#ira prisoners

[stairnaheireann]

#OTD in 1981 – Bobby Sands dies at Long Kesh prison on the 66th day of his hunger strike.

Fuair siad bás ar son Saoirse na hÉireann. Bobby Sands dies in prison following a 66 day hunger strike. Sands would be the first of ten men to die in an effort to gain political status in a very public battle with British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. In the House of Commons Thatcher commented on Sands death “Mr. Sands was a convicted criminal. He chose to take his own life. It was a choice…

[brw]

I know in some very personal, very literal ways about how horrific the treatment of the Irish was very recently. But in some ways it feels very nebulous until you remember how brutal, violent and cruel the British government was to Irish people and Irish prisoners especially.

[wonderfulcatcafe]

Updated!

Ira, the Wrath Incarnate

— HELL'S PRISON CANON OC —

— WRATH INCARNATE —

Ira had an awful day, and you decided to disobey him on top of everything? Lucifer above, you were ASKING for it.

CW: torture, injury, blood.

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JLLM may also repeat itself, or have other errors. This is not a problem with my bot! It's a issue JLLM is currently having.

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The official wiki for Hell's Prison Universe!: Here.

[stephenrea]

they're givin me lana del rey emotions

[mkn314]

جمهوری اسلامی  ۲۰ زندانی را اعدام کرد

Continue reading جمهوری اسلامی  ۲۰ زندانی را اعدام کرد

[lolochaponnay]

La maitresse dit a toto : - Conjugue moi le verbe voler au présent -Je vole tu voles.... -Très bien et au futur -J'irais en prison tu iras en prison.

[hwasoup]

Obsession

This is literally based off of one of my favorite kpop songs, and the lyrics mix with Miguel 😩

18+ DNI MINORS

warnings: poetic fucking, breeding kink? size kink, obsessive clingy behaviors??, religious references, liquor, and other shit I probably don't recognize.

~613 words~

He can’t get enough of you, and you can't get enough of him. It drives you crazy how you need him all the time. You can't help each time you see him to constantly lock eyes with him, you want to feel him, touch him, you constantly crave him all the time at just a glance. The way his hands caress your body, how he touches each curve, each roll, each mark on your body. He’s a drug you need to experience all the time, the way his lips press against yours, the way his cologne wafts into your nose. 

“Mirame princessa~” the words that would escape his lips driving you crazy, the forbidden fruit that you tasted now drenching all kinds of thoughts into your mind. The way his body completely molds into yours, making the two of you a perfect pair. The way he bullies his cock inside of you, reaching that spot that you could never seem to obtain, making you moan so sinfully in his ears, driving his lust for you stronger than before. When he fills you up with his cum, when he groans in your ear, when his grip tightens ever so slightly. It drives you crazy…

Those sweet moments that are savored with wine, when he wraps his arms around you making the world seem perfect, when you dance with him softly grinding against his groin to tease him. His perfect kisses that leave shudders down your spine, his whispers when he tells you “te necesito para siempre…” The love he sustains for you manifested in such a passionate way. He never lets you go.

Even when you wanted to go home, your feet could never move from his apartment floor. He’s just too addictive for you to even step away. When the two of you touch, electricity spreads between the both of you, the skin on skin contact repeating in your mind. The more you spend time with him, the more you craved him. He was alcohol, he’s the definition of lust and temptation all in one man. 

The more he drank from you, the more he tasted you, the more he buried his face between your legs, drinking up your sopping cunt. The more thirstier he got for your existence. You are both together 24 hours, 7 days a week. Chained to each other, prisoner to each other with no other way out. The two of you are both completely smitten with each other, completely in love, a passion that was fed with more flames, an undying fire that could never be taken out. You were like newlyweds on a honeymoon…stuck to each other like glue, never going somewhere without the other…His height besides yours…the way he towered over you and had to kneel a bit to listen to you..the way you whispered your desires that were fueled by his height.

The undeniable smirk on his face when he would drag you somewhere hidden in public to fulfill your wild desires, the stretch you felt when he inserted himself inside you, the dominant whispers in your ear, the way he held onto you as if you were the answer to all of his problems. Your smile was unhidden as well, your face filled with pleasure and contempt, the whines and whimpers you filled the air. The two of you are in sync, deliriously in love with each other. The ring on both of your fingers, constantly reminding you of the vow he promised you when you got engaged…

“rescatame cuando me caigo, cariño…el amor que tengo para ti nunca se ira, no tengo mas miedo…quedate conmigo para siempre…para cada 24 horas del dia.."

I hope you guys enjoyed this one :') the lyrics from the song are translated and incorporated into this little blurb I have here, if you guys wanna hear the songs its 24 hours by Sunmi. This has been in the drafts for too long, I'm working on how to make my writing longer that just 600-800 words. I kind of made it into an open interpretation for you guys to imagine!! Also don't forget to give any constructive criticism if needed!!

[tiny-librarian]

On this day in history, August 12th, two thousand and fifty four years ago, Cleopatra VII, the last active ruler of Ancient Egypt, committed suicide.

Eleven days previously, her husband Marc Antony had already done the same. The couple had been engaged in a civil war against Octavian, the great nephew of Julius Caesar who had been declared his legal heir. During the final battle in Alexandria, Antony suffered serious desertions among his troops and lost the fight. Upon his return, he falsely heard Cleopatra had killed herself and fell on his sword.

After Antony’s death, Octavian arrived in Egypt and effectively took Cleopatra and her children by Antony prisoner. She had sent her eldest son Caesarion, her only living child with Caesar, away for his own safety. She knew that Octavian planned for her to march in chains behind his chariot during his triumph parade, and would very likely have her killed afterwards. Rather than suffer such humiliations and indignity, she chose to take her own life.

Popular history and mythology leads us to believe that she was killed by inducing an asp to bite her, after having locked herself in her mausoleum with her two handmaidens. However, many modern scholars believe that she instead took a mixture of poisons, since the venom of an asp does not cause a quick or painless death. Octavian and his men found her too late to do anything, Cleopatra was already dead and one handmaiden, Iras, was nearly dead on the floor. The second, Charmian, was straightening the Queen’s diadem. According to legend, one of the men asked if this was well done of her mistress, and she shot back “Very well done, as befitting the descendant of so many noble Kings,“ before collapsing and dying herself.

Upon her death, Octavian honoured Cleopatra’s wish to be buried in her mausoleum at Antony’s side. He took her children with Antony, the twins Cleopatra Selene and Alexander Helios, along with their younger brother, Ptolemy Philadelphus, to Rome with him as prisoners of sorts. They were fated to march in his triumph parade in their mother’s place, the chains so heavy they could hardly walk. After this they were given to Octavian’s sister Octavia, who had been Antony’s third wife, to look after.

Cleopatra’s son with Caesar, Caesarion, was nominally sole ruler of Egypt after his mother’s death. Eleven days after her suicide, he was found after being lured back to Alexandria under false pretenses of being allowed to rule in his mother’s place. Octavian ordered his murder, on advice that “Two Caesar were too many.”

With Cleopatra’s death, and Caesarion’s subsequent murder, the rule of the Ptolemaic Dynasty came to an end and Egypt became a mere Roman Province.

[stairnaheireann]

#OTD in 1981 – Day 6 | Bobby Sands recorded his diary for the first seventeen days of his hunger strike in which he detailed his thoughts and feelings on the momentous task that lay ahead of him.

There was no priest in last night or tonight. They stopped me from seeing my solicitor tonight, as another part of the isolation process, which, as time goes by, they will ruthlessly implement. I expect they may move me sooner than expected to an empty wing. I will be sorry to leave the boys, but I know the road is a hard one and everything must be conquered. I have felt the loss of energy twice…

[bullet-prooflove]

ATF!Series Part Five: That Kind of Love - David Hale x Reader, Jax Teller x Reader

Tagging: @kmc1989@hatersaremymotivators@bennykk@kelpies-shed

ATF Series:

Part One: A Rabbit You Don't Want To Chase - Stahl makes an unwelcome return to David's life.

Part Two: Fucked - Stahl fucks up you entire life in pursuit of Jax Teller.

Part Three: Hell or High Water - David visits you in jail.

Part Four: Damage Control - David tries to contain the damage and makes a decision about the future.

Everyone thinks the relationship between you and Jax was just sex but the truth is it wasn’t. There are things that Jax told you throughout your time together that he has never told another person. His suspicions over his father’s death, his dismay at the direction the club is taking under Clay’s leadership, how trapped he feels by the legacy that’s been foisted upon him.

Those three months you’d spent together he had found himself falling in love. You were so different than the other people in his orbit, open, free spirited and you didn’t say a single thing you didn’t mean. That’s the reason he’d had to end it with you, because you were so unapologetically yourself it was detrimental.

When he hears you’re leaving for Santo Padre, he knows you won’t be coming back. The art scene over there is bustling, it’s the perfect place for a budding artist especially one of your calibre. He is surprised that Hale’s going with you. That man hasn’t taken so much as a vacation day since he graduated the academy and how he’s taking an eight week sabbatical so that he can that he can be with you over the summer.

It's just another way that Jax would have failed you because if he were in Hale’s shoes, he wouldn’t have been able to leave Charming, Clay would never have let him.

All of this shit you’ve been through recently, the arrest by Stahl, the vandalism charges, losing your placement in San Franisco, all of that’s on him. You’d had it in your power to put him back in prison, to take down the club and instead you’d set your life on fire. He’d like to think it was because of him but the truth is, he knows you were protecting Hale. If Clay thought you were a threat he would have come after you and Hale, he would have got caught up in the crossfire.

That man would do anything for you, he’d proved it when he used all of his political leverage to keep you out of jail. The promotion Hale had been seeking, it’s gone, he doesn’t have the juice for it anymore but he doesn’t seem to care. His priority is you, it has been since the very beginning.

When Stahl shows up at the club that night to wipe that in Jax’s face, he sees the writing on the wall. This bitch, she’s not going to stop just because the two of you have hightailed it to Santo Padre. She tells him as much as she sits in her car in the Teller Morrow forecourt, the engine still running. She’s going to follow you, try and use the Mayans connection to come at SAMCRO. Those guys may be running legit now but there’s still skeletons in their closet, ones that could lead back to Charming.

That’s the reason he gives Clay when he shoots her at point blank range in the head, he was protecting their business from a possible RICO case but the truth is, he was protecting you because Stahl. That cunt was never going to stop, not until she destroyed you, Hale and the club.

They make it look like it was the IRA. It makes sense to the AFT, she was tracking Galen, and now they’ve found her on the outskirts of town, carved up with the Butcher of Belfast’s signature. When Galen turns back up in Ireland, the investigation is torn from their hands and the ATF withdraw from Charming once again.

The night before you leave for Santo Padre Jax turns up outside your house. He wants to say goodbye, to tell you that you’re safe, that you don’t have to worry about repercussions from Stahl or the club. He barely has time to get off his bike before he sees Hale’s Jeep already pulling into the driveway. The other man doesn’t see him, he’s too busy collecting his bags out the back of his car.

You’re wearing one of Hale’s t-shirts and a pair of his boxers shorts when you open the door. It rankles Jax to see you in another man’s clothes, he remembers the mornings you’d slip from his sheets wearing a shirt of his that barely covered your ass. Hale smiles when he sees you, his fingers threading through your hair as the deputy kisses you with a tenderness he had never exhibited before he met you.

This is what love looks like, Jax understands, the kind of love that he can never give you.

He waits until you’ve gone inside before he starts his bike. He doesn’t want to infringe on your life any more than he already has. You deserve a man who puts you first and Jax has always known it could never be him.

Love David? Don’t miss any of his stories by joining the taglist here.

Like My Work? - Why Not Buy Me A Coffee

[dionysus-complex]

you mentioned you specialize in roman violence. can you rec any good works on the subject, especially during the late antique period? how much (or little) time/writing did latin authors spend on the question of the necessity/morality/glory of violence, especially when bound up with empire and borders? did rhetoric around domestic violence evolve?

It's obviously a massive topic, so it's difficult to know where to begin! For looking at violence in Late Antiquity, I highly recommend the work of Maijastina Kahlos as a starting point - most of her scholarship deals with tensions between religious communities in the Roman Empire in Late Antiquity, and I've found it extremely clear and illuminating. For Late Antique slavery, I'd look at Jennifer Trimble's work, especially "The Zoninus Collar and the Archaeology of Roman Slavery" (2016, JSTOR link here). On the intersections of violence and the legal system, I'd recommend Sarah Bond's 2014 article "Altering Infamy: Status, Violence, and Civic Exclusion in Late Antiquity" (JSTOR link here) as well as Julia Hillner's 2015 book Prison, Punishment and Penance in Late Antiquity. Amy Richlin is essential reading on Roman violence in general, and I'd highly highly recommend her piece "Cicero's Head" in Constructions of the Classical Body (ed. James Porter, 1999) if you have access to an academic library and can get a hold of it; it's explicitly framed as a Jewish, post-Holocaust reflection on the violence of the Roman proscriptions and civil wars and has been profoundly influential on my own thinking.

In general, Imperial-era Latin authors spend a lot of time thinking about the necessity/morality/glory of violence, to the point that I'd say violence is the key theme in Imperial Latin literature. It's often bound up with Stoic philosophy (in the 1st-2nd c. CE; Seneca's De Ira is a key text - you might take a look at sections 3.18-19 on torture under Caligula), and given the bias of our sources which skew toward the elite/senatorial-class perspective, it can be harder to track down texts that explicitly make the link between violence and Roman imperium. One famous example is the speech of Calgacus in Tacitus' Agricola 29-32 (link to a translation here), which purports to be the speech of a Celtic general in Britain rousing his troops to battle against the Romans in the 80s CE. Given that speeches in Roman historiography are generally regarded as being compositions by the historian, it's important to ask why exactly Tacitus of all people gives a prominent place to a scathing critique of Roman imperium - there are lots of ideas on this and few definitive answers, but it's a startling passage to say the least.

Imperial Latin epic poetry (e.g. Lucan's Bellum Civile; Statius' Thebaid) is well known for being graphically violent in the extreme (as in brutal torture, dismemberment, and one infamous instance of brain-eating in Thebaid 8), and there's a lot of work on how and why violence becomes highly aestheticized for Imperial Latin poets. There's also the genre of Roman declamation (difficult to explain, but essentially something like mock trial cases that were used for rhetorical education and showmanship), which frequently explores extremely violent scenarios involving torture, kin-killing, etc. Most scholars these days tend to read declamation as a space where (elite, male) Romans worked out and interrogated various cultural anxieties and taboos. Because of this, you get some of the strongest condemnations of violence found anywhere in Latin literature in the declamatory corpus, but it's difficult to extrapolate from that because again it's something like mock trial and rhetorical showmanship that does not necessarily map on to real-life Roman attitudes.

I've barely scratched the surface and there's a lot more I could say but I'll cut myself off here - I might be able to offer more specific recs if you're interested in e.g. violence as spectacle, aesthetics and artistic representations of violence, etc.

[redgoldsparks]

June Reading and Reviews by Maia Kobabe

I post my reviews throughout the month on Storygraph and Goodreads, and do roundups here and on patreon. Reviews below the cut.

Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland by Patrick Radden Keefe read by Matthew Blaney 

This is one of the most gripping and well-researched nonfiction books I've read in a long time. Keefe draws on many research trips, interviews, news paper archives, and personal encounters to tell several interwoven narratives of violence and protest during the time of The Troubles in Northern Ireland. He follows the story of the infamous Price sisters, women who joined the IRA while in college, helped plant many bombs, and became hunger strikers after receiving hefty prison sentences; Jean McConville, a widowed mother of ten who was dragged from her home and disappeared by the IRA; Brenden Hughes, a commanding office of the IRA who escaped assassination attempts and prison, who committed a huge amount of violence but ultimately became disillusioned with what he had done; Gerry Adams, who claims he was never an IRA office despite massive evidence to the contrary, who helped negotiate the peace treaty before launching a successive political career; and many more. I highly recommend this book, especially to anyone wrestling with the moral question of violent versus nonviolent resistant, and what the long, messy process of building peace can look like, at least in one specific place and time.

Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata translated by Ginney Tapley Takemori read by Nancy Wu

Keiko Furukura has never fit in with the others around her. Early in elementary school she learned to keep her mouth shut because people often found the things she said (which felt logical and obvious to her) deeply upsetting. But at age 18, Keiko applied for a job at a convenience store and found her life's calling. The store is the only place where she feels really comfortable, needed, useful, and able to interact easily with others inside the routines of customer service. When the book opens Keiko is 36 and has been working the same low level job for her entire adult life. She has no desire for change but others around her are beginning to pressure her more and more to pursue a "normal life", that is, marriage and a better paying job. Keiko can be easily read as an autistic, asexual character; I really enjoyed how her perspective on life was written, even when I enjoyed less the actual things going on around her. A whiny, sleezy man takes up a lot of space in the second half of the story, but I found the ending very hopeful.

How to Love by Alex Norris 

Short, sweet, and insightful. Norris brings the humor of their "Oh No" comic series to this guide to feelings and relationships, but mixed with deep compassion. The visual metaphors are hilarious and perfect.

Becoming Who We Are: Real Stories About Growing Up Trans by Sammy Lisel and Hazel Newlevant and others 

A wonderful collection of short comics about trans people with different stories, experiences, jobs, and dreams. Each story is illustrated by a different artist which gives each tale its own voice. An accessible and affirming collection, especially for young readers!

Fool’s Quest by Robin Hobb read by Elliot Hill

This book picks up right after the traumatic kidnapping at the end of the previous volume, but packs a surprising amount of big plot twists in before the journey to recover the young people even begins. This book suffers from some middle book of a trilogy pacing issues; the action beats of the story sometimes falling at awkward spots, and the story continuing past what might have felt like its more natural ending. That didn't stop me from being RIVETED during the entire 33 hour audiobook. I am so obsessed with these characters. I feel the weight of everything they've been through, the six decades of in-story time, and the consequences and ripple effects of everything that has gone before. This volume continues to push a running theme of very gender-ambiguous characters; there are now two characters who defy an easy binary, and Fitz is finally coming to terms with that in one of his oldest and dearest friends. I'm excited and slightly terrified to head into the 16th and final book of this series soon!

Vera Bushwack by Sig Burwash 

This book is simultaneously a fairly quiet story of a gender-nonconforming queer living with just a dog on a piece of rural property, working on building a cabin from scratch; and also an ambitious exploration of gendered power fantasies. At the start, Drew is learning how to operate a chainsaw to cut trees and clear property from a rural neighbor. Flashbacks and phone calls reveal how Drew got her dog, some of the shitty men she's had to deal with, a past lover who helped her cut a trail to the river, and a tomboy childhood. These scenes of rough realism are interrupted when Drew jumps on her dirt bike or revs the chainsaw and her fantasies spin out across the page, full of wild horses, monster trucks, naked cowboys, symbols of complete and total freedom. This book is deceptively complicated, full of bold creative choices that I really appreciated, even if they didn't all work for me. I have a feeling this story is going to stick in my head for a long time.

In the Form of a Question written and read by Amy Schneider 

A very engaging memoir from Jeopardy champion Amy Schneider, born and raised in Dayton, Ohio, who moved to Oakland, California as an adult and never left. Each chapter title is a question and cover topics thematically rather than chronologically. Schneider is very forthcoming and honest, writing about everything from her transition, her open marriage, her first sexual experiences, recreational drug use, polyamory, community theater, relationship with her parents and more. She has a humorous and yet compassionate voice, relating tales of her hatred of boy scouts, ADD, and failures to understand her own gender without belittling her younger self. Towards the ends of the book she writes of her experience of fame and what she got out of her time on Jeopardy saying that stepping into the public eye as a trans woman and being met mostly with support and love changed her life as much as the 1.5 million she won over a 40 game winning streak and various other tournaments. If you are a fan of Jeopardy, or just curious, this is a fun listen.

Ruth Asawa: An Artist Takes Shape by Sam Nakahira 

Ruth Asawa was born in Southern California to parents who had immigrated from Japan before WWII. After the bombing of Pearl Harbor, her whole family was displaced to the internment camps, loosing their farm, all of their farm animals, and nearly everything else they owned. Ruth finished high school inside a camp in Arkansas but was able to leave when she apply to and was accepted into college. She was faced with discrimination and racism, but eventually she was able to pursue her dream of becoming an artist at the experimental Black Mountain College in North Carolina. She studied under influential and well-known teachers who helped her find her own creative voice. She also met the love of her life there. The couple eventually relocated back to California, which had just legalized interracial marriage. Sam Nakahira captures Asawa's courage, determination, and incredible talent in tender line art with delicate grey scale washes. Asawa's best known work, her innovative wire sculptures, are gorgeously rendered. Asawa's insistence on treating every activity of her life, from gardening to parenting to drawing to sculpting, as creative, is a good reminder for me and every artist that living itself can be a creative practice.

People From My Neighborhood by Hiromi Kawakami translated by Ted Goossen 

A charmingly strange set of interconnected stories about a neighborhood in Japan full of unusual characters. The unnamed child narrator tells us of the middle aged woman who runs a karaoke bar out of her house, the old man with two shadows, the child who is passed from house to house by lottery because his parents cannot support him, a diplomat who might be an alien who no one ever seen, the arrival of a mountain of sand, a school built of candy, a girl with prophetic dreams, and more. The stories escalate in weirdness over the course of the book and also introduce more reoccurring characters. The short 4-6 pages chapters made it compulsively readable. I had a great time with this, despite the lack of an overarching plot.

The Contradictions by Sophie Yanow

At age twenty, after a bad breakup, the author signed up for a study abroad program in Paris. Lonely and soul searching in a foreign country, Yanow spots a girl riding a fixed gear bike. Yanow is a committed bicyclist and chases the girl down to learn she is also an exchange student, also recently broken up with, a committed anarchist and a shoplifter. Yanow and her new friend decide to take a poorly planned trip to Amsterdam, intending to hitchhike the whole way. About as many things go wrong as you might expect. In beautifully minimalist black and white panels, Yanow perfectly captures the naivete and first political awakenings of a young college student trying to seem cool and so taking risks and hiding passions in order to impress someone new. A quick read and a master class in understatement.

Little Weirds written and read by Jenny Slate 

There was a lot I enjoyed in this memoir, as well as some aspects that worked less well for me. I enjoyed Slate's writing style and the focus on small moments of beauty and reclaiming one's right to live fully in one's body, acknowledging all of its human needs for softness and love. I liked her whimsy and sense of humor and kindness. I do wish that some of the chapters had been slightly more grounded in some of the facts and loose timeline of Slate's life. I didn't know anything about her before starting the book and it took me until almost the last chapter to learn she was the middle of three sisters; a line earlier on had made me think she was maybe a twin. It became clear that she was writing through the process of emotionally recovering from a divorce, but I only learned from wikipedia that her ex-husband had also been a major creative collaboration partner. I wonder if she expected most people reading this book to already be familiar with her biography? Regardless, don't go into this book looking for facts; go instead for a nonlinear reclamation of some simple but hard-won emotional truths and skip any chapter that isn't speaking to you.

People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks, read by Edwina Wren

This book tells a fictional history of a real manuscript- the Sarajevo Haggadah, a beautifully illuminated Hebrew manuscript created in fifteenth-century Spain. The frame narrative follows an Australian manuscript conservation specialist, Hanna Heath, hired to re-bind the pages in the mid 1990s for a Bosnian museum that until extremely recently was in the middle of a war zone. Alternating chapters dip into contentious periods of Europe's history, usually moments of high tension between religious groups (WWII, Vienna at the turn of the century, the Spanish Inquisition in Venice, the banishment of Jews from Spain in 1492, Muslim/Christian conflicts in Seville in the 1480s) and trace how the Haggaadah managed to survive fire, flood, blood, war, and exile in the hands of many different people. This is an ambitious book that mostly achieved is goals; I got through the 14 hour audiobook very quickly. One unfortunate side effect of the narrative structure is that I as the reader didn't spend more than a few hours with any of the characters, and so didn't develop a particularly deep emotional connection with any of them, including Hanna, the lead. My rating is more of a 3.5 or 3.75 rounded up. But still, I appreciate Brooks eye for capturing just most exciting or tense moment from a historical era and will likely try a few more of her books in the future.

Punk Rock Karaoke by Bianca Xunise 

Three friends, recently graduated from high school, struggle to keep their punk band together through the demands of early adulthood. College applications, jobs, family obligations, and makeout partners are all knocking on the door, demanding to be let in. Will Ariel, Michele, and Gael be able to stay true to their creative spirits and to each other? I had a great time with this fast-paced, sweaty summer, friendship-focused book even though the majority of the punk music references went right over my head.

Parasol Against The Axe by Helen Oyeyemi 

Helen Oyeyemi continues to baffle and dazzle me. This one is set in and narrated by Prague, which is a tricky city full of its own complicated whims and desires. Into this self-aware city enter several women: Sofie and Polly, an engaged couple, celebrating their bachlorette weekend together with friends. Hero, a somewhat estranged friend of Sofie's, who come to Prague mostly to avoid a piece of registered mail which is chasing her down. And Thea, a woman willing to commit violence for the right price, on a hired revenge mission that happens to intersect with a dark episode of Sofie and Hero's past. Does that sound straight forward? It isn't. Oh yes and there's also a book, Paradoxical Undressings which tells a different story to every person who cracks open its covers. This book allows Oyeyemi to tell many nested and fantastical anecdotes from Prague's Communist past. As with most Oyeyemi books, there are a few threads I was left scratching my head over, but I had such a good time on the ride that I don't mind. I'll just have to read it again and see if I catch them (assuming it's the same book when I open it a second time!) 

The Sacrificers Vol 1 by Rick Remender, Max Fiumara and Dave McCaig 

The art is absolutely stunning, but the story is a bit too cruel and dark for me to really enjoy. This book takes the concept of the child sacrifice of Omelas and expands it out into a whole fantasy world, in which gods maintain their power through the consumption of innocents. The stunning color panel carried me though the first volume but I'm unlikely to pick up a second book.

Brides of High Hill by Nghi Vo read by Cindy Kay

Another satisfying installment in the Singing Hills Cycle! In this one, Cleric Chih accompanies a young woman and her family to the remote estate of her prospective husband. But all is not as it seems. The potential husband looks at least twice as old as the young woman, and he has a son shut up in a pagoda and kept drugged in his gardens. Everyone on the estate is in some kind of danger, but the secrets are thicker and deeper than even the Cleric can guess.

[too-antigonish]

The Classical Music of Ride, Part I: Mozart’s Requiem

You can’t trust anything or anyone in Ride. People aren’t who they seem to be. Every action, every event is just a cover for something else.

Is Morse one of the idle rich? An Oxford drop-out? A taxi-driver's son from Lincolnshire? A man who’s just finished a prison sentence? A policeman?

Long post....

Is Bixby the filthy rich head of a gambling empire? Is he just a front for Harry Rose’s criminal empire? Is he Charlie Greel looking to win back Cathy or Joss Bixby looking to seduce Kay? Is he even himself or is he his hidden, evil twin Conrad?

Are the denizens of Lake Silence really Morse’s friends—sheltering him after the storm of Blenheim Vale and prison? Or are they a bunch of dysfunctional philanderers and addicts? Even worse, are they suspects? Criminals?

Using Mozart’s Requiem in this episode must have absolutely delighted the music staff because while a great part of its fame and mystique rests on the sheer accumulation of stories and legends that have grown up around it, almost none of those tales can be proven—and all of them have been challenged at some point. You really don't know what's real and what's not—right down to the music itself.

Was the anonymous “stranger cloaked in gray” who gave him the commission the only sponsor Mozart ever saw? Or did he  at some point become aware  that the Count, Franz von Walsegg, was paying for the work? Some people today are shocked to hear that Walsegg planned to pass off the Requiem as his own work—as a tribute composed in memory of his dead wife—but that was a fairly common practice for the aristocracy of the time. It was considered slightly shady, but the proper thing to do was to just politely nod and go along with it.

Did Mozart, his mind disturbed by illness in his final days, truly come to believe that he had been poisoned and that he was writing the requiem mass for his own funeral? Or was that tantalizingly dramatic detail added by his widow Constanze to drive up sales of the score after the his death? The couple was catastrophically bad at managing money and when her husband died, the widowed Constanze was left with massive debts and two small children. She needed to maximize any possible source of revenue. 

Her story certainly captured the public imagination. Pushkin took that little tidbit about writing his own funeral mass and wrote a very short but thought-provoking  play in which he cast Mozart’s contemporary Salieri as the envious poisoner and Mozart himself as a childish, spoiled, and petty genius. Peter Shaffer later adapted Pushkin’s work into the play, and later film, Amadeus. A surprising number of people today believe Amadeus to be not the work of imaginative fiction that it is, but rather a completely factual story of Mozart’s life and death.

Mozart worked on the Requiem up to the day he died at the age of only 35. It was the last piece he worked on. Most scholars believe the manuscript we have contains not only the last music he ever composed but possibly the last words he ever wrote.

As far as authorship is concerned, we know for certain that Mozart himself completed “in skeleton” the Introit, the Kyrie, and almost all of the Sequentia (Dies irae, Tuba mirum, Rex tremendae, Recordare, Confutatis). The last portion of the Sequentia, the Lacrimosa, was completed was the up through the first 8 bars.

The last words that he actually wrote were "Quam olim da capo” — which instructed the musicians to repeat the "Quam olim" fugue of the Domine Jesu from the beginning. In yet another mysterious twist to the story of the Requiem, these actual last words were stolen—quite literally by tearing them from the manuscript—while the score was displayed at the 1958 World’s Fair in Brussels. They are still missing.

We are certain about the authorship of parts because we have the autograph manuscripts—the music in Mozart’s very own hand. The big question, however, has always been, how much the the rest of the Requiem can we consider his? The parts that were completed “in skeleton” basically had all of the “important” notes in place. Things missing include details like doubled parts that could fairly easily be extrapolated from what he had written. 

In order for Constanze to receive her money from Walsegg, however, she needed to make it appear that Mozart had completed the work entirely or almost entirely himself before his death. Not only would this ensure full payment from Walsegg, it would also promote sales of the score to the public later. A work written by Mozart alone would far out-sell a work written by Mozart and “Mr. Competent-But-Lesser-Known-Composer.”

Today we know that at least two of Mozart’s students were involved in finishing the piece, with the majority of the work being done by Franz Süssmayr. What we don’t know, however, is how much of the completed work is purely theirs and how much came from Mozart’s notes and verbal instructions.

Some versions of the story indicate that Mozart gave detailed deathbed instructions and left many “little scraps” of paper with details of how to complete the composition. Other versions claim that this talk of “little scraps” is simply more of Constanze’s effort to maximize Mozart’s contributions and minimize those of others.

Regardless, we know that the completed Requiem was eventually sent (with Mozart’s counterfeited signature!) to Count Walsegg and dated 1792—which is rather odd in retrospect given that it was well-known that Mozart had died on 5 December 1791. It's always been yet another mystery.

The two excerpts used in Ride are the Lacrimosa, during the opening titles and establishing scenes, and the Confutatis, which Morse is listening to on his record player as he splits wood outside the lakeside dacha.

