Victor was dead.

The world lurched sickeningly as I gasped for breath. I had been standing so still under Elisabetta's scrutiny that I had forgotten to breathe.

Victor was dead. It was impossible, it had only been a few hours since I last saw him, when… oh god…

I had hurt him. The very last time I had ever seen him, I hurt him.

"Wh-what? How?"

"He was thrown from his horse this morning," Elisabetta said evenly.

Through my shock, something in her choice of words snagged at my consciousness. She had referred to him as her husband. Not Victor. Not my creator. Not my father.

Oh god, I was alone now. My sole benefactor was gone and I was alone, an interloper among people who wanted nothing to do with me. She had chosen those words to emphasize that I was completely at her mercy.

Elisabetta watched the emotion play out on my face with an expression of vague resignation.

"What… what is to become of me?" My throat was tight and I had to force the words out.

"Well," she began, "I have something you need: a place to live, somewhere safe where you can skulk out the rest of your existence. Victor told me about what happened in the mountains, so I trust you understand the position you find yourself in."

I nodded. I knew all too well.

"You are also aware that my husband spent a considerable fortune on his obsessions. We've had to let go of nearly all of the staff. I need someone to maintain the household: to cook, clean, launder the clothes. And I need that person to be discrete, someone who won't gossip about Victor's… experiments."

Some of the tension in my shoulders drained away. I wasn't to be thrown to the wind. I could find a way to survive here, hidden away here in this house.

"I will provide you shelter and safety and you will provide unconditional service to myself and my daughters. Do we understand eachother?"

"Yes," I said, barely a whisper.

The rest of the day passed in a blur as Elisabetta explained, in detail, my duties in the household. Victor had occasionally put me to work, sweeping or cleaning lab equipment, but our relationship had been as parent and child, not as master and servant.

The amount of work I was expected to do was dizzying. The household had been maintained by a team of three or four servants, but the staff had dwindled to nothing in recent years as the financial situation became more dire. I was expected to do everything. It quickly became apparent that neither Elisabetta nor her daughters would contribute at all to the work.

After hours of orientation with little break, I was finally shown to the servant's quarters where I was to spend the rest of my stay at the house.

Ostensibly the servant's quarters would give me better access to the kitchen, but the truth was that nobody wanted Victor's creature living in the next room over.

It was just as well, I don't think I could have bared another night in Ella's old room, not after what had happened. Part of me was glad to be away from that room and it's ghosts.

The quarters themselves were cramped, I could touch both walls with my hands if I stood in the center. It was unfurnished, save for a rickety set of drawers and a stiff cot that was about a foot too short for me.

Finally alone, I sat heavily on the cot. My head throbbed and my feet ached. My body was strong, but I was not used to so much activity.

I sat there for a long time, staring at nothing in particular as my brain tried to make sense of everything. I felt… hollow, but somehow heavy, as if my grief had removed all the substance of me and replaced it with something inert.

It had barely been twenty four hours. Victor had been alive. I had… I had hurt him. My mind kept replaying that final interaction - the look of terror, the bruises.

I struggled to stay afloat against a tide of self-resentment. If I had acted differently, would he still be alive?

Was I better off without him? Even through my grief, I felt the tiniest thread of relief. Logically I knew that I had simply traded one cage for another and my life was about to become immeasurably more difficult, but I was finally free of him. I was free of his control and the violations of my autonomy. I was free of his examinations and his probing hands. I was free of those looks he gave me that filled me with an unexplainable terror.

The spiraling thoughts made my stomach twist. Was I a monster for thinking ill of the dead?

Victor was buried a week later on the family plot. I watched from one of the high windows. Aside from his family and a priest, only a handful of others came. It struck me how utterly isolated he had been. He had dedicated all of his attention to me, letting all other relationships whither to nothing. His obsession with me had been absolute.

The next day, as I was making my rounds around the house, I found the door to Victor's study slightly open. There was a faint rustling of pages inside.

I thought of the treasure trove of books in there and I felt a deep longing. I needed to see the multitudes of books again, I needed to breathe in all of the scents of that room, just once.

If all else failed, I could truthfully claim that I was cleaning.

Inside I found Ariane, hunched over a book by one of the shelves. Piles of books were stacked on the desk and there were gaps among all the shelves. Her hair and clothes seemed more disheveled then usual and she studied pages before her with a certain intensity.

Noticing me, she snapped the book closed and cast a poisonous glare at me

"I'm appropriating this study and all of its contents." she said, puffing herself up with as much authority as she could muster with her gangly teenage body.

"You're never to enter here," she snipped. "Never."

I inclined my head deferentially and left her to her work.

Of course, that evening Ariane failed to appear for dinner. I set the dishes of steaming food before Elisabetta and Florina, but I was at a total loss regarding the third. Was I to set the place for Ariane on the chance that she would arrive late? Or should I take it back to the kitchen?

