Title: Ghosts
Canon: The Lethean Glamour
Colors: Harvest Gold 9 (fall back), Fire Opal 10 (fury), Celestial Blue 10 (dearly departed)
Supplies/Styles: Paint-by-numbers (the few lives Helene regretted taking), charcoal, miniature collection, canvas (1, 3, 4, and 5)
Characters: Helene Mossing and a chorus of victims
Word count: 500 (excluding headers)
Rating/Warnings: PG-13, with warnings for violence including violence against children
Summary: Helene and the five kills that left an aftertaste almost like regret.
Notes: Beta read by isana  , who has my thanks!

Amira Franzen

Amira had a mouth as red as strawberries and a tongue that was just as delightfully tart. She had been dear to Helene in those bright months when everything seemed imperishably perfect.

"Helene! How dare you stay away for so long," Amira grinned. "I'd almost think you could tolerate my absence."

Her age was gaining on her, and none would forgive her when she changed from queen to crone. Age was a worse death to women like her than fire and knives.

"You were the best," Helene said. "My only faithful friend."

Even death was fashionable on Amira Franzen. Helene would never forget.

Soren Steensen

"I wanted to kill you even before I knew the bliss of bloodletting, you know," Helene said, conversationally. "When you married Vera, I knew I'd have you here in her attic. I wanted you long and slow and screaming, Soren. I wanted to hear you beg without your tongue. It was gonna be so special. I hate you like black holes love light. I wanted to take you and rip you into rotting tinsel."

Helene yelled and kicked Soren where he had fallen and impaled himself on an exposed pipe. He had proven a thief of her joy to the end.

Aurora Alm

Her name had been Aurora, and she was as gorgeous as her namesake. She had killed a man, his hand upon her cheek, with a little penknife, and brushed him off into a nearby well. When she saw that Helene had seen her, she smiled brilliantly and waved. It should have been the start of something good. It was, for a while. But the ties that bound the fate of every living thing to her showed her Aurora's true heart, and here they were, that same heart warm and beating in Helene's palm.


They'd been nice while they lasted, at least.

Meera Canter

That Meera Canter's blood ever stained one of Helene's blades was a fucking joke. Didn't make it untrue.

Helene considered herself laid back. Fine, sometimes she had to tear a fucker's face off for being offensively more human than the rest of him, but who didn't? She had rules like anyone, and first was that she suffered nobody meddling with what was hers. Anybody that didn't ken Holly Asher being hers was asking for it.

There was no joy in killing children, same as raw meat makes you sick. Helene had to live with that impudent brat staining her blade every day.

The unknown selkie

Helene had loved selkies since she was young, and liked to think she knew a bit what it was like to be one. She kept her secret skin hidden where none could see until she had been dragged under the eye of public judgment. It had been good that her childhood wishes were less than breath and dreams. Helene was no one else's but her own creature.

The selkie in her teeth had died her own creature, as well, her skins both still warm. What was this, when Helene last remembered stalking human prey?

Killing wasn't meant to feel like a crime.