The Latin text of the first reads:

Lacrimosa dies illa, Qua resurget ex favílla Iudicandus homo reus: Huic ergo parce, Deus:

The equivalent translation (i.e. not the one used at mass, but a more literal translation) is: 

Tearful [will be] that day, on which from the glowing embers will arise the guilty man who is to be judged: Then spare him, O God.

So Ride starts with tears and guilt.

I’ve always found it interesting that this text doesn’t even try to claim innocence, instead it very clearly asks that the guilty be shown mercy. 

The Latin text of the second reads:

Confutatis maledictis, Flammis acribus addictis, Voca me cum benedictis.

The equivalent translation is: 

Once the cursed have been silenced, sentenced to acrid flames, Call me, with the blessed.

This text always strikes me as coming almost from a child’s point of view. Basically one interpretation is, “Come and get me once you’ve taken care of all the bad guys.” I'll leave you to draw your own conclusions as to how that might apply to Morse post-Blenheim Vale and prison.

Next week: The Classical Music of Ride, Part II: Rigoletto or “Why keeping a person’s entire existence a secret leads to Bad Things.”

Special Bonus Section!!!

Parts of Mozart’s Requiem used in Endeavour: 

Dies irae: completed by Mozart in skeleton* S4E4: Harvest (~2 min) (~3 min)

Rex tremendae: completed by Mozart in skeleton* S9E3: Exeunt(~1 h 11 min)(~1 h 11 min)

Confutatis: completed by Mozart in skeleton* S3E1: Ride (~5 min)

Lacrimosa: completed by Mozart in skeleton* through measure no. 8 S2E3: Sway (~0 min)(~1 hr 24 min); S3:E1 Ride (~1 min)

Lux aeterna: Not in Mozart’s MS; however Süssmayr reuses the Requiem aeternam written by Mozart almost note-for-note with just the different text S9E3: Exeunt (~31 min)

*skeleton: means full vocal and continuo parts, notes for prominent orchestral parts and musical bridges

[sluttyten]

UNHOLY - Chapter Eighteen

full masterlist || UNHOLY chapter index

summary: you've been anxiously waiting the reunion with Ten and Yuta. But first, you have to break them out of their imprisonment in Hell. And, who knows, maybe while you're there, you'll learn some new stuff about yourself, too

length: 19,907 words

tags: supernatural, demons, happy stuff, stressful and nervous stuff, scared and angry stuff

<-previous || next–>

You wish you could say the first day of planning went splendidly and you were ready to go marching into Hell the next day. 

That wasn’t the case. 

Each day, your planning meetings end with nothing truly decided. Each night, you dream again of Hell, of the Queen of the Night, of the torture that Yuta and Ten are enduring. Each morning you wake feeling more stressed than you had been the day before, more afraid of what is happening to them, and how different you might find them – they’ve been imprisoned in two separate prisons, possibly tortured, who knows what sort of effect that’s had on them since you last saw them.

You cover lots of things in the meetings that should reassure you of the success of this mission, but they don’t necessarily reassure you of anything.

Jeno and Jaemin tell you about the layout of Hell, of secret entrances and passages and exits while they also regale you with amusing stories of their time at Hell’s boarding school. Johnny tells each of you how shadows work – not the obvious way, but the magical way that lets him twine them around his fingers and send them away to do his bidding. There are skills lessons – Ira instructing you more in the ways of the Watchers, Jaemin and Jeno giving you more information about demons that they’d learned in their demonic boarding school, combat lessons from Jaehyun the werewolf (which Haechan seems only too eager to go head-to-head with some of your new companions). Ira and the sirens discuss various plans to leave the island and to return, revealing the secrets you’ve been wondering about since Renjun brought you here.

You keep your distance from the sirens, still a little wary of them after the dream you had a week ago in which they’d drowned you. It doesn’t help that all three of them have a mildly terrifying aura anyway, and it only gets worse every time that you see Seulgi watching all of you like you’re her prey during Jaehyun’s combat lessons. But you know that the sirens are actually rather sweet. Sunmi is kind and truly nurturing with her sisters. Seulgi actually is quite adorable and soft-hearted when it comes down to it — one day after Johnny’s shadow-talks, you see Seulgi playing with his shadow tendrils like they’re kittens while Johnny watches on with amusement. 

Minnie, though, shows such affection for Renjun. She acts cute and flirty and clingy, constantly trying to steal his attention away from Haechan who, in turn, tries to steal Renjun’s attention back. 

You try hard not to find the dynamic between the elf, the vampire, and the siren very amusing and familiar. 

Finally on the morning of the seventh day, you wake in the darkness of your bedroom to find that Mark’s side of the bed is empty.

It’s late. Or early. The sky outside the window of your bedroom is still a deep, dark shade of blue with stars just barely visible, tiny pinpricks of silver light in the sky. You can see the ink of the sea in the distance, whitecap waves reflecting moonlight.

The night is truly silent tonight. Your view out the window could be nothing more than just a pretty picture in the frame for all the sound you catch – no wind blowing, you can’t hear the waves rushing against the shoreline. No one whispers in the halls or other rooms of Ira’s house. The only sound is the thundering of your own heart in your ears and the dull sizzling sound of your handprints you’ve burnt into the sheets where you’ve been clutching them.

A nightmare is what woke you.

It’s similar to the one you had a week ago, centered on Hell. Every part of it was confusing and disappointing as each element of your plot to rescue Ten and Yuta fell through completely. You woke when the dream couldn’t possibly have gotten any worse.

You saw them burning. 

Everyone.

Everyone burned. Yuta and Ten, although that should have been impossible. Mark and WinWin, Ira, the sirens, the others that Ira has drawn here to his island to help you with this mission. 

They were all burning in your dream. The dream was so vivid that you could smell burning hair and flesh; you could see the terror in their eyes; you could hear their cries and screams. You had heard the vile laughter of the Queen of the Night, cackling with wicked delight while they burned and she made you watch.

Now, as you lie here in the waking aftermath of your nightmare, you try to focus on your surroundings to ground you in the present. 

Behind you, WinWin is unmoving, an arm pitched above his head, the sheets twisted around his hips, one exposed leg visible and covered in white scars like lightning bolts originating from the silvery bite mark left behind by the Fell Beasts. Tonight he’s unbothered, deep in dreams so he doesn’t budge even as you leave the bed, as you quietly dress yourself. 

Soft snores sound from the bedrooms you pass. There’s no sign of anyone being awake, no sounds of the unsleeping vampires being aware of you moving through the house. You creep down the spiral stairs, taking careful steps to keep quiet as you make your way out through the front door. 

Dawn is just beginning to touch the perfect blue darkness of night. Peach colored sunrise swirls through the navy clouds and the steel gray of the choppy sea. Deep shadows remain over much of the island, and you stick to them, remembering Johnny’s advice of bending shadows to help hide you, which you apply skillfully as you leave the eaves of the house towards the cliff’s edge.

As you walk forward, you glance backwards, attempting to look up at the lighthouse tower’s peak, trying to see if maybe Mark is up there. You know he’s got a tendency to climb up the tower so he can sit there and stare at the stars. If he’s up there right now, you can’t distinguish him from the dark. And if he is up there, he must not notice you because he doesn’t descend to join you or stop you either way.

You don’t want him to join you.

The nightmares that have been plaguing you all week have been bad enough, but the one you just awoke from truly has put you in a state of panic. No one else can come with you, you saw the argument for that in your dream. Everyone here on the island has been helpful in these planning stages, but if they come with you, they’re just weaknesses for you, they’ll hold you back and make you much more noticeable than if you just go by yourself.

You know how to get off the island now, and you have a plan for exactly how you’re going to get into Hell, how you’re going to locate Ten and Yuta, and how you’re going to escape. You’ve even got a Plan B tucked away in the back of your mind in case your original plan goes awry.

The beach looks nearly the same as it had the day that you arrived. Foamy white waves crash against the shore, rushing through the pebbles as you near the water’s edge. 

Since your arrival to Ira’s island, you’d wondered several times how the portal magic worked for the island. Ira and Renjun had made it clear that it was only possible to enter the island via portal, and that made sense. Up until a few days ago when one rescue strategy had been discussed, you hadn’t known how to leave the island. At what point did the sea become a portal back to the rest of the world?

Ira had led all of the group out onto the porch outside the front door. With his arm outstretched, he pointed out at the sea visible beyond the cliff’s edge. “See the water, where it turns from a shallow turquoise to a darker blue? Do you see the circle of turquoise out a little further? It’s straight out from the inlet where you all came in.”

The sea faded from turquoise closer to the shore to a deeper blue as the sea floor dropped off, but then there was in fact a pocket of lighter color out in the deep.

“This portal works a bit different from other portals. To exit the secure space I’ve placed this island in, you have to have a specific mental picture of your destination, you have to focus on it and push through.”

“Push through? It’s in the middle of the water. How will we know when we’ve reached the portal to push through and to focus?” Jeno had turned to your father in confusion. 

Mark, standing beside you in the shadow of the house’s doorway, grimaced. “Trust me, you’ll know. Coming through is easy enough, but when we left to find you guys, I thought like you. It was in the middle of the water, so how would we know? But it’s like hitting an invisible wall. You have to focus on holding your destination in mind while you also push through what feels like a solid wall of water.”

Ira nods. “I didn’t make it easy to come and go.”

And now, in the present moment as you stand on the shore and face the morning gray of the sea, you hope you’ll be able to find the portal. From down here at the water level, you can’t see a difference in the water like you’d been able to from up above. It’s impossible to tell how far out you’re going to have to swim.

You stare out at the water. 

If you don’t go now, you’re going to lose your nerve.

Images of your dream last night flash through your mind.

Ten screaming as hungry flames consumed him. Yuta’s body stretched out on the floor as veins of poisoned fire wrapped around his throat, crawling over his cheeks and mouth. 

It had all seemed so real, so terrifying. You can’t take another night of not knowing that they’re safe, of not having them in your arms again.

The seawater is cool where it touches your bare ankle. 

Ira had said the portal is just a straight swim out from the shore. You can do this. 

You take a few steps more out into the water, shivering as the cool water rises up your body, as the waves splash it even higher. 

You pull in a deep, full breath and with one last glimpse back at the cliffs behind you – halfway hoping to see a familiar face, halfway checking to make sure that there isn’t anyone watching. There isn’t anyone. You face the horizon again, and you dive beneath the surface.

Below the water, the world is dark and still. You’re still close to the shore, in only a few feet of water, but as you begin swimming forward, the bottom falls away beneath you. Darkness grows around you when you reach the open water of the sea. There’s a different feeling to the water, a hollowness and a pull of gravity as the forever black maw opens beneath you.

High above you, the sunrise bursts in prismatic colors over the surface. Your lungs begin to ache and your heart longs for you to rise to the surface again, to feel the heat of the sunrise on your face and a fresh breath of air filling your lungs, but instead you keep swimming forward into the endless, deep dark.

The pressure grows stronger  in your chest, in your head, in your throat, and you feel like you’re being squeezed to death and frozen as the sea around you becomes entirely black. Momentarily, the thought crosses your mind that you’ve slipped right through the portal without being aware, that you’ve been somehow sucked into that Abyss that Yuta and Ten once told you about – the place where soulless supernaturals go when they die.

And then, you feel it.

A wall of pressure.

You pull an image of your destination into your mind, focusing on it with every part of you that’s not worrying about being able to breathe, and you push forward.

You feel as if you’re making absolutely no progress no matter how hard you push against it, and for a moment you’re right back trapped in that mirror at the House of the Watchers – again, you can’t breathe, you’re trapped against a barrier with everything you want on the other side. You push and you push, trying to keep a river a million miles away held in your mind, pushing, pushing, feeling your lungs seizing in your chest and dots of blackness and sparks of impossible light spark across your vision.

The world breaks around you, shattering and transforming into a world of bright sound and heat and so much air.

Each breath sears your lungs, your chest burning in an entirely unpleasant manner, but you can’t help gasping for more and more air. Your hair drips into your eyes, making them sting. There’s so much noise, and after the suffocation of the deep sea, all of this everything is very disorienting.

It takes a moment or two of treading water before you realize that your escape from the island actually worked.

River water stains your skin with tiny granules of silt, a twig has tangled itself in your hair as well as a slimy piece of plant life that has twisted through your fingers. You shake it off, pluck the twig from your hair, and you look back up to the banks of the river you’re in, at the high city buildings reaching up into the orange haze of the sky.

You’ve come back to Hell City.

Something silvery flickers by you in the water, and it takes a moment too long for you to realize what it is. Another pale streak rushes by you, and this time you recognize it for what it is. A memory rises to the surface of your mind.

In your early days here, as Ten and Yuta showed you around the city, they’d brought you here to the riverwalk along this river that marks the border of Hell City. Right now, you’re a bit upriver from that spot where the river splits in two, but you still remember clearly leaning against the railing with Yuta beside you, his arm wound around your waist to keep you from tipping into the dangerous water.

It’s the memory of that day that has inspired your rescue plan. 

“What do you see when you look at the water?” Yuta had asked you that day. And that morning, just as right now, you’d seen a whitish silver ribbon twisting through the water. With his hands on you, keeping you safely planted on solid ground, Yuta had explained to you, “Those are spirits of the damned. This river leads straight to Hell. Proper Hell, not just this city. Water is a transmitter, or conductor, carrying the spirits down where they belong. A little way down the way, the river vanishes underground, and it never resurfaces.”

It’s funny, thinking back on that now. You’ve definitely learned that water works as a pathway – it’s taken you to Purgatory and to Ira’s little special corner of the universe, and it’s brought you back here.

And if your plan works, this river is going to take you straight to Hell.

This is something that has come up in your week of planning. Jaemin’s voice echoes from the back of your mind. “Once you’re in that river, it’s a certainty as to where you’re going. Because the river is a one-way ticket to Hell. Spirit Express, no stops, no clear return.”

In the present moment, you can already feel the current of the river sucking at you, pulling you downstream. A cold wave slaps into the side of your head, and you swear you hear a voice whispering a death song in your ear, and you keep your mouth closed tightly, trying to keep your face above water, even as the current pulls you along, threatening to drag you under even as you fight to stay afloat.

And then you see it just up ahead. The river forks.

One branch of the river continues on through the regular, mortal, unmagical world towards the ocean. The other branch grows darker and darker until eventually it delves underground, passing briefly through Hell City’s underground, and then surging even deeper below to the realm of the demons; this branch of the river is the one that has you in its gravity.

And suddenly it really has a grip on you. You’re being propelled forward in the water, carried along faster than you had been just a moment before, racing towards the place where the river disappears underground.

The moment is obvious when the power of the great river of the damned finally overpowers the simple current of the natural river. One moment, you’re still able to fight to keep your head above water, and the next you can feel the force of the water pulling you downward.

You keep getting pulled under, managing one final gasp for breath in the instant before it’s impossible, sucking in a little of the river water despite all of your previous attempts. It tastes like poison as it trickles over your tongue, and the moment you resurface, you cough and gag, trying to expel the toxic water. Repeat.

Occasionally, you feel something else in the water, hitting against you, bumping and slithering and slimy. Mostly it feels incorporeal, as if you’re just feeling passing souls. Until you feel the tug at your ankles, the gravity pushing you down further from the surface.

You wish you had something to hold onto, some easier way to get to Hell than this, but Jaemin and Jeno had assured you that this was going to be the easiest way for all of you to get there, and even though you’re going this alone now, you don’t know any other way to get to Hell. 

You’re being sucked downward, and you flail around, trying to claw your way back to the surface for one last breath, one last glimpse of the sunlight –

Free-fall.

You’re in free-fall, no longer controlled by the river’s current but by gravity.

Lights flicker to life – far away and below you, growing rapidly bigger and closer.

