Thorn was still very young, looking not yet twelve, his eyes full of ignorance. He answered whatever Bo Li asked.
“What is your name?”
“Oliver Thorn…” Thorn whispered.
On the surface Bo Li’s tone was gentle, yet in her hand she gripped tightly the small knife hidden in her underskirt. Should Thorn make any sudden move, she would stab his arm at once.
“Why did Mrs. Merlin lock you in the basement?”
“Because…” Thorn trembled, almost convulsing, “I was returned.”
Bo Li then remembered seeing his name “Ollie Thorn” in the notebook, with the mark “SOLD” beside it.
“Can you tell me why?” she asked softly, “I promise I will not laugh at you.”
Thorn nodded, and haltingly recounted his experience—he was not born deformed, but at the age of nine, a lump suddenly grew on his face.
Frightened, he told his mother, but to his shock, her first reaction was that he could become the second Elephant Man.
Thorn’s symptoms were identical to those of the London Elephant Man, who was a great celebrity—not only admitted to the Royal Hospital but also granted audience with the British princess.
From then on, Thorn’s nightmare began.
His parents, one an agent and the other a host, took him touring everywhere. For just one dollar, one could see his true face beneath the burlap sack; for five dollars, one could touch, even squeeze, the lump on his face.
Fortunately—or unfortunately, in Thorn’s own words, which made Bo Li shudder—as he grew, the lump on his face grew larger. The tours at last became profitable. His parents ceased their beatings and scolding, and began calling him their “money tree.”
It was then that Tricky came knocking. After some persuasion, he bought Thorn from his parents.
“I was supposed to go to a circus…” Thorn said timidly, “but that circus suddenly went bankrupt. In the end, a lady from the freak show bought me, asking me to perform circus acts for her at home. But I knew nothing, I could not even speak properly… the lady grew tired of me, and returned me.”
No wonder Mrs. Merlin’s anger was so fierce. With Tricky dead, she had not received a single penny, and still had to clean up his mess.
Of course, she could refuse the refund, but if she wished to continue her business in human curiosities, she could not afford to offend such buyers, and so had no choice but to return the money.
Bo Li asked Thorn: “Do you trust me?”
Thorn looked at her face, then at her thin arms, and hesitated. “…I—I don’t know. I cannot beat Mrs. Merlin, she is too strong.”
“Very well.” The gentle smile vanished from Bo Li’s face, her tone turning cold and hard. “Everyone has their own will. If your wish is to become an Elephant Man, to be ogled like a circus monkey, I will respect your choice.”
“I—”
Bo Li cut him off. “Think carefully before you speak. If you choose Mrs. Merlin, then even if I manage to escape, I will not take you with me—you will spend your whole life here, the latter half of your years entirely in Mrs. Merlin’s hands. Beware she does not saw off your arm and stitch it to your nose, turning you into a true ‘elephant.’”
Thorn shivered violently. His knowledge was limited; the most frightening thing he had ever heard of was the “human zoo,” which his parents often used to scare him. The scene Bo Li painted went far beyond his imagination.
“I… no, no…” he said in terror, “I trust you, I will go with you… but I truly cannot fight Mrs. Merlin.”
“You need not fight,” Bo Li said. “You only need to do exactly as I say, and we will both escape.”
Thorn nodded.
Bo Li leaned close to his ear and began instructing him on what to do.
Thorn was timid by nature, easily yielding to the orders of others.
To prevent him from changing his mind halfway, Bo Li alternated between gentleness and severity in her tone, frightening him until his mind went blank and his body stiffened, like a puppet being manipulated.
“Later, you will lie here,” Bo Li said, “and put on the look of trembling all over—just like when someone is about to pull off your hood, that kind of trembling and terror. Do you understand?”
Thorn stammered.
Bo Li lowered her voice, threatening: “—Do you understand? Or is it that you wish to stay here and let Mrs. Merlin saw off your arm?”
