“Dravidian does not live behind this mask, Chantilly. In fact, he does not live. There is only dead flesh and yellow eyes behind this façade, nothing more.”
She stooped to gather up the books.
“They should be burned,” he said.
He could not have been more cruel even had he struck her across the face. Tears came into her eyes as she placed the volumes back onto the shelf.
“You have poisoned my thoughts with your books and your ideas and I have paid dearly for it,” he continued. “It is a cruelty, Madam, to enlighten the beast as to what lie beyond his cage. He will only resent you for it.”
She reached toward him and he stepped back yet again.
“Why are you so angry—”
“Not angry! Caged! You have made me aware of my confines where before I was not and—”
She lunged forward without warning
