Ash Watched The Target Closely As He Went Into The Bar. She Stood On The Roof Of The Four-story Office-building

The sky cried its own tears that night when the police went to work. The dark was deep as pooled ink, and the voices terse and strict. None took pleasure that night, the nature of their business sapping them of all joy. I suppose that’s why I was called.

I arrived at the scene from the shadows, appearing (as I tend) from the shadows. For what I am is not quite human – but not quite beyond human, either. Magic is my knowledge and my trade; and my magic is very particular.

Dressed as I was in a black trenchcoat and dark gray hood, I supposed I made an enigmatic and rather ludicrous figure crossing the wet grass. I reached the edge of the cordoned-off area, when I was waylaid by one of the officers. “Sir, this is a crime scene,” he said, him being a rather burly white man with fairly obvious anger issues.

“Step aside,” I began, impatient as I was to begin. I do not appreciate being treated as such, especially when I am summoned.

“Raphael, it’s him. He’s my consultant,” came a voice from behind him.

“This guy is your consultant? He looks like an extra from one of those bad superhero movies. What? Couldn’t get in on the Blade series and decided to fight crime instead?”

Bored of his banter, I pushed the man aside as gently as I cared (which was not very much) and continued to the detective. She was young, I suppose, for the role of detective, but I am not a good judge of such things. Brown hair, green eyes. Hispanic. She was probably quite attractive, to people like Raphael, but I am not concerned with such earthly matters.

I looked down at the scene. Three dead. Two adults, a man and a woman. The man, white and in his early thirties. The cause of death was, in all likelihood, the fact that his chest had been eviscerated by perhaps an animal. The woman, also white, was likewise aged and damaged. They were dressed in day-to-day clothing – jeans and t-shirts. Lying between them, as though they had died trying to save her, was a young girl. Going by her features, she was these two’s child. Her eyes were wide open, her mouth opened in a scream that probably ended when she did.

I was looking down at them when the detective spoke. “What do you see, Miyeteth?”

I looked at her, before speaking. My voice sounded like a rasp even to my ears, unaccustomed as I am to the utterances of English. “I see a girl and her parents. The three were killed by something… malicious. Perhaps even evil. Perhaps even… inhuman.”

“Quit playing around. There are no tracks leading to or away from here. Whatever did this could only have been human.”

I stared at her for a couple seconds. “I know why you called me here, Camila. I do not raise the dead on a whim. Violating the laws of nature is not a careless act.”

“Miyeteth, you owe my family a great debt. The number of times we’ve turned a blind eye to your very existence is proof of that enough.  Do it.”

I crouched next to the father’s body. “Send your men away. This is not for the eyes of mortals. You may stay, but I ask that you do not interrupt me.”

She went over to the police officers, and said something to them. They all went, organized, down the hill to investigate other areas further. I put my hand onto the father’s head, and began the words. I began the acclamation.

“In the names of Akraziel, Azrael, and Uriel, I command thee to return to this form. I command thee to return alone. I command thee to follow my voice and return.”

The body spasmed as the soul returned. His eyes opened. “Where am I ? What happened? Eliza? Rachel?”

I put one of my fingers to his mouth. “Silence, son of Adam. Who attacked you?”

“I don’t… where’s my wife? My daughter? Eliza? Rachel?”

He tried to move, but I uttered a single phrase in Enochian. “Noasmi Teloc.”

He lay still, and moved no more.

I went over to the mother. I repeated the acclamation. Her eyes fluttered as she tried to draw in breath. It didn’t work – nothing can restore such life to the dead. “Speak to me, Eliza. Who did this to you.”

“I knew him – he was our friend – but he wasn’t – he was something – he killed me. I died. Where’s Rachel? What happened to Rachel?”

I repeated the phrase. “Noasmi Teloc. Be at peace, Eliza.”

I moved to the third. As I placed my hand over the young girl’s face, I found myself taking a deep breath. I was steeling myself to do this, for this was a line even I do not like to cross. “In the names of –“

“Wait!” said Camila. She looked scared. Maybe even… saddened? She took her time to draw breath, and calmed herself. “Do it.”

I finished the acclamation. The girl awakened with a gasp. “Where’s mommy? Where’s daddy?”

I held her close as I spoke to her. “Do not worry, Rachel. Tell me who did this to you, so that I can see it done right.”

“It was Uncle James. But it wasn’t him – he changed. He was like a big dog – but angry. So angry. He took daddy first, then mommy… then me. Am I…?”

I looked into her eyes. Blue, like sapphire. “Noasmi Teloc.”

She went limp in my arms. “I don’t think this is your case anymore, Camila. This is not a human killer. Honor the agreement I made with your grandfather. Give it to me.”

She shook her head. “I don’t have the power to sweep this under the rug. We have to investigate.”

“Very well. Delay your people as much as you can. I’ll find the killer, but I warn you he will not be alive when you come to claim him.”

I headed off into the night, fading into shadow. Within moments I had returned to my erstwhile, earthly abode. Which is to say, a crowded apartment filled with books. The bedroom had been converted into a study – after all, I don’t sleep – and I began to search my books. I knew that I had to find the killer – and that there were two basic ways I could do this.

One is to summon the spirit of the deceased into a pendant so that they could lead me to their killer. Think of it like a homing beacon – the act of murder inherently links the deceased to their victim, to the extent that it can be magically quantified, and traced.

The second was a bit less direct. The description the girl had given described a Werewolf, which, strictly speaking, do not exist. They are a Hollywood invention, like about everything else. But, their myth came from somewhere. Demons bound to flesh can have all sorts of effects, and shapechanging – both partially and fully – can be a result. And specific demons have specific modes of operation.

Desperate as I was to avoid calling upon the dead more than I absolutely had to, I began to plunge into my books for information on demons who used a wolf-motif. Within a couple hours I found four. Two were obviously not the case, as they had been expelled rather recently. They couldn’t have returned. But of the two, one worried me. Because it wasn’t really a ‘demon’, it was a fallen angel. Ulnniel, child of Lucifer and one of his concubines, was a being of death and depravity – whose hatred for family was only outstripped by his hatred of children.

I had found our killer. But now I needed to track him. I read deeper onto the subject of Ulnniel. His true name was polysyllabic and difficult to pronounce, as they tend to be, I suppose, and committing it to this paper is foolhardy as it would just set fire to itself anyway.

But I managed to devise a method of tracking. I would not summon those poor spirits again – for they had earned whatever blessings may come to them or whatever punishment awaits them. I had learned the hard way not to delay, and had for centuries been focusing on keeping the knowledge I found hoarded away from mortals.

The tracking method involved the true name written onto a map and then with acetone poured onto it, with an incantation spoken. It would destroy basically all the map except the point where he would be.

I did it, chanted the incantation, and there it was. Easy as a peach. I left to head to the location.

But when I got there, something was… amiss. I was atop a building, looking down at a patch of land that had been turned into a garden of sorts. In the center stood a man dressed in a hoodie, leather jacket and jeans. “I can hear you, brother,” he shouted. “Come out, Miyeteth. Face your death with some dignity.”

I could see his face even from here. His face had once been a human’s – probably similar to the male victim. But his face was twisted, wolf-like. A permanent snarl. The beginnings of horns had begun to emerge through the skin on his forehead. “Miyeteth – It’s been a while since I’ve seen you. I thought you were dead. I’d like to make that the truth.”

I jumped down, using my abilities to slow my descent so that I landed thirty or so feet behind him. Ulnniel laughed at my appearance. “Why so human, brother? What, didn’t feel like changing the appearance? So unlike you-“

“Malpirg Ipamis Ne.”

Fire burst from my open palm to try and claim Ulnniel. He jumped out of the way, and I merely left a scorched patch of grass.

Ulnniel growled. “You aren’t Miyeteth – you are something else. Who are you? You are not a mortal – nor an angel.”

He raised one hand and spoke an incantation. A sword appeared in his hand, a twisted thing of black steel and blood, an evil thing, capable of doing much harm.

He charged at me. I spoke an incantation. My weapon appeared likewise – a golden spear tipped with platinum. I dodged out of the way and readied myself for combat.

“Who are you? What are you? An abomination, perhaps? No… my brother is part of you – both within and without. Hmmm…”

Ulnniel clapped his hands. “A conjurer you are! You fused my brother’s body with yours in some damned ritual. Clever. But it ends now.”

He charged and I tried to roll to the side, but he knew my trick and adjusted his blow. Driving his sword triumphantly through my side, he laughed. “Die, fool. Let your blood drip away for eternity.”

But he was close now. Too close for him to dodge as I spoke the words again, this time with my hand on his chest. “Malpirg Ipamis Ne.”

He screamed as he was blasted backwards by grey fire. I pulled his sword out, its metal hissing as it touched angelic flesh. He was immobilized. I walked to his form, and drove my spear into his chest. He screamed louder, as his very being was eradicated by the angelic weapon. The child of hell breathed no more.

I waved a hand over the body, and spoke a simple incantation. Its formed returned to human proportions, and I searched its pockets. I found a piece of paper, on which a few words had been written around a pentagram. This was how Ulnniel had been summoned. The humans sought to do what none other had – truly bind an angel.

I looked down at my form. I suppose I am not truly Miyeteth – I was born, in some form, on the twentieth of July, 1592. A rich child of a noble family, I had sought unholy knowledge. I found love – my wife died shortly after our marriage, and I sought to use my research to bring her back. I failed. I bound a son of Azrael to myself – Miyeteth. His knowledge and entity subsumed my mortal entity, and I became this. Perhaps an abomination. Perhaps something else.