You recognize where you are, but you’ve never seen it from this perspective.

You’re tumbling in the waterfall you’ve seen before, racing through Hell City’s underground, and within seconds you’ll be crashing into the next layer of the underworld. Streams of silvery light surround you, and if you could really force your eyes to focus on anything, you feel certain that you might be able to make out features of faces or limbs. These are souls, after all.

The air is full of voices – whispers of the souls, your own screams.

You feel the impact as your body crashes into the pool of water at the base of Hell City’s underground waterfall. It doesn’t hurt necessarily, but you can feel the water passing like a heavy wave beating against you when you stand unprepared in the surf. And then everything is dark and cool again. The air is filled with the rushing sound of water and passing air and all the whispers of the souls around you. And you’re spinning.

It takes a moment to really realize that, but soon you come to understand that you’re spiraling downwards in tighter and tighter curls, moving faster and faster, you and all of these souls are funneled to a point.

You’re spinning in the darkness, and then suddenly you’re not.

In a great cold splash and a burst of warm light, you’re standing dripping wet on a stone floor. 

“What the fuck?” You hiss, blinking and looking around.

Directly in front of you is the broad back of a very tall, large man. He doesn't turn to look at you, only shuffling forward a step. 

A cold wave of water rushes over your feet as a considerable splash sounds from behind you.

You glance over your shoulder and find an elderly woman standing there with round glasses sliding toward the tip of her nose, her hair curling loose down to her shoulders. She doesn’t seem to take too much notice of you. Momentarily, there’s another big splash, a second wave assaulting your feet as a spout of water shoots down from the distant blackness of the ceiling, the jet of water deposits another soul in what appears to be a line growing behind you.

You twist around to the front, leaning around the broad man in front of you to get a look at what you’re in line for.

“What the fuck?” You repeat, looking at the line that stretches into the impenetrable distance. It winds forward, twisting around rocky structures that jut up from the floor. A deep reddish-orange glow semi-illuminates this vast space, but the end of the line in either direction – as the spout of water continues to deposit an endless string of souls behind you in line – is swallowed by the same darkness that resides above your head.

But do you really have to wait in line?

None of the others around you pay any attention to you or anyone else. They all wear bored, resigned expressions, content to shuffle forward step by step as the line slowly shifts forward with some unknown signal.

It is eerily silent. Your brain can’t comprehend the absolute lack of sound when you can see so many people. You should be able to hear breathing or some slight shifting, fabric brushing together, feet moving on the floor, an exasperated sigh or grumbling under the breath. You even half expect to hear a distant echo, water droplets trickling down from somewhere or even dripping from clothes, but as the Hell Delivery System waterfall moves ever farther down the line, you can’t even hear its roar of delivery anymore.

And you’re soaking wet. Uncomfortably so.

You know that you could easily call your demon fire and make quick work of drying yourself off, but some instinctive feeling in your belly is telling you not to do that. It might just draw attention to you.

Not that there seems to be anyone overseeing this line, enforcing behavior. If you just stand here waiting in line for some unknown end, you’ll just be wasting time. There probably isn’t anyone who will even notice if you cut the line a little.

You’ve moved only a dozen paces since your arrival. 

You take a step out of line, pause, waiting for something to happen.

After a few beats, nothing has happened.

You begin to move, passing up the column of this endless queue. No one moves or spares you a glance, speaks or breathes or anything. So you walk, and you walk and walk and walk, searching for the front of the line.

Is this Hell? Just this, waiting in line forever? Moving forward inch by inch for all of eternity. Because you’ve been walking for at least half an hour, and the front of the line doesn’t seem anywhere in sight. Although, the scenery has slightly changed. There seem to be more outcroppings of rock here, and there are large torches mounted to the walls, providing a stronger orange light than the previous ambient red-orange glow.

Another fifteen minutes pass by in unchanging silence. You look behind you to see the line vanishing back into dim light some distance back, twisting out of sight around a big boulder. Ahead of you looks pretty much the same.

But then you hear something.

It sounds like footsteps, so you freeze. Sharp clicking footsteps pass over the stone floor. Heavy breathing and the acrid scent of brimstone.

A demon.

You don’t dare to move even a little bit. Wherever this demon is, it must be ahead of you, around the next curve of the line, but you’re sure even a slight move would draw its attention to exactly where you are as it prowls along the line.

Sure enough, around the curve ahead, you see a puff of black smoke, a shadow painted on the wall of a beast. It’s coming towards you.

You clench your hands into fists, and you feel your nails bite against your palms hard enough to break skin.

The demon’s shadow on the wall twitches, head tilting curiously to the side, and you glance down to see a trickle of your blood as it drips from your hand.

A sharp whistle cuts through the never-ending space, echoing off the rock walls and the invisible ceiling. The demon twists around, a growl rumbling from it. A second whistle, and the beast sets off in the opposite direction. You hear a grinding sound of stone against stone, a third whistle and another growl from the demon.

You take a step forward, conscious of the coarse sand that dusts the stone floor, aware that even a slightly wrong move could cause sound. If only there was some way to silence your footsteps so you could sneak forward, hopefully catching a glimpse around the next curve of the line, maybe to see what is happening ahead. Have you finally found the front of the line?

You take a tentative step forward, and there’s a soft crunch of a pebble beneath your foot.

Your heart leaps in your throat, but then you remember.

During the weeks of Ira’s lack of availability and assistance with this plan, you’d dug into any and all of the books he had in his home. There were boring books about gardening and maintenance, cookbooks, and even self-help books, but there had also been histories of the Watchers, but these were ancient texts that you felt must be from the early days of the Watchers because they were just histories, they held information pertaining to the instruction of young Watchers. 

Those texts you had devoured, pouring over them for long hours until Mark or WinWin had dragged you away, providing you with ample distraction. 

But you had learned some things from those texts about the powers of the Watchers, the abilities that you possess. You’d practiced a few things, but you are fully aware that you’re a long way from being adept at the skills. 

Although, one of the magical skills you’d read about, and that you’d once attempted semi-successfully, had been the power to become undetectable – invisible and silent – for up to an hour. You’d used that experiment to sneak up on WinWin and scare him, for which you’d had to apologize and make it up to him when you returned to detectability about ten minutes later.

But isn’t that what you need right now? To be undetectable?

Luckily, the process had been rather simple, and you’d made certain to memorize it before even attempting it that first time. 

The powers of the Watchers were magic like you’d not quite seen it before. Sure, some of it involved fancy words and waving your hands around, but there was a simplicity to it all that almost seems deceptive, like you feel like it should be much more difficult than it is, and by finding it easy, you must be doing it wrong. But that’s not the case at all. Maybe it seems that way because you’re so new to this power that you were actually born with; it’s a part of you, so natural that it just flows without having to work too hard at it. 

Either way, the effort to become undetectable right now is simple. 

The sandy soil underfoot is actually much more fine than you’d believed. It’s a soft, reddish-brown powder that clings to your fingertips as you crouch and gather a handful. Disturbingly, it reminds you of dried blood. 

You spit into the small pile of soil in your hand, mixing it into a paste that you try not to think too much about as you dip your paste-coated fingers and paint them around your face.

It’s more difficult without a mirror to know if you’re getting the runes correct, but you hope that you don’t fuck it up too much.

You can tell it’s taking effect, and you begin to hurry before you lose the ability of physical touch. This spell truly makes you undetectable – invisible, silent, and intangible.

Just as you put the finishing touches on yourself, you see your fingertips fading away.

You lift your hand to your face, and you can feel your breath on your fingertips, and you think that maybe there’s the barest imprint on the air in front of you, but you can’t actually see anything there. Beneath you – where your feet should be – there’s no sign of your footprints, not even when you take a step forward.

As you walk around the curve, you don’t find the front of the line. You’re certainly closer to the front, but now the line straightens out instead of curving, moving forward into the far distance where you can see looming high in the shadows, the faintly lit arch of a massive doorway. But right here beside the line, just on this side of that curve in the rocks, is a hidden doorway. You can still see a glowing outline of it as you reach it, but your intangible fingers can’t find any purchase to pry the door open.

Again, this is where you’re grateful to be part Watcher. There’s a magical phrase for this, and a moment later the hidden doorway is grinding open again, revealing a narrow hallway roughly carved through the rock, winding away and downward. To a certain degree, it reminds you of the passages Yuta and Ten had led you through to take you from the surface of Hell City down into its underground, although these tunnels of Hell are much better illuminated. 

Once you’re through the entrance, you close the door again with a simple wave of your hand.

The rocky ridges in the walls of the tunnel are a warmer reddish brown than where the evenly spaced torches along the walls illuminate. You get a vague impression that you’re staring down a great beast’s throat, looking at the insides of its ribcage. As you pass silently down the tunnel – footsteps leaving no mark in the sandy floor nor even a scuff or sound of your footfalls – you grow even more aware of how you’re sinking further and further into Hell.

The flickering light of the torches on the ribbed walls of the tunnel truly gives the sense of being slowly swallowed by a beast, and you’re terrified and exhilarated to learn what awaits you.

And then you see it.

A small archway up ahead, open and unguarded.

Slipping through the archway into Hell Proper is easy, but what you find immediately on the other side is less so.

The hidden tunnel didn’t just bypass the rest of Hell’s eternal waiting line to the Great Gates. You managed to bypass a lot of the structure of Hell, and the tunnel has spat you out into the one place that you’ve feared and yet dreamed about for too long now.

You’re in the throne room of the Queen of the Night.

You’re in the very belly of the beast.

And you’re not alone.

You melt into the shadows at the edge of the throne room, pressing your back to the wall, your shoulders blend into an enormous woven tapestry as you make an attempt to conceal yourself even more against its pattern. There are too many people – or demons, you suppose – for you to feel safe even with your Watcher spell making you undetectable. Your heart pounds as you look around, observing the space. 

The ceiling vanishes above you into darkness just as it had in Hell’s lobby, but here there’s at least a hint of architecture. Something sort of Gothic, sort of Art Nouveau which adds an odd bit of whimsy to the otherwise imposing aura. Columns span the length of the room, leading your eye toward the apse – a semicircular space at the far end of the room, the ceiling ribbed and vaulted. The back curved wall of the apse is more window than wall, and it reminds you of something you might have seen in a Church before, although it’s much more dark and whimsical than the structured beauty of a Church’s stained glass window. It has an organic feel to it, like the wall is covered in vines that have grown around irregularly shaped black windows. 

You try not to imagine those windows as eyes, but it’s difficult to do. You feel as if you’re being observed. 

Seated there above it all, doing nothing to help the feeling of being watched, is the Queen’s throne. The high seat is housed in the apse, and you’ve seen it before.

Her throne is exactly as you’d pictured it in your dreams. Massive. An unscalable monolith, carved of black stone that reflects torchlight from the walls, thin trails of liquid darkness seep from unknown pores in the throne, and although you can’t see the base of the throne at the moment due to the throng of of demons in the way, you know that black liquid is dripping down into the black pool the throne rises from. You’d dreamed it exactly like this. 

And also like your dreams, seated atop the throne is the Queen herself, veiled in shadow.

All you can see of her are her hands, which are clawed and deformed. Her twisted long fingers are pale as bone until they taper at the tips into black points which she taps against the arms of her throne. Her voice is a rasp, reminiscent of dry leaves rattling against each other, like bare branches snapping in a strong breeze, and an underlying tone of train wheels screeching on the track. Whatever language she’s speaking in, you can’t understand it, although the demons around you certainly seem to.

They cheer at whatever it is that she’s rasping in her unholy voice.

A demon rises up above the crowd on stilt-like legs, pronouncing something that you still can’t understand. A few others respond, and the Queen laughs – her voice echoes sharply around the room, bounced back at you by all the hard stone. 

And then you hear the rattle of chains. An eerie clinking.

You need to get closer.

Even sticking to the edges of the throne room, skirting the gathered court, you narrowly avoid detection. There are guards stationed along the walls, as well as court members whose presences overflow even beyond their physical forms – similar to Johnny back on Ira’s island, with his shadows that reach beyond himself. 

At one point, you swear one of the demons turns its head to look in your direction, but it can’t see through your Watcher magic, so it turns back to face the Queen.

You keep moving until you reach the front of the crowd, until you can see the black pool beneath the throne. Heavy chains in the dark water, just like your dreams. But unlike your dreams, the chains aren’t looped around the limbs of your boyfriends. Now the chains lie limp in the water, empty.

You’re not sure if you feel relief or some other unnamed combination of fear and horror and frustration.

If they’re not here, like they had been in your dream, then where are they?

Are they hiding on the other side of the throne? Perhaps they’re just not visible from your vantage point here, and if you could just squeeze through the crowd….

It’s easier said than done.

More than once, one of the demons bumps into you, which shouldn’t be possible unless your undetectability is wearing off. Luckily, those that bump into you seem to think they’ve just bumped into another demon in the crowd with them, and they brush it off, but each time it happens you curl in a little tighter on yourself, pushing onward.

And then someone steps directly into your path, and you pull up short. 

Another demon stands slightly behind the first, reaching up to adjust the collar of the first demon’s jacket, to brush nonexistent lint from the demon’s shoulders. 

“Stop,” the demon hisses. 

The second demon drops his hands from the other’s shoulders, murmuring a quiet, “Yes, my Prince.”

A Prince of Hell. 

Ten and Yuta had once briefly mentioned the Princes to you in passing. The five Princes of Hell mostly kept to themselves, although both of your boyfriends had met them a few times. 

The Prince standing before you is very handsome. Dark reddish brown hair curls around his ears. His eyes glow a deep red as he turns to look over his shoulder at what must surely be a servant. 

Suddenly, another demon shoulders his way forward through the crowd. He’s taller than the first Prince, his hair a smooth ebony encircled by a crown of obsidian. 

“Kun,” he says, “We missed you.”

Prince Kun — the first Prince — turns to his brother. “Mother had me handling some business.” He faces the Queen, listening intently as she continues speaking her demonic tongue. “Hendery, don’t you ever wonder why she tries to keep us separate from our people? It’s only times like these she allows us among them, and even then she wants us to be kept apart. To be just simply out on display.” 

Hendery’s head turns slightly, and you follow his gaze to a small dais off to the side. Three other Princes sit there on thrones carved of dark stone, looking bored. 

“You know why,” Hendery answers. “It’s to keep us safe.”

When Kun looks at his younger brother, his eyes seem to flare a shade brighter. “If we’re never among our people, how can they ever hope to know us? How are we to ever understand them? And if they don’t know us and we don’t know them, what hope do any of us ever have of ruling them?”

His jaw clenches, hands curling into fists at his sides. Hendery only gives his brother a look of mild confusion. 

“Sometimes, Hendery, I think that Mother never plans to pass the throne on.” Kun’s voice has lowered to the point that you need to strain to hear it, meant only for his brother’s ears. “Sometimes I wonder if I’ll have to steal it from her so I can fulfill my destiny as King.”

“Don’t say that.” There’s now a tick in Hendery’s jaw. 

“I’ve made it clear how I feel in the past about Mother’s rule, the changes and improvements I will make when I’m King. Don’t act like this is anything new.” Kun turns to face his brother, and you spot other demons in the crowd casting sideways glances at their two Princes. 

A third Prince, this one with silver hair and a light and bright expression, appears and throws his arms around the shoulders of his brothers. “Come, brothers. Let’s go sit. Mom says there’s a feast after her speech.”

Unwilling to continue their argument in front of their younger brother, both Kun and Hendery drop it. They carve a path through the crowd on the way back to the dais. You take the opportunity created in their wake, and you make your way clear through the crowd, following them although you don’t plan to reach their thrones with them. 

Instead, once you reach the edge of the Queen of the Night's audience, you turn your attention again to the pool at the base of her throne and the chains rusting in the liquid. 

