#and a treat to go back to ghostly painter

[ahatintimepieces]

Another three chapters of By Any Other Name are up! When Ven makes it clear that she’s not willing to see the painter’s side of things, he tries to make his escape again, though with startling consequences. Meanwhile, Mari struggles with a ghost in her home! And I don’t mean the books suddenly showing up on her table and doors that seem to swing open on their own! Or, actually, maybe those things aren’t so separate after all...

[violettelueur]

RYŌMEN SUKUNA || LITTLE CAGED ARTIST

| featuring : ryomen sukuna ft. itadori yuji 

| warnings : mention of emotional abuse and murder as well as grammar errors

| form : imagine

| word count : 1691

| published : 22 december

| request : Hello, idk if your request are open but feel free to ignore, but just, imagine another reencarnation au (those imaginw of yours are my favourite) where the reader was a painter and Sukuna's personal favourite so he took her and kinda abused her psycologicaly to the point where she would just draw him and only him and he loved that, and in the future she's still an artist that draws Yuuji bc theyre friends but when she sees the tatoos she again draws Sukuna and he feels guilty for the way he treated her and her art in the pastIf It's angst i would apreciate but it's not really necesary

| barista’s notes : hi there~ i apologies for the extremely long wait for your coffee order but now it is there ╲ʕ·ᴥ·　╲ʔ right now it is nearly 5am in the morning and i have no idea why the hell i am awake, but oh well ʕ ᵒ ᴥ ᵒʔ  DONT WORRY THOUGH! after this, i am going to sleep and rest up since today it is Fushiguro Megumi’s and Kageyama Tobio’s birthday today ʕ≧ᴥ≦ʔ but other than that, i hope you enjoy your order of a cup of classic black coffee (jujutsu kaisen request!) and i hope you come back soon! ʕ •ᴥ•ʔゝ☆

“Sukuna….please leave me alone...leave the village alone, I beg of you please,” you whimpered to the man that was standing tall and proud with a sadistic smirk painted on his face, while you were on your knees tightly holding onto his large wrist - somewhat slightly covering the black ring marking - as if your weak physical strength could do anything to stop his raising them up and giving a rain upon hell to the people that was residing in the small town you lived in.

You have no idea how you had managed to catch the attention of the most feared curse to both humans and jujutsu sorcerers nor did you know how you managed to become acquainted with the man in front of you. All you knew right now was that the situation you were in at this current moment and time, was not ideal to anyone at all.

You were just a simple artist. A simple village girl artist that was blessed to be hired by the nobility and aristocracy to paint their family portraits with the finest colours that they would offer you, for you to be then paid so you could provide for your village. However, as luxurious as it sounded, you were in love with the idea of just placing a sharped piece of charcoal on a piece of paper or cloth you could find anywhere and sketch your heart designed.

“Leave you alone?” Sukuna questioned you in his deep voice, before slowly crouching down to become face to face with you. “I could never leave you alone, not when you have caught my attention with your craft little one,” Sukuna then stated, as he gently placed a hand on your cheek before using his thumb to caress the soft skin he was touching. 

Ever since Sukuna had caught sight of you delicately painting a portrait of a noblewoman with such care and gentleness, he couldn’t help but wonder how your hands were so carefully and how patient you were to make sure every stroke was perfect to your desire. Slowly, he began to wonder what it was like to be the subject of one's view. A subject that someone desired to recreate on a simple piece of paper. However, compared to his past sightings, you were the most talented as well as the most beautiful he had ever seen and once he was able to gain a clear view of the noble woman that you were illustration, he was surprised at how much detail you were able to encapture in your work and just like the noble woman’s reaction, they both were extremely happy with the result of the final product.

“How about this?” Sukuna suddenly asked, causing your head to suddenly shot up leading you to meet eye to eye with the King of Curses, “if you come with me and draw me and me only for the rest of time, I would leave this little village alone as well as the people residing in it. How does that sound, little one?”

‘Come with him? Where? Why? What’s going to happen to me?’

“If you don’t accept this deal, every single person here will die. Burned, stabbed, slashed, any way possible I can. Men, women and even little children’s lives will be gone, and it would be all your fault.”

‘My….fault? But-’

“You know I’m not a patient person little one, I might as well start my massacre while you take your time to think, it will be-”

“NO PLEASE! DON’T, YOU CAN TAKE ME, JUST LEAVE THE VILLAGE ALONE, PLEASE!” you screamed in desperation, as you tighten the grip of his wrist that was within your grasp to keep him down, as you didn’t want to risk him getting away from your sights for the safety and protection of the people  within the little town you had lived in since the day your life had started.

With a large cruel grin, Sukuna had somehow managed to pry his wrists free from your tense grip before sliding an arm under your knees as well as an arm around your body lifting you up in a bridal position, while you were just expressing a face of shock and fear, confused and fearful on what you had just accepted in exchange for your life. Where were you going? Was this the end? Were you going to die? How much longer have you had left?

“Don’t worry, I won’t kill you, you’re too precious to be slaughtered little one,” Sukuna answered - as if he knew what you were thinking - before placing a ghostly kiss upon your temple leading you to freeze still, petrified on what he would do with you had moved a single inch.

This was your life now. 

A caged artist.

                                               ꕥ

Here you were, sitting on a wooden platform outside with a sharpened piece of charcoal that Sukuna had kindly given you, in order for you to sketch a portrait of him. The second you placed the charcoal upon the paper, Sukuna couldn’t help but stare at the light movements of your hand as you lightly stroke a few lines to create an outline before watching your hand suddenly pause, causing the King of Curses to switch his view from the sheet to you, only to find your look at him with such a frightened look.

“I’m sorry…..I shouldn’t look at you, should I? I apologise deeply,” you softly muttered before quickly turning back to the portrait that was right in front of you - you didn’t want to do anything wrong in his eyes, you knew he could go back on his words and harm the people that you cared about. However, it seemed like Sukuna didn’t care at all, he had managed to trap you into his life and had the power to demand you to draw him every time he would mention he could go back to your little village and burn it to the ground. He relished in the idea of being the subject of your attention.

This is what he wanted. 

His little caged artist.

