“It was the dark before dawn. So apt! So perfect. I freed myself, pulled my hand off the table. The blood had pooled there. It was sticky, and the wood contained stains from all the other times. Father liked a record of what he’d done.”

“A monster.” Kellen wasn’t sure if she was speaking of Mara or her father.

“I pulled the tip of the bloody needle out of the table. I waited, huddled in Father’s easy chair by the fire. He rose, as he always did, at 5:00 a.m.—he believed a disciplined life created a man of character. I heard the water running for his shower—cold, of course. I imagined him dressing, and I heard him come down the stairs and walk toward the kitchen.” Mara told the story with animation, creating an atmosphere of dread. “He rounded the corner and looked surprised that I wasn’t in my place—and I launched myself at him, and stabbed the needle through his eye.”

Kellen didn’t know what was worse, hearing about the abuse Mara’s father had doled out, or how Mara got her bloody revenge.

“He screamed the way he always admonished me not to do. He tried to knock me aside, but I clung to him. He was my father!”

“You loved him.”

“Yes. I loved him.” Mara breathed hard. The Cheshire Cat was back, with its cruel smile. “He didn’t die all at once, so I knelt on his left arm and plunged the needle through his hand, eight times to commemorate each time he made me pay for my failure, and one time for his failure to anticipate my attack. You see, he had to pay for his failure, too.” Mara grabbed Kellen’s hair, jerked her head back, and stared into her eyes. “Everyone has to pay for their mistakes.”

“Is that what he told you?”

“That’s what he taught me. He was right. He paid. He died. I removed his hands, his soft, scholar’s hands, and kissed each one.”

Kellen could see the ghosts of Mara’s prey, floating behind her. “Did you kiss their hands?”

Mara looked wide-eyed at Kellen as if she’d pulled her back from a precipice of memory. “Who?”

“When you took the hands of your other victims, did you kiss them, too?”

“No. They weren’t worthy.”

The ghosts shrank back and blew away with the wind.

“How did they catch you?” Kellen asked. “The authorities?”

“My mother…she wouldn’t stop screaming, and she had never loved me like my father did. She’d tell him not to hurt me. She never wanted me to be better.” Now Mara’s voice was indifferent. “So I killed her, too.”