I felt culpable. He wanted me to tell you, Gray, and I wouldn't. I said that if he was so damn set on you knowing that I'd been there, he could tell you himself. But he didn't. Instead... he did this."

The letter. The library. The will. Their middle names. The date of Ave's birth—and Emily's death. The numbers, scattered all over the estate. The stained glass,the riddle. The passage down into the tunnel. The grate marked M. E. Thehidden room. The moving wall. The door.

"He wanted to make damn sure," Jameson said, "that I never forgot."

So what about the books? The puzzle box? The journal? The hidden messages? The video. Oh that video.

"You think that is what this is?" Grayson's voice was something I never heard before. Violent. Enraged. "You think this is all about you, don't you Jameson?" He stepped back, "No, this is nothing to do with you or Emily. It's all because I killed Sarina. And that man never stopped punishing me for it, even in his grave."

Now the entire oxygen of the room was sucked out. My throat was tied up in a bow and handed to me. 

"On her birthday—on our birthday," Grayson's eyes were on me now, "The old man had planned a surprise. We were going to watch the fireworks from the tree house. We were going to get her in that shed, run out and then at the strike of midnight, surprise her with us five, and giant birthday cake the size of a tower, and a telescope." He chuckled dryly at the bittersweet memory, "We were ready in tuxedos and big grins. Presents over presents. All the fireworks ready." 

"Grayson," Nash warned, Xander's eyes already wettening. Jameson looked like he swallowed magnum.

"I was the one to lead her to  in the house. I was the one who kissed her cheek before locking the door." He closed his eyes, his fists clenching so hard, I was worried he'd draw out blood. "I was the one who smelled the gasoline everywhere."

It was my turn to step back in horror.

"I was the one who couldn't act in time. The fireworks burst and..." The video. The burning. Sarina Salva burned to her death because of Grayson. So who the hell was Arlene? "That night, you all know what happened." He met the gaze of his brothers one at a time. Nash, Xander and Jameson. All looking beyond broken.

"He pulled me aside, he didn't yell, he didn't hit. He did nothing but look at me." Grayson clutched a part of his arm. The one most hidden under his suit sleeve. "He..."

"Grayson, please, stop..." Xander pleaded. 

I didn't need to put two and two together. 

"He pressed a burning sparkler on me." I wanted to vomit. "He reminded me what I had lost. What my foolishness had caused me and he promised me, in his exact words," Grayson looked at me once again. No longer the man of the house. No longer the fearful, formidable Hawthorne. No longer the one with absolute control.

Just a nineteen year old boy who had seen more than what death could offer him.

"Like this scar on my arm, I would always get back to what I lost."

"You were nine." I sobbed out. "A child."

"Maybe I was, my dear," He smiled ruefully, but then looked at Jameson hardly, "Yet I did what I did. And I lost one of the most dear person to me. A person I could never get back." Jameson tried to say something, but Grayson beat him to it, "I'm not a blind man, Jameson. I see the similarities of Rina in Arlene. I see her face, I see her smile and I see her. But I know well enough that Rina is dead. And Arlene is here. And I'm more than happy to have her here and well."

"This twisted game was a manner to show us all what we lost. So, no. He didn't want to make sure you don't forget. He wanted to make damn sure that I remember  what I did till my last breath."

"No," Xander blurted out. The others turned to look at him. "That's not what this is," he swore. "He wasn't making a point. He wanted us—all four of us— together. Here."

Nash put a hand on Xander's shoulder.  And that hand was shaking with rage. "The old man could be a real bastard, Xan."

"That's not what this is," Xander said again, his voice more intense than I'd ever heard it—like he wasn't speculating. Like he knew.

I said nothing as Xander revealed everything he already told me.

All I could think about was what a horror would be under my pretty boy's coat amor. What always had been.

"Do you know why your grandfather chose me?" Avery demanded. "Have you known the answer all this time?"

Xander held his hands up in front of his body, like he thought I might throttle him. "I only know what he wanted me to know. I have no idea what's on the other side of that door. I was only supposed to get Jamie and Gray here. Together."

"All four of us," Nash corrected. "Together." Avie remembered what he'd said in the kitchen. Sometimes you gotta excise a wound before it can heal. Was that what this was? Was that the old man's grand plan? Bring us here, spur them into action, hope that the game let the truth come out?

