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KETYA RAN AND STOPPED FOR NONE. She had left her red fabric to bleed in the snow, her scrawny legs carrying her out of the small alley way and to her home at the back of the theatre. When she finally reached the small door, she pushed it open with both her palms—only to land on them a second later.
For the first time in a long time, she let herself scream. Her hands blistering by the cold wood floor. 'She put a palm on your chest', She thought to herself. 'Stupid, stupid, stupid—she knows. You let her put her hand on your chest and she could feel nothing!' Ketya wanted to kick herself in rage. The old woman could've been miles away by now, telling every soul in Birsk about the girl with no heart. She'd wake up the next morning to the sound of crackling fire and her skin burning. They'd call her a witch or a demon.
But all she was, was a scared girl.
In her eighteen years, she'd been so careful of who she let touch her. She'd avoid hugs from the occasional friend she made, she'd avoid games with other children back at the orphanage.
Back in Növesk, the town of her birth, the nurses had told her that they had found her dead in the snow. A baby, barely a month old—laid out to die in the frigid cold. They had taken her back to the orphanage, simply to bathe her in holy water and bury her body. They'd been shocked when Ketya had sprung alive in their arms, life breathing back into her body.
The nurses had told her that the death god had shown her mercy, breathing life back into her body.
But he'd forgotten her heart.
Ketya had never felt her heartbeat, it had never returned to her body. For all she knew, she had a dead heart rotting away in her chest—perhaps it never existed. She'd never wanted to know.
She took a few deep breaths before settling herself on her knees. Ketya needed to calm down, old women had horrible memories didn't they? Perhaps she'd simply forget that she'd met a girl with no heart by the time she ever found someone to tell. Or she'd find someone to tell but forget Ketya's face, or could never find her way back to the alleyway. The possibilities were endless.
"He's coming for you, Ketya Növak" The woman had said, somehow knowing her name. But how could she have known her name? Birsk was a city, surely the name of a small tailor wasn't on everyone's lips?
She knows you because everyone around here knows you, Ketya assured herself as she brought herself to her feet. Everyone knows you because you're an excellent tailor. She knows you because you go to the market every morning to pick up your rations, she knows you because the Baker's Wife calls your name when you pass by. That is how she knows you. Nothing more, nothing less.
She let out a breath she didn't realize she was holding. It was a silly thing to worry about mad old women, there were bigger things at hand anyways. Birsk was a safe city, it had been for five years.