I picked up the body and dropped it on the stairs of the precinct of a certain detective I knew. I had some people to track down – and some knowledge to claim.

You’re a necromancer who secretly helps the police by bringing back murder victims and interviewing them.

Fire, Death, Light, Dark. There are many such abilities beholden to the Awakened. Those powerful souls who can command a fundamental force of nature with their will alone. There are thousands of us, an underground society operating even to this day, under the guise of governmental organizations and secret agents. Some of us are hired guns, sought out to bring down oppressive regimes – at least on paper. Many hone their abilities through such work. Others try their hardest to help those who need it. Some of us, though, hunt down our fellows who break the laws of the Covenant, an ancient document made by the First Council of the Awakened, to bind us all and keep us secret. Those hunters are called the Vyadha

I’m one of the latter; day to day, I’m a private investigator in sunny Miami, but once in a while, a next-to-unused fax machine (which is unlisted and even unplugged) will spring to life and print out my next target. A picture, a name, and some basic information will be printed out and I’m to hunt them down, wherever they be, all costs assured. Who finds out what they did, who sends the commands, no one knows. It’s the job of the Vyadha to hunt them down, and to recruit other Awakened to serve as Vyadha; once they take the oath, they are bound to hunt down all who break the laws until they lay dying. Those who fail become the hunted.

It was one boring Tuesday in the middle of November when the fax machine did just what it does, printed out the face of an attractive twenty-something boy. Long, unkempt but clean blonde hair, blue eyes, a well-defined jawline, and dressed in some combination of black and leather. The name and aliases read as follows.

ALEKSANDER KUZNETSOV

“The Bright One, Sunspot, The Light of God”

Twenty-two, Russian origin, currently hiding out in Crimea. You know what to do.

I looked at his face again. I didn’t know him, but then again, I didn’t need to, to know what he was. I looked closely at his face, and I saw it in his eyes. He wasn’t just one of the hired soldiers, he was one of the “Razbudili Rebenka”, the child soldiers that saw use in the latter days of the Soviet Union, whose use continued into the late twentieth century by the disenfranchised pieces of the disbanded country. When their use became a risk to secrecy, they were killed by their handlers, soldiers who were unawakened. Even against the powers of nature, a single bullet can take our lives just as easily.

I’d guess he probably killed his handler. I wonder if he had even met one of his own kind. I wondered if it would have made a difference. Probably not; it was too late for him, regardless.

Getting up from my seat, I picked up my overcoat and put it on, looking in a mirror. An aged face looked back. I’d been at this for a long time. I was born in 1973, a child of a poor German-Jewish immigrant, whose parents had moved here to avoid the Nazis, and a black woman, and for the first fifteen years of my life I was happy enough. Then, they came.

The Erwechter Henker, a sect of Awakened Neonazis who sought to kill all awakened bloodlines from ‘lesser races’. They tracked down my father and struck. An awakened whose powers were to control fire burned our house down, killing my father, asleep in bed, my mother taking me and running outside. The awakened who had burned down the house was waiting outside with a group of unawakened. They took pleasure in beating me and my mother until I lay dying and my mother dead. That was when it happened, my powers awakened, the bloodline coming alive like fire devouring my blood.

My power is a rare one; the ability to affect matter with my mind. I can agitate it, move it, pressurize it, among other things. Within seconds I’d boiled the unawakened’s brains within their skulls, and shattered the bones in the awakened’s arms and legs. Unable to move, and therein unable to use his abilities, I took my pleasure slowly forcing all his blood into his head until it popped like an overripe cherry. I was sixteen years old.

I’m not ashamed of what I did that night; swearing to never let this kind of man do what he did ever again, I buried my family and left that night, to hunt down the rest of the Erwechter. Thanks to my efforts, their sect will never take root in America ever again. That took a decade and a half to do. By the end of it, I had burned every bridge in my life. I had no family; fascists had taken all that from me. It was then that he came to me, a Vyadha calling himself Jack the Reaper. His power, to control darkness, was used to hunt down Nazis across South America, to inspire terror in them before they died. He was near ninety when he came to me.

It was night, and I was drunk, aimlessly wandering around the streets in the dark, when he approached. He was dressed in a suit and overcoat, looking every bit the sophisticate. I looked like a vagrant, mostly because I was. I had no money, no goals – I had done everything I’d sought out to do.

“You are lost,” he spoke, his voice overlaid with a subtle German accent. “You are better than this, herr Abner.”

I looked at him closely, wondering if he was a spy of some sort. “Are you one of them?”

He shook his head at this. “Do not ever mistake me for one of those shizcoff.”

“Then who-“

“I am like you. I am Erwecht, Awakened,” he interrupted me. “I have spent my life hunting down the scum that have robbed us of our families, and I knew your grandfather and father before they came to America. I had heard he had a son.”

I nodded to this, it making sense even in my relatively inebriated state.

“He was a good man. I am sorry to hear what happened to him. I’m sorry that this is the fate that has befallen you; your vengeance was justified, but it should not have cost you the life you could have lived.”

I nodded again, accepting his statement. I’d have been lying if I had not thought the same thing, many times.

“I am here to offer you a chance at a new life; I am Vyadha, of the ancient order of hunters who destroy those who would break our laws. One such as the Erwechter Henker, and many such groups across the world. I have come to offer you the oath to join. It is a lifelong commitment, and should not be taken lightly.”

Here he paused, thinking for a moment. “I do not have much time left, myself. I have spent my years hunting much the same chaff as you, sending them to whatever awaits them. You can continue my work.”

From there, he handed me a piece of paper with a phone number on it, as well as a cell-phone, something somewhat rarer at the time.

I did not call right away. I continued to wander, the thought never leaving my mind.

But, one night, that changed. Two weeks later, I was taking the subway downtown, and came across a scene. Two muggers assaulting a black woman, calling her several slurs along the way. What charming fellows, with Celtic crosses and swastikas tattooed on their necks and the backs of their heads. I shouted at them, and one of them turned to me, drawing a gun. “What do you want, shitskin?” he asked, pointing the gun at my head.

“Leave her alone.” I stated, calmly. It wasn’t the first time a neonazi had pointed a gun at me. Wasn’t even the dozenth, or even the dozenth dozen.

He laughed, drawing back the hammer on the pistol. “Nah, I think I’ll kill you. Then-“ he gestured at the woman, “Me and my friend will do what we want to her.”

“No, I don’t think you will,” I said, this time cracking a smile.

“And why’s that, you n-“ he stopped as I broke his hand with my mind, dragging it down, and causing the gun to discharge into his foot. Screaming in pain, I picked him up by the throat with one hand, and threw him bodily into his friend. I nod with my head, indicating the woman to leave the station, as I did what I always do to Nazis. Leaving behind quite the gory mess, I pulled the phone out, and dialed the number. The voice on the other end was familiar. “Have you made your decision?”

Looking down at the corpses of my attempted murderers, I answered, “Yeah, I think I have.”

Two days later, I met him in central park. “I used my connections to get the investigations against you to stop,” said Jack, holding a lit cigarette. “Two men dead to gang-related activities, I am afraid.”

We both stop to laugh a little. “What do I need to do?”

He tossed me a silver knife and a piece of parchment with writing on it. “Cut your hand and say the words aloud. That is all that need be done.”

Drawing the blade across my hand, I read the paper.

“I swear on the Powers that Be to honor the first covenant, to hunt down the enemies of life itself, and to keep the secrets of the First Council. I swear this on my life, on the lives of my ancestors, and the power passed through blood. On this day, until my last day, I swear.”

I felt something change – like my awakening, but stronger. Pain, yes, but almost in a good way. Like a cleansing. “It is good to meet another Vyadha,” said Jack, “Welcome, brother Abner.”

That all seemed so long ago. Jack took me under his wing for a few years, introducing me to his contacts and other awakened, like us. But in 2006, at the age of 95, he died peacefully in his sleep, and I made sure he was buried with his dead family in Germany.

He left me a tidy sum, secret bank accounts holding liquid assets nearing a half a million dollars. Funds stolen from Nazis he had hunted.

Now, in the present, I boarded the first plane I could get to Ukraine, calling in favors from some of my contacts for information on the target. He was indeed of the Rebenka, and had indeed killed his handler. He was famous for his abilities, to channel light into his body and out through his hands. The effect could be anything from creating fire to blowing apart a building, depending on the strength of the light and his own desires.

I rued the fact that Jack had died so long ago, his ability to extinguish light would have come in handy in this venture. But, there are other ways to handle this.

Arriving in Ukraine, I was met by one of my contacts, an elderly woman who had lived through worse regimes than the modern Russians and had been a friend to Jack. She brought me to her son, a mechanic who had helped me and Jack in the past. War-torn countries are often havens for Awakened seeking to escape world governments. He gave me a vehicle, I took out a fake passport – one that claimed I was a reporter from the states – and set out for Crimea.

Within a day’s drive, I was in Crimea, and trying to figure out where Aleksander was. I hoped he’d been making a scene, but, as I knew was likely, he’d gone underground. It took a week of searching before I even heard of someone matching his description.

He’d fallen in with a gang in Sevastopol, who had protected him in exchange for his services as a ‘peacekeeper’, an enforcer who hunted down rival gangs. I tracked him to a club, called P’yana Svolota, and kept a close eye on the door, before following him into the club, wearing a thick hood and gloves. A black man in Crimea would stand out like a sore thumb. And there he was – dressed in the leather he seemed to like so much, attempting to woo a dancer – and by woo, I mean he was snorting coke out of her bra. He was laughing and chatting up a couple of suspicious-looking gents in suits in Russian. I couldn’t make a scene, killing him here. I’d probably kill him before he could do anything, but I’d most likely get shot for my trouble. I listened to their conversation.

