The Little Girl Who Was Too Fond of Matches

The father hangs himself, ending the family's life of total isolation on the estate. Following his death, the two siblings decide that one must travel to the nearby village to fetch a coffin. Their world shifts from secluded routine to exposure to outsiders.

At the village decision point, the truth is revealed: one of the sons is actually a female who has no concept of sexuality. She believes she was castrated and remains largely unaware of the outside world.

In the village, a mine inspector questions her about her living situation. She makes an impulsive advance toward him, driven by a carnal urge learned from her family dynamics, but he refuses. He warns that outsiders will try to change her life.

The inspector denies her advances, and she flees back to the mansion on the family horse in anger.

Back at the mansion, she informs her brother of what she learned in the village and urges him not to dismember or burn their father's body. He remains cold and begins considering how to handle the corpse.

Her brother starts to fortify the household by placing mannequins around, making the house seem defended. The eerie display underscores the siblings' isolation and his grip on the property.

She moves to a secluded area of the property she calls the vault, a place her brother avoids. She continues writing in a book of spells, deepening her solitary rituals.

From the two letters on the property, her brother builds a shooting post and crowns himself king, wearing a dead raccoon cap. His display marks a stark escalation of control over the household.

A figure emerges from the forest on an unfamiliar mining machine—the mine inspector returning to the property. He seeks the narrator in the vault and prepares to confront the deeper truths of the siblings’ life.

The inspector discovers a living bandaged figure and a skeletal figure behind a glass case. The narrator explains these are the twins, with the living twin seen as a punishment and the mother dead in a fire tied to the twins’ past.

The inspector reveals that she is pregnant with her brother's child. They decide to flee the property together, mounting a motorcycle to escape toward safety.

As they ride toward the pines, the brother shoots the mine inspector in the back, killing him instantly. The betrayal marks a brutal turn and leaves the narrator with no immediate ally.

The narrator returns to the vault as villagers begin to gather on the property and her brother surrenders. The tension between the world outside and the family’s paranoia comes to a head.

She packs her belongings and escapes into the pines, choosing to leave the house behind rather than submit to her brother’s control. The world beyond the property becomes her uncertain new horizon.

The story ends with the main character giving birth, suggesting a fragile new beginning despite the scars of her past. The ending leaves her future open, shaped by both danger and the possibility of life outside the vault.