CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
The old Billings house creaked, as if in anticipation as Vivian moved through its dusty rooms. Every board, every beam seemed to whisper ancient secrets as she completed her preparations.
The smell of wood smoke curled through the air—the brick oven outside was already coming to life, hungry and waiting.
After decades of patience, the moment had finally arrived.
It was time.
Vivian stepped into the parlor, where late afternoon sunlight slanted through lace-curtained windows, illuminating dust motes that drifted through the air.
“Memories,” Vivian muttered aloud. “Memories floating all around me.” It seemed natural to her that those memories would be here.
Her eyes fixed on the glass case against the parlor wall, the one she'd been forbidden to touch all those years ago.
Behind that protective barrier sat Loyalynne, unchanged by time—porcelain face still smooth, glass eyes still bright, cloth body still waiting for the embrace of a child who needed her.
“I've come back for you,” Vivian whispered, approaching the case with reverence. “Just as I promised.”
For a moment, she hesitated over the small brass latch —the act of opening this case had been forbidden for so long that breaking the rule still sent a thrill of anxiety through her body.
But she was no longer that helpless child.
She was the one making the rules now. She was writing her own story now, the way it needed to be told.
The latch gave way with a tiny click that echoed in the stillness of the abandoned house. Vivian lifted the glass lid and reached inside, her breath catching as she finally—finally—touched the cool porcelain of Loyalynne's face.
“Hello, old friend,” she murmured, lifting the doll from its prison with tender care.
Loyalynne was heavier than she'd imagined, substantial in her hands.
The doll's glass eyes stared up at her, blue and knowing.
Vivian cradled her against her chest, feeling a rush of emotion that brought tears to her eyes. “We have so much to catch up on.”
She carried Loyalynne through the house, moving from room to room like a tour guide leading a cherished guest. “This is where the witch would serve tea to the children,” she explained, stepping into the dining room with its long oak table covered in a film of dust. “She'd let us drink from real china cups, let us pretend we were proper ladies.
Then she'd show us the music box collection, the old photographs, the spinning wheel.”
Vivian's voice hardened as she moved into the kitchen.
“But you were always here, held behind glass. I could see you watching me. I could feel you wanting to come to my rescue.” She ran her finger along a countertop, leaving a clean line in the dust. “I asked to hold you. Just once. Do you remember? I promised I would be careful.”
She turned Loyalynne to face her, looking deep into those eyes. “She said you were too valuable. Too old. Too fragile for children's hands.” Vivian's lips twisted into a bitter smile. “But she didn't understand what we meant to each other, did she? She didn't know that you were made just for me.”
Vivian wandered into what had once been Ida's bedroom, now emptied of most personal items but still containing an antique dresser and mirror. She held Loyalynne up to see their reflection a woman with blond hair and sharp eyes, holding a child's treasure like the most precious thing in the world.
Vivian didn't see how her blonde hair had frayed at the ends like old rope, brittle from years of bleaching, nor how the carefully arranged waves had collapsed on one side, exposing a patch of scalp near her temple.
She made no note of the half-moons of exhaustion carved beneath her eyes, deep enough to cast shadows, or how time had etched a network of fine lines around her mouth that resembled cracks in porcelain—making her face a strange mirror to Loyalynne's.
“Think of how different things could have been,” she whispered.
“If she'd let you come home with me. You could have kept me safe when father drank. You could have comforted me when mother pretended not to see the bruises. You could have whispered warnings when the bad men came.” Her voice trembled.
“You and I would have protected each other. That's what friends do.”
Loyalynne stared back, silent and unmoving.
“Don't you have anything to say?” Vivian asked with a note of uncertainty. “After all this time? Not even a thank you for freeing you from that case?”
The doll remained mute, its painted smile fixed and enigmatic.
“It's alright,” Vivian assured her, stroking the doll's yarn hair. “You've been trapped for so long. It must be overwhelming to be free. You'll find your voice soon enough.” She glanced at the small watch on her wrist. “We have work to do now, anyway. Important work. For all the children.”
She carried Loyalynne out the back door and across the overgrown yard to a stone outbuilding. The smell of burning wood grew stronger as she approached. Heat radiated from the structure, and smoke poured from the chimney, rising into the crisp October air.