                                               ꕥ

1000 years later and here you were. 

Here you were sketching a picture of your best-friend Itadori with a picture of him that you had managed to capture on your phone. Itadori first came into your life shortly after you had enrolled into Tokyo Metropolitan Curse Techincal College around the same time as your other classmate Kugisaki did. 

You have no idea what drew you into the boy with the pink hair, but something within you pulled you towards him causing the blooming and somewhat hilarious friendship to start, even causing Fushiguro and Kugisaki to wonder what was going on in your mind to somehow relate to the boy - yet, they didn’t mention their questions since they didn’t really think you knew the answer yourself, and they were correct.

However, as you continued to smoothly glide your pencil across the page, applying different pressures to construct some definitions as well as shadows within the photo you were copying from, you began to suddenly realise that you were starting to draw marking upon his portrait. Markings that were so familiar to the ones the person within him had.

Ever since that day at the Eishu Detention Centre, the sight of Sukuna standing in front of you with his shirt ripped off showcasing his black marking caused a trigger of unknown memories to suddenly flood into your mind, causing excruciating pain that was so unbearable, you thought you were going to pass out from the intense pressure, maybe as even close to dying from the immense pain.

From what you could even recall from the sudden flood of blurry images that appeared in your mind, there was a picture of you drawing with a piece of charcoal with the infamous King of Curses seating right beside you, watching you draw will whispering in your ear the threats that he would bombard you in order for you to make sure that you were only drawing him and him only.

Slowly but in a shaking manner, your drawing hand continued to sketch in Sukuna’s markings that would appear on Itadori’s body as you were somewhat extremely afraid of what the King of Curses could do to you if you didn’t - just how you left 1000 years ago.

Although unknown to you, your best-friend Itadori was standing right behind you, having a clear view of what was happening to you as well as the drawing right in front of him. Seeing your shaking figure with slow but clear teardrops landing on the sketch book as well as the drawing evolving from him to the curse residing inside of him, made him realise how damaging Sukuna was to not only him but also to the people around him. Carefully, Itadori placed a hand over your hand that held the pencil, causing you to flinch before finally noticing that it was your friend that was holding it and not the special grade curse.

Within his Innate Domain, Sukuna also had a clear view on what was happening to you and slowly but strangely began to feel something drop to his stomach with the feeling of his throat closing up at the sight of you slowly breaking down into a small state of insanity. This isn’t what he wanted. He didn’t want his beautiful little one to become lifeless and paranoid like you were now.

Even after 1000 years after your death, your incarnation was carrying the feeling of fear, despair and numbness that you were weighed upon the second you had given your life away to the King of Curses for the sake of your village. Even though you had more freedom then you did then, you still left trapped and lost within the metal cage that Sukuna had enclosed you in. Even with the small hint of guilt that was manifested within the cruel curse’s heart. 

You were trapped with no escape out.

You were trapped forever with no key to open the door that was clearly right in front of you.

Forever his little caged artist.

[ibijau]

chap 3 of the modern xisangyao, also on AO3

Lan Xichen deals with emotions and regrets that aren't quite his own while trying to make sense of what's happening around him

Something about the young man in that chair strikes Lan Xichen, making his heart race in his chest the instant he sees him. He can’t explain it, that man is hardly older than Lan Xichen’s little brother, and looks like the sort of people said brother usually hangs out with, but there’s something about the stranger that speaks to Lan Xichen’s soul, making him ache with a sorrow that he isn’t sure is his own.

Puzzled by this alien pain, Lan Xichen is startled when his own shock becomes mirrored on the face of that young man.

"You!" the stranger gasps. "What are you doing here?" 

Fear is not an emotion Lan Xichen usually evokes. Even his students aren't afraid of him, unless they have anxieties of their own, and his insolent brother has never been so much as impressed by him a day in his life. And yet, there’s no mistake possible.

That young man is terrified to see him.

Meng Yao isn’t doing great either. He’s been nervous for a while, since they got into the car actually, but only now is Lan Xichen realising that perhaps Meng Yao lied and took him to that house without the permission of mister Shanzi, never expecting to be discovered. But if this intern denounces him…

He has to be an intern of some sort, or an assistant, or…

Meng Yao is shaking like a leave, he’s so pale, but that doesn’t mean this young man is… he can’t be, everyone knows mister Shanzi has been in the art business for decades, he can’t, not unless…

Not unless he, of all people, manages to reach immortality.

The thought, already odd on its own, feels like it doesn’t come from Lan Xichen’s own mind, and more from the memory of a mind that used to be his. It is a disconcerting feeling and Lan Xichen finds himself fighting against the intrusion until his vision sways. He takes a step forward, more to support himself against the wall than to enter the room, but the young man inside misreads his intentions and cries out. He motions toward the door which closes on its own, as if pushed by a gust of wind. 

There has to be a hidden mechanism, Lan Xichen tells himself, his disoriented mind clinging to this odd detail. Doors don’t move without being touched. He cannot question it or investigate it though, because Meng Yao grabs him by the elbow with unexpected strength. Lan Xichen is dragged away from the basement, back toward the kitchen. He stumbles onto a chair and falls onto it while Meng Yao, still trembling, starts pacing in front of him.

“I can’t believe I fell for your act!” Meng Yao hisses. “Oh, you’re good, you’re really good!” He spits, pointing an accusatory finger at Lan Xichen. “With your airs of innocence, your clumsy flirting… and how did you manage to insert yourself into so many publications? Or is that part real? Are you really a researcher?”

“Of course I am,” Lan Xichen says. He closes his eyes, overcome by an outrage that isn’t his, no more than the other emotions he seems to be feeling since entering this house. Last time, it was him making accusations, he thinks, and A-Yao wasn’t innocent in the least so what right does he have to treat Lan Xichen this way?

A wave of nausea hits Lan Xichen.

He’s never called Meng Yao A-Yao before. Never even thought of calling him that way. So why does this nickname come to him so easily now?

“What do you want from him?” Meng Yao insists, his earlier pallor disappearing as anger turns his face red. “Where did you meet mister Shanzi before?”

“I’ve never met mister Shanzi in my life,” Lan Xichen says.

“Well he’s met you!” Meng Yao retorts.

