The album's thematics are loosely based around Rennes le Chateau.
The thirteen tracks tell the story of a weary traveler who is led to a
church for lodging by a terrifying but compassionate wolf creature. Once
there the wolf transforms into a beautiful woman who seduces the
traveler into a soul selling deal. Once imprisoned in the Chateau the
traveler descends to the bowels of the building and finds a crypt,
wherein lies the body of "Christ". Disillusioned and heartbroken the
traveler prepares to commit suicide, only to learn that God and the
Devil are toys of even higher entities. The album begins with a haunting
monologue:
"Upon the Cross he did not die, they tortured him, but he
survived. Smuggled across the open sea, to Southern France, tranquility.
There he married Magdalene, and founded another dynasty. A church was
built upon a hill, to serve all of the gods at will."
The plot correlates with that of the original album Abigail, and the
listener discovers that she is actually the half-sister of O'Brian (the
mysterious leader of the Black Horsemen from the original album), and is
kept alive. The year is 1863, and Abigail is now 18 years old. She
walks through a forest to the mansion from the original plot, where the
gates are locked. She was going to die, when 'little one', the ghost of
the original Abigail from 1777 opens the gates. Abigail enters and is
greeted by Jonathan's servant, Brandon Henry. It turns out that Jonathan
did not die after he fell down the stairs, but he uses a wheelchair. He
has not moved on from Miriam's death and now calls himself Count de
Lafey. He greets Abigail, calling her Miriam and believing she is back
(she died from the pain when she gave birth to Abigail). He goes to bed,
taking Abigail, where Jonathan rapes her, and Abigail decides to get
revenge. Abigail goes to the crypt to see her past incarnation. Brandon
Henry finds her and Abigail takes a sharp necklace from the mummified
baby's neck (the same one from The Eye)
and slits his throat. She puts broken glass in Jonathan's food, and
then sets him on fire where he dies. The fire spreads to Abigail and she
dies as well. The stillborn body of Abigail's 'spirit twin' is still
alive, because the fire cannot get to the crypt, so her ghost does not
pass on.
As the album opens, a young King and his mother and sister are
welcoming King's grandmother home from a mental asylum. That night, King
investigates strange voices and discovers his grandmother having a tea
party alone, with the teacups and kettles floating in the air. King is
promptly sent back to bed.
On another occasion, Grandma awakens King and tells him that she will
teach him about Amon, their house, over a cup of tea. Grandma cuts
King's sleeping mother's hand and adds her blood to the teapot. The
voices of the house ("Them") begin to affect King with a drug-like
effect. King's sister Missy tries to convince King that they should do
something to help their mother, who is unconscious under "their" power,
but his judgment is clouded due to his altered state. He refuses to call
for help and cuts the phone line. At tea, Missy interrupts and
furiously expresses concern about her mother's state and breaks the
teapot. "They", in response to the breaking of "their" teapot, chop
Missy into bits with an axe and throw the remains into the fireplace in
the kitchen. King is snapped out of his "spell," and he stumbles outside
and pieces together the events that transpired.
After fainting and regaining consciousness, he decides to attack his
grandmother. He notices that "their" power is weakened outside of the
house, so he lures his grandmother outside and kills her. The voices of
Amon continue to haunt the boy as he is questioned by police and
incarcerated in an asylum. Years later, he is released and returns home
to find his grandmother and the voices of Amon are still very much
alive.
King Diamond meets Victoria after a Christmas show put on by the
Puppet Master in Budapest. One year after they meet, his beloved goes
missing and he sets out to find her. While searching, he comes across
the Puppet Master's wife killing a homeless man. He follows her into a
building where he is struck from behind and loses consciousness.
When King regains consciousness, he finds himself strapped to a
hospital bed and The Puppet Master and his wife standing in front of him
with a scalpel. The Puppet Master leans over him and says: "First your
eyes... then your skin... we will make you feel born again." and starts
to cut out his eyes. One eyelid drops down into a jar. The Puppet Master
uses an instrument to pull the eyeball out of its socket, and cuts off
the nerve-string which is the only thing holding the eye in place. The
Puppet Master then puts the eyeball into a puppet's eye socket. His body
is being made into a puppet that comes to life when blood is injected
into it. An accident during the ritual when The Puppet Master is dealing
with the Devil about King's soul, leaves King Diamond's soul trapped
within his permanently aware eyes. It is after this that he sees his
wife's body, now a puppet, on another shelf in the Puppet Master's shop.
King Diamond and his beloved are infused with a syringe-full of their
blood nightly, so they can practice their routines and learn how to
perform for their Master. Each night, after being put away, King and his
beloved "talk with their eyes" from across the room as the essence of
their blood fades away. King Diamond is forced to witness her fading
away every night, because his immortal eyes keep him from slipping away
like she does. Once instructed to dance by the Puppet Master, Victoria
stumbles into the wall where jars of blood for the puppets are stored on
shelves, knocking six of them down. She is then sent away to Berlin and
King vows to find her again.
Christmas time comes around for the third time in the tale, and King
is to perform as The Little Drummer Boy. At his performance, he
intentionally falls and breaks his drum to embarrass the Puppet Master.
For his actions, he is sold to a shop and left nailed to the wall. At
some point, he hears of how the Puppet Master is building a second
theater in London, to be run by the Puppet Master's son and daughter and
he re-affirms his vow to find his lost love or see her on the "other
side".
