Mordecai hummed softly to himself as the music of Francisco Tárrega played softly in the background. With an absent thought he slowly twisted the knife in his victim’s thigh causing her screams to crescendo with the guitar’s song. Mordecai gave a small smile as he continued to plucked one pizzicato pain-filled note at a time with a virtuosity to mirror dancing guitar music. With a slight smile, he leaned in close to whisper softly in his victim’s ear, his lips brushing wisps of blonde hair from the shell of her ear. Once so pale and perfect, now jagged and drenched with blood, a creation of his making.
“All I want Isabella is the key… just a simple little key. Give it to me and this will all stop… it’s such a small thing… why do you persist?”
Isabella whimpered an incoherent moan escaping her lips. Tsking softly Mordecai brushed his thumb across the ridge of her brow.
“The only reason I can think that you would deny me so is that you love my company. You must yearn for this, and as a gentleman, I must always give a lady what she wants.”
His eyes never leaving her face, Mordecai reached for another razor. Isabella’s eyes flew wide in horror as her will almost audibly snapped.
“Henry…. Henry has the key… he keeps it with him…like inside a puzzle automaton.”
“The silver stag?” Mordecai inquire softly, the razor twirling in his finger tips casting small flashes of light across Isabella’s face.
Isabella nodded weakly in response. With a soft hum, Mordecai stepped back to gaze at the broken woman before him. “See, that was not so hard now was it?” He crooned softly.
Isabella said nothing, just hung limply in her shackles, pinned to the wall by the assorted razor thin blades that Mordecai had deployed to trap her there. Each exquisitely planned to maximize pain but not cause fatal injury. The leather traps he had used to hold her in her place initially still compromised her breathing so that she could never inhale completely.
“Isabella, I have some good new for you… I am going to release you.”
Isabella’s pale blue eyes briefly flared with hope causing Mordecai to remember another time those same eyes had looked at him so, except then it had been infatuation that had caused those eyes to light up. A sensation that he had never returned, but still those eyes would follow him from across the room time and again. He would miss that, that sensation of being seen, even if that gaze had never see beyond the facade that he cared to present to the world.
“Now, what do you say to that Isabella?” He inquired softly.
With a meek whisper she choked out a soft “Thank you” that caused Mordecai to smile beatifically as his uncallused fingers gently stroked down her cheeks.
“Your welcome” was his only reply before sliding the razor in his hand clearly across her throat, severing her jugular.
He stopped back nearly to avoid the spray. With a final twirl of the blade, he tossed it back on the work bench. Swaying lightly, he let his head fall back as the guitar music reached its feverish crescendo.
“Ah Tárrega… such an under-appreciated artist.”
All business now that he had the answers he wanted, Mordecai wiped his hands clean on Isabella’s discarded coat before tossing it aside. With a jaunty twirl of his cane, Mordecai left the lab, leaving the dead woman’s body surrounded by song. After all, Isabella had always love music so. It was the least he could do for such a longtime friend.
©2020 by Leila Ghaznavi