Lan Xichen feels another wave of nausea hit him. That man, that boy in the basement, that can’t have been mister Shanzi. Not only is the age wrong, his name isn’t… that’s not his name.

His name is…

His name…

But that can’t be his name.

“I’ve never met him,” Lan Xichen repeats. Not in this life, he’s certain of that. In another though…

A picture flickers through his mind. A young man in green and grey, crying and throwing himself at someone Lan Xichen held dear. He remembers affection for both people. Pity as well, and perhaps longing. Regret too, so much regret, though the regret, he thinks, isn’t something he felt when that scene happened, it is only something that came later to taint that memory, long after both these people had left.

He only caught a brief glimpse of mister Shanzi, and the memory of the man in green is fleeting at best, but there might be a family resemblance between them.

“You have to leave,” Meng Yao orders. “I’m taking you back to your place, and then I swear if you ever try to come in contact with me, I’ll…”

“I’m not leaving,” Lan Xichen snaps.

Meng Yao stops pacing to instead look at him as if he’s lost his mind. Perhaps he has.

“I don’t know what you want with mister Shanzi, but I’m not letting you hurt him,” Meng Yao threatens, darting toward the kitchen counter and opening a drawer in search of a weapon. All he finds is a silver knife, but he still waves it toward Lan Xichen. “I’m not betraying him?”

“Why not? You have already,” Lan Xichen hears himself say, which makes Meng Yao flinch.

He means that taking Lan Xichen here was a betrayal.

He means also something else, something older, so old neither of them can remember it.

This is when it hits Lan Xichen. Mister Shanzi isn’t the only one he’s met before. It’s harder to be sure because Meng Yao looks too different, because Lan Xichen’s mind is a mess right now and he probably wouldn’t recognise his own brother for sure, but he can feel something familiar about the soul waving that knife at him and…

And a part of him, ancient and broken, wants to laugh at the idea of Meng Yao so protective toward mister Shanzi. If he knew…

If he knew…

It ended in blood last time.

It might end in blood again, if they’re not careful.

“What’s so funny?” Meng Yao snaps, gripping his pathetic knife tighter.

Lan Xichen realises he’s laughing. Or something that is part of him does, anyway. A hysterical laugh that turns into heavy sobs he can’t control either.

“What’s wrong with you?” Meng Yao asks, just a hint of worry to his voice.

He always used to be so worried, something tells Lan Xichen.

Smiling but worried.

He doesn’t smile as much as he used to, does he? But neither does Lan Xichen.

“You can’t stay here,” Meng Yao repeats.

“I’m not leaving,” Lan Xichen retorts. “This is my home.”

It is, or it was. Past and present feel like odd concepts right now. But Lan Xichen knows he spent too long inside these walls. The place has been changed and redecorated, but it’s still the same, still his Hanshi, his home, the place he lived, the place he died, when old age crept on him in spite of his efforts.

Not that he really was trying anymore toward the end, was he?

Eternal life would only have brought eternal guilt. He remembered being relieved, every time he died, because his choices never seemed to be the right ones.

“I’m calling you a taxi,” Meng Yao insists, dashing out of the kitchen, knife still in hand. “Don’t try anything funny or you’ll regret it!”

Lan Xichen doesn’t try anything funny. He doesn’t try anything at all. Without Meng Yao’s presence, away from mister Shanzi, Lan Xichen’s agitated mind starts calming down somewhat. The ghostly feelings harassing him mellow out, enough for him to wonder what might have caused them. Unlike his uncle and some of his older relatives, he’s never had any strong religious feelings, and the idea of reincarnation isn’t one he’s ever been convinced by. It apparently doesn’t matter what he believes though, because aside from having met mister Shanzi and Meng Yao in another life, he can’t explain what just happened to him.

It should bother him more than it does. A day ago, he would have laughed at this sort of thing. Having lived through it, he just accepts it. His soul has lived other lives before, it is just a fact he cannot deny.

After a long while, Meng Yao returns. He still holds that knife in his hand, still looks agitated. Less than he did in that other life they shared, Lan Xichen distantly thinks. But then again, at that time, Meng Yao knew he had lost everything he had to lose, everything except his life… and even that he hadn’t kept for very long, had he?

“I’ve managed to find a taxi company that will come here,” Meng Yao announces, pointing his knife again at Lan Xichen. “I swear if you try anything…”

“I just want to speak with him,” Lan Xichen says. Or at least, some part of him says. He has nothing to say to mister Shanzi, but the man he once was, the one who died old and alone in this house, has plenty to talk about.

“About Nie Huaisang?” Meng Yao asks with a mocking grimace.

Lan Xichen startles, then nods. This will, indeed, concern Nie Huaisang. It cannot be a coincidence that mister Shanzi has such an interest in that obscure painter, much like Lan Xichen himself does. 

“I just want to speak with him,” Lan Xichen repeats, more firmly. “I think I’m here for a reason.”

“You’re here because I’m an idiot,” Meng Yao snaps. “If I’d been thinking with my brain instead of my…” He sighs. “Nevermind. It’s a lesson I won’t forget. I’ll be more careful on my next job… Fuck, but I’m so fired. Do you have any idea how good this job was? Why did you have to ruin this? You’re just…”

Meng Yao stops speaking and turns to look out the window, as does Lan Xichen. There is a noise coming from outside, like the rumbling of an engine going at great speed.

It’s too early to be the taxi, since the house is so isolated. A taxi wouldn’t be going at that sort of speed anyway. Pushed by curiosity, Lan Xichen rises from his chair and walks to the window. Meng Yao glares at him and points the knife at him, but for him too curiosity is too strong and he joins Lan Xichen at the window.

A sleek white car speeds toward the house. For a moment it looks as though it will crash into the Hanshi, but the driver slows down abruptly at the last possible moment in what Lan Xichen finds to be both a demonstration of great skill and complete recklessness. From where they are, Lan Xichen cannot see the driver, but he hears two car doors open and close.

“Did you call someone?” Meng Yao hisses, pointing the knife at Lan Xichen's throat.

“No. Do you think mister Shanzi was expecting someone?”

