Marionette Of Sorrows Prologue

Once upon a time there was a young marionette maker whom excelled at his craft. Spending his days happily wildling away the dolls and painting exaggerated or delicate faces while in shop until later in the evening. The children especially loved his creations, gathering around the shops windows pressing their faces up close to the glass. Boys trying to get a glance at the sillier looking marionettes while girls vying for a view of the pretty ones in beautiful gowns. One of the things he loved most about being a marionette maker was seeing the joy and laughter that his creations would bring to others.

It was a sunny day; the children had not been let out of the school house yet when she walked into his shop. He had seen her around the village square, but never before had she come into his shop. He shyly watched her now and then peruse his store every once and a while she would flicker her gaze up to him, their eyes meeting for a moment before she would blushingly turn her gaze back towards the dolls. This charade between them continued for a few more weeks until one day he gathered up the courage to speak to her. After that it didn’t take long before the pair was happily married. So in love with each other on their wedding he gave her a gift of a bride marionette. Perfectly mirroring his young bride the marionette enchanted her.

Their happiness however did not last long, just short of their first anniversary the marionette maker’s wife fell ill. The pain and suffering of her illness weighed heavily on his soul, feelings of being helpless and hopelessness forever etched. On the morning of their anniversary he awoke to a coldness that seemed to envelope the room. It wasn’t the lack of ragged breathing that made him realize that she was gone the moment he opened his eyes, but the sudden feeling of emptiness that comes with being utterly alone.
It wasn’t longer after her funeral did his mind begun to unravel. His shop would never to be opened again; swirls of mystery and rumors surrounded his reclusiveness. He was only ever to be seen again getting supplies for food and making his creations. But the lights of his house could be seen burning from a distance at all hours of night. What had happened those few weeks after his wife’s death remained a mystery until his journal and the life sized marionette were found in a room that had been bricked off in the basement.