❝ Anitchka, Anitchka, will you not invite me in? ❞
In which a girl is indebted to a wintry demon for saving her life, and the gold from her fingertips is a magic whose price she must repay tenfold. Unless she guesses his name first.
| loosely based...
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"WHERE ARE WE GOING tonight?" Anitchka asks, warm under the layers of her deep blue coat, its fur lining running from the collar to the end of the material. She has donned earrings, the silver of it like delicate vines twirling until it hangs in the form of a crescent moon on her collarbone. It is exquisite. But it tightens a knot in her stomach.
The coach jolts as it hurries over uneven ground, and she braces herself. "Who are we meeting?"
"Someone important, Anna," the Collector says in a clipped tone, tugging gloves onto his hands, his thin fingers concealed immediately in black leather.
She mutters under her breath. "I figured as much."
"I heard that."
"It was meant to be heard, Sir." Her gaze wanders to the night sky, lingering there with a sinking feeling. Anitchka faintly remembers watching it from her windows when she lived amidst the living and not among the dead. It is a time that is spiraling towards being forgotten, and she clutches desperately at the blurred memories. Briefly, she traces the outline of the trees and wonders whether they have aged since she left. After all, every second her eyes flutter shut, something changes in the land of living. She hears the Collector – perhaps she should call him the Count for a while since he wears those features tonight – clear his throat.
When she refuses to turn, he sighs. "I take it that you are upset." Silence greets him, so he continues, "It's understandable. I'm afraid I cannot tell you who has requested my services, but I assure you I am just as put off by this as you are."
His disappointment in reaping intrigues her, and Anitchka thinks hard. An enemy of the demon is an ally to her, so she decides to tread her chances carefully. "Very well, why are you unhappy with this certain . . . deal?" When his gaze fixates on her, narrowing suspiciously, she hurries, "I thought settling debts was important."
"It is," he agrees, "Although it's unfortunate that I cannot refuse anyone."
"Is that why you helped my mother that night?" The crooked moon of her earring shivers against her skin, rattling.
The Count looks away. Dressed in black with ringlets of gold swirling at the shoulder pads of his coat and smattering along the tip of his cap, he appears a dashing young man. Yet he is anything but that. "Yes, that is why I helped your mother that night."
Anitchka drums her fingers, holding back all the things she wants to ask. She can't tell whether he is being impartial in his honesty or letting lies slip through his teeth. "Will you ever tell me what truly happened?"
"We're here."
She balks. Once more, she has forgotten to watch the path they were taking. Once more, she's slipped before the demon. Anitchka considers seizing him by the collar and demanding the truth from his jaw, tearing it from his throat. The power that settles on her shoulders speaks to her. It urges her to wring his pleas and bury them in the snow. But she doesn't. Instead, she bites her tongue and hushes a gasp.