“He would have been dressed better than that,” Meng Yao says, lowering the knife already, which Lan Xichen finds oddly comforting. Their past life was a mess, he thinks, but he really does like Meng Yao as he is now. “Do you think we were followed?”

Lan Xichen considers the idea, but before he can answer, there’s a knock on the door, startling both of them. The knock is only for show though, because immediately the front door opens. The two of them exchange a look. Lan Xichen quickly grabs a knife of his own which he hides behind his arm as well as he can. Meng Yao and him nod at each other before exiting the kitchen for the main room where they find two men.

Lan Xichen drops his knife.

Although both men are familiar, although the man in red and black is probably the most striking of the two with his bold makeup and elaborate outfit, it is the other one who catches Lan Xichen’s attention. That tall man with cold eyes and long dark hair has, for some reason, a ribbon tied around his forehead. On anyone else, it would look somewhat ridiculous, Lan Xichen thinks, but on this man it looks elegant, dignified even.

“Well, that’s a surprise!” The man in red and black exclaims. “Hey Lan Zhan, look who it is!”

The man wearing a ribbon sports a shocked expression which mirrors Lan Xichen’s, and cannot seem to take his eyes away from him.

“Xiongzhang,” he says with emotion, stepping closer.

Lan Xichen, breathless, falls to his knees.

His brother.

Not the one he knows, not the one he grew up with, but his brother still, one he has missed more dearly than he could ever say. And now, after several lifetimes apart, his brother is returned to him.

Lan Xichen breaks into tears for the second time today, while next to him Meng Yao screams in terror and points his knife at the newcomers.

[tinydooms]

Original Short Story: written in early 2016 while I was minding the doors at Handel and Hendrix in London (in my glamorous past life). Content Warnings: demons, assault, demonic sexual assault, murder.

The Death of Andromeda Ashton

Now darling, you know that there is a big empty house on this property, away up past the formal gardens; you can just see it from your window when the leaves are down from the trees. Ashton Manor is its name, so called because my ancestor, Joseph Ashton, built it centuries ago, when Queen Anne ruled this isle. A solid English manor house, with wings stuck on it during the reign of the Georges, built of grey stone and with hundreds of windows peering down at us like so many curious eyes. It is the country seat of the Ashton family and has been for almost three hundred years. But we do not live there. Not anymore.

I can see impatience in your face. I know all this, is what you’re thinking. Patience, dear one, for I am going to tell you why.

They were great collectors, the old Ashtons were, and as the years went on they filled the Hall with all manner of treasures, ancient books and paintings and sculptures from far off lands where strange gods were worshipped and men look nothing like you’d believe. Every generation of Ashtons contributed to the Collection, until one day, one of them brought home something monstrous.

The house is empty now, its windows stare unseeing; its treasures are locked up and guarded by an aging caretaker. All know that it is abandoned, most of its treasures still inside, though some were safely moved to London around the time Queen Victoria died. But never, in eighty years, has anyone broken in to steal anything. There are too many stories about the place. You’ve heard some of them, of course. The crying that can be heard in the east wing. The singing heard on stormy nights. The dark figure that prowls the corridors and the woods by the park, thinning the packs of rabbits that live there. The woman sinking into the lake. Yes, I can see by your eyes that you know of what I am speaking.

Her name is Andromeda Ashton. She lived here many years ago, when the house was an open and happy place. She was the darling petted baby daughter of older parents, born when her elder siblings were almost grown and had thought their parents were passed the age of engendering children. Her eldest sibling, Henry, was already well into his first year at Cambridge, her sisters away at school. The closest brother in age was Edward, seven years older than she, a quiet and thoughtful boy.

Now, because she was the baby, and in no small part because she was a beautiful, intelligent little thing, Andromeda was given license to behave in ways that were most unusual for a girl of her class in that time. She had a governess and a tutor, learned Greek and Latin from childhood, and could always be found prowling the family Collection or reading books by great explorers and renowned antiquarians. By the time she was eighteen, Andromeda was widely considered to be one of the brightest Ashtons for a generation. What a shame, people said, that she was not a boy and could then use that pretty head of hers. What a shame such remarkable intelligence was all for naught.

They need not have feared, for Andromeda had plans for making her mark upon the world, in the form of her family’s Collection. She may not be allowed to attend Cambridge like her brothers or study theology like Edward, but she was allowed and encouraged to contribute something to the Collection. And it would be more than just her portrait, which showed a slim, wind-pale girl with dark hair and eyes, gazing at the painter with a fiery intensity. No, Andromeda had not spent her life reading the tales of antiquarians for nothing.

Now dearie, you know that there are many stories of ghosts and legends in these parts. The hills are as dotted with stories as they are with sheep. On the eve of her nineteenth year, Andromeda began to collect them. With her father’s blessing and the help of her former governess, a project was begun: to compile the county’s folktales. It was no small task. For months, Andromeda could be seen riding from farm to farm, speaking to laborers and landowners alike, and writing down their stories. The Crone of Tetley. The Wailing Well of St. Edmund’s. The Fenbury Witch. She recorded them all, never realizing that she herself would one day become such a whispered story.

“I don’t know how you sleep at night, after hearing these tales,” her mother said once.

Andromeda smiled. “They are not true, Mother! They’re silly superstitions that came about because people in the past had no learning. People tell stories to ascribe meaning to what they do not understand, that’s all. There’s no truth to them.”

This, my dear, was Andromeda’s firm belief: that superstition had given way to science, and that all the ghostly tales of the past, while amusing and interesting, had a rational explanation. It was to be her undoing.

Now, as is sometimes the case with amateur antiquarians, Andromeda began to be curious as to the truth behind these stories. There was one in particular that caught her fancy, and that was of the Chalice of Tilbury St. Bartholomew. What’s that? The what? I knew you would ask; it’s certainly not talked about anymore. Not since-no, I’m getting ahead of myself.

