I own nothing.
On the island of Rokkenjima, there were two mansions. One laid isolated and forgotten, the walls choked with ivy, the gate choked with rust. No one lived there anymore, you see. The mistress of the mansion was little more than a prisoner, trapped in a cage of golden bars, trapped in the cage of the name 'Beatrice.' She was a prisoner, and the fence were her prison bars, the servants her wardens. When she escaped, she fell from a cliff overlooking the ocean she had never seen, and crushed her skull upon the rocks. Her spirit had fled into the forest. There was no need even for servants. Her home was shut up, and fell into disrepair.
But her spirit was not gone, as I said. Perhaps Beatrice had in death remembered her true nature as the Witch of the Forest, or perhaps the Witch of the Forest had come and possessed her houseless spirit. Either way, Beatrice soon made her presence known, turning her eyes to the other mansion of the island.
On the other side of the island of Rokkenjima, there was another mansion. There, a man claimed that he lived a caged life with a family that was forced upon him, but he forced Beatrice to live a life behind bars, and felt no remorse. He loved her, and his grief at her death drove him into madness, but what remorse he felt came not from the caged life he had forced upon her, but for other offenses.
In this mansion, there was a room known as the VIP room. It was a room meant to house the most important of guests, but the master of the mansion had never let anyone stay in it. There was no one in this world, he claimed, always claimed, who was important enough to stay in it for any length of time.
There was only one he would have accepted, only one he would have allowed to live in that room. The master of this mansion had longed for the day when he could present his beloved Beatrice and welcome her into his home as a member of his family. But Beatrice was dead now. The moment when she could be welcomed and ushered inside would never come, for all eternity.
In the VIP room, there was a doll.
History would not record who had first placed the doll in the room. It could have been one of the servants, or the master of the mansion himself, or some other unknown, acting on their own agenda—no one knew.
A little French doll was placed in the VIP room. Its skin was made of porcelain, its long golden hair derived from strands of silk. It wore a black satin dress and smart black velvet shoes. The doll sat on a tiny cushioned couch, its head slumping downwards slightly; there was no life in it, after all. This was only a doll. This was not Beatrice, however much it had been made in her likeness. The doll sat there, waiting, for a moment that would not come for all eternity, for she whom it represented was gone, and could not be revived. The room around it seemed to hold its breath waiting for the moment, but the moment would never come. In front of the doll laid a plate piled high with wrapped candies and chocolates, and cookies that were made fresh for it every day, in remembrance of how Beatrice had loved sweets.
The doll meant many different things to many different people.
The daughter of the mansion, practically a princess in this place though still secretly unsure of her own home, saw the doll and was unnerved. The stories of Beatrice roaming the halls of the mansion at night filled her head, as did the horrible slithering sound that greeted her ears at the strike of two on a stormy night. Without prompting, she saw the doll as a vessel, and the sweets as offerings. This was a shrine, but one whose implications were ominous. 'Please don't curse us. We respect you. We know that you 'exist.' Please don't curse us.' She fled and never looked upon the doll again.
The mansion's chef thought this a quaint custom, proof of his coworker's provincial backgrounds, but it was not polite to say so aloud, so he did not. When he was called upon to provide sweets, he did so with good grace. The chef was proud of his skills in the kitchen, and even for such a strange thing as this, half-measures simply would not do. And truth be told, he was a little spooked by the rumors of the Witch, and wanted to avoid any accidents.
The head servant was the one who most often made the home-baked sweets placed in front of the doll. He was a quiet, sober man, and one would not have pegged him as such a skilled pastry chef, but his sweets were superb, and even the man employed as the mansion's chef had to be impressed by them. He would place the plate down in front of the doll, and there, he would sit and remember. Remember the charge he had failed to protect, remember his guilt, and remember how he had never said a word. Remember how he had felt suspicions, how he had known that something wasn't right, and how he had still said nothing. 'Please, forgive me. I let all of this happen to you. And then I let your child be injured. Please, forgive me.'
The old woman was not lacking for skill with pastries herself, though her real specialty was with fish. She did her part faithfully, and like the head servant, she remembered the old days. But though her smile was wistful, she tried tor remember better times, instead of dwelling on her grief. 'I remember, Beatrice-sama. These were always your favorites; you always did like the western candies best. Will you not eat again?'
And there was a young servant who came as well. This child—no, not really a child, nearing adulthood. This young servant, this young adult, came with what was probably the most meager plate of all of them, but the young servant's cooking skills were not quite up to par with the rest, so it could not be helped.
This young servant came, less often than the others, but stayed longer than any of them. That person sat by the doll, and stared long on it with a pensive, brooding, only faintly unhappy expression, and would speak in a soft voice.
'I've brought you the sweets they tell me you liked. Genji-sama and Kumasawa-san helped me make them, so I know they're alright, and they're the way you liked them. I have some cookies from the stores on the mainland too; biscotti and things like that.
'You know, I wonder sometimes. I really like these sweets myself. If you were with me today, would we eat them together? Would I have grown up eating them with you? Would I have come home from school and told you about my day over black tea and these sorts of candies and chocolates? I really don't know.
'This doll isn't you. I know that. I have no pictures of you, for no pictures were ever made, and Genji-sama tells me that the portrait is your remarkable likeness. In comparison, this doll looks nothing like you, apart from her golden hair. I may as well be laying out a burnt offering towards a pagan idol.
'But I hope you still like them. Even if you have to eat them alone. Even if only your spirit can touch them, and they have no flavor. I made them especially for you, Mother.'