Florina began eating immediately, not noticing or not caring of her sister's absence. Elisabetta had just started cutting into her food when she noticed me standing there, paralysed by uncertainty. She glanced first at Ariane's empty chair, then the clock on the mantelpiece. She sighed and rolled her eyes.

"Just take the food to her," she said dismissively.

I hesitated a moment. Ariane had ordered me never to enter her new sanctum.

Noticing my pause, my stepmother looked at me. There was a cold flicker of hatred in her eyes, as if to remind me who was the mistress in the house. I quickly turned and fled to the study with the plate of food.

When I arrived, there was no reply to my knock. I swallowed and opened the door.

There were even more books on the floor, stacked in neat piles. Ariane sat on the floor squinting at a sheaf of papers. Hearing me, her head whipped in my direction. There was a manic gleam in her eyes and the dark circles under them were more pronounced than usual.

"Your mother ordered me to bring you dinner," I blurted, almost tripping over the words.

She blinked at me before her mouth twisted into a scowl. I saw the same mental calculus unfold - she could command me around, but her mother's word was law.

"Fine… just put it on the desk… and don't touch anything!"

I complied and she went back to examining the papers.

Ariane failed to appear for breakfast the next morning, and then lunch. By dinner, Elisabetta's patience had run out. She made a noise in her throat somewhere between a sigh and a growl.

"Go get her and order her to come to dinner," she snapped at me.

I ducked my head and complied, suddenly apprehensive of being caught in the middle of a power struggle between a teenager and her mother.

I tapped lightly on the door. After half a minute of no reply, I opened the door. The room was in complete disarray, only a few books remained in the shelves, the rest were arranged in massive piles scattered around the room, apparently organized by subject.

Ariane herself was even more rumpled and somehow more manic. She was wearing the same dress from the previous night. Her eyes were bloodshot and those dark circles were shockingly stark against her pale skin. When had she last slept? She had barely touched the previous meals I had brought her.

She blinked at me in exhausted confusion, as if she had forgotten that a world existed outside of this room.

"Your mother has requested your presence," I mumbled, breaking eye contact.

"Well, she-"

"She has demanded your presence," I corrected myself before she could complete the thought.

For an instant, there was a murderous look in her eyes. I knew I would pay for this intrusion.

She painfully got to her feet and stood wobbly for a moment. She cast one more contemptuous glance at me before walking stiffly out the door.

Her limp was especially pronounced and it took some effort on my part to keep a healthy distance behind her.

When she reached the dining room door, she paused to steel herself. She straightened her back and took a breath.

Elisabetta was in the midst of eating when she entered. Elisabetta didn't look up as Ariane stepped forward and stood awkwardly, fidgeting.

Florina didn't pause her eating either, but her eyes were fixed on Ariane, glittering with anticipation.

"Sit," Elisabetta commanded after lengthy silence. She raised her eyes to regard Ariane coldly and the girl flinched under the gaze as if struck. Ariane swallowed and sat hurriedly into her chair.

"Young lady, I have indulged you this past week, but you will be joining us for dinner going forward."

"I'm not hungry," Ariane mumbled.

Elisabetta cleared her throat.

"Perhaps I have not been clear. You will be dining with the rest of the family or there will be consequences."

Ariane looked at her plate and made a barely audible noise.

"What was that?" Her mother said, glaring at her.

Ariane's shoulders hunched and she repeated a quiet "yes ma'am" before picking up her fork to absently poke at the food in front of her that had already gone cold.

"Good. Now, your sister and I were discussing the task before us. As it stands right now, your marriage prospects when you come of age will be rather bleak unless drastic action is taken."

Ariane seemed to shrink even smaller. It was clear that she would rather be doing anything besides discussing future marriage prospects.

Florina snorted.

"As if any man would want to marry a ghoul like Ariane."

Ariane didn't say anything, but there was a brief flicker of abject misery on her face. Once again, I felt a tentative pity towards the girl.

Elisabetta continued on, not acknowledging the insult at all.

Ariane did get her revenge upon Florina a few days later, and I was caught in the middle of it.

I don't even know exactly how it happened. I wracked my mind for days after to determine if the accident could have been avoided. One moment I was attending to Florina's laundry, the next a full inkwell toppled off of a dresser.

I do remember the absolute panic that seized me as blue-black ink spread into one of Florina's dresses.

"Oh no! No no no no no!"

I scrubbed at the spreading stain, but that only made the problem worse. I didn't know what to do, how to fix it.

By some malignant design, Florina entered the room at that exact moment.

I froze, heart pounding in my chest.

Florina gaped at the ink stain on the dress. Any remaining fear of me evaporated as her face turned red with rage.

"You imbecile!" She screeched. "You stupid, stupid moron!"

She continued hurling insults as she stepped forward and began pummeling me with her fists. I cowered before her. I couldn't flee, I couldn't defend myself. To do either would only make matters worse. She was stronger than she looked, but not enough to cause serious damage.