“This is where it ends,” Vivian told the doll as she pushed open the heavy wooden door.
Inside, the brick oven dominated the small space, its iron door glowing faintly red around the edges.
The old dome-shaped oven built from fireproof bricks was designed to cook large amounts of food for a farm family and workers.
The fire inside it now roared and crackled, consuming split logs and generating the intense heat needed for what was to come.
In one corner of the small room, on a rough wooden bench, lay Ida Billings. The old woman was unconscious, her frail little body bound with clothesline, her white hair falling across her face. Her chest rose and fell with shallow breaths.
“I did it differently this time,” Vivian explained to Loyalynne, propping the doll on a shelf where she could see everything.
“Claudia and Rebecca—they didn't understand the importance of darkness in stories. They thought children should be sheltered from the truth.” She shook her head.
“I couldn't let them keep spreading that poison. So I gave them poison of their own—my special mixture. Quick, but not painless.”
Vivian knelt beside Ida, brushing the hair from the unconscious woman's face with something almost like tenderness.
“But this one, the witch—she deserves a fairytale ending, don't you think? The injection I gave her was heavy on jimsonweed and tamed with just a whisper of foxglove, enough to bring darkness, but not death.” She smiled.
“I want her aware when the flames take her. Just like in the story.”
She stood and moved to the oven, opening the iron door. A blast of heat struck her face, turning it red and making her eyes water. The fire inside danced and reached, eager for more fuel.
“When it's hot enough,” Vivian said, turning back to Loyalynne, “we'll give her that well-deserved ending.
Children will be safer when she's gone. When they're all gone—all the ones who want to sanitize the stories, who want to pretend the world isn't dangerous.” Her voice rose with fervor. “Children need to know the truth! They need to be prepared for the world’s evils! To learn how to protect themselves, how to escape.”
But Loyalynne only stared, glass eyes reflecting the orange glow of the fire.
Vivian's certainty faltered. “Why won't you say anything?” she asked, her voice smaller now. “Are you angry with me? After all I've done to find you again? After I've rescued you?”
The silence between them was broken only by the crackle of flames.
“You'll understand soon,” Vivian whispered. “When it's finished. When the witch is gone. Then you'll see that I've done everything right.”
*
Jenna’s patrol car ate up the rural road, siren wailing through the ordinary sounds of an October afternoon, trees and fields blurring past the windows.
Every second mattered now. The pieces of the puzzle had finally locked into place, but Jenna feared they might already be too late to save Ida Billings from the fate Vivian Crane had designed for her.
“How much farther?” Jenna asked, navigating a sharp curve.
“Two minutes, maybe less,” Jake replied. He checked his weapon for the third time since they'd left Nancy Billings’ home.
The radio crackled with updates from the second patrol car that was somewhere behind them, following to provide backup. Jenna also knew that Spelling was sending a highway patrol unit, but she and Jake would be the first to arrive at the old house.
The connections between the murders had been there all along—Vivian's rejected book, the fairytale deaths, the focus group members targeted one by one.
But they hadn't seen the pattern until Piper's warning had pointed them toward Ida Billings and her collection of antiques, including an old doll named Loyalynne.
“We should have figured it out sooner,” Jenna muttered. “She's been planning this since—”
“Don't,” Jake cut her off. “We got here as fast as we could. We're here now.”
The road narrowed as they approached the turnoff to the Billings property, gravel crunching beneath the tires as Jenna slowed just enough to make the turn without sending them into a ditch.
The old farmhouse waited at the end of the lane, abandoned for years now that Ida lived with her daughter in town.
They rounded the final bend and there was the old house, surrounded by tall trees. A plume of dark smoke rose from somewhere behind the house, curling into the clear blue sky like a malevolent spirit.
“Jake—” Jenna’s voice failed as fear squeezed her chest.
“I see it,” he said. “Could be a brush fire.”
But no. “Watch out for the flames,” Piper had warned, and their mother had delivered the message to Jenna. Now, with smoke billowing into the autumn sky, the words took on the meaning she’d most feared.
“The witch,” Jenna whispered.
“What?”
“In Hansel and Gretel,” Jenna said, her hand on the door handle. “The witch was burned alive in the oven.”
And Jenna knew that was exactly the horrible fate that Vivian had planned for poor Ida.