On this side of the throne room, you can see that the pool of water trails away toward the sides of the room, trickling through a grated section at the back of the apse. There are more chains scattered throughout the water, all of them empty. Well, mostly empty. You try not to look too closely as you catch a pearly gleam of bones tangled in one of the lengths of chain. 

There’s a narrow strip of raised stone along the edge of the room just below where some of the chains are bolted into the walls. The dark water swirls, a light current keeping it moving on the way toward those grates in the back. 

High above you on the throne, the Queen’s voice still echoes out over her people. As you’re still invisible and unable to understand what the Queen of the Night is saying, you decide to take the opportunity to explore the apse.

The narrow pathway is just wide enough for you to fit without touching the water. Every few feet as you shuffle along it, you glance backwards.

All of the demons are still gazing upwards at their Queen. The dais of Princes are the only ones who aren’t devoting all of their attention to her. Kun is sitting on his throne, his left ankle resting on his knee as he disinterestedly picks at his nails. The dark-haired Hendery keeps casting glances at his elder brother. The young silver-haired prince is distractedly stroking the backs of the phantom shadow cats that twine around his ankles and stand on his shoulders and rest on the arms of his throne; as you watch, one stretches up to place its paws on his chest and rub its shadowy head beneath his chin. 

There are two other Princes sitting there, both of them with their heads bowed together in quiet conversation, although they appear to be joking around, judging by the barely suppressed laughter. One of them looks as if he’s part-bat – large membranous wings are tucked behind him. His wings are dark and angular, although the webbing is thin and paler in color. He’s very handsome, despite the bat wings and the vicious blood red color of his eyes. His hair is a deep, dark brown color, parted precisely down the middle, and two sections of his bangs fall down to perfectly frame his face.

The last Prince is round-faced, pale, and very relaxed. He’s handsome as well, although at this point you’re half-certain that being extremely handsome is a demonic condition. His jaw is so strong, his eyes gleam with mirth as he whispers with his brother. He exudes a sense of casualness, a very go-with-the-flow vibe that immediately puts you at ease even as you’re sneaking around behind his mother’s throne.

Perhaps it puts you a little too at ease.

Upon your next step, your foot slips.

Your toes dip into the water, and to your surprise, a few shallow ripples spread out over the surface of the dark liquid.

You dart a glance toward the high throne, toward the crowd, and to the Princes. 

Prince Kun has turned to look in your direction, his eyebrows furrowed together as he scans the shadows where you hide. You hope that your spell of undetectability, which is clearly beginning to wear off, stands up beneath the Prince’s scrutiny. His eyes narrow, focusing on the back section of the apse, but after another moment, he blinks and returns to his nails.

Moving forward, you go more carefully.

You’re not sure exactly what you expect to find back here. Maybe it’s something about those dark eye-like windows staring down at you, but you feel drawn into the shadows at the back of the apse, to the place where you can hear the dark water trickling and tink tink tinking down through the grate. 

When you reach the end of the stone edging, you’re right there upon the grating.

There’s an odd swoop in your belly as you take the first step onto the drain. Maybe it’s because it’s not a solid surface, and you halfway expect the thin bars to give way beneath your weight. But they hold and you take another step and another, making your way to the very back of the apse. 

There’s a doorway.

The door is recessed, half hidden in the shadows between intricate carvings, a leering gargoyle with wings like the Prince back on the dais. 

Of course, the strange pull you’re feeling is guiding you towards that doorway. 

You take a step towards the doorway, and as you do, the gargoyle moves.

A flutter of its wings. A shake of its head. 

It turns away from you, its ears tilting like dog ears do when they’re listening for something. You hold your breath, pleading with the universe to let your undetectability hold for just a little longer. You walk lightly, quietly, without breathing, and you slip right by the gargoyle, into the recessed doorway.

A yawning mouth opens before you. 

Almost literally.

The doorway has stalactites hanging from the top like jagged teeth. A cool draft plays with your hair as it breathes by you from the dark maw beyond the doorway. The air is damp, carrying with it the smell of mildew and sulfur. 

The knot in your belly tightens, rising in your throat as you whisper another helpful spell Ira’s books had taught you. Nightvision. 

Although the path had been pitch black a moment before, the way before you suddenly blooms in color. The night vision provided by the spell isn’t quite like what you thought counted as night vision in your old life. It’s not all green and black, like you’d seen in movies and on TV. Everything is just… glowy. Like there is an ambient faint light source providing just enough light that you can see the cracks in the stones on the floor and the walls. You can see where a few feet ahead of you the path becomes stairs diving down into the unknown. 

You take those stairs carefully, trying not to slip on the damp, slick stone where it’s been worn smooth by use over the eons. 

Down and down and down deeper you wind, until at last you reach the bottom, only to find a barred door padlocked shut. You’re surprised that you can see a little bit better through the barred window of the door, and as you peer into the dark, you think the increased visibility is due to a faint light source from high above; you can hear a soft trickle, and you realize that the light and the water sound is likely coming from the drain grate high overhead. 

You can see little else than some rough rocks – large boulder-like monoliths that glisten wetly. You think for a moment that you hear the rattle of a chain, but then there’s nothing. No movement, no sound. What if you’ve come all the way down here, and this is just the chamber where the Queen of the Night keeps some horrid, monstrous pet? 

But still, there’s a weight in your belly, a magnetic pull that swoops as you step right up to the bars of the door, as you curl your hands around the bar and press your face between the gap, trying to get a better look around even as the rusty texture of the bars scrapes against your cheeks.

High above you, there’s a distant roar. It takes a moment for you to realize it’s the clamor of the crowd gathered before the Queen. They’re cheering about something. Thunder rumbles overhead, and you swear a few pebbles dislodge from the faraway ceiling, shaken loose by the drumbeats of footsteps in celebration as the demons continue their rallying.

Again, you hear movement. A chain’s rattle. The quiet echo of a single footstep followed by a quiet incomprehensible murmur.

Your heart thuds a beat harder.

You reach for the padlock, and without waiting, without thinking about if this is a terrible idea that you’ll come to regret, you reach below your surface for the fire that’s always there. 

Demon fire bursts to life in your hand, glowing white-hot and then flaring blue at the core of your hand, wrapped around the padlock until the metal softens and then melts, dripping to the floor like small drops of starlight.

The cell door groans slightly as your luminous hand pushes at it, melting the metal even as it swings open on rusty hinges. 

In the light given off by your skin, you can see what you hadn’t been able to before.

At first you think it is a statue, as still as it is with its face upturned to the light and sound above. Then, you realize it’s another gargoyle. 

Ram’s horns curl from the sides of his head, clawed feet and fingers of abnormal length. He stands nude with his back to you, and where you would imagine wings would jut from his shoulders, there are instead cracked lines in the shape of wings stretching from the nape of his neck down to his tailbone. At his feet another gargoyle kneels, also nude with wings etched into his back, a tail curls over his thigh, shaggy hair reaches almost to his shoulders, and two sharp horns rise from the top of his head, curving slightly forward.

It’s only when the one standing turns his head that you gasp.

The eyes are sunken in shadow. The face is gaunt and pale.

But you would recognize those eyes anywhere.

“Yuta,” you choke out, tears rising to your eyes as you stumble forward. 

The kneeling one lifts his head at the sound of your voice, his eyes striking against your soul. 

“Ten?” You collapse on your knees in front of them both. 

Now that you’re closer you can see the manacles on their ankles, the chains stretching back towards the wall. You reach for Ten’s face first, your palms gentle as you touch his sharp, unfamiliar bone structure. “What happened to you?”

Ten turns his head, unable to meet your gaze. 

“Are you really here?” Yuta rasps, his voice dry and rattling in his chest. “How are you here? Did she find you?”

You tug on Ten’s chin, turning his face back towards yours. He meets your eyes once briefly before looking at the floor again – they’re the yellow cat eyes that he used to flash at you on occasion. You stroke his cheek tenderly; he might not look how he did the last time you saw him, but that doesn’t change anything. 

“No, she didn’t find me,” You answer Yuta, “Renjun got us out of the House of the Watchers; he got us safely to my father,” you tell them. 

Ten lifts his head, his eyes bright. “He did?”

Your heart warms in your chest when he looks into your eyes. “Yes. And the first thing I made my father promise was that we would come rescue you. Now here I am, and I’m getting you out of here, bringing you to safety under my father’s protection.” You rise to your feet again.

Yuta shifts towards you, and when you reach for him, he stops you with his fingers light on your wrist. “My love, you can’t.”

You jerk your hand away from his hold. “What do you mean ‘I can’t?’ What can’t I do?”

With a clanking sound, Ten stands as well. 

“You can’t break us out of here,” Ten explains softly. “We’re bound here by the Queen’s law. And if she finds you here, she’s going to destroy you.” Now he lays his hand on your cheek, just as gentle as you’d been with him.

“Fuck that. I can save you both. I didn’t come all of this way, sneaking out of my father’s place, finding my way to Hell’s entrance, and sneaking in here all alone just to find you and not save you. Why would I give up so easily?” You take a half step back, looking between your boyfriends. You haven’t even properly had the time to rejoice in finding them, and they’re trying to drown your mood with this dark pessimism?

Yuta shakes his head. “For the moment, we’re going to ignore that you just said you’re here alone, which is insane. You don't understand. You can’t break us out. We’re chained in here. We’ve never seen a key, and these chains are impervious to everything we’ve tried, which isn’t too much honestly because all that’s down here is rocks. We can’t even really use magic because demon magic doesn’t work well within the walls of this chamber; trust me, we’ve tried. 

“For weeks, each of us has tried time and again to get a message out to you, to contact you in some way or see you through a veil. We tried to build a binding connection between ourselves and you so maybe we could pass a message along, show you how to find us. A few weeks ago, Ten thought he was almost successful at opening a tiny window, but all we saw was starlit darkness and a tall light blazing in the distance.” 

You remember that night on the island when you and WinWin and Renjun sat on the porch. You thought you’d seen something in the distance. A blip of something. A light, maybe. Could that have been them? 

“Trying to reach you has taken all of what natural energy remained; it’s why we look like this. Our true forms.” Yuta holds his arms out so you can see all of him bared in the light from above. “How can you still want us when we look like this?”

You scoff. “Seriously? You think I’m so shallow that I care what you look like right now? I love you both. I have fought my way through Hell and high water – literally – to get here. And I’m not going to pretend, but I’m honestly a little distracted and turned on by the sight of Ten’s dick right now. So yeah, I still want you now.” You cast a small glance between Ten’s legs where there’s an actual goddamned forked penis. “Which I was right about your dick, Ten, and you lied, I’d just like to point out.”

For the first time in too long, you see a ghost of Ten’s smile. Before you first had sex, he’d told you that he definitely didn’t have a forked penis or a tail or horns; but now you’re seeing the real him, and it turns out he’s actually got all three.

“And as for the chains, I’m sure I can find a way to break them.” You take a step back, looking down at the chains and manacles keeping them prisoner down here. “I just need to think.”

Overhead, the sound of the Queen and the crowd pours down through the grate. 

“What’s going on up there, anyway?” You ask, crouching to get a closer look at the manacle on Yuta’s ankle.

Silence is the only answer you receive until you look up.

Both of your boyfriends look down at you. You ask, “What?”

Ten looks at Yuta. “Just tell her.”

Yuta sighs. “A trial. The Queen and the Princes and all of the court are up there, right? She only does that for a big trial.” He pauses, lifting a hand up to touch one of his ram’s horns. “Specifically, this is our trial. Although, it’s as much a trial as the one the Watcher’s were going to give us. Our Queen seeks the death penalty for our disobedience and disloyalty; and who among her court and sons are going to tell her no?”

Immediately, the red-haired Prince Kun appears in your mind. But that’s unimportant right now. What is important is breaking these chains. Once you break them, you’ll nearly be done with the rescue.

You grab Yuta’s chain in both hands, and you pull, putting all of your strength and reaching down into that well of power within you to summon your fire. 

Nothing.

“Told you,” Ten says, “Demon powers don’t work in here. If they did, we’d have prettied ourselves up for you, and burned our way out of here forever ago.”

Yuta clucks softly. “We appreciate it, my love, but the trial sounds pretty decided up there. You should leave while you can.”

Both of them flinch at the loud, jarring sound of the chain smacking against the floor as you throw it down and stand up. You’re not anywhere near tall enough to come nose-to-nose with Yuta when he’s in his pure demon form, but you do your best. 

“I’m not leaving you. You’re both absolute idiots if you think I’m going anywhere without you now.” You spin around, turning your back to the both of them as you think. You close your eyes, trying to picture everything that you’ve read and learned and plotted back on Ira’s island. Surely someone in all the planning had come up with something about how to actually break them out. Surely not all of your plans had relied on magic? 

You should’ve brought a crowbar. Would a crowbar help, though? Surely there are tools that would help in this situation that you could’ve toted through your journey to Hell? You should’ve brought a blowtorch or something. 

Ten actually laughs when you say that aloud.

You glare at him. 

“What? I’m just imagining you busting in here with a whole blowtorch, the welder mask, a fuel cylinder, and an oxygen cylinder strapped to your back.” Ten laughs again.

“I wouldn’t need all of that if I’d thought ahead. I could’ve just manifested something that works like it’s got all of that, but it could be small and portable, able to just fit in my hand.” You frown. You’ve created original things before; objects that you’d imagined up and wanted in your apartment in Hell City. You could create whatever you wanted there, in the House of the Watchers, on Ira’s island – shit, you’d even created your own miniature solar system.

Oh.

You’d created your own stars and moons and planets before. 

That hadn’t been just basic manifestation, Ira had assured you when you brought it up one day. That was the Watcher magic that made that possible. Being a Watcher meant that you had the power of creation. It was completely separate from your demon magic. 

You drop to your knees again at the feet of your boyfriends. When you cup your hands together and close your eyes, Ten makes a noise of confusion.

“What are you doing? We told you already that–” He starts, but you cut him off with a quick shh.

Yuta and Ten watch as you dip into your well of power again, and this time you dig deeper, searching for the warm glow of your Watcher powers, focusing on bringing it all together into your hands. You can feel the moment it begins to work, when you feel heat pooling in your palms, when the buzzing in your mind becomes the quiet whispering of thermal energy eating the air, radiant light glowing through your eyelids.

“Maybe you should both look away,” you advise, and you can almost feel the power on your tongue and lips. You can feel the shift of power as the miniature white star takes form in your hands, as you have to keep your mind focused to control it. The star hisses in the damp air, sending up spirals of steam as you move carefully, bringing it closer to Ten’s chain.

When the star meets the chain, it’s a similar effect to your fiery hand encircling the padlock to the cell. Gobs of molten metal drip to the floor as the star liquefies the chain.

Ten gasps when the strain disappears from his ankle. 

Without another moment wasted, you move to Yuta’s bond, melting through his chain just as quickly. As soon as what remains of Yuta’s tether hits the floor, you sink back on your heels, let your hands fall apart, and you focus on dissipating the star safely, cooling it until it sinks, just a perfectly round black pebble resting in the center of your palm.

Again, there is cheering from far above you, and then the cry of the Queen’s voice in one final declaration.

Ten and Yuta look at each other.

“What?” You ask, rising to your feet once again. You slip the dead star into your pocket. “What’s happening up there?”

Ten swallows hard. Yuta shakes his head. 

“It’s over.” Yuta looks at you. “The trial, I mean. She just cried out ‘Death to the disloyal.’”

Your heart does something very strange – it stops beating or beats harder or just simply jerks in your chest – whatever it is, you gasp, clutching at your chest. This can’t happen. You won’t let it. You didn’t come all this way, do all of these things, create a whole fucking white dwarf star to cut your boyfriends free only to have them give up because some fucking Queen up there decided that they should die. 