Startled, Thorn no longer hesitated and nodded frantically.
Bo Li glanced at the time. She planned to pound furiously on the basement door at midnight, rousing Mrs. Merlin from sleep.
When deprived of sleep, the spirit is weakest. Once awakened, Mrs. Merlin would certainly be irritable and cursing.
She had no idea Bo Li carried a knife, and relied too heavily on her own strength. Likely she would enter the basement without caution to personally check on Thorn’s condition.
At that moment, all Bo Li would need to do was circle behind her and plunge the blade into her neck—
The thought made Bo Li’s heart contract tightly.
She told herself to treat this as nothing more than a horror survival game.
Do not hesitate, do not fear, do not soften.
Cast away every negative emotion.
Yet her palms still broke out in cold sweat. Fearing she might lose her grip on the knife, she cut a strip of cloth from her underskirt and bound it tightly around her hand.
In her mind, she rehearsed again and again the act of stabbing—would it kill with a single thrust? If not, what should she do?
By the time dawn neared, her mind was a field of blood-red, like the dark crimson curtain about to rise onstage.
At two o’clock, Bo Li had Thorn lie on the haystack, facing the wall, curled into a ball. She told him that as soon as he heard Mrs. Merlin’s voice, he was to begin trembling and thrashing about.
Once certain he understood, Bo Li drew in a deep breath, climbed the stairs, and began pounding the basement door with all her strength:
“Help—help—Mrs. Merlin, help! Thorn is in trouble! Thorn is in trouble! He’s going to die… Mrs. Merlin, Thorn is going to die!”
Minutes passed before footsteps sounded. Mrs. Merlin came with a lantern in hand, scolding as she walked: “Enough howling, enough! You little chatterbox, do you want to call the police here?”
The bolt was drawn, and the basement door swung open.
Mrs. Merlin held up the lantern, staring coldly at Bo Li. “You, get down the stairs. Don’t think that just because I came down, you can take the chance to run. This door can be locked from inside as well.”
Bo Li’s eyes were already swollen from weeping, her sobs breaking her words. “It truly isn’t to run away… please, come see. Thorn seems about to die… I don’t know what happened. I only didn’t want him near me, but suddenly he began convulsing. I thought to remove the sack from his head to see if he was having a seizure, but his convulsions grew worse… I was so afraid he would die just like that…”
“All right, all right,” Mrs. Merlin said impatiently. “That brat has no identification—if he dies, it does not matter. Keep wailing and I’ll strangle you first.”
Bo Li seemed frightened, covered her mouth with tears still brimming, and barely managed to stifle her sobs.
Mrs. Merlin stepped toward Thorn. “Let me see what trick this brat is playing… If I find you two are toying with me, I’ll beat you both to death.”
Thorn trembled.
Fearing he might suddenly turn against her, Bo Li immediately cried out in a loud voice:
“He moved, he moved… is he about to have another fit?”
“You little brat, shout once more,” Mrs. Merlin warned, “and I’ll cut your tongue out on the spot.”
Perhaps because Bo Li’s acting was too convincing, or perhaps because in Mrs. Merlin’s eyes Bo Li was nothing more than a foolish, kindhearted girl, she turned her back on Bo Li and crouched down without the slightest guard.
—Now.
Bo Li fixed her gaze on Mrs. Merlin’s neck, tightened her grip on the knife, and drove it forward with all her strength.
After that, her memory fractured as though cut off. She only remembered the gush of blood bursting forth, soaking the cloth bound around her hand, drenching her shift—her entire body felt heavy, heavy with the weight of blood.
Mrs. Merlin clutched at her neck and turned her head toward Bo Li. She seemed about to speak, but when she opened her mouth only a rush of blood poured out, mingled with saliva and foam.
At that moment, Bo Li instead grew utterly calm.