"Not just the four of us," Grayson told Nash. He looked back toward me. "Clearly, this was a game for five and one."

Ezra, the silent ghost he had become, stepped closer to me. Vallerine smiled, her presence finally acknowledged, "That, and one little more thing from our dear dolly." She placed a hand on my shoulder, trying to support a sinking vessel. "Emily Laughlin didn't die of a heart attack..." The world stopped spinning. 

Every secret I pridefully locked away sprouted weeds in my stomach.

Ati sarvatra varjayat. I think I know what that means. Too much of anything leads to nothing.

"Emily Laughlin was killed. Shot."

I looked up. My golden eyes shadowed and dull in the darkness of the room.

"By me."

·······•✦•······

"What the hell do you mean by that, Arlene Amira Grambs?!"

I was wondering the same thing. Not.

God, everyone was too loud. 

"Easy, easy," Vallerine held up a hand, "Let the poor woman speak."

"And who the fuck are you?" Jameson spat, his body shaking with confusion, anger and sorrow all at the same time.

"A dear familiar of our Deadly Doll," I tried to keep Vallerine a secret. Ati sarvatra varjayet. "They call me The Dancer, The ballerina," She bowed, her eyes glinting dangerously, "And won't you listen to what our dear Bambola has to say, Hawthornes?"

All eyes on me, and my lungs were collapsing.

"Emily Laughlin... Emily Laughlin is an anagram." I met his eyes. "Miley. Miley L. Hauling. The Emily you knew died at the age of fifteen from her heart. A Stage performer called Miley had been living as her perfect clone." I swallowed the bile in my throat, "Miley was... was Salvatore's informant. She kept track of everything happening in the Hawthorne house, although I don't know why."

"All I know it that I, Annabelle Salvatore; The Deadly Doll, was given the performance of eliminating her when she started to... warm up—" The deliberate use of the word, "—to the Hawthornes. Going rogue for the money she wanted. For the thrill. For the fantastical lies." 

I wanted to stop living. "None of you were responsible for what happened to Emily," I took in the two brothers' faces, "I'll tell you," I looked at my sister, "I'm a roseless thorn."

Vallerine didn't show any remorse for ruining the relationships I made with so much hardship, in one sentence. But she did lean into my ear, "You have no home, sweet girl. So come back to a stage where you can dance as you are."

And for once, as I leaped back into the room, the idea didn't seem half bad. Until it did.

His hand was in mine again. 
"You're not leaving me, now, darling," He whispered. "No matter what you have done or do or will do."

Could I cry now?

"I didn't know... I had no idea what was right or wrong or..." I hated how small my voice became. I hated how I practically was sniffling like a little child as the other three joined the hug. "I'm sorry... I'm so sorry..."

"We've got you now, Arlene," Jameson buried his head against back of my neck, his older brother held me the closest while the eldest ruffled my head and the youngest nuzzled against my cheek. My sister smiling at the sight. Despite the gravity of what I just admitted to, I felt as light as a feather with them. "You're stuck with us forever."

I wouldn't want it any other way. 

"So... group hug aside," Xander grinned, "We wanna see what's behind that door or what?"

Our laughter rang loudly in the narrow chamber.

"Damn right we do."

·······•✦•······

The anagram was solved as quickly as it should. Avery Kylie Grambs. A very risky gamble.

To think I never held her as tightly as I did before.

It was slowly unraveling. Why she had been chosen as the second heir. The heir to the fortune, the gamble that brought all the brothers together.

I was nowhere needed. A pawn, I was.

I didn't speak. I didn't expect anything, but my mind begged for answers. Why wasn't Avery the first heir then? Why did you put me upto so much importance if I meant nothing in the end? Even if Avery wasn't the player, she was at least the glass ballerina or the knife. I was nothing.

The arrogant old bastard didn't even leave me a fucking letter.

Nothing.

I looked up to see all eyes on me, "What?" I managed a grin, "Do you think I'm gonna start watering my eyes again because I didn't get candy? Puh-lease," My eyes rolled, "I'm happy I didn't get one," I lied, "I already have waaay too much on my plate."

I wanted more. That didn't mean I could have more.

"Oh well, for the rich there is nothing so rare as salvation."

"Stop." Grayson said suddenly, making my pause.