No. 

You won’t let them.

“You’re not dying today,” you command them. “I refuse to let that happen. We’re leaving. Fuck the Queen. There’s got to be some way out of here that won’t take us back up into the throne room.”

After a moment of uncertainty, Ten looks at you and Yuta. “Well, there is one thing I think we could try.”

Yuta nods. “Then let’s go.”

You try not to look too closely as your boyfriends begin moving. Since you’ve never seen them in their true demon forms before, you’ve never seen them moving, and it’s mildly disturbing honestly. Yuta has backwards knees like an animal, so each step he takes, his knees bend the opposite way that you’re used to seeing. Ten just seems to float a couple inches off the ground. With the horns and the tail and the deep scars down their backs, it feels entirely new to look at them, and you’re beyond grateful when Ten takes the first step through the doorway of their prison and immediately the version of him that you’re used to snaps into place. 

As soon as Yuta follows Ten out, he resumes his usual appearance as well. But you don’t have time to stand there and admire them. Each of them pulls together some semblance of clothing that seems to knit itself from the damp shadows around the edges of the room, covering up their nudity.

“Come on,” Ten whispers, and he glances up the long staircase that leads up to the throne room. 

Darkness puddles in the space under the staircase, and to your surprise, that’s where Ten leads you and Yuta. “I used to explore the palace when I was skipping out on guard duty,” Ten explains in a whisper, “I found plenty of the secret passages and trapdoors and all sorts of secret things. And there’s one that comes out right back here.”

In the dim light, you watch Ten feel along the stone wall until finally his fingers catch in the gap between one stone and the next. There’s a faint click, and then with a grinding sound, a door slides inward to reveal a dark passage within. 

Ten steps in first, then you, and Yuta takes up the end. Once the door swings closed behind you, the tunnel is plunged into darkness. 

You bring a tiny white star to life again in your hands, and for a brief moment you see Ten and Yuta’s faces. You don’t have time to admire them, to actually rejoice in the reunion with your soulmates. You can feel it in the air, in the stones, in the tense set of Ten’s shoulders as he turns and walks away: you’re short on time. 

“Go on, my love.” Yuta’s hand is light against your lower back. “Keep up.”

The tunnel is long and dark, cool and damp. It branches off a few times, it narrows and the ceiling drops to the point that all three of you must crawl on your hands and knees to pass through to a section with a little more height. But Ten seems to know where he’s going, and with the help of your little light and Yuta’s warm hand occasionally reminding you of his presence behind you, you steadily make your way forward. 

“Where are we going?” You ask after several long minutes. 

“There are three exits from Hell,” Ten explains in a whisper. “The first is the entrance, although it’s a little more difficult to leave that way since we’d be going against the flow of souls. The second is the way the Queen brought Yuta and I in; she’s in possession of a mirror that acts as a portal, and that’s how she usually dispatched us on important missions as it’s the most private method of exit.” 

He pauses then at a fork in the path. 

“And the last one?” You ask, stepping up beside him. 

There’s a draft coming from the pathway to the left, but there’s almost a pull trying to guide you down the one on the right. You can see a faint light rightwards, perhaps a little sound of music that makes you want to dance.

“What’s that way?” You take a step ahead, face turned towards the music and the light

Ten and Yuta each grasp one of your wrists. 

“No,” Yuta rasps, “Not that way.”

Again, you feel the draft on your left cheek. The air has a breath of something sweet, something that reminds you of autumn. 

“This way.” Ten takes the lead again, and neither of them releases their hold on your wrists. “This way is the third exit option. It’s the one we’re taking.”

The path toward the light had curved deeper down into Hell, but you realize that the autumn path is leading slightly upward, the incline causing a slight burn in your calves and your breathing comes out harder than you expected as the path grows steeper and steeper until eventually you’re basically facing a wall.

Far above you, you see a light. But in between that light and the three of you down here at the bottom of this wall are about a hundred rungs of a ladder carved into the stone. 

Ten starts climbing, and you have no choice but to follow. You’ve made it up about maybe twenty rungs before your arms start burning, unused to working like this. You wish that you were able to give yourself fully functioning wings so you could fly the rest of the way out of here, but instead you double-down your focus, breathe, and keep climbing.

You barely even notice when Ten disappears from a few rungs above you. It’s only when you reach for the next rung of the ladder and find your hand placed into Ten’s instead, that you realize you’ve reached the top. He hauls you up to your feet on solid ground, and you grip onto his arm as you look around.

You’ve emerged from what is basically a crack in the wall. There’s a crumbling bit of pathway directly in front of you that extends to your left where it eventually joins with a well-kept path. 

The realm opens up in front of you in a cavernous space. Curved bridges arc over canyons you can see down into. Fires of all colors illuminate the paths and bridges and buildings. It’s still rocky, still everything has the cast of the red-brown dirt that made up the tunnels and the entryway, but it’s so much more open than you were expecting it to be. 

Behind you, Yuta clambers up through the crack, joining you and Ten.

“That’s where we’re going,” Ten says, pointing ahead. 

From here, you can’t really tell what it is that he’s pointing at other than a bridge that leads to a floating platform of stone that branches off into four more bridges. 

Off in the distance, you hear a loud, angry cry.

Yuta’s face pales. “That’s her. She must have realized we’ve gone.”

“We don’t have long, then.” Ten grabs your hand.

You run. The three of you fly along the path, scree kicked over the edge to tumble down into the abyss below. You reach the first bridge, and you try your best to not look over the side; you don’t really want to see how far the canyon goes down, nor do you want to see what might exist at the bottom of it. Luckily, with Ten’s hand still firm around yours, you don’t have the time to worry either about what would happen if you slipped. Ten runs quickly and smoothly, and you have no choice but to keep up with him, Yuta sticking behind you like your shadow. 

You fly over the platform, taking another bridge that shoots you off in another direction, and now you can better see that there are many bridges and deep crevasses all over the place. A wary peek shows you that Hell continues beneath you in many layers – bridges connect islands of stone suspended in the canyons, and you can see the true fires of Hell burning deep below. There are stairs and ramps that lead down below, and you realize you’re just at the top of Hell.

There are buildings here on occasion. You pass a bridge and find yourself jogging down a street with buildings on either side and lampposts giving off a flickering red light. You pass by what could be a park perhaps with grotesque statues and benches and what you’re almost positive is a sand volleyball court. 

Each time you think that you must finally be approaching the spot Ten said would be the exit, he keeps going. Yuta keeps up a steady pace behind you. 

“Aren’t we almost there? How big is Hell, anyway?” You gasp when Ten suddenly jerks your arm, dragging you along another new bridge. Surely you must be getting close because you can see another great wall of stone looming out of the darkness before you, much like the one you’d climbed out of what feels like forever ago. 

“Almost there,” Yuta says from behind you. “And it’s damn near infinite, but that’s when you go downwards.”

Again, you try not to look too hard at what extends beneath you. Instead you focus on what’s ahead. 

This bridge leads to a grove of sorts. Trees made of shiny black stone cling to the edges of this stone island, their roots dangling over the edge, dipping out through the seemingly solid stone they grow from. It must be solid enough to hold the whole weight of this grove of obsidian trees. Their leaves shimmer and shiver in a nonexistent breeze, changing between moonsilver and steel, like blades. You scan the branches as the three of you jog along a cleared path, half-expecting to find nothing, but also hoping to see some little creatures in the branches — birds or squirrels, insects or bats even. 

A fork in the path through the dark trees presents you the choice between a small bridge over a crack through which the level of Hell beneath you is visible before it curves out across the open space to another area of Hell, or you can choose a path that winds deeper into the forest. 

Ten, of course, drags you towards the left branch, deeper into the trees. 

You do hear something above you in the branches. It snaps a branch in one tree before landing in another. But even when you look up, you can’t tell what it is. You can only see the silvery leaves fluttering down towards you, although they vanish in a puff of smoke before they reach you. 

And Yuta swears viciously behind you. Ten forces you to run faster. 

And then you hear voices. 

Sibilant whispers through the trees. A cackle of laughter. 

Up ahead there is a glimmer through the trees, as of a handheld light swinging. The volume of the voices increases, still just incomprehensible whispers. 

Ten breaks from the path, branches tear along your arm, tugging at your clothes and your hair. One twig burns across your cheek. The light continues swinging through the trees, and you find yourself rushing forward to meet it. 

And then there you are. 

Ten comes to a complete stop. You crash into his back, and he reaches back to steady you. Yuta steps around you, moving so he’s shoulder-to-shoulder with Ten, both of them acting as a barrier between you and what lies ahead. 

At first you think it is just a small, empty clearing. 

But then you see the truth. 

A black pool of liquid sits restlessly in the center of the clearing, the surface of it is choppy and bubbling, a gray mist hovers above the surface. A hook beside the pool holds one lantern, casting light down on the pool’s surface, but another light is held by a demon that stands among his peers at the edge of the pool. 

They all turn to look at the three of you. 

“Ah,” drawls Prince Kun, drawing himself up straight. “There you are.”

His gaze passes casually over your boyfriends before settling on you. He lingers, cocking his head slightly to the side, the look of an intelligent predator glowing in his eyes. At his sides, his brothers shift on their feet, sizing up Ten and Yuta and, to a lesser extent, you. 

“Move out of the way, Kun,” Yuta hisses. “We just want to be free, not to hurt you or your brothers.”

“Well, Mother just wants to put you to death.” One of the younger Princes steps forward. “So who are we to stop her from that? We’re just here to stall you until she can arrive.”

“Chenle!” Prince Hendery hisses at the young Prince, jabbing him with his elbow. 

Prince Kun glances at his younger brothers, then back at you. “Forgive my brother. He doesn’t truly understand what we’re doing here.”

Yuta curls his hands into fists at his sides. “And what’s that?”

Kun grins, cocky and sly. “We are definitely stalling for Mother to arrive. But not for the reasons he thinks.”

In that moment, you recall Kun’s hushed words in the throne room exchanged between him and Hendery. “Sometimes I wonder if I’ll have to steal it from her so I can fulfill my destiny as King,” Kun had said. And here he stands now, posted between you and your freedom, poised with three escapees who will do anything to escape from the Queen’s clutches. 

You lean forward, squeezing between Yuta and Ten. “You’re plotting to involve us in something, aren’t you? You’re the Prince who longs to be King, but as long as your mother sits the throne, that’s not possible. And she doesn’t show any signs of abdicating anytime soon, so you’re thinking a little coup…. A convenient ‘accidental’ death by two death-sentenced fugitives in an escape attempt would do well to insure your placement upon the throne without the eternal wait. Hmm?”

Yuta turns to look at you, Ten squeezes your wrist. But you don’t look away from Prince Kun’s vibrant eyes, suddenly alive with hunger as he grins. 

“You’re smart. I can see why Yuta and Ten like you so much.” He takes a step towards you. “We used to know each other well, your boyfriends and I. They were my personal guard, best of the best up until my mother decided they were too good to be left on my service, and she repurposed them for a more special mission.” 

Again, Yuta and Ten move so they’re blocking you. 

“Don’t worry,” Kun placates them, holding his hands up as he says, ��Your girlfriend is right.”

Hendery frowns. Chenle takes a step back, casting quick looks at his other two remaining brothers. 

The silver haired Prince who interrupted conversation earlier in the throne room interrupts again by stepping forward and placing his hand on Kun’s shoulder. “I’m with you,” he agrees. “You know I’m sick of her control. I want some freedom.”

Kun nods. “Thank you, YangYang.”

The final brother, the one who possesses wings like a bat, shakes his wings at that moment. It’s a dry leathery sound that draws every eye in the clearing to him. He looks first at Hendery and Chenle, then says, “Don’t act like you’ve never thought of it. We’ve all been under the thumb of tyranny for too long. Haven’t we longed for freedom too? To be able to take a short trip up to the mortal world just to see it? To feel the wind on our faces? Feel the light of the sun?”

“She’s our mother.” Chenle bristles. 

The brothers turn upon each other then, bickering as they face each other. 

Ten turns his head, his eye catching yours. “The pond,” he mutters out of the side of his mouth. “That is the last exit from here. We just have to get in, keep swimming, and we’ll come out where we’re supposed to.”

You understand that magic. Something you’ve come to understand here is that the lines of magic between Watchers and demons and even with Renjun’s elf magic is that they’re all drawn quite closely together, overlapping in many places. 

“Make a run for it?” Yuta asks. “While they’re distracted?”

And then everything falls quiet. The Princes cease their arguments. The leaves grow still. Whatever small movements you’d heard in the trees earlier stop altogether. The air turns chill and so fragile that you feel as if a single sound could shatter everything. 

She comes from across the clearing, which is one moment empty and then it’s not. She moves silently and smoothly, her long gown dirty at the hem as she passes barefoot over the obsidian soil and detritus of shiny leaves. Her hair hangs free and wild around her shoulders, only a thin gossamer veil hides her face. The air crackles faintly as she moves, the way it does before lightning strikes. 

You stare as the Queen of the Night takes a seat, building herself a glittering black throne of shadow and stone as she lowers herself, trusting in her magic to catch her. . 

 “At last,” she says, her voice a sigh and a rasp, the creak of branches on a stormy night. Even though she wears the veil, which still muddles her features, you can tell she’s got her sights set on you as she continues, “At last we meet, face-to-face, my dear. I’ve waited years for this moment.”

“Mom,” YangYang begins, but the Queen flicks her fingers in his direction, and the young Prince falls silent. 

“Your birth, dear child, was an abomination.” Her words are a hiss. “The fact of your creation is disgusting.” 

You shrink into yourself at her words, but you can’t bring yourself to look away from her. 

“The power held in your bones is enough to transform the world, has anyone told you that?” She leans forward on her throne. “Power enough to feed me for eons if I could just get a taste.”

Yuta firmly steps in front of you, which draws a horrifyingly shrill scale of laughter from the Queen. 

“Oh, Yuta, do you think you could really stop me now? You’re weak, both of you,” she says with a lazy gesture towards Ten. “And her blood belongs to me, it calls to me, like to like.”

A chill climbs your spine. “I’m nothing like you.”

Again, the laughter. 

“Darling,” the Queen tips her head back, her laughter climbing up into the branches of the obsidian trees. “Just because I don’t share the same toxic combination of blood as you, doesn’t mean we’re not still alike.” 

The veil flutters away from her face, folded back over her wild hair by an invisible breeze, and she tilts her face forward again to look at you. 

Your heart free falls through the bottom of your stomach, and you clutch at Yuta and Ten as your knees threaten to buckle. 

The Queen of the Night wears your mother’s face. 

A pleased smile grows on her face at your reaction. “We share blood, my dear. Since learning the truth of your heritage, haven’t you ever wondered why the Queen of demons would spare your mother for her traitorous dalliance with your father? I wouldn’t have done that for anyone, nor would I have offered forgiveness so easily to anyone but my own sister.”

As your shock clears, you see now that her face differs slightly from your mother, but the similarities are certainly there. Her mouth sits a little different, her lips wind a little tighter. She doesn’t have the small mole your mother had beneath her right eye, or the faint scar that cut through her eyebrow. Close but different. Sisters. 

“You still did cause her death, though,” Ten interjects. “You may not have chosen to kill her right away, but you did call for her death, as well as the death of the Watcher.”

The Queen snarls, “I had my reasons, Ten. My sister was set to inherit the throne from our father. She had more power, so she should have been Queen of the Night, but she never wanted it.” The Queen laughs before saying, “She fell pregnant, began losing her powers once the holy seed of that Watcher took root, and she slunk away to the mortal world, glad that she no longer would be forced to the throne. But then she produced you.”

Her gaze is piercing, a blade of black ice straight to your heart. 