“I want my salary doubled,” he said, sniffling a little.

“You’re already the highest-paid employer in our service,” said one of the men in suits. “We can’t justify paying you more – despite your valued service.”

Laughing, Aleksander brushed his blonde hair away from his face, and began again, “I don’t think you understand, I’m not asking – I’m telling you what I want, and you give it to me, or I drop more bodies than just your enemies.”

“The boss will hear about this,” said the other man, “You can’t just go making threats like this –“

“I can and I will, you mat’ shlyukhoy,”

The two men in suits stood up and walked out, and I watched as he pushed the dancer away roughly and got up, going to the bathroom. I followed.

Inside the dingy, graffiti-laden bathroom, I stood a couple urinals away from him and when he went to wash his hands at the pair of sinks, and I joined him at the other.

“Hey, man,” I said in English.

“What do you want?” he responded in an accent-laden English.

I turned to him and used my powers to throw him into the wall.

“Sukin syn!” he exclaimed, followed by a stream of likewise vulgar slurs.

Aiming a hand towards me, I dodged out of the way as a burst of flame went from his hand to the far wall, nearly taking me out. Using my abilities, I pinned his arms against the wall, and he responded by shooting light out of every bare bit of skin he had – brighter than a flashbang. Losing my concentration, he dropped to the floor, diving towards me while I was blinded. Recovering quickly, I used my abilities to turn off the lights in the room.

Remembering what Jack had taught me about fighting in the dark. Guard on all sides. Use your other senses, he had told me, be prepared for a strike from any side, but if both you and your opponent are on equal footing, make sure to face wherever they are coming from.

I drew from my pocket a switchblade that I had bought on the trip here, knowing telekinesis would be less than useless without my sight to guide it. I heard his footsteps as he ran towards me, and threw myself forward in a tackle.

Unfortunately, I dropped my knife. We grappled on the floor, and I heard sounds from outside, shouting. As I pinned Aleksander, the door slammed open, spilling light into the room. I rolled off of Aleksander as he blasted a beam of light from his bare hands, at what would have been me, but striking the ceiling. Finding the knife, I crouched as he rolled backwards, throwing himself forward into a standing position. Firing blast after blast at me as I dodged as fast as I could, I got closer and closer to him. A blast grazed my arm, melting cloth and burning flesh, painful but survivable.

Finally, I stabbed the knife through his right hand, causing him to scream in pain. Though he was trained in hand-to-hand, he was mostly a ranged opponent and was unused to physical pain in combat. Pulling the knife out quickly as he tried to blast me again, I drove the knife home, slicing through leather and into his right lung. A scream becoming a gurgling gasp as the lung collapsed, I knocked him off his feet, and finished the job, slicing across his throat. I turned and saw the man standing in the doorway, trying to draw his gun, but it was already too late. I threw him out of the doorway with my mind, ran outside and got back into my loaned truck, and drove.

It took me a week, three cars and a couple thousand dollars, but I made it back to the States, and to my house. Taking a beer from the fridge, I relaxed into my chair, and turned on the television. A rerun of Friends was playing. Taking a sip, I closed my eyes and let out a groan. My bandaged arm still hurt like hell. Then, the fax machine in the corner began to beep and print again.

There are many types of Mages in the world. Fire, Ice, Wind, Water, Death, Darkness, to name a few. But in this world, every type of mage is treated as equal. Everyone can be a good guy, no matter how dark your power. And anyone could be a bad guy, no matter how beautiful their ability…

oooh have you ever done a post about the ridiculous mandatory twist endings in old sci-fi and horror comics? Like when the guy at the end would be like "I saved the Earth from Martians because I am in fact a Vensuvian who has sworn to protect our sister planet!" with no build up whatsoever.

Yeah, that is a good question - why do some scifi twist endings fail?

As a teenager obsessed with Rod Serling and the Twilight Zone, I bought every single one of Rod Serling’s guides to writing. I wanted to know what he knew.

The reason that Rod Serling’s twist endings work is because they “answer the question” that the story raised in the first place. They are connected to the very clear reason to even tell the story at all. Rod’s story structures were all about starting off with a question, the way he did in his script for Planet of the Apes (yes, Rod Serling wrote the script for Planet of the Apes, which makes sense, since it feels like a Twilight Zone episode): “is mankind inherently violent and self-destructive?” The plot of Planet of the Apes argues the point back and forth, and finally, we get an answer to the question: the Planet of the Apes was earth, after we destroyed ourselves. The reason the ending has “oomph” is because it answers the question that the story asked. 

My friend and fellow Rod Serling fan Brian McDonald wrote an article about this where he explains everything beautifully. Check it out. His articles are all worth reading and he’s one of the most intelligent guys I’ve run into if you want to know how to be a better writer.

According to Rod Serling, every story has three parts: proposal, argument, and conclusion. Proposal is where you express the idea the story will go over, like, “are humans violent and self destructive?” Argument is where the characters go back and forth on this, and conclusion is where you answer the question the story raised in a definitive and clear fashion. 

The reason that a lot of twist endings like those of M. Night Shyamalan’s and a lot of the 1950s horror comics fail is that they’re just a thing that happens instead of being connected to the theme of the story. 

One of the most effective and memorable “final panels” in old scifi comics is EC Comics’ “Judgment Day,” where an astronaut from an enlightened earth visits a backward planet divided between orange and blue robots, where one group has more rights than the other. The point of the story is “is prejudice permanent, and will things ever get better?” And in the final panel, the astronaut from earth takes his helmet off and reveals he is a black man, answering the question the story raised. 

Writing tool for your fight scenes.

It was a Thursday evening, near twilight when they brought them in. A large, burly man with tattoos, and a skinny man whose skin was clear of mark or blemish – he was, indeed, remarkably attractive to the inobservant outsider, who did not know why they were sent here.

Dressed in orange jumpsuits, they were escorted from the prison bus to the building – a fancy modernist apartment building, surrounded on all sides by desert, and at a nearer radius, a barbed-wire fence. They were brought to the fence-gate – a sturdy, steel affair – where a guard station stood. The guard inside was chewing nicotine gum as the two approached, and he pushed a single button to open the gate. As it opened, he stepped outside the box, to speak to them.

Chained at the hands behind their back and at their ankles, the prisoners were flanked by guards dressed in full riot gear. The man from the guard station raised a hand when they were a  couple meters away, and they stopped.

“Hello, prisoners 22998 and 22999. Pardon the cliché, but welcome to hell.”

The prisoners both looked at the finely-made but arguably poorly maintained apartment building, looked at the guard, but remained silent.

“You see, back a few years, we decided to switch up the usual ‘executioner’ method.”

Gesturing grandly at the building behind him by spreading his arms.

“This is the grand Hotel Del Gran Inferno; jewel of Great Basin. Or at least, that was the plan.”

He looked up at the sky and laughed.

“Here, four hundred years ago, a band of Spanish conquistadors slaughtered a group of native americans that fled here. They say that it’s that blood that created the great evil that stays here.”

He looked back at his prisoners, and crossed his arms at his chest.

“But, I doubt that. I think what’s here is older – something of blood, something that draws tragedy to it, not the other way around. Either way,” he said, “The hotel never saw a single customer, and every worker on it – some four hundred men and women, not to mention their children – has died of some accident working on it. As such, it is partly unfinished. But it still stands.”

He pointed at his prisoners. “You’ll spend the rest of your days here, prey for whatever devil haunts these halls. Don’t worry,” he laughs again, this time a somewhat manic sound, “It won’t be many days. None have lasted the night. Running only ever gets you so far.”

The prisoners remained silent. No one had told them about this transfer, but they handled their surprise well. After all, they’d been on death row for quite some time.

The man from the guardhouse gestured on, and the guards flanking them walked them to the inside of the gate, unshackled them, threw them forward, and shut the gate behind them, locking it with a thick padlock.

“Good luck,” said the guard, blowing the pair a kiss. “We’ll be by in the morning to collect your corpses.”

With that, they all climbed into the bus and left. The skinny prisoner walked to the gates and heard the buzzing. Looking at it, he could tell that touching it would probably blast him back a few feet. Looking at his newfound prisonmate, he hatched a plan within seconds. Waving the man forward, he seized the man by the throat and bodily pushed him back-first into the fence. The larger man screamed as the electricity coursed through him and blackened the flesh it touched. The skinny man then jumped, clambered up the man, and jumped over the top of the fence. Landing with a roll, he looked back and laughed at the larger man, now collapsed on the ground, as he turned and ran towards the sunset.

By the middle of the night, he had made good progress forward and had found enough wood lying around to build a simple fire. Lighting it with flint, he sat at it and looked at the stars. Soon he’d be free again. Licking his lips, he laughed. Demons, he laughed. What nonsense. Soon he’d be free to be the only demon the world ever needed – soon he could kill again.

Closing his eyes, thinking he needed sleep, he turned away from the fire. Then, he heard it. Bolting upright and smiling, he recognized the sound. It was a young girl singing, singing a nursery rhyme he knew well.

“London bridge is falling down, falling down, falling down…”

He looked and saw the source. A girl with her back turned to him. No older than nine, with blonde hair, she was his preferred prey. Wetting his teeth with his tongue, he growled, a low, bestial sound. He snuck up behind her as she finished the tune.

“My fair lady…”

As he got close behind her, she turned, and he saw her face.