She gave Mrs. Merlin no chance to resist. With a swift pull, she drew out the knife and plunged it once more, this time into her heart—
Mrs. Merlin finally recovered her senses, her voice incredulous: “You… you…”
The muscles of her arms bulged as if she meant to seize the knife and strike back, yet when she saw her hands slick with blood, she faltered.
Meanwhile, the wound at her throat seemed like a second mouth, writhing as it spurted blood again and again, until at last her entire body collapsed with a thud.
Bo Li flung the knife aside, searched Mrs. Merlin’s body for the ring of keys, tried them one by one, and at last opened the basement door.
She dragged the stupefied Thorn to his feet and pushed him out first.
Then, stripping off her blood-soaked shift and unbinding the cloth from her hand, she threw them all onto Mrs. Merlin’s body before stepping out of the basement.
—I killed someone.
That thought flashed across her mind, then swiftly sank into the night.
Bo Li roughly wiped the blood from her face, then rummaged through the villa’s wardrobe until she found a clean cloak and dress, which she changed into.
Afterward, overturning chests and cabinets, she found the gun Mrs. Merlin had confiscated.
Gripping the pistol tightly, she said to Thorn, “Let’s go.”
Thorn nodded, completely at a loss.
Bo Li sprinkled herself with a heavy dose of lavender perfume, masking the overpowering stench of blood—she felt as though Mrs. Merlin’s scent had seeped into her whole being.
…Filthy. Intolerable.
She wrapped a cloak around Thorn as well, and told him that if they encountered patrolmen on the street, he was neither to speak nor to cry—everything would be handled by her.
Thorn nodded his assent.
Fortunately, patrols were only posted in the wealthy districts. Once past the garden villa streets, not a trace of patrolmen could be seen.
Half an hour later, Bo Li, driving a light carriage, brought Thorn to the hotel.
She secured a room for him, instructing him to rest well, and that they would speak of the future once he had slept.
Then, she ordered a tub of bathwater for herself.
The attendant on duty said the boiler was always kept burning, and hot water would be ready for her bath at once.
Bo Li gave him a tip of one dollar.
After bathing, she dried her damp hair as she returned to her room, took off the cloak and dress, and changed back into her own clothes.
Only then did she notice her fingernails had not been cleaned, still filled with blood—congealed, brownish blood.
Bo Li’s expression remained indifferent as she wiped away the stains with a handkerchief, glancing absently around the room.
Erik was not there.
She no longer had the strength to guess what he was doing.
Too much had happened that day; her mind was in turmoil, she only wished for a proper sleep.
…
Around five or six in the morning, Bo Li woke with a start from a nightmare.
She dreamed she had returned to the modern world. Just as she was about to breathe a sigh of relief, she realized Mrs. Merlin’s corpse had followed her there as well.
The police extracted her fingerprints from the knife at Mrs. Merlin’s throat, and arrested her with ease.
Yet the verdict of the trial was—she was to be imprisoned forever in the nineteenth century—
Dreams shift in an instant; the next moment she was on trial in a New Orleans court. But the charge was not murder, it was her identity as one from the future.
“We believe in God, and we revere science,” the judge said. “Your existence offends the authority of God and violates the progress of science. We must sentence you to death.”
That sense of not belonging to either side scared her awake.
Curiously, she was not as terrified as she had been in the dream—only her heart still beat fiercely, so strong she could feel it pounding in her wrists.
Bo Li rubbed her eyes, just about to get out of bed to pour herself a glass of water, when she realized a tall figure was standing in the guestroom.
All her hairs stood on end at once, the nightmare cast aside.
Fixing her eyes on him, she saw it was Erik.
Bo Li exhaled in relief, her voice unconsciously tinged with complaint and a nasal whine: “…Where did you go?”
He did not answer, but stood at her bedside, looking down at her from above.
His gaze was shadowed, as though searching her body for some trace.