The story goes like this: centuries before, at the time the plague first appeared in England, there was an alchemist who thought he could escape the illness by coming to the countryside. And where did he come? Why here, of course. Tilbury St. Bartholomew, though in those days the name was rather different. It was whispered that this gentleman-I use that term lightly, for he was no such thing-continued his strange experiments in his cottage, and that he not only practiced alchemy, but the dark arts as well. You’re skeptical, I see. So was Andromeda. What were considered the dark arts then is known as science now, of course. But for all that, the villagers were afraid of him. It was said that he conjured devils, and that one such devil was contained in a silver cup he kept with him in his bedroom, ready to do his master’s bidding. Village maidens dreamed of a dark shape coming into their beds at night, bending over them and stroking their hair. The alchemist leered at them in church on Sundays, leading to speculation that his demon was kept for the hunting of women. Unease and unrest grew in the village, yet the alchemist continued his work unmolested.

But when the plague finally came to Tilbury St. Bartholomew-for no part of the country was left untouched-the villagers said it was the judgments of God upon them for allowing an evil sorcerer to live unhampered in their midst. The alchemist was dragged from his home and burned at the stake. The village maidens breathed sighs of relief, for though the plague raged about them, the dark creature came to their chambers no more. The alchemist’s cottage was burned, too, and the silver chalice was lost. No one knew what became of it.

Andromeda, though, had her suspicions. She was a learned young lady, and figured that there had to be some record somewhere of a necromancer and his effects. I don’t know what sort of research she did, but one summer evening, when her brother Edward was visiting from his Cambridge seminary, she asked him to ride out with her. No one knows where they went, but when they came back, Andromeda looked quite pleased, and shortly thereafter presented an ancient silver goblet to the family.

Why did she want it, you ask? Why, if such demonic stories were attached to the thing, would a young lady wish to bring such an object into her home? Come, child, haven’t you been listening? Andromeda was not a believer in such things as demons. She was an active and intelligent young lady, and it rankled that she could not use her brains to their fullest capacity. A book was all very well and good, you see, but a treasure such as this cup was a real asset to the Collection, and it gave her a measure of fame, besides. She wrote the card for it herself. Silver chalice, English, circa 1330. What a find! Everyone in the family and many people outside of it admired the discovery.

All of this is common knowledge. You can find Andromeda’s book in any bookshop in the county, and the local historians will tell you about the silver goblet. They will also tell you that the goblet has been lost under strange circumstances, and when pressed for an answer, they will sigh and tell you it was a great tragedy. For you see, darling, very few people know exactly what happened to the Ashton family in the months following Andromeda’s discovery.

Most of what I know comes from Edward’s personal diaries, and they are to be treated with much caution. He lost his mind that year, you know. But I think he was saner than anyone knew.

Nothing went right for the Ashtons after Andromeda’s discovery. First Mrs. Ashton, who had never been strong after the birth of her daughter, succumbed to illness, soon followed by Mr. Ashton, so that Henry, the eldest son, living in London, found himself head of the family. That was in September. Then there began to be problems with the livestock. Horses went mad, sheep began to die for seemingly no reason, and the gamekeepers reported outrageous amounts of dead rabbits and birds in the woods. The servants began to complain that tricks were being played upon them, for it seemed as though they were being pinched and grabbed at by unseen hands. Edward recorded in the days that followed his mother’s funeral, was the sense of being watched when you knew you were alone, of a cold breath at the back of your neck, the creak of a chair that only creaked when sat in. There was a presence in the house, he said, and everyone knew it. But no one spoke of it.

Andromeda was not spared. Alone in her room at night, as she lay in bed, she felt the gentle caress of fingers across her cheek, in her hair, running over her body, cold as a breath of winter air. She told herself that she only imagined the icy kisses on the back of her neck, on her shoulders and breastbone. They were the products of a fevered mind, surely, imaginations brought about by grief at the death of her parents. She ignored the caresses. What’s that, darling? She must have been very brave? Yes, or very foolish.

By late November, the events had become too real to ignore. When serving tea to visitors, Andromeda would feel whispery fingers on her thighs, and moments later her stockings would loosen as her garters untied themselves. Something tugged her hair as she brushed it, or grasped her hand as she reached for a pen. At night, the sensation of someone cuddling close to her became unbearable, until she jumped for a light, gasping. And then she would hear it: a soft, cold laugh.

At last, after one such night, Andromeda swallowed her pride and told Edward what was happening. He was a priest, or nearly so; of course he would help her.

“It has only been since we brought home my goblet that this has happened,” she told him as they walked through the portrait gallery. “But artefacts cannot truly contain demons. Can they?”

Edward rubbed his hand through his hair, eyes straying to Andromeda’s portrait, swinging in its frame against the far wall. “We cannot know what devilry a sorcerer can conjure when he goes against God. I fear we made a mistake in unearthing that cup, Meda.”

“What must we do?”

“We must put it back where it was. As soon as possible.”

They agreed that Edward would write to one of his teachers, Reverent Dr. Padgett, to come assist them in exorcising the demon. The letter was duly dispatched. The reply came by telegram the next morning: Dr. Padgett would arrive that evening on the six-thirty train. They would commence their business immediately.

That afternoon, Andromeda asked the servants to leave the house for the night. She found them eager to do so. None of them liked to say how relieved they were to be away from the house and its unseen occupant. At half past six, the head footman was dispatched to the station to collect Dr. Padgett. In the back of the carriage was his own trunk, for he had no intention of remaining alone with the family in the house once he had safely delivered the doctor. It was a cold, windy evening, and later he said that his master and mistress could not have picked a worse night to be alone in that house.

All of this is fact; you can find the records in the village police archives, if you’ve a mind to. But what I’m about to tell you know, darling, are the words of a madman. You see, the only two people who know what happened in that house are Andromeda and Edward, and the latter was in no fit state to speak coherently of what happened for some months afterwards. Besides, his tale was dismissed by doctors and magistrates alike as being too unbelievable to come from a sound mind.

What Edward said was this: believing that Padgett would soon arrive, he and Andromeda set about making preparations for the exorcism. The house was empty, but the air around them seemed heavy, oppressive. As there were no servants to light the lamps, they sat in near-darkness. Their black mourning clothes must have made the scene even darker. Once or twice, Edward felt as though something touched the back of his neck, but there was no one there but Andromeda, sitting on the sofa by the window, peering out into the windy dusk.

“Perhaps we should bring the cup here,” she said, at last. “Perhaps Dr. Padgett will be willing to go out with us immediately.”