It was a face he recognized. One of his… a child he had taken and done away with as he pleased. Her screams were still fresh in his mind. But she was different now. Her throat he had cut, and the mark she bore – dried blood, at first unseen to him, was prevalent across her front. Her skin was bloated, from the bog in which he had left her, and maggots crawled visibly through her face.

Her eyes were white, with no visible iris or pupil.

Too late to avoid, she gripped him by the throat with one rotting hand and threw him back towards his impromptu encampment. She laughed, a childish noise undercut by something much deeper and darker. The very night seemed to shroud her as she approached, and she walked towards him.

He got up, looking for a way out, and tried to run away, for he was a simple creature – fighting or fleeing was all that came naturally to him. But he was unaccustomed to being prey – and what he was fighting was a far better predator than him.

With unnatural speed she bowled him over, and had him again by his throat. Her form seemed to stretch to unnatural proportions as she lifted him by the throat, off the ground. She laughed, “Why did you do it? Why did you kill me?”

He struggled at her grasp, trying to rip his way free, but her grip was solid. Far more solid than any young girl’s should be. The wind stirred around them into a near whirlwind, as she continued to speak.

“Why did you kill me, to sate the beast inside you? The truth is there, no matter how you pretend. You aren’t a demon. You aren’t even a man. You are… scum.”

She lifted her head up, revealing her neck to be not slit like he had done to the girl, but a ravenous maw.

“Burn,” she said simply, and threw him onto his fire. Screaming as he was set alight, he felt his limbs stretched out as if being drawn and quartered, and spiked pieces of ashwood pierced has hands and feet. He could not move as he felt his body burn, and the last sight he had was of the creature’s maw opening wider and wider, as if to consume all he was, body and soul.

Meanwhile, back at the Hotel, his betrayed fellow inmate was waking up, feeling like his head had been split in two. Looking at the fence and remembering what had happened, he found himself cursing the man who had left him there under his breath. “Damned little slippery bastard.”

Looking around, he saw nothing, but the abandoned building, and felt the cold. He decided it was probably best to go into the hotel, regardless of what the guards had said to him. If the place was haunted, it would hardly be a better end to freeze to death. If he was going to die, he was going to die inside.

Opening the door, he found himself in a spacious atrium, with a finely-made wooden staircase with red carpet. The place looked to have been fit for a king. He wandered down a darkened hallway, and tried the light switch. Nothing turned on. Sighing, he wandered still, into what he thought was a kitchen. Finding his way around in the dark, he found a couple full bottles, probably hidden there by one of the deceased workers. Wandering back to the atrium, and by the light of the moon, saw it was a bottle of orange Absolute and a bottle of Captain Morgan. Fit for a king. Taking a swig of the Absolute, he wiped his face, and sat on the staircase. What was he going to do now? He couldn’t run the same way the other had. Even if he did, he’d die of dehydration before he made it there. The liquor wouldn’t help, after all. He took another swig.

And what if the guard had been honest? What if this place was going to kill him? Why else would they put death-row prisoners here?

He sat there for a few minutes before he heard it. Footsteps, from upstairs. Knowing he full well was alone, and recognizing the cliché despite the onset of inebriation, he decided to go up the stairs towards it.

Walking down the upstairs hallway, he heard the footsteps still, and still he followed, still holding the bottles between the fingers of his right hand. Seeing a light beneath the door on his left, he opened it and stepped inside. It was a different scene.

It was the house he and his wife had lived in, when she was alive. He could see himself, holding a bottle of beer, sitting at a table in the corner. He could see her, with her brown hair and eyes, shouting at him and brandishing a knife. He watched as he stood up, he watched as she charged him, and he responded in the only way he could at that point, by hitting her with the empty bottle. She hit the ground like a ragdoll, and he watched as he kneeled down and checked her pulse before getting up and calling 911.

He took another drink from the bottle of Absolute, hoping it would chase away the memory playing out in front of him.

He watched himself go back to his wife and start begging her and praying for her to return to him. It was his fault. He watched as the police arrived, he did not respond, and they beat down the door. He watched himself being led away numbly by the police.

It was then that he felt her. Standing behind him, with a hand on one shoulder and her head on the other. “You did this.”

As he quickly turned, dropping his bottles, she bounced backwards. He saw her, the right side of her head caved partly in from the blow dealt years earlier, blood leaking from her ear. He ran past her, down the hallway, and she followed, jumping rather than running. Keeping a couple feet behind. He ran and turned down the hallway, finding a dead end – an unfinished ledge above a pile of rusted steel beams.

Turning back, he saw her leap and grab his throat. She held him aloft, as he struggled with her grip. “You did this,” she said again, her voice a menacing growl.

“I know,” he said, barely able to breathe, closing his eyes, “I know.”

“You killed me. You deserve death.”

“I did. I deserve death. Kill me. It’s been eating me alive. All these years, Therese. Maybe this is fate. Take my life, like I did yours. It’s… fair.”

She stopped. She seemed shocked. She looked down, and then dropped him. He landed on his feet, not falling over the ledge.

“You… deserve...,” she stopped.

He moved towards her. “Please. I deserve it. Therese…”

“I… can’t…,” she stepped back.

“The guilty must be punished…,” she said, “The guilty… not… you…?”

She sat down, shifting between forms. Therese, a child, a Hispanic woman, a tall man, a thin man, a twisted, shadowy mess. Finally, she settled into a form somewhere between the three most recent – a young girl, perhaps thirteen, with brown hair and eyes, with darker skin.

“You…” she stopped, and looked over the horizon. The sun was rising on the horizon. Turning into a floating ball of shadow, she disappeared.

Running down the stairs, he saw that the bus was arriving again. He saw the guards leave, the one from earlier laughing. He felt the hand again. Turning, he saw the girl again. She pointed at the guard from the guardhouse. “Guilty.”

He looked at her, suddenly understanding. “You… can’t go out into the daylight, can you?”

She shook her head. She began in a different language, then stopped. Beginning again in English, she spoke, “I am cursed to reap vengeance for as long as the sun shines not. Bring him here, to face his judgement.”

“Face his…? Is that what you call this? Judgement? You’ve murdered people.”

She shook her head. “I… am not the only curse this place bears. This is a place of death, to be a place of death for all eternity after.”

“If he’s so guilty, why don’t you get him whenever he comes into the compound?”

She shook her head. “He never comes in. He knows. He’s smart.”

“What has he done?”

“I won’t know until he faces my judgement.”

Watching, he saw the man from the guardhouse send in two guards, to check for bodies. Thinking quickly, as they entered, he grabbed a chunk of brick and threw it down the darkened hallway to the right. Looking at each other, then looking down the hallway, they moved cautiously towards it. When they had moved a safe distance down the hall, he ran out towards the open gate.

“Hey!” he shouted.

The man from the guardhouse turned towards him. “What in the hells-“

He began to draw a taser from his waist, but it was too late. Knocking the weapon from his grasp, the former prisoner pinned his arms behind his back and used his own handcuffs against him. “What the fuck – let me go!”

Dragging him backwards into the hotel, kicking and screaming, the former prisoner looked around. “Where the hell are you?”

Emerging from the shadows game Her.

Taking the form of a prisoner, she walked towards the handcuffed guard.

The prisoner had taser marks on his face and neck, and smelled of burnt flesh. “You did this.”

The guard screamed. “Get away!”

Another prisoner appeared, different person, same marks. “You did this.”

“Go away!”

Another appeared. Then another. Emerging from the shadows, materializing from nothing. The same mantra. “You did this. You did this. You did this.”

He screamed as loud as he could as he was surrounded by the prisoners. Screaming like a banshee as he was enveloped, screaming as ripping and crunching of flesh began. Screaming as blood poured across the floor. Screaming that stopped all too suddenly as he did.

When it was over, nothing remained of the guard but blood and scraps. Only the girl and the former prisoner stood in the room. She handed him a key. “Go,” she said, simply, then vanished, fading into shadow.

Not needing a second chance, he left, got into the empty prisoner bus, and drove. Where he was going, he did not know. Only that he’d never see that hotel again – and never wanted to.

Story Shard 536

A death row prison where the you are killed by what you killed the most in life.

As I drove along the highway that night, a snowy November evening, I suspected little of the contents of the evening; it had been a fulfilling one, after all. After leaving work, I had gone with some friends to get drinks at a nearby bar, a favorite of one of my coworkers, and I’d promised for a while to join them.

Before I left, I had gone to the bathroom, and on the way out, walked into someone. A woman, probably no older than thirty, who I did not know. I apologized, but she made eye contact with me, almost blankly. Then, in a somber tone, as if she was delivering a verdict, “It ends tonight.”

I thought nothing of it, and continued drinking with my friends.

Maybe that was a mistake.

Maybe I drank too much that night.

Maybe it didn’t matter.

All that mattered was the drive.

The night was dark and the road was dimly lit by poorly-spaced lamps, and though I had made the trip many times, I had never done it in the dark. But I was not afraid; I had no fear of the dark, I didn’t fear the car that was behind me, even when they swerved in their lane. I did not fear them when they were alongside me, and I heard the people inside, four or five college students, drunker than I by far, screaming and hooting as they tried to pass me.

Tried. Their rear bumper hit the front of my car, sending me veering off of the road and into the ditch.

Before that, I looked to my right, and saw Her. The girl from the bar. She was smiling, something inhuman and ancient in her brown eyes and hair. Even in her ordinary features there was something eldritch and ancient that brought out a primal fear. A fear of death.

I was thrown from the car, and blacked out.

