Iris crushed the handcrafted ring. The paper rose surrounding the fake gem crumpled as dull wrinkles. The crimson stone fractured, collapsed, and scattered as faint pink particles. Even the dried ring-shaped twig snapped, crackling as if laughing mischievously.

Antina shuddered. She looked at her mistress, whose eyes had become filled with churning void. It was a sea of darkness, of impregnable blackness, with only a singular dot of light flickering against this tide.

That dimmest light pierced Antina’s eyes. She turned away from her mistress. An illusory silhouette of a black rose and a feminine skeleton hand manifested behind her. Her distortive air spread throughout the carriage.

Iris blinked. The darkness vanished. She clasped her hands around Antina’s. Her gentle stroke stopped the expanding power, which receded into the confused maid.

“Don’t ask,” Iris said. “I just want to hold your hand like this.”

Antina puckered her lips. But what could she do? She leaned close to her mistress, who rested quietly with her eyes closed.

Her slightly trembling hands firmly held onto her maid. Her hair stirred, but she suppressed every particle of her emotion, of anxiety grinding her heart, of fear squeezing her chest.

This tranquillity blanketed her, but she could not feel at ease. This artificial peace was a world built on a glass foundation. A slight touch, and all would tumble to ruin.

She hated this feeling, this circumstance, this body.

“I’m . . . really tired, Antina,” she said. “I just want to rest.”

“Then rest, Mistress. Your maid will wait for you.”

Iris gave an unconvincing smile. “The world won’t wait for me. It will leave me behind, all of us behind.”

“We will hold back the world for you.”

“Should you not hold me instead?”

“With your permission.” Antina switched to sit beside her mistress. She still watched her mistress’s hands. “We would like to . . . understand you. Please let us feel you.”

“You’ve helped me enough, and certainly felt me enough.”

“Our help is superficial, as you only allow such.”

Iris slowly opened her eyes. She let go of her maid’s precious hand, for which she found herself unworthy. But her maid seized her hand and drew it close to her chest. Iris could feel that warm, pulsating heart echoing wordless assurance through the stifled air.

The world became a little brighter, a little less brittle. It would still sink beneath the ground, but one figure would stay by her side, guarding her useless heart.

“I don’t know,” Iris said. “I have no idea. Something happened . . . but I could no longer remember it.”

“Would you allow me?”

Seeing that her mistress didn’t resist, Antina moved toward her mistress. Their foreheads touched. An insignia of a black rose appeared on her forehead. Its roots linked the two, sinking into their consciousness.

Antina let go of her control. A wave of heaviness blurred her mind, bound her body in this sluggish temperament, and whispered dreamy words, words she couldn’t understand or resist. She struggled to keep her eyes open, yet she remained calm, assured by the familiarity beneath the exhaustion.

She fell on top of her mistress, shivering from every faint touch. Minute yet vivid sensation paralysed her, forcing her to focus on the entangled feeling.

In her mistress’s delicate embrace, she drifted away from reality. Her spirit sank within her body, within her heart, and rose from a sea of flowing clouds. She instinctively looked up.

Dimmed stars, whose cracked surfaces leaked out azure light, crawled through the endless cosmos, searching for a place of rest. Their flowing light pierced through the floor of clouds, puncturing holes and exposing the land below.

Antina appeared beside a massive hole. Her soul flickered as she saw the land below. Ruinous rubbles adorned with miasmic blackened rifts covered the grey dead world. Patches of black and white flames glowed fleetingly as dreary gales threatened to end their existence.

Antina had never seen such a devastated consciousness before. Even the cultists whose minds had been destroyed by the curses of their deities paled before this calamitous aftermath. She descended from the clouds and landed as lightly as possible.

The hushed world left nothing discernible. She could traverse for an entire day and perceive no chance in this homogenous landscape.

What did her mistress experience? How could anyone endure this much yet remain . . . so graceful?

Antina raised her right hand above her left. Dark purple webs sprouted out of her palms and weaved into a fragmentary mirror. The weakly coupled shards reflected an assortment of visions, of sunken wreckages drowning in pale mists, of spreading flames amidst crumbling buildings, and of a graveyard of broken spears and scythes.

The graveyard towered in solitary, against the vast, wrecked world. Its graves of shattered golden spears glimmered while the dull scythes hauntingly vibrated.

Despite the omen plaguing that vision, Antina retracted her webs and stepped onto her shadow. She sank inside the darkness and rose out of the shade of a gigantic scythe, whose murky blade revealed her reflection. She wore a tattered black cloak, a wanderer to this dream. Hidden beneath the thinnest of attire, her foreign beauty attracted the attentionless weapons.

She looked around the graveyard. At the centre, rings of white ashes layered over the land untouched by the rest of the world. Not even the subtlest turbulence dared to venture near.

Antina touched her chest. Her heart didn’t respond. Her connection with her mother didn’t react. She found nothing extraordinary about the mysterious circle.

“You’ve arrived, my Dear,” a voice echoed.

Antina turned around. The massive scythe’s blade shone. In its reflection, a lady in a pure-white robe stood with her back facing Antina.

“Who are you?” Antina couldn’t even muster her power. Nothing would answer her call, not even her mother’s Domain. “How are you related to Mistress?”

“As expected, you’re too loyal, too clever.” The lady chuckled. Her figure vanished before appearing in the reflection of a broken spear. “But your question is wrong.”

Antina tilted to her side, trying to look past the floating veil covering the lady. “My life would’ve already ended if you so wished.”