“Certainly,” said Edward. “Shall I go for it?”

“No.” Andromeda stood, smoothing her black skirts. Edward says that her hands were shaking. “I feel certain it has to be me.”

Though neither of them said it, the fact hung in the air that Andromeda was the one to have meddled in what she should not. Still, Edward, being a kind soul, rose from his seat and put her arm through his.

“We will go together. Come now, little sister, chin up. Everything will be all right.”

The silver cup was in one of the many rooms that housed the Collection, deep in the bowels of the cold house. I’ll show it to you one day, if you like, through the window. Night was falling fast as they walked through the halls, the strong wind driving dark clouds before it as it screamed around the manor. The lamp in Edward’s hand flickered in the draught, and his diary says that it was with some relief that they gained the Collection rooms. Leaving Andromeda by the door, Edward moved across the room to light the lamps, thinking to bring some cheer to the evening, if cheer were at all possible.

It was as he was lighting the lamps that Edward heard the screams. He ran to the door to see Andromeda lying in the corridor, beating at something unseen with both hands. He ran to assist her and all at once found himself picked up and flung back into the room he had come from. Undaunted, he picked himself up and made to run to his sister, only to again be thrown down by the unseen creature. It must have been terrible, fighting such a force while Andromeda’s shrieks echoed through the halls. Edward says that she twisted this way and that as though grappling with something. He made for her a third time--and this time, Andromeda was thrown down on the floor, gasping, and the thing, the monster, the demon, grabbed Edward by the neck and dragged him back into the Collection room. He was sure it would kill him. But it did not. A moment of white hot pain, and Edward found himself pinned to the floor with an arrow through the leg. Where the dart came from, he did not know. He could not move. Apparently satisfied that the young priest would prove no further nuisance, the thing returned to Andromeda. Helpless, crying with pain and horror, Edward heard his sister’s screams renew, growing more and more awful until they were drowned by a low, terrible laugh. Then there came the sound of a body dragging, and Andromeda’s shrieks faded as she was carried away.

Dr. Padgett, arriving an hour later, found Edward, alive but in a terrible state. Having asked his driver to wait at the door, Padgett was able to send for a medical doctor, and a search was made for Andromeda. It did not take them long to find her, for though the wind continued to buffet the county, there was no rain. You know where they found her, of course, my dear, for you can see her there still, some nights. She was in the lake, just under the water, her dark hair a loose cloud around her, her heavy black frock covered in hundreds of tiny gashes, her shoes and stockings gone. Her eyes were closed, her skin bleached of color in the green water. She was quite dead.

For months afterwards Edward screamed in the night, howling that the monster had come for him. Certainly in the mornings he was covered in scratches that had not been there the day before. A team of doctors agreed that his mind had been shattered by his sister’s murder, for they did not believe that anything but a mortal man could have done such a vicious thing to the Ashton children. The best thing for him, they told Henry, was to retire to the coast in the care of a nurse. And so Edward never returned to Ashton Hall.

And the cup that had started the horror? Dr. Padgett conducted a search for it, but it was nowhere to be seen, though Edward swore it was in the room when they were attacked. No one knows what became of it. Perhaps it had gone, and the demon with it. I see the doubt in your eyes, dearest, and I have to agree with you.

Ever after, the servants whispered that there was something still haunting the rooms and corridors of the hall, and the gardeners swore they saw Andromeda slipping out of the lake on icy winter nights. Henry’s family certainly never felt comfortable in the Hall, and so it was shut up. And so it has remained for these eighty years, and who knows if we will ever return to live in it? But one thing I know for certain: on nights when the wind blows and the moon is dark, shapes can be seen moving in the windows of the Hall. And out in the lake, a dark-haired Victorian lady floats just underneath the water. Watching. Waiting.

[curious-wildflower]

Elizabeth Siddel Part 3

Since there is a tendency to focus on the supernatural elements associated with Siddal, she is commonly viewed as a ghostly figure more than a real woman. As this sort of shadow figure, it becomes easy to project rumor and myth onto her and accept them as true.

One of the ideas that persists is that she was the inspiration for the character of Lucy Westenra in Bram Stoker’s Dracula.  Some even take it so far as to claim that Stoker was present at Siddal’s exhumation, an impossibility since when the deed took place Stoker was twenty-two and still a student living in Dublin.Bram Stoker lived in the same neighborhood as Rossetti and he was a friend of Hall Caine, who at one time was Rossetti’s secretary.  Stoker dedicated Dracula to Caine, with a nickname used by Caine’s grandmother (“to my dear friend Hommy-Beg”). Stoker may not have included the story of Siddal’s exhumation in his notes, but due to his closeness with Caine he had to have heard an account of it at some point and he had probably read Caine’s book Recollections of Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1882).

The belief that Stoker used Siddal as inspiration is bolstered by his 1892 short story The Secret of the Growing Gold.  The ‘growing gold’ is the hair of a dead woman, the very tresses that had been her most striking feature in life.  Her hair grows persistently and with a purpose; her intent is to haunt her husband and avenge her own death.  The similarity between Stoker’s story and the claim that Siddal’s hair continued to grow and fill her coffin after death is unlikely to be a coincidence.

The Secret of the Growing Gold

By  Bram Stoker

When Margaret Delandre went to live at Brent's Rock the whole

neighbourhood awoke to the pleasure of an entirely new scandal.

Scandals in connection with either the Delandre family or the

Brents of Brent's Rock, were not few; and if the secret history of

the county had been written in full both names would have been

found well represented. It is true that the status of each was so

different that they might have belonged to different continents-or

to different worlds for the matter of that-for hitherto their orbits

had never crossed. The Brents were accorded by the whole section of

the country an unique social dominance, and had ever held themselves

as high above the yeoman class to which Margaret Delandre belonged,

as a blue-blooded Spanish hidalgo out-tops his peasant tenantry.