Bo Li shrank back a little. “I didn’t mean not to return to the hotel… I thought Mrs. Merlin was a good person, so I tried to get close to her, to ask about the whereabouts of the freak performers. Who could have known she was in league with Tricky and the others, and locked me in the basement…”
Before she could finish, he suddenly bent close, seizing her chin, forcing her to bare the vulnerable line of her neck.
The white mask pressed near.
From within came the distinct sound of breathing.
Exhalation.
Inhalation.
Slowly, it moved up and down along the side of her neck.
He was inhaling her scent.
At once, gooseflesh rose all over Bo Li’s skin.
…Would he fail to recognize her, simply because her scent had changed?
“It’s Mrs. Merlin’s blood… I was afraid of drawing the attention of the patrols, so I sprayed on a great deal of perfume to cover it,” she said nervously. “It does smell a little now, but in a few days it should be gone.”
Erik said nothing, only continued to breathe her in intently.
Bo Li’s scalp prickled under his scrutiny, her heart nearly leaping from her chest. The nightmare was already flung to the farthest skies—for what did it matter now? The pressing question was: what was Erik thinking?
Yet clearly, she had never once guessed his thoughts correctly.
Turning the matter over, she could only rely on experience. She leaned forward, tightly embraced his waist, and buried her head in his chest.
“I don’t know why,” she murmured, “but I missed you a little.”
It was the truth.
Ever since she had seen Thorn, that strange sour ache had lingered within her, refusing to disperse.
She did not know whether it was pity for him—or pity for herself.
Incredibly, after gazing at the side of her face for a moment, he actually asked:
“What do you miss about me?”
His voice was too near, reverberating within the white mask, carrying a peculiar tingling that drilled into her ear, as though something were being poured inside.
Hot. Sticky.
Like blood.
Perhaps because of what she had experienced that day, Bo Li’s breath grew heated.
Her palms still remembered the sensation of fresh blood—so filthy, so unbearable.
But beneath Erik’s gaze, that discomfort swiftly transformed into something else.
Blood was no longer blood, but oil—slick, viscous oil, that would burst into flame at the slightest spark.
The atmosphere grew strangely charged.
Bo Li could not help turning her head, rubbing her ear hard against the pillow. “…I don’t know, but when I was pushed into the basement, I was truly afraid I would never see you again, and even more afraid you would think I had run away…”
A lie.
Erik, inhaling the scent clinging to her, thought without emotion.
He knew she had been shoved into the basement by Mrs. Merlin.
He had been there.
Yet from beginning to end, she had not once mentioned him.
She had even found the leisure to draw in another freak, coaxing him just as she had once coaxed Erik.
—“I truly wish to give you a job, to let you perform like real actors, moving the audience with story, acting, and personal charm, rather than relying solely on your unusual appearance.”
How many times did she intend to repeat those words?
He had sat in the villa’s shadow the whole time, waiting for her to call out to him for help.
As long as she called his name, he would have strangled Mrs. Merlin on the spot.
Yet behind the basement door, she cried for help a hundred times—her voice ringing clear at first, then hoarse, shifting from panic to sobs—but never once did she mention his name.
Why?
He had watched her drive the knife into Mrs. Merlin’s neck, her whole body drenched in Mrs. Merlin’s blood.
For the sake of that freak, she had reduced herself to such a state of ruin.
Erik observed coldly, unable to say what he felt. He only knew his heart was like a pump gone mad, contracting and expanding too quickly, blood surging through his whole body at an accelerated pace.
This sense of losing control made him unbearably irritable.
He wanted to press her beneath the water, until that foreign scent was completely gone.
Yet for the moment, he did not wish to kill her.
After a silence, he suddenly asked: “Are you still bleeding?”
Bo Li froze, then realized—he was asking about her monthly courses.
“…They ended recently,” she thought for a moment, then added, “They usually last only a week.”
He said nothing, his mind filled with how to restore her scent to what it had been.
Besides blood and water, was there another way—another liquid—that could wholly cover her smell, and make her entirely new again?