She awakened only to realise that the echoes of the past were still there. She got up and ran towards the end of the hallway, where she used to tell jokes and laugh with her sisters. The statues were staring at her, from both sides, from above, through hollow, yet somehow luminous eyes. These eyes, both demonic and divine, had been following her every move ever since she was left alone in the house, years ago – centuries ago in her mind. She never knew their verdict. She found herself in front of the back door, never the front door, never on the way out. The garlic was hanging above the door as ever, next to the artificial withered-looking flowers. She never understood why the lord insisted upon keeping such strange, unwelcoming decorations. They used to have many unpleasant visitors lurking around the house indeed, but they were the kind that fed upon her happiness, not upon blood. And the flowers… what was the point? Artificial flowers looking withered – how peculiar!

There it was. The garden where they dwell. Their souls were entrapped in the past – they succumbed to a dreadful repetition of agony; an eternal reenactment of their fate. There was something tragic about the way in which they were displayed: each in their own place, yet all bound by the obligation to keep the Show going beyond time. Like pieces of a living puzzle, or fragments of a graphic novel, or carvings in the Cave of the Making, each depicted one sad episode. They were surrounded by glittering blues – portals through which M. could relive the suffering of the ancient.