I woke up in the black and cold, with a splitting pain above my right eye, but otherwise intact and whole. I looked around and saw my car, aflame, broken and ripped apart by the collision. The college students, it seemed, had left without attempting a rescue.

Lit by the flames of my now-nonfunctional vehicle, I looked around. I expected to see nothing, but there was not. On the ground, not fifteen feet away, was the girl. She was lying on the ground, breathless, motionless and unstirring. Crouched above her was a strange girl, blonde-haired, not older than nineteen, dressed in simple clothing – jeans and a t-shirt – and carrying a weapon of some kind. It looked like a short sword, but the blade was thin and linear, not unlike a sharpened rapier blade but shorter still. Its hilt had a hand guard fashioned in the imagery of an Ouraboros, except with outstretched wings, set in gold but the blade of some black material I could not identify.

I stumbled forward, still disconcerted from the blast. “Who…?”

The girl looked up at me, and her eyes reminded me strangely of the girl who had been in the car with me; not in actual appearance, for this one’s eyes were an unearthly pale blue, but rather they evoked the same primal fears – the same fear of death.

This girl was dangerous.

She sheathed her strange sword in a leather hilt at her belt, and raised her right hand, and shouted, “Khairete!”

I shook my head, not understanding, wondering if maybe I had a concussion.

“Willechomen aband?”

I shook my head again, wondering if maybe I was having a stroke and this would be the end of it.

“Avete!” At this she waved her hand as if miming a greeting.

I stared blankly this time.

“Dia dhuit!”

I continued to stare.

She slapped her forehead and said, “Ego eimai Angelos.”

At my lack of a response she continued, “Ich bin Angelos?”

Rapid-fire she continued to spout in what I could only guess was a multitude of languages until she stumbled upon one I recognized, English. “Hel…lo?”

I nodded at this, encouraging her to continue, “I am Angelos.”

She spoke with a thick accent, something between Greek and German. “You should not be alive. You-“ at this she pointed at me, and paused. “You were supposed to die.”

I felt a little faint, and saw shadows dancing at the corners of my eyes as if my vision was being devoured by something. As I began to swoon, she ran up, but it was inhumanly fast, as if she had less ran to me and more flitted to my side. She waved a hand over my face and I felt a warmth, as if my body face were bathed in sunlight. The cold around me seemed to bite less, in that moment, and I felt awake again.

“Try… to stand,” she said hesitantly, helping me again to my feet. I tried to get to my feet and, nearly fell again, slipping into the snow. She put my right arm over her shoulder and helped me to my feet. As we walked along the snow, I began to ask questions. “What do you mean I was supposed to die? Who was that girl? Who are you? Why was she in my car? Why are you here? Are you… going to kill me?”

She gritted her teeth at my questions, but answered them all the same, “I mean you were fated to die tonight. In that crash. My handmaiden,” she gestured behind us at the crash, “was supposed to take your soul to my kingdom, and you would have been given judgement and sent to your proper afterlife. She has accompanied you, intangible and invisible, for most of this evening. I’m here because it seems she became the victim of fate tonight – her cord cut in place of your own. But you cannot stay here. For you are no longer fated to die.”

“So I’m not in any danger?”

She laughed, a harsh bark befitting an animal moreso than a human. “Not from me, paidi. But the elements, it seems, may have different plans.”

“So where are you taking me?”

She chuckled a little at this, and seemed a little more human in turn. “To my realm, Katachthon. Deep in the bowels of the underworld. It seems we have a vacancy that you could fill in the place of Tilphousia back there.”

I stumbled a little. This was all so much to believe, but what else could I do? Magic seemed the only explanation at this point; the girl appearing in my car, predicting my death. This girl, healing my wounds. I noticed, after a bit, that we were walking into the woods, away from the highway. We made our way to a clearing, and she stopped.

“Tóso kaló óso opoiodípote. This place seems as good as any. Hold to me tightly; this will be a little… disconcerting.”

In a second, it seemed, we were travelling at the speed of light, shadows dancing, laughter – raucous and unearthly, inhuman – and we arrived, on the balcony of a castle overlooking a darkened lake, within a massive cavern. I let go of her, and collapsed, and saw no more.

oadelԙ���

You’re driving a long, dark stretch of highway, when Death appears in the passenger seat, informing you that you are about to die. The car then spins out of control, flipping, and you black out. You wake up, hours later, in a deserted field. Death is laying lifeless on the side of the highway.

reading update: june 2023

as promised (to myself) I spent all of gay months reading books by and/or about the gays, no exceptions! (unless you count the heaps of old Batman comics I was reading, but come on. it's all pretty fruity.) the trend will be continuing into July as well because I overshot and still have book I need to finish, so in the immortal words of Janelle Monáe: happy pride forever!

anyway, what have I actually been reading?

Empress of Forever (Max Gladstone, 2019) - man, I've been meaning to read this FOREVER! and I'm glad I finally did. Gladstone's space opera follows ultrawealthy tech genius Vivian Liao, a sort of dykey Lex Luthor who's CERTAIN that she's the good guy. okay, yes, she's trying to get control of the nukes, but she's not going to use them. it's just that the world's a mess and she needs to be in charge. unfortunately our girl Vivian doesn't get far in her master plan before she's transported across the galaxy and finds herself on the run from the all-powerful Empress in the company of a cybernetic monk named Hong and the legendary space pirate Zanj, the Empress' greatest enemy. from there our heroes are off on a slow, messy quest across the galaxy as they make new friends, grow as people, and strive to bring the Empress down. it's a very long book and can feel slow in places, but all of the time devoted to fleshing out the characters ultimately pays off as their stories converge into a resonant narrative about the notion of identity and what it means to be yourself. if you like Becky Chambers' Wayfarer books of the Guardians of the Galaxy movies, get on this shit.

also hey listen Max Gladstone is having a bit of a Moment rn; the book he coauthored with Amal El-Mohtar, This Is How You Lose the Time War, is getting a huge boost thanks to the Trigun (????) fandom??? over on Twitter, and you should definitely go check it out

Not Gay: Sex Between Straight White Men (Jane Ward, 2016) - Ward is a brilliant queer feminist writer; rigorous and insightful while keeping her work imminently readable. while the title may sound facetious, Ward actually takes entirely at face value that there are men having sex with each other an engaging in otherwise homoerotic activities - mutual jerkoffs, hazing rituals that involve anal penetration - that sincerely aren't stemming from a place of gay desire and asks us what the fuck we're supposed to make of that. what results is a fascinating look at masculinity and the intricate rituals that both subvert and maintain it. shockingly thought provoking for a book that contains so many transcribed craigslist posts of men looking for straight guys to have totally normal hetero dudesex with!

The Latinos of Asia: How Filipinos Break the Rules of Race (Anthony Christian Ocampo, 2016) - I was lucky enough to get to see Ocampo (who is gay) speaking at the National Conference on Race and Ethnicity this year, and naturally I had to buy one of his books while I was there. I strongly suspect he's about to become one of my new favorite nonfiction writers, because the Latinos of Asia was a brilliant read that I really couldn't put down. Ocampo (who's also Filipino!) delves into the formation of Filipino-Americans' racial identity, and finds that many feel caught between the most conventionally accepted racial categories - feeling alienated from the idea of Asian identity, which is often perceived as pertaining to East Asians like Chinese, Japanese, and Koreans, and instead relating much more firmly to Mexican-Americans and other Latinos. it's a FASCINATING study on race and one (of many!) loopholes that exists in this very large, messy, totally made up construct of race.

A Lady for a Duke (Alexis Hall, 2022) - for my pride month romance novel I wanted to read something that I might actually like. I've previously adored Hall's genre-fucking ultra-queer Sherlock Holmes pastiche, the Affair of the Mysterious Letter, and Lady for a Duke was really well-reviewed, so my hopes were high! and you know what? I fucking loved this. it was like cotton candy, perfectly sweet and made to be inhaled without a second thought. Our Heroine Viola was the heir to an estate who faked her death at Waterloo so that she could run away and be herself - that's right baby, this is a 19th century trans lady romance! she reconnects with her old BFF the Duke of Gracewood, who's been catatonically depressed since losing his best friend in the war, and reader, you will not believe what happens next. just kidding, you totally will: they want to kiss each other so bad! they're yearning so bad and it's great. it's a very silly book and Gracewood is the most unexpectedly forward-thinking 19th century duke EVER who is instantly down to accept Viola entirely as a woman and thinks that having biological children is overrated, and you know what? that rules. I'm not reading this book for historical accuracy I'm reading it to watch a man beg his girlfriend to fuck him tenderly in the ass. and she does!!! if I'm being honest everything after they finally hook up is kind of nonsense and the book probably is too long, but god it's a delightful time.

Chlorine (Jade Song, 2023) - back in the days of twitter I started following Jade Song as soon as they announced selling this book, the story of a competitive high school swimmer succumbing to obsession as she fantasizes about becoming a mermaid. finally getting to pick up the book from the library and actually read it felt crazy after existing in potentia for so long! while Song's novel is a little rough in some places in exactly the way I expect from a debut, it's still gripping and visceral. our protagonist lives in an intense and demanding world, striving to please an overly handsy coach, wanting to please the immigrant parents she can barely speak to, stumbling through sex with boys on her team while longing for her female best friend. through it all she fixates on mermaids, and the story is told in flashbacks building up to a drastic act of self-mutilation at a swim meet. it's definitely not the right book for the faint of heart or anyone looking for feel-good fluff, but it's harrowing in the best way.