“If you keep testing me, my hand might slip.”

Antina took a step forward while donning a smile. “You could’ve erased this place, rebuilt this world, and buried this secret forever. Yet you leave it here.”

“Yet I wait for you. Why did I do that?”

Antina looked at the sky. She could not see through the bed of clouds or the dancing, dying stars above it, but she could feel the familiar air surrounding this illusory world.

“What did she sacrifice?” Antina said. “The Court has many treasures, treasures which eluded our identification. Can I use them to reclaim her price?”

“Do you believe you have something more valuable than her soul?”

Antina swiftly looked away from the mysterious lady, fiery thoughts dancing in her cold eyes. The temperature plunged abyssward. Her extremities tingled as if pricked by sharp needles which refused to let go. She steadily reached forward.

A mirage of a bright moon appeared behind her. Its soft radiance condensed into slim threads that swam beside the broken spear. They dared not strike the mysterious lady, yet their threatening flow never ceased.

The mysterious lady raised her head to stare into the distance. Her gaze pierced through all and landed on the innermost essence. She gave a muted smile, a smile felt by her visitor.

“You underestimate your mistress,” the lady said. “She would never sell her soul in exchange for her safety.”

“I don’t fear that scenario.”

“Am I so low as to force her?” The lady snapped her fingers. “Her soul is not with me.”

The threads lost their brilliance. They crumpled to the ground, twisting futilely while silence claimed their liveliness. The moon behind Antina cracked. Rifts on its surface poured out a sea of greyness that dissipated minutely across reality.

Antina covered her mouth. Luminous air escaped through the gaps between her fingers. She fought the urge to retreat.

“I want to know the price she paid.” Her voice was hoarse.

“Unfortunately, you cannot.”

“I’m . . . willing to trade away my emotions. If they aren’t enough, then take my heart as well.”

“She forbade me from accepting that deal.”

“Then what can I do?”

“Tell her what you saw . . . and tell her to be more honest.” The lady touched her lips. “All these secrets can be hidden from all but herself.”

Before Antina could speak. The lady playfully turned around. The shroud concealing her feature lifted skyward. The broken spear imploded. A mystical portal opened, its holy presence painting the land with a majestic aura.

The lady stared into Antina’s frozen eyes. Her long, flowing blue hair danced like an energetic ritualist who offered her most sincere gesture to her most reverend goddess.

Antina took a step backwards. Her mind went blank; her vision swiftly followed. The illusory dream fell into the void beneath, leaving only that confident, elegant, charming, divine smile in her memory.

It obliterated all the lady’s features except itself.

Antina gasped. She held her mistress’s hands while sleeping on her mistress’s lap. Her clouded eyes regained their clarity. Her mistress’s mild expression overflowed her vision. Nothing could give her a stronger sense of security.

She rose from her nap and straightened her attire. Her quivering hands regained their steadiness, and her alerted heart calmed its incessant beating. The visage of the dreamland and her adventure in it rapidly evaporated from her mind, but she could seize onto the most significant moment before it left her grasp.

Her mistress examined her body, touching everywhere sensitive, caressing everywhere private. Antina did not resist. She recollected her thoughts while her mistress undressed her.

“Mistress . . . what are you doing?”

“Satisfying your desires.”

Antina looked into her mistress’s serious eyes. “You’re hiding again.”

Iris drew back her hands. “Morbi and Parmin have planted a seed in my heart. It’ll die if you don’t water it.”

“Did you remember something?”

Iris leaned closer to her maid. “Should I?”

“You would never lie to us, but you would never tell the truth either.” Antina lightly pushed away her mistress. “You must have an idea of what happened, yet you still let me look into your heart.”

“Your smile bewitched me. And your sleeping face teased me.”

“Who . . . is she?”

“That part of my memory is no more.”

Antina pouted. “Why did you have to go this far, just to hide it from us?”

“I also can’t remember the reason.” Iris covered her mouth. “You’ll have to tell me, my Dear.”

“You can never hide the secrets from yourself, Mistress.” Antina turned away, hiding her expression from her mistress. “Please be more honest with yourself.”

“Are those your feelings?”

The answer wouldn’t matter. The two Monster Girls listened to their quiet thoughts while the carriage rocked their bodies against the cracks on the bricked path. The pace slowed and accelerated periodically; the journey would never end, not until they resolved the knots in their heart.

“In your dream, I saw a great ruin, an emotionless world with nothing but the wreckage of the past. Except for . . . a graveyard and her, there is nothing but desolation.”

“What do you think of her?”

“Mysterious, charming, and flirtatious.”

Iris innocently tilted her head when her maid stared at her. “You have too wild of an idea, Antina.”

“Compared to your secrets?”

Iris giggled. “I’m starting to think that the most valuable things I possess aren’t those secrets but myself.”

“You’re the most precious treasure.”

“Would you like to have a taste?”

“Please tell me what happened, what you remembered, and what you believed has transpired.”

“As a reward, or as a price?”

Antina dispersed her thoughts as warm breaths. She let go of her restraint, unbuttoned her dress, and leaned on her mistress. Her relaxed hands held onto the delicate body which must have suffered much, too much to bear without releasing the pressure.

All those pains, which she only experienced marginally, plagued her beloved always. She wanted to relieve the stress, scatter those memories, and suppress the anxious future into a whisper drowned by all-permeating pleasure.

Even if for a mere moment, she wished to fill her mistress’s heart.