The Domner’s Puppet

By WD Seitz

Entry for the 2024 CBC Short Story Prize

2126 Words

I am to feed the creature in the mountain.

I’ve heard the Domner does not like bones, instead preferring the soft, malleable compression of flesh. It enjoys the feeling of wrapping its fangs in a nice warm blanket, of swallowing limbs whole, like they are ice cream cones on a warm summer day. A meal that is entirely formless and subservient to its tongue.

That’s one of the reasons why they chose me. I have no bones. I was born without them; without much of anything, really. My parents had no money. They could not afford to send both my brother and I to school, so it was decided that I would live at home, learning how to mind a household from my mother.

My mother, who also has no bones.

We do not even have skin. The puppets in our family were crafted from the wood of a walnut tree. Other puppets from other families are chiselled out of oak, or chestnut. My strings are white like spider silk, tucked neatly away inside my clothes, so they cannot be grabbed, pulled, or gawked at. It’s indecent for a puppet to show her strings. You can be arrested for that sort of thing.

But I am allowed to show my strings to the Domner. I’m allowed to do whatever I want, in fact, with the Domner. It’s going to eat me, eventually, so it’s only fair. They have polished my arms and legs and painted me the colour of porcelain; have contoured and molded my face into a pretty, pouting thing; have brushed my hair until it is as soft as the belly of a rose. They could have chosen this fate for anybody. They told me I was special, that only I can do it, but I know that the Domner will eat any puppet, no matter what she looks like. It’s not a matter of taste. It’s a matter of being fed.

I do pride myself with how long I have lasted. Every day, I must climb the mountain and sit before the Domner’s cave. I can see it sometimes, peering closely at me through the darkness. They say the Domner is truly not that terrible. It will not take a puppet by force. She must willingly untuck her strings from her undergarments and drop them into its talons. She must say that she wants to be eaten. She must beg to feel the graze of its teeth, the strength of it as it flings her against the cavern wall; she must demand to be shattered into thousands of splinters, once the Domner realizes the thing it possesses is not real.

That’s the catch, you see. I am a distraction for this creature. Who knows what would happen if a Domner were to set out into the world, if it were to walk among honest people— human beings of flesh and blood—who are not as easy to control?

The Domner’s voice is warm and velvety, as if it’s laced with something narcotic. “How are you? It’s been a while.”

“It has only been a few days.”

“But you have been thinking about me?”

“Of course.”

“Good.”

I’m not lying. I think about the Domner often.

“Who owns you?” The Domner asks.

I giggle, because that is what I’m supposed to do when I don’t know what to say.

“I own you, don’t I? Say that I own you.”

“You own me.”

“Good. Very good girl,” says the Domner, and I shiver, knowing that I am doing well. It’s strange. I’m aware that I am nothing but an object to this creature; I am a doll to explore, own, break, and defile. I am the worth of a toy. But that is all I have ever been, since the day I was carved, before ever meeting the creature in the mountain. Either I am destined to sit on a shelf, forgotten—or I am destined to break, and be thrown away. At least with the Domner, I know that I am fulfilling a need. In this moment, as the Domner audibly salivates over my strings, which I am twirling slowly around my fingers, I am useful.

I tell the Domner that I will give it a single string. It’s not like I have much else to do, and my stomach flutters, wondering what will happen. It is one of those rare moments where I feel something akin to life. I take a string that is attached to my finger and submerge it into the darkness of the cave. There is a moment where nothing happens, where I am left reeling in the void, my stomach sinking and swirling and jumping in the most intoxicating way. This is my purpose. I am lending out a piece of my soul. And as the Domner quietly takes it, I feel a sudden, gentle pull toward the darkness. “Thank you, my pet,” says the Domner. “Thank you for this gift.”

It’s not difficult to resist by any means. I know that if the creature were to tug, sharply and violently, the string would simply break. And although I would lose the string, I would not lose myself.

The Domner asks if I would like to play a game. It says it will pull my string in multiple different directions, and I can take these gentle tugs only as suggestions; I do not have to follow if I don’t want to. In this way, he says, we can dance together.

I feel the Domner lift the string, so I raise my finger, and then my hand. I allow the Domner to make me touch my nose, wave, and spin in a circle until I am dizzy. The string gets tangled around my body, and the Domner chuckles, warning me that I must not be so careless. Puppets are not allowed to dance where I am from. It feels good to move my body, and I wonder if this is what it’s like to be human. Later, when I am alone, I think I will dance like this. I might even do that which is forbidden and pull my own strings, to remember this moment, when the Domner allowed me to be free.

The Domner asks me if I am having fun.

“Yes,” I say.

“We could have more fun if you lent me more of your strings.”

