Chapter 7 Dust and Crimson

I hold the book.

Both hands shake—
but one much worse than the other.

The left is slick, fingers slicked with blood, ink, dust, and whatever part of me decided to let go first.

Still—

I clutch it like a trophy.

A prize.

Something earned.

My jaw opens.

Victory speech.

It should be glorious.

“GgrkkHHmmmhgg—!”
“Ffftt-‘mhzzz—hhghrrRRMM!”

It isn’t.

The words come out like wet gravel pushed through a horn.
All consonants, no redemption.

‘That sounded better in my head.’

The book itself is—
like everything here—

Gray.

But it carries a hint of something else.
Like color once lived here,
buried beneath a thick quilt of dust and ruin.

Maybe red.
Maybe gold.
Maybe something rare, like the color of sunrise memory.

It's thin.
No more than seventy pages, maybe eighty.
The kind you'd slip into a coat pocket.
Or tuck under a pillow during long travel days.

With a daft, hopeful motion—
I brush the cover clean.

Wrong hand.

The left one moves first.
The bleeding one.

It swipes across the surface in a slow arc.

The dust stirs.
So does the dirt.

And now—

A bold, smearing stroke of crimson across the cover.
Right down the middle.
Tacky. Wet.

I blink.

Stare.

Then—

“Oh… my blood has color.”

For a brief moment, that’s a comfort.

Then reality nudges again.

“…Oh yeah. That was dumb.”

The grit presses into the open wound.
Dust, soil, flakes of God-knows-what
now rubbing into the meat of my palm.

And now the pain wakes up.

It starts as a slow vibration.

A pulsing ache, rhythmic and rising—

Then sharper, clearer, burning—

A handful of nerves screaming into a pillow.

“…Yeah. That was really dumb.”

I stagger back toward the wall.

Still clutching the book.

Still victorious.

Still very clearly bleeding out.

And also, apparently, allergic to basic first aid.

A dry chuckle scrapes from my throat.

It's weak, raw—
less amusement, more survival instinct.

But still—

A laugh.

Because if I don’t find something to laugh at,
I might start screaming instead.

Alright. Time to stop bleeding to death.

I glance back toward the bedroom.

That chest at the foot of the frame—
clothes.
I remember them.
Frilly, flouncy, fabulous.

Disgusting.

I limp over, cradling the book under one arm.

The chest creaks open with a sigh,
and the air inside smells like lavender perfume mixed with mildew.

Inside:
Layers of tailored mockery.

Silk collars.
Lace frills.
Raven feathers stitched into shoulder seams.
Ribbons tied just because.

“No man should ever be caught in something this... confident.”

I reach in.
Grab a blouse that looks like it once performed in a cabaret.

It tears beautifully.

The pain of wrapping my hand
is a whole new genre of agony.

Pressure surges through the torn muscles,
and every time the fabric presses into the raw divot where the hook used to live,
my spine arches like I’ve been slapped.

“Mmghh—ha—hhghhrr—dammit—”

But it holds.

It works.

The bleeding slows to a crawl.

Good enough.

Book in one hand,
bandaged shame in the other.

Time for some answers.

I step back into the main room,
look around at my fine, ruined world—

And head for the bed.

I breathe.
In.
Out.

Then sit down—

—And immediately fall through the bedframe.

CRACK.
THUMP.

“GhA–OHHF—!”

My back slams against the cold floorboards.

The barbed wire just above my head creaks ominously,
like it's considering whether or not to reward my stupidity with tetanus.

I lie there for a moment.
Staring at the ceiling.
Watching dust dance through beams of frozen light.

“...Ah. Yeah.”

“No mattress.”

A long, tired groan escapes my lungs.
A sound of a man who has run out of curses,
out of patience,
and possibly out of blood.

“I hate this story.”

“I want to go back to my farm.”

-

I don’t even sit up.

There’s no point.
My spine’s already crumpled against the slats of this mattressless deathbed,
and one leg's still propped up like I’m sunbathing in a trench.

I frown at the ceiling.

Then at the book.

Then at existence.

And crack it open with a sigh.

The first page resists for half a second—
like it knows it shouldn’t be read.

Then it lies flat.
Exposing bold lettering, etched into the paper in dark, violet ink that gleams like bruises.

I blink.

Once.
Twice.

And read:

“My mother, she killed me,
My father, he ate me,
My brother Felinkin, gathered all my bones,
Tied them in a silken scarf,
Laid them beneath the juniper tree…”

…

“Tweet, tweet, what a beautiful bird am I.”

Silence.

Even the vines in the other room have stopped tapping.

The ink shimmers—just slightly—
and within it, I see stars.
Tiny specks of light, as if the letters were cut open and night itself had bled inside.

This is no journal.

It’s a curse, bound in soft covers.
A poem with teeth.
A song built to bury someone.

And I’m holding it like it’s the morning paper.

I sigh.

Cross my leg a little tighter over the broken beam.

“Cool. Murder lullabies. Love that.”