"Say that again." Jameson breathed out.

"Oh well," I blinked, my eyebrows furrowing in confusion, "for the rich there is nothing so rare as salvation...?"

"That..." Nash looked at me wide eyed, "That was the last thing Tobias Hawthorne had to said to all of us. Before he died."

... how the hell am I even supposed to react to that?

"No." I said, "There is no way... Salvatore—" I hesitated, debating whether to use the term of relation or not, but deciding anyways, "my father—or the closest biotic thing to it— used to say that." Everytime he made me torture someone for his own gain. No need to say that part out a loud, now do we? "And I doubt he and Tobias ever personally met..." The gears clicked, "I... think..."

"Leens?" Xander looked up at me from the wall behind the box, "You might want to come here and check this out."

So I wasn't nothing after all.

The wall had the tiniest of blocks on them. The smallest of buttons and even smaller letter on each. You'd need a magnifying glass to read them.

"Here," Xander held out a detective grade magnification lense as if candy from his pocket. We all looked at him. "What? Can't a guy carry around random stuff in his infinite pockets?"

No one decided to comment.

The letters enlarged through the lense, "Ave?" I called, but she shook her head, "This one is yours, Leena." She smiled, nudging me towards the buttons.

Rare as salvation. "What do you think this could be?" My hands moved the letters as well as I could. 

"Dunno," Jameson plopped down beside me. Grayson followed, on my other side. Nash and Xander leaned in as Avery crouched to see what I was doing.

I remembered those manipulative, cruel, kind and loving golden eyes I shared with my father. I remembered how he would smile at me as if I was the light that brightened up and burned his entire world.
"You are rare as salvation, mia rosa. You will always be rare as salvation."

For reasons unknown, I remembered Sarina's final admission in her diary. I know my real name. I am my name, broken salvation past tear.

I was probably going brain dead with the information overload but what if we take it too literally?

"By literally, you mean how, doll?" Grayson asked, making me realize I said that out loud. And that he knew I read Sarina's diary.

"Well," I looked at him, then everyone around me, "Literally. If your break the word or noun Salvation, you get Salva and Tion. Sarina's last name is Salva."

"So past tear," Avery tapped her lower lip in concentration, "past tear what?"

"Past tear..." Jameson furrowed his brows, trying to think up on something, "Before tear? Whole?"

"Salvawhole doesn't exactly sound like a name." Nash deadpanned. Xander nodding his head in agreement.

"Past tear; past tense of tear?" Grayson suggested, "Tore?"

Boom. Explosions in my head. And a second later, in everyone's.

"Holy shit..." I gasped. My fingers now arranging the buttons in a manic speed.

R A R E  A S  S A L V A T I O N

My hands dropped to my side when I saw what became of the anagram.

S A R I N A  S A L V A T O R E

The entire wall split open, gears turning and bolts creaking. Bricks tearing apart from each other until nothing but a hollow space showed in front of me. With a lone chest in the heart of the room.

"The Chamber of Secrets," Xander muttered as we entered the hollow space, our voices echoing around.

"The treasure trove." Nash murmured. 

Grayson was silent as he just stared at the old, antique box. It was large enough for a child to fit in. He and Rina used to love hiding together during hide and seek. "Doll?" He turned to meet my gold eyes. His grey windows trying take in every light that shone from them. 

I knelt against the box. Preparing myself for what I was about to see.

Maybe gold?
Maybe a whole chest of letters?
Maybe children remains—okay, no that was dark, even for a dead psycho billionaire.

A long breath in and a quick breath out. 

I threw open the lid.

Only to find pictures. Hundreds, if not more, pictures. 

"That's..." Grayson froze beside me. 

In the chest there were pictures of a little girl with a bright smile, beautiful golden eyes and sandy skin. In every way possible. In every ounce possible.

There were all pictures of Sarina Salva.

Of me.

My phone buzzed sharply through the thick blanket of silence. I took a moment to put it against my ears with shaky hands. 

Oren spoked through the phone, "Leena, you remember that DNA test you sent for? It came earlier than usual. The result is—"

I think I watched myself from out of my own body when he said that last word.

"—positive."

·······•✦•······

THE END.

OR IS IT JUST THE BEGINNING?

DO TELL, DEAR DOLLY. DO TELL.

·······•✦•······