     The Delandres had an ancient record and were proud of it in their

way as the Brents were of theirs. But the family had never risen

above yeomanry; and although they had been once well-to-do in the

good old times of foreign wars and protection, their fortunes had

withered under the scorching of the free trade sun and the "piping

times of peace." They had, as the elder members used to assert,

"stuck to the land," with the result that they had taken root in it,

body and soul. In fact, they, having chosen the life of vegetables,

had flourished as vegetation does-blossomed and thrived in the good

season and suffered in the bad. Their holding, Dander's Croft, seemed

to have been worked out, and to be typical of the family which had

inhabited it. The latter had declined generation after generation,

sending out now and again some abortive shoot of unsatisfied energy

in the shape of a soldier or sailor, who had worked his way to the

minor grades of the services and had there stopped, cut short either

from unheeding gallantry in action or from that destroying cause to

men without breeding or youthful care-the recognition of a position

above them which they feel unfitted to fill. So, little by little,

the family dropped lower and lower, the men brooding and dissatisfied,

and drinking themselves into the grave, the women drudging at home,

or marrying beneath them-or worse. In process of time all disappeared,

leaving only two in the Croft, Wykham Delandre and his sister Margaret.

The man and woman seemed to have inherited in masculine and feminine

form respectively the evil tendency of their race, sharing in common

the principles, though manifesting them in different ways, of sullen

passion, voluptuousness and recklessness.

     The history of the Brents had been something similar, but showing

the causes of decadence in their aristocratic and not their plebeian

forms. They, too, had sent their shoots to the wars; but their

positions had been different, and they had often attained honour-for

without flaw they were gallant, and brave deeds were done by them

before the selfish dissipation which marked them had sapped their

vigour.

     The present head of the family-if family it could now be called

when one remained of the direct line-was Geoffrey Brent. He was

almost a type of a worn-out race, manifesting in some ways its

most brilliant qualities, and in others its utter degradation. He

might be fairly compared with some of those antique Italian nobles

whom the painters have preserved to us with their courage, their

unscrupulousness, their refinement of lust and cruelty-the voluptuary

actual with the fiend potential. He was certainly handsome, with that

dark, aquiline, commanding beauty which women so generally recognise

as dominant. With men he was distant and cold; but such a bearing

never deters womankind. The inscrutable laws of sex have so arranged

that even a timid woman is not afraid of a fierce and haughty man.

And so it was that there was hardly a woman of any kind or degree,

who lived within view of Brent's Rock, who did not cherish some form

of secret admiration for the handsome wastrel. The category was a

wide one, for Brent's Rock rose up steeply from the midst of a level

region and for a circuit of a hundred miles it lay on the horizon,

with its high old towers and steep roofs cutting the level edge of

wood and hamlet, and far-scattered mansions.

     So long as Geoffrey Brent confined his dissipations to London and

Paris and Vienna-anywhere out of sight and sound of his home-opinion

was silent. It is easy to listen to far off echoes unmoved, and we

can treat them with disbelief, or scorn, or disdain, or whatever

attitude of coldness may suit our purpose. But when the scandal came

close to home it was another matter; and the feelings of independence

and integrity which is in people of every community which is not

utterly spoiled, asserted itself and demanded that condemnation

should be expressed. Still there was a certain reticence in all, and

no more notice was taken of the existing facts than was absolutely

necessary. Margaret Delandre bore herself so fearlessly and so

openly-she accepted her position as the justified companion of

Geoffrey Brent so naturally that people came to believe that she

was secretly married to him, and therefore thought it wiser to hold

their tongues lest time should justify her and also make her an

active enemy.

     The one person who, by his interference, could have settled all

doubts was debarred by circumstances from interfering in the matter.

Wykham Delandre had quarrelled with his sister-or perhaps it was

that she had quarrelled with him-and they were on terms not merely

of armed neutrality but of bitter hatred. The quarrel had been

antecedent to Margaret going to Brent's Rock. She and Wykham had

almost come to blows. There had certainly been threats on one side

and on the other; and in the end Wykham overcome with passion, had

ordered his sister to leave his house. She had risen straightway,

and, without waiting to pack up even her own personal belongings,

had walked out of the house. On the threshold she had paused for a

moment to hurl a bitter threat at Wykham that he would rue in shame

and despair to the last hour of his life his act of that day. Some

weeks had since passed; and it was understood in the neighbourhood

that Margaret had gone to London, when she suddenly appeared driving

out with Geoffrey Brent, and the entire neighbourhood knew before

nightfall that she had taken up her abode at the Rock. It was no

subject of surprise that Brent had come back unexpectedly, for such

was his usual custom. Even his own servants never knew when to expect

him, for there was a private door, of which he alone had the key, by

which he sometimes entered without anyone in the house being aware

of his coming. This was his usual method of appearing after a long

absence.

     Wykham Delandre was furious at the news. He vowed vengeance-and

to keep his mind level with his passion drank deeper than ever.

He tried several times to see his sister, but she contemptuously

refused to meet him. He tried to have an interview with Brent and

was refused by him also. Then he tried to stop him in the road, but

without avail, for Geoffrey was not a man to be stopped against his

will. Several actual encounters took place between the two men, and

many more were threatened and avoided. At last Wykham Delandre

settled down to a morose, vengeful acceptance of the situation.

     Neither Margaret nor Geoffrey was of a pacific temperament, and

it was not long before there began to be quarrels between them. One

thing would lead to another, and wine flowed freely at Brent's Rock.

Now and again the quarrels would assume a bitter aspect, and threats

would be exchanged in uncompromising language that fairly awed the

listening servants. But such quarrels generally ended where domestic

altercations do, in reconciliation, and in a mutual respect for the

fighting qualities proportionate to their manifestation. Fighting for

its own sake is found by a certain class of persons, all the world

over, to be a matter of absorbing interest, and there is no reason to

believe that domestic conditions minimise its potency. Geoffrey and

Margaret made occasional absences from Brent's Rock, and on each

of these occasions Wykham Delandre also absented himself; but as he

generally heard of the absence too late to be of any service, he

returned home each time in a more bitter and discontented frame of

mind than before.