So I endured the punishment in silence.

That night at dinner, Florina was still fuming. She snapped orders at me constantly. She insisted that her silverware was dirty or that her food was undercooked.

I was almost too distracted to notice Ariane, but I caught her eyes darting between Florina and me with a cruel gleam. The corners of her lips twitched in smug amusement.

At some point in the evening, I realized that nothing that day had been an accident. Ariane had orchestrated everything, from the misplaced ink to Florina discovering me.

The revelation stunned me. Any sympathy I had for her shriveled. I had seen how she suffered under the shadow of her mother and sister. I had seen how she grieved for her father, complicated as their relationship might have been. I had begun to imagine that she could be an ally here, but those hopes were now dashed. She was as cruel as the rest of them and I was truly alone here.

In those disastrous first few days, I began to understand the hell I had fallen into.

Elisabetta was ever present at the beginning of my servitude to ensure that my work was up to her exacting standards. Even the smallest mistake would earn me a canning which left horrible bruises that healed rapidly and deeper aches that did not.

By the good grace of Victor, such as it was, I was created with a sharp mind that latched on to patterns and details. I was a quick study and by the end of the first month, the canings had all but ceased. After another fortnight, Elisabetta was generally content to simply ignore me and let me go about my work.

Her daughters were another matter entirely.

Florina was her mother's golden child, the social butterfly that could do no wrong. She was vain and flighty and dreadfully spoiled.

She hated me with a passion.

She had spent her childhood basking in the extravagance of her family's wealth. She held me personally responsible for the loss of her family's fortunes, for the loss of privilege and status. She resented that the circumstances of her life were out of her control, so she relished the control she had over me.

Her moods were like summer storms, shifting suddenly and violently. She lashed out at me randomly, tripping me and making messes after I cleaned them. She would issue commands and then change her mind on how she wanted them done, forcing me to start from scratch. My stepmother was aware of all of it, of course, but she allowed it all to happen without comment.

Ariane was just as cruel as her sister, if not worse. If Florina was like the summer, Ariane was like the winter. She was cold and indifferent, and her approach was far more subtle. She remembered every detail, no matter how small and used them to strike at her sister or me. As with that first episode, she never targeted either of us directly. Instead she would arrange some inconvenience for Florina, who would then rage at me.

Ariane cared little for the financial and social woes of the family. True, she did lament the loss of her tutors, but she was more than capable of self study.

No, her animosity towards me came from somewhere far deeper. I didn't fully understand at the time, but she resented what my existence represented. She had spent a childhood desperate for a father's attention and approval only to be met with emotional, and later physical, distance.

I was the constant reminder that she hadn't been good enough for him, that he chose some platonic ideal of a daughter over his own flesh and blood.

So my life went on for three years. I woke, I worked, I endured the torments of my stepsisters. Without conversation, without music, I slipped into a fog, barely living.

The first year was the worst by far. My body heals quickly but it adapts slowly. I would go to bed each night with the delicate skin of my hands cracked and bleeding, my feet covered in blisters, my body covered in scrapes and bruises. When I woke in the morning, the skin would be pristine and unbroken and the process would repeat. It took months for calluses to form, far longer than they would have on a normal person. Eventually my skin learned to protect itself, but those first few months were a constant symphony of pain.

Though my flesh healed quickly, there was another sort of pain, an aching that seemed to seep into my bones as time dragged on. It concentrated in the places where my body parts from different sources had been joined together. My ankles were the worst, Florina's favorite torment was to trip me as I carried heavy loads, I rolled and twisted my ankles more times than I could count.

When the winter months came, my room became unbearably cold and I would find myself curled up before the kitchen hearth, trying to extract as much heat from the dying embers as I could. After those nights, I would wake filthy from the spot, earning punishment from my stepmother and unending mockery from Florina.

My only companions were the mice that scuttled around the kitchen after everyone else was asleep. I gave them names, made up stories about them to give my mind something to do.

There were rare moments of beauty, firey sunsets, the full moon gleaming on freshly fallen snow, the violent riot of color as wildflowers in the edge of the estate burst into bloom. I tried to fix those moments in my mind, to remind myself that beauty did exist in this world.

I sometimes thought of the original Ella, whose ghost haunted me still. What kind of person would she have been? Would she be cruel like her sisters? Or would she have been the light and joy of this place as Victor had described her? If she had lived, would this family be happy or would they have found another reason to despise eachother?

Would she have been kind to me?

I desperately wanted to believe it, but it was difficult, surrounded by so much cruelty.

Each day, a tiny piece of me gave in to despair. I was like a cracked pot, leaking my life away, one drip at a time. One day there would be nothing left, I would be empty and broken, with nothing left to do but be discarded.

I increasingly caught myself wondering if I had made the right decision, staying here. I knew what the alternative was, I had lived it, but this… this was another kind of dying.