Splintered

I reach up and tap the leg of a ragged stuffed lamb who’s missing an ear. The toy sways on a noose of spider silk. The movement is so silent and tranquil, it’s disturbing to my core.

Tranquil. That bothers me … the fact that the instant I stood up, everything hushed. Bone-deep quiet. After all those years of yearning for silence, why is it that I seem to feel more at home amid mayhem and noise now?

Finding a sleepy doll that’s eerily similar to one I loved as a little girl—complete with time-yellowed vinyl skin and moth-eaten lashes over eyes that open and close—I touch its foot. The leg swings, hanging by a thread to the stuffed body.

The doll’s eyes snap open, sucking my courage away. Something in its empty gaze begs for escape … something that’s trapped, unhappy, and restless, aching to get out. The toy is harboring a soul. They all are.

I wait, mouth drained of all moisture—for the doll to scream or to weep out all the pain I see in its eyes. But the movement slows, and her eyes close once more.

A rustle stirs behind me. Prickles of awareness clamber up my spine, spreading through my shoulders and all the way to my wing tips.

Maybe Sister One followed my footprints in the snow.

Please be the nice one … please, please, please be the nice one.

Reluctantly, I turn on my heel. A shadowy face bends down to mine.

“Why ye be standing on this hallowed ground?” The voice—like branches tap-tap-tapping a frosted windowpane in the dark of night—rushes over me. Her breath smells of freshly dug graves and loneliness, sending shivers of terror from my toes to my fingertips.

“I can explain,” I whisper.

“Dandy that would be.” She draws back. Her clothes, body, and legs are duplicates of her sister’s. But on her face, scars and fresh lacerations dribble blood. On her left hand, a pair of gardening shears takes the place of fingers. She must have caused the cuts herself.

Compared to her, Sister One is the sugarplum fairy.

My odds of getting out with my head intact just plummeted to almost nil. “I—I took a wrong turn.”

“I’d say ye did.” Her other hand eases out from behind her hoop skirt, covered by a black rubber glove. She carries a trio of ragged toys on a web like fish on a line. Her scissored deformity edges close to my neck—snip, snip. Puffs of air graze my skin as the blades open and close. “Ye don’t belong here.” Snip, snip, snip.

“I don’t want to belong here.” The stuffed atrocities in her hand cause fresh dread to bubble up in my chest. I step backward and nearly slip on the snow. Spreading my wings low, I catch my balance.

“Well, ye won’t. So long as ye’re still breathing.”

“Right,” I answer, gasping to assure myself I am.

“It’s when ye stop breathing that ye’re mine.” Her scissors rake my sleeve’s shoulder seam. “Once I cut out yer lungs, ye’ll belong then.”

Self-preservation kicks in, and I back up two more steps, breaking through a curtain of branches to get closer to the trunk of the tree. Heavy with decrepit toys, the limbs bow over me almost to the ground, like a morbid parasol dimming the light.

Sister Two’s silhouette moves on the other side, scuttling around the circumference. Taking strained breaths, I turn with her, keeping her in my sight through openings between branches.

The instant she parts the curtain to come inside, I fold my wings around me, watching through a translucent shell.

She laughs—a grinding, hollow sound. “The pretty butterfly is now the cocoon. Isn’t that backward from the natural way of things?”

As if anything is natural here. I ease against the tree trunk to protect my back.

The point of her blades nudge the juncture where my wings hide my windpipe. Even through the gossamer layers I can feel the cold metal compressing my air passage.

“Ah, yer wings are yet young. Thin as paper. I can chop them into little pieces and dance in yer confetti. Face me, or suffer that fate.”

She steps back. Considering how much it hurt just to step on my wings earlier, I let them fall to my sides and stand against the tree trunk.

Smiling, she snips at the air in front of my face, blowing sharp wisps around me. “Now. Ye’ve stolen something from me. Give it back, or I’ll bleed ye like a pig until ye squeal.”

“I haven’t stolen anything!”

The scissor-like tips drag down to my abdomen, trailing a chilling line through my clothes. Wings folded around either side of the trunk, my spine grinds into the icy bark and my stomach rolls over.

Her face leans closer—a bloody and horrific sight. “Tell me what ye did with Chessie’s smile.” Snip, and a strand of red lace falls from my tunic onto my bare feet.

My heart nearly stops. “I—I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Liar.” Snip, snip, and a rain of tattered fabric gathers around me as my baby-doll tunic peels open at my waist, leaving only my blouse covering me. “Yer lungs have to be in here somewhere,” she says, digging around the fabric.

Growling, I jut out a knee, knocking her hoop skirt lopsided and unbalancing her. Her eight legs regroup before I can escape, and she rams forward until our noses touch.

The cold, sharp point of her blade crimps the bare skin above my throat. “I know why ye’re here. Ye seek the next square. The one that will win ye the crown.”

Square? Crown? My mind bounces back and forth, caught between confusion and the will to live. I swallow, and the tip of the shears bites deeper into my skin. “No,” I whisper, slipping my fingers around her bladed hand to alleviate the pressure. I push against her. “I won’t make this easy for you.”

“Good. I like a challenge.” Her bumpy tongue rakes over her lips as she snakes the blades toward my sternum, pushing harder against my resistance. “Less’n ye wish to watch me hull out yer heart like a nut’s meat, ye will tell me where ye hid the smile … now.”

I close my eyes, willing my erratic pulse to calm, to become steady and confident. There’s only one way out of this. Only one thing I can rely upon.

Pandemonium.

I envision the branches around us filling with rabid sap—a snarling, feral energy sweeping through each branch. The movement jostles the toys awake, and they let out a mournful howl. Every branch on every tree across the lair joins in and twists, restless spirits awakened and angry.

“Devil’s child!” Sister Two screeches and lifts her scissored hand to stab me. Trapped between her and the tree, I scream and raise my arms to protect myself from the blow.

The doll I roused earlier swoops between us and grabs the shears, wrestling Sister Two.

Seeing my chance, I break through the swaying branches. Snarling toys claw at me as I make my way out, tugging my hair and wings. I burst through and sprint for the entrance, colliding with Sister One.

She shoves me behind her as her twin crashes out of the tree, a bloodthirsty scowl on her marred face. “Move out of my way! The little thief is mine.”

“Wait!” Sister One says, out of breath. “I took the smile!”

I wither in relief, panting and slumped against the back of her hoop skirt.

“What do ye mean, ye took it?” Sister Two asks. “Ye’re not to touch my wards!” She waves the stuffed toys in her good hand, effectively stilling the trees all around us as the spirits cower in fear.

“Morpheus gave an oath,” the good twin explains. “If I should help the girl get into the garden and cross off the last two squares, he’ll relinquish the moth spirits into my keep.”

“Ye never use any sense, nohow!” the murderous sister screeches. “I told ye to stay out of it. It be none of our concern.”

“Contrary that! We must have the spirits. One spirit in exchange for a thousand. ’Tis fair price to keep the dead contained here, so they’ll not possess the living. ’Tis our sworn purpose, after all!” Sister One pushes me through the archway back into the labyrinth.