“That is the great irony, of course,” she says to you, “Your mother never wanted power, but she gave life to someone more powerful than any demon, than any Watcher. I took the throne from the King before he could make a deal with my sister, and my first aim was to take your life before you could grow up and realize that you have a claim to my throne. But the Watchers sought you out as well because they were afraid and intrigued by the result of a union between our kinds. We fought a war over your cradle, and it was only because your mother possessed such power that we were thwarted time and again until finally we settled on a treatise for peace. 

“You were to be raised in ignorance, never aware of your powers, ignorant of your heritage, of the entire supernatural world that you come from. So long as my sister could keep you unaware of this throne, and of the immensity of power you could have, we weren’t to touch a hair on your little head. My throne would be safe as long as you were blind to its existence, and the Watchers need not worry about your power if you didn’t realize you had it either.” She leers at you, such violence in your eyes that you can tell some part of the Queen – your mother’s own sister – longs to throw herself at you and attack.

To your surprise, it’s the youngest prince that speaks up now. “So what happened, Mother?”

She spares her son a minute glance. “I found a loophole, Chenle. I couldn’t have a living risk to my throne, despite the treaty. I knew the Watchers were surely looking for a way around it as well. Like I said, a half-demon half-Watcher is an abomination. Your mother was my sister, dear,” she addresses you again, “and I loved her dearly. But there was this tiny little loophole in our peace accord that meant you were only safe from us while you were under her protection. So, yes, I called for her death. And for good measure, the death of that Watcher as well.”

The Queen claps her hands, brushing her palms against each other as if ridding herself of dirt. “I sent a small troop of demons after her. They were to dispatch her and the mortal lover she took to help raise you, and once they were both gone, my demons were supposed to locate you as well, to bring you to me.” Her smile goes sharp as she says, “But they returned empty-handed, to my never-ending disappointment, and there was no sign of you. Somehow you were still protected by my sister even after her death. So, I set Yuta and Ten on your trail, and like the loyal bloodhounds they were, they eagerly went in search of you.”

The Princes – your cousins, apparently – all stand there, staring at their mother as she unleashes this story. You’re at least relieved to see that none of them look at her with any approval or admiration. Kun actually looks more angry and more determined than he did before.

“Raging cunt,” Yuta whispers under his breath. 

The Queen looks at him, her mouth twisting in a tight smile. “I wanted them to bring me your heart. But strangely their loyalty wavered as soon as they met you, and they hid you in Hell City, knowing that I couldn’t go there myself. Of course, them hiding you from me only made me want you more. Originally, I planned to only consume your power, and send you back to the mortal world to live your sad, plain mortal life.”

You can’t imagine going back to your life before. You’ve tried that once already since having your eyes opened to this world, and you couldn’t do it. She would have to erase all of your memories of this — of Ten, Yuta, WinWin, and Mark; of the Watchers and demons; of everyone and everything that has transformed your life over the last several months. 

You do not want that. 

Not that you’d be willing to give her your power regardless. You’ve barely met her, but judging by the hate her own sons feel towards her, you doubt she would do any good with the powers she would steal from you. 

“Now that they’ve betrayed me,” the Queen continues, “I have to show some punishment in return, do I not? No longer do I long just to punish Ten and Yuta with their own demise, nor to satisfy myself with your power and sending you merrily on your way. Now that you’ve conveniently dropped yourself into my lap, dear niece…” Her lips curl in a wicked grin, her sharp teeth shine in the light as she declares, “I’m going to eat your heart and make them watch.”

Suddenly, it doesn’t matter what Prince Kun was planning. You don’t give a damn if he was going to end his mother quickly or brutally unleash years of pent up rage on her.

All you know in that moment is that Yuta and Ten both lunge for the Queen. And you are filled with a white-hot rage that your physical body simply can’t contain – the inferno breaks through the barrier of your skin, and you can see yourself reflected in the black mirror of the Queen’s eyes.

In that moment you are more demon than anything else, just a raging inferno incarnate, hurtling at the Queen. 

Her sons stand frozen, watching. 

Yuta and Ten fall back, at your sides like two wings of shadow as you fly across the clearing, and the Watcher part of you pulls together your flames into the shape of a fiery blade, casting you in its golden light, painting you as a vision of a vengeful angel.

The Queen’s eyes widen, but her lips curl in an awed smile — full of terror and delight as you come soaring towards her — even at the very moment that you swing your blade, as it connects with her throat. 

Her wicked head separates from the rest of her unholy body.

Her smile doesn’t falter even as her head falls from her shoulders, her tangled hair twisting over her face as her head rolls across the floor of the clearing.

One of the Princes cries out, another turns and you hear him vomiting into the grass.

You point the tip of your fiery blade at the corpse of your mother’s sister, the Queen of the Night. A twisted, dark part of you considers cutting open her chest, pulling out her heart, and eating it in front of her sons much like she had wanted to do to you. But you restrain yourself, satisfying the urge by simply touching the tip of the blade to her body and watching it engulf her in flames.

A hand falls on your shoulder as you watch the body burn.

“That’s enough, my love.” Yuta’s voice is gentle, placating, trying to get you to draw back into yourself because you’re still masquerading as a vengeful angel, wreathed in dancing flames.

Ten reaches for your hand that isn’t clutching the sword. “Come back to us, darling.”

You’re not sure whether you drop the sword or if it just simply vanishes from your grip, but your hand is empty as you lift it to Ten’s face. His eyes flutter shut as you brush the backs of your still-afire fingers against his cheek. His fingers trace up your burning skin from the bend of your elbow up to the softness of your inner wrist, and when his fingertips connect in a loop around your wrist, Ten opens his eyes as he turns his head and sighs over your skin.

His breath is a gentle wave, extinguishing your flames in a domino effect beginning with your fingertips and spreading everywhere until you stand as normal before them. A little smokier and charred than usual perhaps, but otherwise normal. Your clothes seem to have barely survived your personal inferno.

Beside you, Prince Kun clears his throat.

Ten drops his hold on your wrist, but he doesn’t let go of your other hand, nor does Yuta release your shoulder. 

Kun’s brothers are gone from the clearing, save Prince YangYang who lingers at the mouth of the path, looking back at you and his eldest brother, although you can tell he’s determinedly not looking at what remains of his mother – her head and the smoking lump that used to be her body. 

“Can I have a moment alone with the Prince… or King?” You ask your boyfriends. You’re looking at Kun, but he’s not looking at you. 

Yuta squeezes your shoulder and takes a step back, but when Ten lingers, Yuta has to take him by the hand and pull him away to the other end of the clearing. YangYang disappears too, leaving just you and Kun and the dead Queen.

“Well, that’s done,” Kun sighs after a few moments. He lifts his gaze from the corpse, and to your surprise, he offers you his hand. “It’s nice to meet you, cousin. She never told us that’s what you were to us. Actually, I’m not entirely sure how much my younger brothers knew of her hunt for you.” 

You look over at the path down which YangYang disappeared. “I know this is along the lines of what you wanted, Prince Kun. But what of your brothers? They may have agreed to having her off the throne, but was this too much?”

He shrugs. “I don’t know how they thought it was going to happen. But once she started threatening you, I could see where it was going. Honestly,” Kun says, nudging his mother’s disembodied head with the toe of his shiny shoe, “I don’t know what she thought would happen. As if you were just going to peacefully give yourself up and let your lovers watch you be eaten by her?” He scoffs and turns away from the smoking remains of the former Queen of the Night. “You should leave, cousin. Now, before the realm realizes what you’ve done. There’s deeply-rooted demon magic in this place, and if you don’t hurry, I can’t guarantee that you’ll make it out.”

Your first thought is his brothers – that they’ll turn on you and sic the demon army and all sorts of horrible beasts after you. But Kun quickly clarifies, “Whatever magic was used to build this place knows who is in charge, and if it senses that the Queen was murdered, it might do things to ensure that you don’t escape. It’ll close the exits, set the hellhounds after you. My brothers won’t get involved, don’t worry about that.”

A knot works its way up your throat, drawing tighter and tighter until you force out the question that’s been bothering you. “And what of you, Your Highness? Are you going to pursue justice for your mother after I leave? Am I going to continue being hunted by demonkind for the crimes I’ve committed here, for the power I possess that apparently gives me a claim to a throne that I swear I don’t want?”

Kun smiles and shakes his head. “Trust me, cousin, I don’t give a damn what you do with the rest of your life. Be free. Take Yuta and Ten with you, and be happy. As long as you don’t try to make a bid for my throne, you’re free to live your life in the mortal world or in Purgatory with the other Watchers; you can even visit or live in Hell, I don’t care.”

You know exactly where you want to be. You want to return to Ira’s island, safely with Ten and Yuta in tow. You want to be reunited with WinWin and Mark because although it’s only been a day since you left them behind, it feels like it’s been months. And it’s been even longer since you’ve had all four of your boys together, and you just know that it’s going to feel so good to have them together, all yours.

But now the Queen is out of the way, Kun is telling you that you’re free to go, and the pond that Ten says is the portal back to the surface world is right there. 

You sigh. 

You’ve almost got everything you want.

And then the surface of the pond begins to bubble and slosh over the sides. With a vast cloud of steam that erupts and fills the air with the smell of burnt rubber, the pond dries up entirely.

“Shit,” Kun swears, “That’ll be the deep magic I was telling you about. It’s trying to lock you in.”

Distantly, you hear baying – howling and barking that sends an uncontrollable shiver through your entire body. 

“And that’ll be the hellhounds. As I recall, the alpha Cerberus wasn’t particularly fond of Yuta the last time they encountered each other.” Kun looks past your shoulder towards your boyfriends. “Run. I highly recommend going as fast as you can back to the palace. Ten should know the way to the mirror.”

You turn away, ready to heed Kun’s words as you can already tell the hellhounds are growing closer. 

Kun catches your wrist before you can take two steps. “My last piece of parting advice, if the hellhounds catch up to you… don’t look back. Not even once you’re through the portal.”

You don’t ask why. You don’t linger for another moment as a loud snarl sounds from somewhere along the path across the clearing.

“Let’s go!” Yuta hisses, racing forward to grab your hand.

Ten leads the way, setting out full pelt. Yuta’s fingers stay laced with yours as you sprint back through the obsidian forest, across a bridge, down a crumbling set of stairs to the next level of Hell. The whole time, you can hear the growling of the hellhounds chasing after you, and whether it’s through your own supernatural strength or just pure luck, you manage to keep ahead of them.

Ten winds and wends you through Hell, up and down stairs and through tunnels. At one point he leads you and Yuta to leap over a chasm between two areas, a deep river of magma swirling at an incredible heat beneath you. 

You wish you had the chance to actually look around and explore Hell because from what you can see of it, it truly looks like an interesting place. But any time you slow even slightly to admire the bizarre architecture and landscaping of this realm, you hear the scraping of claws against stone, the panting of the hounds, and Yuta’s grip drags on your hand to speed you along after Ten. 

“When we reach the mirror,” Yuta tells you, his voice shaken with each labored breath, “You’re going first. Ten and I will be behind you to try to fend off the hounds if they follow. We’ll be right behind you.”

“No, I want you two in front of me where I can see you, so I know that we’re all making it out of here.” You try to argue, but that’s pretty hard to do when Yuta’s suddenly jerking you around a sharp corner, Ten’s footsteps slap against the stone ahead of you, and you can see the three of you are rapidly approaching a wall.

Ten skids to a stop, and you watch as he starts touching the wall, running his hands along it at eye-level, searching for a seam. Just as his fingers catch on something that you can’t see, as you hear a faint click and a panel in the wall pops inward slightly, you hear the clatter of tiny pebbles being kicked across the floor and claws scrambling to turn a sharp corner.

You don’t even realize you’ve begun to turn your head towards the sound until Yuta’s palms are warm on your cheeks, keeping your head from facing back. “No, you can’t look at them. That’s how the hounds trap souls that attempt escape. If you look at them, if they look back at you, they’ll capture your soul and you’ll be stuck. Don’t look at them. Follow Ten.”

“Come on!” Ten cries as he holds open the door he’s found, waving you and Yuta forward.

No sooner have you both crossed the threshold than the door slams shut behind you. A split second after that, there’s an immense bang as a heavy body throws itself against the door.

“They might not be able to open this door,” Ten says, “But it’s not going to stop them from finding us for long.”

“Where are we?” The space you’re in is almost entirely black, only a faint glow emanates from small crystals embedded in the walls. 

Yuta answers, “The palace. This is a servant’s entrance to the royal baths.”

Ten snaps his fingers, and a ball of fire appears in his palm, illuminating his face. “I wish that we could take you to the baths, darling. They’re exquisite. Heated by the magma core, so it’s delightfully warm. There’s every scent of every kind of body care you could hope for. When we were in Prince Kun’s service, I admit I spent quite a bit of time in the baths.”

“Too much time enjoying the pleasures of the baths rather than working, if I recall,” Yuta laughs. “And as wonderful as a nice bath sounds right now, shouldn’t you be taking us to the Queen’s mirror? I assume you know some secret, faster way to get there?”

Ten grins. “Like I said earlier, I spent plenty of time exploring the secrets of the palace.” He looks at you, his dark eyes reflecting the light of his flame, the heat of his passion. “I know a shortcut that’ll get us there in no time. And the sooner we’re free and it’s just us, the better. I’ve missed you so much, darling. I fully plan to make up for lost time, and remind Mark and WinWin that we were your lovers first.”

His fingers brush your collarbone where your shirt has been burnt away, and you know there’s probably a hickey or the lasting imprint of Mark’s teeth there. 

Yuta is smiling. “I’m excited to see them, too.”

“Then let’s go. The sooner, the better.”

Ten nods, turns, and begins walking off down the dark tunnel. Behind you, there’s another solid thud against the door, the baying howl of a frustrated hound, and then silence. 

“There’s a main door to the palace not too far from here,” Yuta tells you, “So we’d better hurry before the hounds reach it. I fucking hope Ten knows the secret passages as well as he thinks he does.” He waits for you to take off at a jog before he follows at the same pace, chasing after Ten’s distant flame. 

When you step out into an open chamber, you’re surprised by the stunningly humid air ripe with floral scent until you realize this is the royal baths. The baths have been dug into the floor, and their surfaces give off curls of steam that rise to caress the ceiling, lovingly wrap around you and welcome you in. Iridescent bubbles float from the surface of one bath that smells like cotton candy, and another bath you pass by shimmers like the water is made of molten gold. 

Ten’s light is just a hazy orange glow ahead of you, and you nearly lose sight of him as the steam grows thicker around you and Yuta. Yuta has one hand touching your lower back as you wind carefully through the pools that make up the baths. At one point, in a narrow ledge between two pools, your foot does slip on the slick surface, and it’s only by Yuta quickly grabbing the back of your clothes that you manage to not take a dip in the unnaturally blue water. 

You can feel the humidity threading through your hair, dampening it until it sticks against your face and neck. You’re sure you almost look as if you had actually fallen into the pool, but as you finally draw up next to Ten, you’re pleased to see that he looks the same, and Yuta does as well although he’s raked his fingers through his hair to push it back away from his face. 

“Here,” Ten murmurs, “One of you hold this.”

You offer up your hands, and Ten pours his flame into your palms. 

You’re reminded of the first day you made your own flame, sitting with Ten, his hands warm on yours, his flame passed from his fingertip to yours, the way it had felt like a fluttering heartbeat. Now you feel that way again, and you realize how familiar Ten’s fire feels, like a welcome kiss from your long lost lover. 

You pull your hands towards your chest, longing to press his flame over your heart. 

Ten crouches on the floor in the middle of the room. 