Vagabonds! (Eloghosa Osunde, 2022) - gorgeous gorgeous gorgeous gorgeous! Osunde celebrates queer life - those called vagabonds, society's outliers - in Lagos, Nigeria, slipping between the real world of social stigma, oppressive religion, judgmental family, and dangerous politics, and the world of magic, gods, and the unreal, blending the two together in an effortlessly dizzying effect. the ultrawealthy hide behind layers of flawless masks to conceal their identities, a lonely woman dying of cancer summons up a daughter than only she can see, and a young man channels the devil to raise his murdered lover. while the stories start bleak, firmly establishing the danger of life on the margins, they gather speed with increasing warmth and love as the story progresses, eventually bringing all of our protagonists together in glorious, life-affirming celebration of vagabonds and all who love them. Nigeria, in Osunde's hands, reads much like family - imperfect, sometimes even awful, but also capable of harboring tremendous love, surprising tenderness, and still worth holding out hope for. I think measuring books in terms of relatability is a fool's game, but as an American queer watching more and more legislation and persecution roll out against my people each day, it was hard not to feel a cord being struck. Vagabonds! is a beautiful reminder that queer resilience is eternal, and reader, I did cry.

Quietly Hostile (Samantha Irby, 2023) - I was a ride or die bitch for Sam Irby even before she picked up and moved to my small Michigan city, effectively becoming my neighbor. (not really, but she is married to the mother of a friend of a friend, so.) despite this, I will freely admit that I was a little underwhelmed by her last release, 2020's Wow, No Thank You. it's possible that WNTY was damned by its March 2020 release, putting it in the awkward position of being a humorous essay collection creeping out into the world at a time when everyone was paranoid and nothing was funny; maybe on a reread I would receive it a bit more warmly. Quietly Hostile, on the other hand, is just stupid funny right out of the gate. Sam Irby is old (see: in her early 40s) and going downhill, writing candidly about peeing her pants everywhere, adopting a rancid little dog, getting sent to the hospital with a severe allergic reaction, and jacking off to plot-heavy porn of elderly lesbian nuns. it takes a little bit of work to get me to actually laugh out loud at a book but man, I was chortling. if you don't already know her work, this is a sign from god (me) to check Samantha Irby out now.

what am I reading now?

Black Water Sister (Zen Cho, 2021) - the was one of the oldest queer novels(TM) on my list and I really wanted to knock it out for pride month. the Malaysian setting and culture is a welcome addition to contemporary urban fantasy, but I'm not sure I'm crazy about the story overall. and yet, I'm over 200 pages deep and don't want to give up, so ? I guess I'm persisting.

Giovanni's Room (James Baldwin, 1956) - my local library lost their copy just in time for pride month, so I bought one on ebay for all of nine dollars. haven't started yet, but I'm really excited to finally pop that proverbial Baldwin cherry!

I woke up with a splitting headache, lying in bed next to the devil himself.

Wait, that may sound weird to an outside observer.

You see, a couple weeks ago, I met the devil himself at a ‘con, and, assuming he was just a cute (and dedicated) cosplayer, I asked him on a date. On the date, he told me what he ‘really’ was.

That was it, until last night, when I came home and found he’d broken into my apartment, helped himself to a couple of my beers, and was watching ‘Keeping Up With The Kardashians’. He was apparently on the run from his brothers, the archangels Michael and Raphael.

So, we did shots. Lots, and lots, and lots of shots. I lost count after about four. I checked under the blanket and breathed a sigh of relief. I was not naked. I looked over at him. He was shirtless, but save for that, he was clothed. I got up, and walked over to the full-length mirror. I was disheveled, and my lower lip was cut – as if…

“Morning,” said Lucifer, getting up and stretching, ruffling his black curls as he scratched his head. “Did you sleep well?”

I turned back to him and pointed to my lip. “Did you do this?”

He smiled, mischief flashing in his eyes. “You are a very naughty drunk, Adam.”

I moved to my shirt to the side a little bit, exposing a small, mouth-shaped bruise on my collarbone.

“And you aren’t exactly an angel yourself,” was the retort I saw fit to utter, and his smile was almost radiant.

“Well, I think my brothers would be inclined to agree. Breakfast? Do you know a place around here that we can get it? Somewhere out of the way?”

I looked at myself in the mirror again. I looked kind of awful.

“Let me shower first.”

Lucifer nodded. “Probably a good idea?”

“What about you, do you… shower?”

He chuckled a little bit. “Unless you’re offering to share, not really.”

“Not really.”

“Well,” he sighed (he’s very emotive, for a being who supposedly punishes the damned), “I guess I’ll have to see to myself, then,” and he waved his hand over his body, and his form seemed to shimmer. His clothes changed into a rather simple set of garb – a hoody over a t-shirt and jeans, with sneakers. He looked like he had showered, shaved and dried.

Shaking my head, I went into the bathroom. Turning on the shower, I looked into the mirror. “What the hell have I gotten myself into?”

I heard a muffled sound from my room. “Me, if you’re lucky!”

After I had finished showering, I returned to the living room to find him watching the news. He switched it off as I entered the room, and walked over to the door. “So, you have any idea where you want to go?”

“There’s a good IHOP near here. You do eat, don’t you?”

He shrugged. “I do, sort of. I can imbibe any mortal faire you please, up to and including liquor. I’m capable of becoming drunk, but I can end my inebriation in an instant if I need to. It’s a handy angelic trait. I enjoy these things, because they’re so…,” he shrugged, “Human, I guess.”

“And… sex?”

“Same thing, really.”

“Okay. Am I driving, then?”

He seemed glad for the change of subject, “Probably for the best. I can’t drive.”

“You can’t drive? You’re the devil for Christ’s sake.”

“Hey, I teleport everywhere. Occasionally I get a chauffeur. I’ve never had to.”

“Cars have existed for nearly a century and a half!”

“And I’m over a half a million years old! Cut me a little slack, please.”

It was my turn to sigh, this time walking to the door and nursing my headache a bit more. Maybe it wasn’t the liquor. Maybe it was just his personality.

When we got into my car (a beaten 1999 Ford Taurus, a dark shade of green and rusting through in spots), I asked him another question. “Is there anything I can call you other than Lucifer? It seems a tad bit…”

“… excessive?”

“Kind of. I mean, most people hear Lucifer and they think… I don’t’ know, goat’s head, human body, caduceus?”

“Sadly enough I left my caduceus in Hell. It was a fun little prop for a while, but once people start expecting things, it gets boring quick. I’ve never dealt well with expectations.”

“So, are there any that you like?”

“Satan?”

“Same problem.”

“Sammael? Lilith liked that one.”

“No, too… Aramaic.”

“Old scratch?”

“Too folksy.”

“Iblis? It’s not my name, but I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t mind.”

“I feel like that’s appropriation somewhere along the line.”

“The French called me Voland for a while, does that work?”

“You have absolutely no clue how human names work, do you?”

“I mean, no,” he seemed a little offended. “You do realize I’ve had more names than you’ve had days on this planet, right?”

“Alright. Luci it is.”

“Luci? Am I a demon or a cartoon character?”

“How do you know about Charlie Brown but you don’t know how to drive?”

“Hell gets cable, not gasoline.”

I began to drive, and he watched out the window. Not like a sullen teenager, more like a child on their way to Disneyworld. He was caught somewhere between obvious excitement and a deep, internal reverie. I noticed his eyes were now green.

“You… don’t get out much… do you?”

He shook his head. “A couple days a decade, typically. I try to keep up with current events – I remember it took Machiavelli half a century to teach me about his contemporaries. Boy, you should have heard what he said about them…”

“Why don’t you….”

“… come to the world more often? Typically, because Michael has taken a liking to beating me up and throwing me back into Hell. Heaven views it as a prison break, usually. The last time I was allowed on the surface was to hunt down another rogue angel. That was the last time that I saw Raphael, too.”

“When was that?”

“About a thousand years ago, I spent six years on the surface.”

“How long do you plan on staying this time?”

“Forever. I left Iblis in charge, he can take care of things for as long as I need him to. He relishes it, poor bloke.”

“What, and you don’t?”

“Don’t get me wrong. It can be fun, for a few thousand years. Getting vengeance for those hurt by the damned, a righteous anger that can’t be sated. But it’s poisonous; you can lose yourself. Also, ruling over the ‘inhabitants’ of Hell can be good too. Some of them have wonderful personalities. Unfortunately, even that gets old. I created Hell, what seems like an eternity ago. From nothingness. John Milton almost got it right. But the problem was, that no matter what I did, I couldn’t recreate home. And maybe ruling in Hell isn’t as good as serving in Heaven was.”

“Can you ever go back?”

He smiled, a wistful expression. He seemed unbearably old then, like an old man who had seen too much of life. “Ta lonsh calz zonrensg, babalon adrpan.”

I heard a sound like thunder from the clear sky.

“As the exalted above have decreed, the wicked are cast down. Until the end of days, I am cast out of Heaven.  I suppose someone like me doesn’t get a redemption arc.”

As he finished that little diatribe, I pulled into the parking lot of the IHOP. I got out of the car, and he followed. “Do they have chocolate chip pancakes here?”

“What are you, twelve?”

“On a scale of one to ten, yes I am.”

“Pride goeth before the fall,” I responded.

“Not as much as you’d think.”

When we got inside, we were met by a server. She had brown hair, a pierced lip, and seemed happy enough to serve us. “Booth for two, please.”

“Right this way,” she said, leading us both to a booth in the far corner of the restaurant, next to the bathroom. She handed us a pair of laminated menus. “Can I start you off with something to drink today?”

I looked at Lucifer, who was staring intensely at the menu, and I guessed I would be the one to speak first. “Water for me. Luci?”

