The Ash Mouth

Journal Entry – November 28, 1871

The house tastes of smoke.

Every breath carries the tang of cinders, as though I’ve swallowed the hearth itself. When I speak, a thin wisp escapes my mouth, curling upward like a secret eager to flee.

I found gray streaks along the wallpaper this morning — long vertical trails that weren’t there before, as if something inside the walls were leaking outward. When I touched one, the ash stuck to my fingers and pulsed, faintly warm, before vanishing into my skin.

By noon the coins were hot again. I keep them wrapped in cloth, but the heat seeps through, steady as a heartbeat. Each one hums to a rhythm just out of sync with my own. When I hold them, the mark on my arm brightens until the veins glow blue-white beneath the flesh.

The guests complain of the smell — burnt sugar, they say — but they stay. They always stay. The inn feels fuller than it should, the halls too narrow, the air too thick. Sometimes I hear voices from rooms I know are empty, whispering my name with mouths that don’t exist.

At sunset, I coughed into my hand and found soot. The mirror in the hall trembled; my reflection’s lips moved before mine did.

“Breathe,” it said. “Feed the flame.”

And when I did, smoke drifted from between my teeth like prayer.