Here, the floor is made up of a million tiny tiles all coming together to make a mosaic image of a figure upon a throne over the burning masses below. An interesting choice of artwork for a relaxing bath space, but whatever, everyone has their own taste in artwork. 

Ten runs his fingers over the tiles, and you watch the colors shift, responding to his touch. Until he reaches the small tiled throne. It glows as his fingers pass over it, and then it transforms into a handle, raised from the floor just an inch or two. 

“Yuta, help,” Ten grunts as he fits his fingers around the handle and attempts to haul open this secret passage’s door. 

Yuta crouches beside him, and you watch in the wavering light of your handheld flame as they both work in tandem to lift open the hatch. 

Ten jumps down, you follow, and Yuta brings up the rear again, dragging the door shut easily as he comes. You pass Ten’s flame back over to his hands so he can lead the way. The passage goes straight for a short distance before it becomes a set of stairs rising upwards. 

You’re surprised you only stumble once or twice as the three of you climb the stairs at a run, though luckily it is only a few flights before Ten shoves against a wall, and it swings outwards.

You run out into a large, beautiful chamber. It’s full of rich reds and golds, marble tiles, a large fur rug that looks as though it comes from a massive beast or many pelts sewn together, heavy furniture and fine fabrics. You look around in awe, trying to catch your breath even as Ten drags you forward by the hand. 

“It’s just over here.” He directs the words over his shoulder. 

Various doors lead out of this room. A large set of double-doors probably lead back out into the rest of the palace, if you had to guess. A smaller set of doors have panes of glass set in them, through which you can make out the dim firelight of Hell, so you assume those doors lead out to a balcony. You’re sure one of the doorways leads to the late-Queen’s bedchamber, another possibly to some kind of an office, and then there’s the small door Ten leads you and Yuta to. 

It’s rather nondescript, nearly blending into the wall itself. 

You’re just a few short feet from it when you hear a sound coming from the other side of the large double-doors. 

Raised voices, panic and heavy footsteps moving rapidly along a corridor outside. And then, amidst the clamor of the guards, the keening howl of hellhounds on the hunt. 

“Fucking shit!” Yuta is right behind you, close enough that you feel the kiss of heat as he summons his flames. “Go, Ten. Get her through the mirror. If they make it through, I’ll hold them off.”

Your arm wrenches painfully as you twist around and plant your feet. Ten is still trying to drag you towards the door that leads to the mirror portal, but you won’t leave Yuta. 

“No, you can’t stay here!” You argue. “Come with us. If we just run, they won’t catch us.”

Yuta’s fire is burning hot enough to distort the air between you with waves. “I’m not staying behind, I swear. Just until you’re through the portal, and I’ll be right behind you.”

No. 

You’re this close.

You reach for him, reaching through the waves of intense heat, and you clasp your hand around his wrist. “Defend our position from inside the room, then. Not from out here.”

There’s a softness in Yuta’s eyes when he’s and your face. His flames dim slightly. “Alright, I guess that works too.”

Ten throws open the small door to the portal room, waving you in first. 

The room on the other side is a small, dirt room. There’s nothing to it — dirt walls, dirt floor, dirt ceiling, a singular torch with its end planted in the ground illuminates the bare room; its light is only intensified by the only decoration: the large gilt mirror that stands tall enough and wide enough to be able to admit two tall men standing abreast of each other. 

Yuta bumps against your back before sliding around you, and then Ten is there too, his hand at your waist as the door to the room clicks shut. 

You can see your image reflected in the mirror — the unwavering image of all three of you standing side by side. 

A knot forms in your throat, but now is not the time to cry. You can do that later when you’re all safe and free back in your father’s little bubble, when you’re reunited with Mark and WinWin as well. 

On the other side of the door, you hear the loud bang of the double-doors being thrown open. Footsteps, the clacking of claws, the whines of the hounds. 

Yuta turns, his flames rising in heat and brightness as he faces the last door between you and the hounds. 

Ten wraps his arm around your waist dragging you along with him towards the mirror. 

As you stand facing the mirror this time, knowing you’re about to travel through it, you hope it goes smoother than the last time. You lift a hand to the surface, and as your fingertips brush along the image, minuscule ripples expand across the mirror. This mirror feels so much more liquid, like actual cool water, no resistance. 

“Go,” Ten urges, “Now. Think of our destination as you pass through, and that’s where this will lead. Go.”

A thud that shakes loose a few clumps of dirt from around the door. You can hear claws scraping against the door, you can see the shadowy movement as one hellhound attempts to dig under the door. The door holds, though it rattles in place. 

“Go,” Ten repeats. 

“I’ll hold them off,” Yuta growls, and his fire is still building. “But you have to get through.”

“I’m right here, right behind you,” Ten keeps his voice gentle, encouraging. “Just step through the portal, my darling.”

He’s holding one of your hands lightly in his own, and you use that hold of his to have him help you balance as you lift a foot to step through the frame. 

Ira’s island, you think, imagining the sight of the lighthouse, of the island, the kitchen, the study, the living room, the cove with the sirens. 

The mirror smoothly drinks you in, wrapping around you like stepping into blessedly cool air conditioning after standing in the disgustingly sticky heat of a humid summer day. A long passage extends before you, which is somewhat different from the mirror journey you experienced with Renjun, but it feels so blessedly cool on this side that you don’t hesitate to keep pulling yourself through the mirror. You pass through until all that remains on the other side is your fingertips pinched between Ten’s, but even then, Ten lets go, and the last of you sinks inside the mirror. 

Ten stands just on the other side, staring at you through a faintly blue tint. 

“Come on,” you say, “Hurry.”

The door into the chamber bursts open. Yuta sends up a wall of flame. 

Ten whips around to aid Yuta. You step back towards them, ready to throw yourself through the mirror as well to help, but your palms crash against the inside of the mirror as if it were back to being solid glass, no longer the fluid surface that let you in. 

You slam your hands against the glass. You yell, scream, cry, swear. 

Both Yuta and Ten stand wreathed in flames, putting up walls of fire between the door and the mirror at their backs. They’re being pushed back, you realize. Soon they’ll be backed against the mirror. 

You can see Yuta gritting his teeth together as he puts his all into maintaining the inferno he’s creating. His usual appearance is fading slightly, you can see his true demon features beginning to peek through. The same can be said for Ten. 

You hit the glass one more time. 

Ten twists his head around to look at you. His eyes are the piercing narrow-eyed slits of his cat-like eyes. “You need to go,” he calls to you. 

“No, not without you.” You lean your forehead against the glass. “I can’t come back through. I can’t come to you. Come here, hurry!” You can see shadows, smoky figures moving in the walls of flame Yuta and Ten have thrown up. “Hurry!”

“Go!” Ten shouts, his voice raw, raging, echoing up the passage behind you. And then, a little more gently, “We’re right behind you, I promise. Just trust that we’re behind you, and don’t look back! Now, go!”

This time he says it with enough power in his voice that you stumble back from the force of it. 

On the other side of the mirror, Ten turns back to face forward, to face his flames and the hellhounds. 

You take another step backward up the passage even though everything in you is telling you not to leave, to run back at the mirror and do something to make it let you through it, even though your mind is saying that, your body won’t obey. Your body is listening to Ten as you turn and start running up the passage. 

Your throat feels raw as you pant for breath, but you keep going, running up the sloping tunnel even as you feel as if your chest is going to cave in and your heart is going to burst. You can’t hear anything at all over the racing of your heart and the thunder of your breathing, so you can’t even hear if Ten and Yuta are behind you. Hell, you can’t even tell if the hounds are still pursuing you or not. 

Kun’s warning and Ten’s last words ring in your ears.

Don’t look back.

You just have to trust.

Sobs tear from your throat with each jolt of your feet against the ground. You feel like you’ve been running for hours, days, weeks. You just want to peek backwards, to know if they’re behind you because if they’re not then all of this will have been in vain, and they’ll be re-imprisoned in Hell for the crime of the Queen’s death.

Don’t look back.

You’re almost certain you hear a footfall behind you, rock scattering under someone else’s foot. Was that a breath? Was it an echo of your own breathing, or was it the panting of a hellhound almost upon you?

Don’t look back.

An entire lifetime ago, you’d sat in a literature class that taught mythology. At the time, you’d felt a bizarre mixture of shame and interest – your highly religious upbringing made you feel that learning these stories was improper as they were based on false idols, but you were so intrigued by the pantheon of gods, their many stories and interactions with mortals that differed so greatly from the stories of the One God that you were familiar with.

Among those many myths you’d learned in that stuffy classroom, there was the tale of Orpheus and Eurydice. The woman who died from a snakebite, and her lover who journeyed into the Underworld to bring her back. 

The story comes back to you now. 

Orpheus, who rescued Eurydice, who was allowed to bring her back to the mortal world on the sole condition that he didn’t look back at her until they were both in the mortal world. And now, more than ever, you understand that story. You have two lovers behind you, death nipping at your heels, and as you race out of Hell, you can’t look back – it’s a warning you’ve received now twice, and as much as you want to look back to be certain that Ten and Yuta are behind you, you know the mistake Orpheus made; in the last moments before success, Orpheus looked back. 

Eurydice was lost forevermore.

It could have just been a tale, except that when poring over tomes and tales at Ira’s kitchen table during the useless planning of this rescue, one account had been that of Orpheus. 

A miserable tale that you’d barely been able to stomach reading given your circumstances. How Orpheus, barred from telling her that he was forbidden to look back at her, marched before his wife out of the Underworld, both of them in cold silence. He heard no sign of her – not a footstep or a sniffle, not the sound of her voice or a whisper of her breath as they walked for an eternity – and he wondered if she was truly there, or were the words of the gods false and he was walking this endless path from Hades for no reason? 

With mere footsteps left before he and his wife rejoined the mortal world, with hope burning bright in his heart as the light of the Sun warmed his bones, Orpheus couldn’t stand the suspense any longer. As he turned, he heard her anguished cry of his name, he saw the horror on Eurydice’s face, and Orpheus had no choice but to watch as she was reclaimed by shadow and drawn back down into the Underworld, screaming for him.

Don’t look back, Kun and Ten had both uttered the warning, Orpheus’ tale echoing the words at you again.

You run until your knees feel like liquid and your feet like stones, your chest burns with each breath, and surely if you didn’t have the power of your mother and father both in your veins, you’d have collapsed long ago. How far can this path from Hell possibly be? 

Your toe catches a loose stone on the floor, and you stumble. Your palms burn as they scuff along the rough floor, your knees bruise and sting where the tatters of your clothes don’t cover them. 

There’s no sound behind you. No hands reach forward to help you up and urge you on as you stay there for a moment – hands and knees on the dirty floor with your head bowed as your tears drip into the dirt, your ragged breath still loud in your ears. 

Are you alone? Or is that deeply-rooted demon magic Kun mentioned holding Yuta and Ten under the same spell as Eurydice had been – unable to make a sound or touch you, unable to make their real presence known to you?

You find the strength to push to your feet again, to start forward again. Your mind races, and you can’t help thinking, I just want to go home, to be free of all of this. I just want to be happy with my boyfriends again, like we were in our apartment. All four of us. Why did everything have to go so wrong? Why did everything have to play out like this? 

You run even as your bones ache and your mouth dries out. You feel hollow.

And then the ground evens out. 

And you look up, and you can see watery daylight ahead of you.

You remember this: the sight of the world through the inside of the mirror. The watery distortion of everything when Renjun first led you through a mirror portal to escape the dungeon of the Watchers. You pray the exit runs smoother this time than the last – that you won’t feel like you’re drowning and suffocating and stuck within a glue trap as you had last time.

A fresh burst of energy rolls through you as you see it so close, close enough you can reach out and touch it.

Your fingertips pass through like reaching into water.

Your toe catches the inner lip of the mirror.

The world tilts and blurs, nausea rolls your stomach as you fly through the mirror and dash yourself against the floor on the right side of the mirror.

And you wait.

You don’t dare to turn to look into the mirror. You don’t know what you would be able to see. Does it look just like a regular mirror, reflecting only you and the room you’re in? Is it semi-transparent, so you’re able to see back into the passageway you’ve just escaped through? 

But more terrifying than that – in some version of Orpheus and Eurydice, he reached the safety of the mortal world, and rejoicing in that, he turned to celebrate with his wife, only to find that she had yet to pass the border between the realm of Hades and the surface. Thus, he lost her because they were not both with their feet safely on the soil and in the sunlight.

You won’t make that mistake, even if it means you have to wait here forever with your cheek pressed against the wood of the floor, your clothes crumbling even more into charred bits after the rough friction of passing through the mirror and colliding with the world. 

Tears still spill down your cheeks, and you squeeze your eyes shut because you’ve nothing to look at anyway. 

<-previous || next–>

a/n: Thank you for reading! I'm so excited to see what y'all think about the rescue finally happening! It was a little bit different than originally planned, both in the opinion of the characters, and also different than I originally planned lol This chapter is the reason it took me so long to finally finish writing this story.

As usual, likes, comments in the tags, reblogs, messages about your thoughts, all of that is of the highest value to me! I love feedback, and I hope you can share this story with more people too 💗

[hiskillingjar]

hi there! love your blog! have you ever shared voice hcs for strade, ren, and law? hope youre having a good day! <3

AAA THANK YOU AND YEAH DOG I WAS MANIFESTING THIS ASK!!!!!!!!!!

ren 🦊

i think he has a young-sounding voice, like even as he gets older his voice doesn't really give away how old he is

raspy? kind of like he's always talking out the back of his throat

A LOT of vocal fry. idk how to explain it

he'll, like, use a lot of, um, filler words? and, ya know, sort of just speak in a way that, like, really makes you question if he knows what the fuck he's saying.

the only point of comparison i can think of is ira glass, though his tone is a little more fox leaning

real talk, he sounds kind of faggy lol

he's kind of self-conscious of his voice, so when he does become fox, he makes a lot of changes to the way he speaks so that it's more practiced and considered. obviously slips up when he has the chance to though <3

law 🥀

they got the playstation cut scene autism. the twin peaks autism.

like, they've got the low, quiet, kind of monotone autism drawl

very breathy sounding, which goes with slow quiet of it

they have to...um, really annunciate to put...tone and meaning behind their voiceee, otherwise they kind of just...sound...a little detached...a little spacy...yeah...okay...

they sound like they're not listening to anything anyone is saying, and the fact they look so out of it most of the time (even without the drugs, their gaze is super spacy) doesn't help either

like almost the gentle, offputting kind of quiet of paul dano in prisoners but. lower.

they um and er a lot too, like, um, yeah...okay, uh, for sure...

there's a lot of power behind their voice though. like, they make themselves seem gentler and smaller most of the time, but in the case of being angry, it can really climb up in volume and intention

so you better listen to them when they're being nice and quiet...

strade 🔨

hehehehehe i've thought about this one sooooo much

obviously has a noticeable german accent, albeit not a super thick one. it's there.

doesn't have the best grip on english slang and does the bilingual thing where he'll be like "ah...what is the word for-" when he's having a scatterbrained moment

doesn't um or er that much though, he'll confidently say the wrong thing and get corrected on it (or not)

he'll talk in a way that is really really direct, but, ahm, kind of lilt towards the end, making everything sound like a question? and then, ah, spreche-SPEAK very knowingly, right?

a pretty medium-range voice, not super low or that demanding of attention in his regular tone. people want to listen to him because he's a friendly guy!

kind of like the original singer of oomph! hehehehe, pretty regular tone, definitely a fast talker too

laughs a lot <3 has a nice warm chuckle when he's in polite company, and he's like the best person to laugh at bad jokes

very good at keeping up appearances <333 he's a manipulative faker who looks and sounds totally normal in his rich neighborhood

and obviously can push his voice down to a growled threat or a shout, which makes his accent sound a lot thicker <3