He looked up like I’d interrupted some deep meditation, rather than a decision over what to have for breakfast. “Umm… I’ll take a hot cocoa.”

I raised an eyebrow at this, but he either didn’t notice or feigned ignorance. When the waitress stepped aside, I whispered to him, “Hot cocoa?”

“I have a sweet tooth.”

“Clearly.”

As we waited for the waitress to return with our drinks, I began to ask questions. “So, Michael and Raphael. What do they look like?”

He arched his fingers in front of his face and focused for a second. The waitress arrived with our drinks while he pondered an answer. Taking a sip from his cocoa, he began. “You have to realize that our earthly forms are not our only forms. I’ve taken a particular many forms over my remarkably long life, and this is just one I picked up in ancient Greece.”

He took another drink. “So I suppose that Michael and Raphael could look like anyone. But they won’t. They like specific forms.’

“So what will they choose?”

“Michael is a lot like me, ashamed though he is to admit it. He likes younger forms. Typically androgynous. He is very much an Aryan – blonde hair, blue eyes, the like. He typically goes for lithe but muscular frames. He dislikes facial hair. He’ll stand out in a crowd – he’s vain, he likes to be pretty and he likes to be the center of attention. You’ll see him coming a mile off.”

“And Raphael?”

“He’s a little bit more varied. He likes to look smart, so expect him to look bookish. He likes older forms – middle aged men with grey hair and beards, typically he chooses to look more Arabic, with darker, weather-worn skin. He picked up that tendency in the eighth century or so.”

“Okay. Are you sure they won’t try to disguise themselves better?”

“Nah. I’m the one in the family who got the gift for illusions; they know I’ll spot them regardless. Their goal is to hunt me down like hounds chasing a rabbit, rather than try and sneak up on me.”

The waitress came back, this time with a small notepad. “Can I get your orders?”

“I’ll take the chocolate chip pancakes. And another cocoa.”

She took my order and then went back to turn it in to the kitchen. Within a few minutes she was back with his pancakes and my omelet, and he poured syrup on his food and began to wolf it down. “For someone who doesn’t need to eat, you sure like to.”

He began to speak with his mouth full, then paused, swallowed, and repeated. “I don’t get this kind of luxury very often. In Hell, we have our feasts and the like, but it’s all so much protein. Demons love beef and pork and the like, but we never get the sweet stuff.”

“My heart bleeds for you,” I said, as sarcastic as I could muster.

He had near-finished his plate when he looked alert and then dodged under the table.

“What are you doing?”

I looked down and saw him next to my right knee. He put a finger to his lips and whispered, “Shh. Door.”

I looked over my shoulder and saw two men entering. One was blonde-haired, blue-eyed and young. The other was a middle-eastern man with gray hair and glasses. Both were dressed in matching suits and long coats of wool.

“Are they…?”

“Yes!” he whispered, “Now quiet!”

I watched as he grabbed my fork off the table and jabbed it into his thumb, drawing blood. “What the fu-“

He put his finger to his mouth again and made eye contact. He began to draw on the ground in his blood. I watched as the two men talked to our waitress, and watched her point over to our corner. Goddamnit. The two made meaningful eye contact, and began to walk over, reaching into their coats and pulling out silvery… somethings. They looked like blades, but blades typically don’t blur like you’re watching them through some kind of smeared lens.

They walked over to the table, and began to speak. First it was that strange, guttural tongue which Lucifer had spoken in the car. Then, it was English. “Come out, little brother. We would have words with you.”

Lucifer climbed out from under the table with his hands raised, “Come now, boys, we don’t have to do this right now. I was just having lunch with my boyfr-“

Michael grabbed him by the throat and drew him close. “Quiet, you fool. Had it been my way we would have turned this pitiful city into a burnt-out pillar of salt rather than see you walk here. Your very presence befouls this world.”

Raphael put his hand on Michael’s arm, moving it away. “Not here, Michael,” he said, in accentless English. “We must try to keep a low profile.”

Michael moved his hand away from Lucifer’s neck, and nodded at me. “What about the boy, Raphael. He knows too much, I would suspect.”

Lucifer glanced at me. I recognized the look. It was fear. “He knows nothing. Let him be.”

Michael scoffed. “As if I would trust you to tell me anything, brother.”

Raphael looked at me. His eyes were pale, like ice. “Tell me true. Who are you?”

I couldn’t break eye contact. I was frozen. It felt like the truth was being pulled from me, extracted more thoroughly than torture ever could. “My name is Adam Drakeson.”

With that, he looked at Lucifer, then back at me. “And what has Lucifer told you?”

“That you are angels. That he is Satan. That you wish to send him back to Hell.”

Michael scoffed. “The basics.”

As he went to lift Lucifer into the air again, I got up and tried to stop him. It was mostly an unconscious thing, but I got to my feet and grabbed his arm. I don’t know what I thought I could do, but I do remember him backhanding me back into the booth. It felt like I’d been hit by a small bus.

At this the occupants of the nearby tables became agitated. A man, middle-aged and dressed in simple, everyday clothing got up and went over to him. “Sir, please, this is a restaurant, you shouldn’t –“

Michael looked at him, his eyes blazing pure blue, with no visible iris, pupil or schlera. “Know your place, pond scum.”

The man was blasted across the room, out a window. “Raphael! Wipe the human’s memory, then let’s be on our way.”

Raphael leaned towards me and made eye contact. “Forget whatever Lucifer has told you. Forget Lucifer. Forget us. Forget everything that has been changed because of him. Forget.”

I felt like someone was tugging on the inside of my skull, like my brain was being fed on, eviscerated, reduced. But, inexplicably, it faded. I forgot nothing. I remembered everything. Lucifer was laughing.

“What’s so funny?” Raphael snapped.

“It won’t work, brother. I warded his mind against illusions and alterations the day I met him. You won’t be able to do anything to him.”

Michael laughed, a haughty, hollow sound. “Nothing? I could always kill him. A corpse has no memories.”

Lucifer laughed back, this time shifting form, almost imperceptibly to me. His horns grew back. His eyes glowed red. The laugh became a cacophony of voices, the voice of legion. “Babalon ziltar zien!”

From beneath the table there came a groaning, screaming, as whatever he had drawn beneath it came to life. The table was destroyed as a portal opened, of black and red and shadow and death. Screams echoed as a creature emerged. Dressed in black robes, it was unlike anything I had ever seen. It had black scales, lizardlike features, with two curling ram’s horns. It carried with it two stone tablets. As it appeared, Raphael dived with his blade to strike it. It said a word, and Raphael was disarmed, his blade flying out of his hand and to the ground. “Fugio memet, coeles viventem.”

Raphael screamed as in a flash, he disappeared. Michael dropped Lucifer and went to strike the creature, but it spoke again, and this time, black, tarlike tentacles emerged from the portal to grab him. “Unhand me, infernal creature!”

It dragged him closer to the pit, and the creature looked at Lucifer. “Debitum solvit.”

Lucifer nodded, grabbed me by the arm, and dragged me towards the exit. “Time to go, I think.”

“I’m not the kind of person who gets a redemption arc.”

This began as a response to a writing prompt, but it’s deviated enough from the premise to post without it.

She was walking down the crowded street to her secret laboratory, a street with merchant stalls and strange smells from the Yggdras caravans who brought great foreign cuisine and creatures for those whose purses were heavier than their heads.

She was not such a one.

She was a Dravidii, the caste of those magical metal-smiths who could make clockwork golems; strange entities of bronze, steam and the mystic chemical of aether that granted them life. But this science was not without flaw or risk; to create a clockwork golem could take years of effort, effort which could be wasted if a single part was out of order or the incantation to bind the will of the creator to metal and aether.

And this art is expensive, so she kept moving, ignoring the temptations of the sights and sounds; to a mind such as hers it was almost torture, for inquisitiveness was her favor and her foible, her birthright and her curse. Such is the flawed nature of the Dravidii.

Closing her eyes and focusing on her destination, she took a second to gather herself and, opening her eyes anew, she struck forward.

That is, until thirty seconds later, when she heard a voice emerging from a thickly perfumed stall to her right. A Yggdras woman dressed in a thick shawl that did little to hide her figure, holding an amulet in her right hand and a dagger in her left, was speaking to her. “Come here, Ivana.”

Dumbstruck by both the woman and by the woman’s knowledge of her name, she stepped towards the stall. “For fifty dras, this master-crafted amulet could be yours.”

Ivana looked at the amulet for a few seconds, sizing it up. It was definitely of Dravidii make, a net of bronze around a core of aether. She had never seen anything like it, and it was indeed finely wrought. To own it would be to own a piece of not just beauty, but power. Who knows what secrets it could contain. What she could learn from its workings.

Wide-eyed and a little mesmerized, she broke her gaze long enough to look down at herself.

She saw her formal clothing, plain and cheap as it was – with what little flair a Dravidii could add to it. Glued-on gears on her simple cap, some red cloth wrapped around her waist as a garnish for her belt on simple brown trousers, a matching, threadbare coat – fifty dras would be enough to starve her for another week or two, and she wasn’t sure she could make it through that. Not again.

As the thoughts whirred through her head like the bronze gears of her project, she finally came to her decision. Closing her eyes, she shook her head no, and turned on her heels to return to her path.

“Wait, girl.”

She turned back to the woman, who had taken a half-step towards her and outstretched a hand. Upon Ivana looking back, she regained composure. Whispering a little under her breath in a foreign tongue, the Yggdras woman began again, “I was rude. I apologize.”