I catch a glimpse of the creature’s eyes; unblinking, wide, and enraptured. It’s as if I am staring into a deep well and suddenly there is an unknown presence breathing down my neck. I tell the Domner that I must go now.

“Of course,” says the Domner as it releases my string. I stumble forward slightly, surprised by the tension that had accumulated, by how close I had danced toward the edge of the cave. I promise the Domner that I will come again, but it’s a number of days before I return. I can’t get the image of those eyes out of my head; how hungry they were, how owlish and primal. There is a part of me that’s ashamed for allowing a beast to play with me. I see how the others look at me, knowing that I have lasted this long, that I have not given myself up yet. They think I’m a degenerate, that I enjoy the attention. I’m one of those puppets, now, and it isn’t long before I find myself climbing the mountain again, offering my strings to the Domner.

With each visit, I present the creature more and more of my strings. I know the decent thing to do is to give myself up; my purpose is to feed, not to dance. Besides, it’s not like it would hurt. I’m made out of wood. I do not have nerve endings, a brain, or a heartbeat.

My friends and family no longer speak to me, and the thing is—they’re right to. There’s a part of me that enjoys this. I want my body to be controlled in a way that best pleases the user. I want to feel stupid and dizzy and lost, a lamb in the vicinity of a semi-starved wolf; something to toy with before being eaten. But I have never enjoyed the thought of being consumed. It’s the build, the back and forth of will, where I am treasured, protected, and slowly conquered. It’s a dangerous place. There is power here, standing before the cave, the wolf waiting inside. I think, maybe, it’s the greatest sense of power a puppet can achieve. If you’re a human and you want to control other people, you can overpower them physically, or you can get inside their head. But if you are a puppet, and you want to control other people, you must slowly and deliberately lose yourself to them. You can poison them, but first you must let them taste you.

I have danced so long for the Domner that my legs have collapsed. I kneel before the cave, my arms outspread in front of me, my palms facing the sky. The Domner holds my strings; every last one of them.

“Have you tired of dancing, my pet?” It asks. I nod with all my energy. I am exhausted. There is nothing left for me now. The Domner knows this, and I can feel its desire, vibrating down the strings. Although I can’t see far into the cave, I know how the creature must be staring at me. I am no longer as simple as an ice cream cone on a hot day. I am a beacon of light; a lake in the middle of the Sahara; a star descending into orbit. The Domner raises my hand and strokes the length of my jaw, trailing my fingers down my neck, across my collarbones and between my breasts. I have not given it permission to do this. My eyes flutter closed, accepting it anyway, bathing in the height of my power. If I surrender now, I will be a symphony. I have made this creature work for its meal, and once it has tasted me, once it realizes I’m not made of flesh—it will become so utterly broken. I can see myself now, laughing as the Domner tears me apart, my laughter echoing in its ears as it plucks my splinters from its teeth.

“Please,” I breathe.

“Please what, my pet?”

“Please take me now.”

“You want me to take you from this world?”

“Yes. I’ll do anything you want. Please, just take me.”

The Domner inhales sharply; it cannot contain its composure, and I know that this, too, is a result of the power I manifested. I have wrapped the creature in my strings and, when he is done with me, I will remain snagged beneath his fingernails. I will return again and again like glitter to dominate his mind. In this small way, I have won. Now I can finally let go.

The Domner wrenches my strings and I am flung inside the cave, into the darkness. The shadows envelop me like a warm blanket, and suddenly the cave feels so immeasurably big, like I am floating in the vacuum of space. There are no stars. There is only the Domner, holding me in his clutches, pinning me against the gloom. I feel his tongue slide up my leg, and I think perhaps he will take his time with me, will savor me, so I can be remembered. But then he bites down, and it hurts.

It hurts.

I scream, but he covers my mouth, sinking his enormous fangs into the flesh of my leg. It hurts, and there is blood, squirting into the void; an invisible liquid that drenches the both of us, slicking up and down my ribcage. I know that if I want to win, I must keep still, I must enjoy it—but none of that matters anymore, because they lied to me. I am real. I am real. I am real, and oh God it hurts, please stop this, somebody please help me. I was meant to be so much more. Mother, they lied to us; we are not puppets. We were not made to feed the Domner, we were not made to serve, to be bought, decorated, consumed, or put on display. We were not even made to dance. It’s not fair. I try to tell the Domner to stop, that I no longer give my permission, but the Domner has tied my strings around my mouth.

If only I had known—I would not have begged to be eaten. I would have begged for permission to exist.

Mother, we have strong bones. I can feel the crunch of them beneath his molars.

Mother, have you ever known love?

Mother, I’m sorry.