she
supposed that was a dreadfully strong reason to fight, though she wouldn’t know
it herself. Still, she wasn’t sure she could imagine Armand having such a
profound attachment to anything, not even his own blood.

“She
didn’t know that truth,” he went on. “No one did. Only my father and I–and the
mother. Her mother was a servant. I don’t remember her. It wasn’t love. I was
spoiled, selfish, and young–not that those are fine excuses; I know that now.
My father agreed to take Clara as his own child and the woman for his bride.”

This
part didn’t surprise Anne so much. That part seemed more like the Armand she
knew. Even then, he’d kept himself separated from everything else around him.

“Her
mother died giving birth, so it was only my father then–and, of course, several
caretakers. At first, I was distant, but as I watched her grow, I saw so much
there that I wanted to be part of. I did nothing but look after her, teach her
things, and give her anything she desired.

“I
wanted her to know that she was my child and not my sister, but my father
convinced me that it would confuse her at that time. We agree to wait, and when
my father was on his deathbed, we would tell her together. None of us made it
that far.”

The
woman at his side clenched his hand, guessing that this was difficult for him
to say. Of course it was. This was exactly what he’d been trying to keep from
her since they’d first met. She didn’t interrupt his story; not once, as he
went on.

“I’ll
never forget that night. I had a strange feeling. I got out of bed and went to
her room, just to be sure she was alright. I went inside, looked down at the
bed in the dark, and it was empty. I panicked. I tore everything apart. Clara
was not there.

“I
had never dreamed that anyone could possibly get to her. To come into our keep
and take her directly from beneath my nose! But it happened, and once I found
that she was gone, I knew exactly where to look for her.

“I
remember that it was very cold, like tonight. I trudged out through the snow on
foot, muttered to a few watchmen where I was headed and for them not to follow
me. Eventually I got to my destination, and I found the man I had gone to see.

“His
name was Augustus, and he was a toy maker. There were rumors that he used magic
in his work, for the things he was able to create with his hands were
completely impossible, and he would never reveal his secrets. Clara had thought
that he was so fascinating, and he made her so many incredible things that
could never be explained. For instance: the marble you know as the ‘cat’s
eye’.”

So
that is how he knew what it was and how to use it.

“I
took her to his shop many times, and he made frequent trips to the keep. He
always had something new for her, but I never liked him. I never liked the way
he looked at her, or the way he seemed to care about the things he made more
than anything else. He seemed to be obsessed with dolls, and when I went to see
him that night, I found out how he had made most of them.

“If
he saw a young woman that he found desirable–and that would have to mean that
she looked like a doll–he would turn her into one, convinced that it was her
destined form.

“On
that night when I went to him, he was just standing there, holding Clara in his
hand, gazing so lovingly down at her. She was so tiny. Just a lifeless doll.

“I
didn’t bother confronting him, I simply rushed in with my sword–and that is all
I remember of that moment. I remember waking up in the dark. I was in a box,
locked inside. I broke out of it with strength I had no idea that I had, but
everything was different. Everything was so much larger and distorted… I
understood immediately what had happened to me, because I had seen what had
happened to her.

“After
I had been missing for a while, and since I had told some of the men where I
was going, they came after me. When they found my sword there on the floor, and
saw the dolls that looked suspiciously like the missing girls, they were going
to burn the toymaker. So, in a last desperate attempt to save himself, he
transformed himself into a rat.

“He
had planned for that, but hadn’t expected to use that escape so soon, so when
he used it so abruptly, he’d not yet created an incantation that would allow
the curse to be lifted. He was destined to live as a rat forever–as long as he
kept himself alive. The manner of which was unknown to me until I spoke to the
Shaman, who told me about the ritual of devouring human flesh.

“Augustus
made his escape, because the men had thought he’d simply vanished. All that had
been left were his clothes. The men left in fear and sought to burn the
building down, but Augustus had used yet another spell, animating the dolls and
puppets within his workshop–including the soulless doll that Clara had become.
No longer the child I loved; no longer with a single memory of me. Only a
likeness in doll form.”

So
sad…

“Those
toys that he brought to life left with him, and followed him for years all over
the continent and finally here.

“And
all that way, I followed him, usually always two steps behind. It was simply luck
that Olivia’s uncle brought me to this house where my enemy had made his den. I
thought there was a good chance I might find him here, so I did not try to
escape. I have also found out now that, not only does Augustus the Rat King not
know of my presence here, he is weak. He needs you or Olivia for that ritual
soon. Without its performance, there is a good chance he will simply die.
Though I know I can deliver neither of you to him, I don’t want him to simply
fade. I want the pleasure of killing him myself.”

Anne
listened to every word, thinking it was the most atrocious thing she’d ever
heard. His story was wholly more fantastic than anything she’d ever read in a
book, but so terrible that she wished that it wasn’t true.