Cocking a single eyebrow, Ivana stood silently. She had some inkling of what this was about; it was rumored that some Yggdras had the second sight, the ability to perceive some wisp of the future before it occurred. Each caste had their own magic, after all – the Dravidii the ability to bend metal to their will, the Yggdras the ability to perceive the future – but each must hone their ability, and not all had it to the extent of others.

“Learning the name of another to attempt to sell them a bauble is hardly a fair tactic,” said Ivana, somewhat feigning annoyance. Who knew, maybe she could get a discount.

The Yggdras woman nodded. “Let me offer you two things then.”

This time the raised eyebrow went a little higher. An offer freely made by a Yggdras merchant was a rare thing, after all.

“I offer you this bauble,” she said, taking three steps to stand in front of Ivana, and handing it to her. “And this,” she said, leaning forward, so that their lips brushed together into a subtle kiss.

Ivana blushed at this, and began stammering a little, “I… not… my…”

Putting the bauble into her coat pocket, she looked down at her feet, managed to mumble a quick thanks, and began off on her way at double-pace, without looking back at the (now, very confused) Yggdras.

She made it to her destination, after turning down an alleyway and about hallway towards the end, opening a hidden door with the touch of a button, disguised as an outwardly-pointed brick.

Entering the facility, she looked around, taking stock of her equipment and checking for changes. Her chair at the worktable was as she had left it, and the half-built golem lay on the table there, each finely-made piece interlocking to form a frame. Sitting herself down at the table, she leaned back and let out a heavy and self-exasperated sigh. She probably could’ve handled the merchant with a bit more tact, after all. Pulling out the bauble, she was surprised to see a bit of paper wrapped around it.

Extracting the paper, she found that it had writing on it. Reading it, she found it said only two things.

My name is Yvi, if you wondered

And beneath that, somewhat hastily scrawled as if done quickly out of embarrassment.

Dinner?

Looking down at her worktable, and her half-finished project, she weighed her options. Awkward as she was, she was loathe to turn down the opportunity to repay Yvi for both the gift… and (blushing at the thought anew) the kiss.

She looked at the bauble again, and began to work. The easiest way to clear her mind, after all, she supposed. Maybe the answer would be written plain in gears and screws.

Tinkering with the bauble, she found it had no catch or secrets, it simply existed as a finely-wrought artpiece. She knew it hid secrets, but how to gain them was a mystery. So, she fixed a chain to the amulet, and put it around her neck. Where better to keep it safe, after all.

She began anew on her golem, using her abilities to work bronze into proper shape, attach metal ligaments, wire the ‘nerves’ of the thing, and test the steam capacity, all the while, reminiscing of the history of this place, and of her family.

Her father had been a Vanis, whose abilities were charm and manipulation, but who had honestly fallen for her mother, a Dravidii that she had taken after moreso than her frankly foppish father. Her mother had been a clockwork golem-maker as well, working alongside her brother, Ivana’s uncle.

Her father had wandered into her mother’s shop one day, and began asking questions about how one makes a clockwork golem. Her brother had been intent on kicking the wayfarer out of the shop, despite his pretty features, but she was honestly transfixed by the curiosity she found in his eyes. He would show up daily, listening to her for hours about how the art of golem-building was partly a magical and partly a physical craft; a body could be made to the letter from a blueprint, but without the binding of a Dravidii’s will to the metal, there was no hope of it ever coming alive.

Ivana’s father returned day after day until he finally worked up the courage to ask her mother out to dinner. From there, a romance quickly blossomed. Ivana’s mother’s parents were long-since dead, so her brother, Ivana’s uncle, stepped in at a couple points to ensure Ivana’s mother’s fair treatment. And indeed, her father treated her well, though Ivana’s uncle would oft boast over dinner about almost breaking the fop’s nose a couple times to set him straight.

A year later, he proposed. A year after that, Ivana was born. But the pregnancy was hard on her mother – she never quite recovered her full health after, and bout after bout of illness took their toll, and finally her life by the time Ivana was eleven. Her father tried to comfort her, but Ivana spent the days in her mother’s study, until her father realized what he must do. Entrusting Ivana to her uncle, Ivana learned the art her mother had so cherished – the art of making a golem.

Now it had been eight years, and Ivana was building her third golem. Among countless basic prototypes, she had made two working complex golems – not the basic toys she could sell for fifteen dras apiece to collectors and children, but those golems worth thousands upon thousands of dras, whose very worth could spare her from the poverty that had surely claimed her mother’s life, as plain as any illness.

Her uncle had left some year and a half ago, to find his own way, entrusting his secret workshop and business to Ivana. He had given her a few dras, and told her she could make her own way, and that he would return when he had finished his journey.

She had not heard from him since. She lived a lonely life, either spending her time here or at a rented room in a nearby inn. The owner charged her harshly, but fairly enough for a nearby stay to work. In truth, she had probably spent more nights sleeping in the workshop in her uncle’s old chair than at the inn, but she was close to a breakthrough.

A golem that could pass for a human. She had been in correspondence with her grandfather on her father’s side, and had gained insight into illusion and charm, those coveted abilities that those of Vanis blood possess. Though she did not have the blood – taking after her mother so she did – she managed to come up with a rudimentary formula to grant the golem a likeness of humanity, if done in conjunction with the proper aetheric mix and focals.

She spent the day working on the golem, but the breakthrough was not coming to her. It seemed she had reached an impasse, a block that hours at the table could not fix. Sighing in exasperated fashion, she got up. It was time to go back to the inn, rather than try to finish this work that seemed to be trying to evade her.

She left the workshop and looked up and down the alley. She saw nothing, save a couple boys standing at the end of the alley. Walking towards them, she began to try to ask them where their parents were, until one of the boys ran towards her. As he did, she caught a better look at him. No older than eight, he was a speedy little creature, running up, jumping up and catching her newly-gained amulet by the bauble and tearing it loose, without breaking stride, and running.

Surprised and knocked aside, Ivana began to run after the boy, who was laughing at his newly-invented game of keep-away. Running down the alleyway and into the now-empty street, he looked back and bellowed, “You’ll never catch me!”

That is, just as a heeled shoe stretched out from the shadows beyond the edge of the alley, tripping him and bowling him flat.

“Gavroche, Gavroche, Gavroche,” cooed Yvi. “I thought mum had taught you not to take things that don’t belong to you,” she said as she leaned down, grabbed the amulet, and walked back towards Ivana.

“I was just playing,” said Gavroche, reddening at Yvi’s interference, whether from embarrassment or anger one could not tell.

“Sure you were, Gav, sure,” said Yvi, handing the amulet back to Yvi. “I’d like to apologize for little Gav’s actions. Our mother tried to raise him better,” she said, glaring sharply back at the boy who had barely managed to get back up into a sitting position, rubbing a skinned knee.

Looking back at Ivana and cracking a smile, she spoke again, this time in a cheerier tone, “In light of recent discoveries of the terrors that walk the night, allow me to walk you to your home.”

Wandering down the street towards the inn, they found themselves talking about their lives, a wonderful pastime for those with as interesting lives as these two, even if they did not know it themselves.

“I’m sorry about Gav. He’s been like that ever since pa died last spring. He’s been trying to earn enough money to help mum keep the house, as have I, but he’s young. Not too much work out there for him, and little of it honest.”

Ivana rubbed her hands together, to keep the could out. “It’s okay. It’s not like I had the thing that long, or that it would cost me anything if he had taken it, I suppose.”

Yvi laughed a little. Looking at her again, Ivana saw that the woman she had seen earlier wasn’t much older than herself – maybe a couple months, but most of the show at the stall had been simple makeup and legerdemain, to make her seem older and wiser.

“So, how did you wind up in a secret workshop in the middle of an abandoned alley?” asked Yvi.

Ivana was temporarily thrown, which seemed to be happening a lot that day. “I – it’s not – ummm… please don’t tell my uncle that you know that it exists?”

Yvi laughed. “Don’t worry, your secret’s safe with me, and I’ll make sure Gav doesn’t tell anyone either. But I’m fairly certain half the town knows it exists – neither you nor your uncle are very subtle, you know.”

Ivana shrugged. It was a fair criticism.

Before either had known it, they had reached the inn, and Ivana turned to speak. “This is where we go our separate ways, I think,” she spoke softly, not really wanting to leave.

Yvi quickly grabbed Ivana’s hands in her own. They were warm, which was odd enough, given the season. “You never answered my question.”

Ivana looked at her blankly.

Yvi sighed. “Dinner, Ivana.”

Ivana remembered the note and blushed. “I… may… be…?”

Yvi turned aside a little and muttered, “Well, it’s better than a no…” before turning back to Ivana.

“You have never once in your life been asked out on a date before, have you?”

“Well… no...,” said Ivana, blushing a shade redder than crimson. Most of the local boys were scared of her uncle, with good reason, and she’d never been asked by a girl before – or been confident enough to ask another.

“Well, I guess I should go,” said Yvi suddenly, turning to return the way she had came.

“Wait! Yvi…,” Ivana shouted, and then got a little quieter. Taking a deep breath, and then letting the words stream out in a single uninterrupted stream, “Would-you-like-to-go-out-to-dinner-with-me-please?”

Out of breath and blushing redder as the conversation wore on, Ivana began to hyperventilate as subtly as she could manage (which is to say, not very subtly at all).

Yvi laughed. “Of course, silly girl. Meet me at my stall tomorrow at twilight, and don’t you dare be late.”

She then ran off into the night, and Ivana, finally, saw the family resemblance between Yvi and the little rogue, Gavroche.