     At last there came a time when the absence from Brent's Rock

became longer than before. Only a few days earlier there had been

a quarrel, exceeding in bitterness anything which had gone before;

but this, too, had been made up, and a trip on the Continent had

been mentioned before the servants. After a few days Wykham Delandre

also went away, and it was some weeks before he returned. It was

noticed that he was full of some new importance-satisfaction,

exaltation-they hardly knew how to call it. He went straightway to

Brent's Rock, and demanded to see Geoffrey Brent, and on being told

that he had not yet returned, said, with a grim decision which the

servants noted:

     "I shall come again. My news is solid-it can wait!" and turned

away. Week after week went by, and month after month; and then there

came a rumour, certified later on, that an accident had occurred

in the Zermatt valley. Whilst crossing a dangerous pass the carriage

containing an English lady and the driver had fallen over a

precipice, the gentleman of the party, Mr. Geoffrey Brent, having

been fortunately saved as he had been walking up the hill to ease the

horses. He gave information, and search was made. The broken rail,

the excoriated roadway, the marks where the horses had struggled

on the decline before finally pitching over into the torrent-all

told the sad tale. It was a wet season, and there had been much snow

in the winter, so that the river was swollen beyond its usual volume,

and the eddies of the stream were packed with ice. All search was

made, and finally the wreck of the carriage and the body of one horse

were found in an eddy of the river. Later on the body of the driver

was found on the sandy, torrent-swept waste near Tasch; but the body

of the lady, like that of the other horse, had quite disappeared, and

was-what was left of it by that time-whirling amongst the eddies of

the Rhone on its way down to the Lake of Geneva.

     Wykham Delandre made all the enquiries possible, but could not

find any trace of the missing woman. He found, however, in the books

of the various hotels the name of "Mr. and Mrs. Geoffrey Brent." And

he had a stone erected at Zermatt to his sister's memory, under her

married name, and a tablet put up in the church at Bretten, the

parish in which both Brent's Rock and Dander's Croft were situated.

     There was a lapse of nearly a year, after the excitement of the

matter had worn away, and the whole neighbourhood had gone on its

accustomed way. Brent was still absent, and Delandre more drunken,

more morose, and more revengeful than before.

     Then there was a new excitement. Brent's Rock was being made ready

for a new mistress. It was officially announced by Geoffrey himself

in a letter to the Vicar, that he had been married some months before

to an Italian lady, and that they were then on their way home. Then

a small army of workmen invaded the house; and hammer and plane

sounded, and a general air of size and paint pervaded the atmosphere.

One wing of the old house, the south, was entirely re-done; and then

the great body of the workmen departed, leaving only materials for

the doing of the old hall when Geoffrey Brent should have returned,

for he had directed that the decoration was only to be done under

his own eyes. He had brought with him accurate drawings of a hall in

the house of his bride's father, for he wished to reproduce for her

the place to which she had been accustomed. As the moulding had all

to be re-done, some scaffolding poles and boards were brought in and

laid on one side of the great hall, and also a great wooden tank or

box for mixing the lime, which was laid in bags beside it.

     When the new mistress of Brent's Rock arrived the bells of the

church rang out, and there was a general jubilation. She was a

beautiful creature, full of the poetry and fire and passion of the

South; and the few English words which she had learned were spoken

in such a sweet and pretty broken way that she won the hearts of the

people almost as much by the music of her voice as by the melting

beauty of her dark eyes.

     Geoffrey Brent seemed more happy than he had ever before appeared;

but there was a dark, anxious look on his face that was new to those

who knew him of old, and he started at times as though at some noise

that was unheard by others.

     And so months passed and the whisper grew that at last Brent's

Rock was to have an heir. Geoffrey was very tender to his wife, and

the new bond between them seemed to soften him. He took more interest

in his tenants and their needs than he had ever done; and works of

charity on his part as well as on his sweet young wife's were not

lacking. He seemed to have set all his hopes on the child that was

coming, and as he looked deeper into the future the dark shadow that

had come over his face seemed to die gradually away.

     All the time Wykham Delandre nursed his revenge. Deep in his heart

had grown up a purpose of vengeance which only waited an opportunity

to crystallise and take a definite shape. His vague idea was somehow

centred in the wife of Brent, for he knew that he could strike him

best through those he loved, and the coming time seemed to hold in

its womb the opportunity for which he longed. One night he sat alone

in the living-room of his house. It had once been a handsome room in

its way, but time and neglect had done their work and it was now

little better than a ruin, without dignity or picturesqueness of any

kind. He had been drinking heavily for some time and was more than

half stupefied. He thought he heard a noise as of someone at the door

and looked up. Then he called half savagely to come in; but there was

no response. With a muttered blasphemy he renewed his potations.

Presently he forgot all around him, sank into a daze, but suddenly

awoke to see standing before him some one or something like a

battered, ghostly edition of his sister. For a few moments there

came upon him a sort of fear. The woman before him, with distorted

features and burning eyes seemed hardly human, and the only thing

that seemed a reality of his sister, as she had been, was her wealth

of golden hair, and this was now streaked with grey. She eyed her

brother with a long, cold stare; and he, too, as he looked and began

to realise the actuality of her presence, found the hatred of her

which he had had, once again surging up in his heart. All the

brooding passion of the past year seemed to find a voice at once

as he asked her: -

     "Why are you here? You're dead and buried."

     "I am here, Wykham Delandre, for no love of you, but because I

hate another even more than I do you!" A great passion blazed in

her eyes.

     "Him?" he asked, in so fierce a whisper that even the woman was

for an instant startled till she regained her calm.

     "Yes, him!" she answered. "But make no mistake, my revenge is my

own; and I merely use you to help me to it." Wykham asked suddenly:

     "Did he marry you?"

     The woman's distorted face broadened out in a ghastly attempt

at a smile. It was a hideous mockery, for the broken features and

seamed scars took strange shapes and strange colours, and queer

lines of white showed out as the straining muscles pressed on the

old cicatrices.

     "So you would like to know! It would please your pride to feel

that your sister was truly married! Well, you shall not know. That

was my revenge on you, and I do not mean to change it by a hair's

breadth. I have come here to-night simply to let you know that I

am alive, so that if any violence be done me where I am going there

may be a witness."

     "Where are you going?" demanded her brother.

     "That is my affair! and I have not the least intention of letting

you know!" Wykham stood up, but the drink was on him and he reeled

and fell. As he lay on the floor he announced his intention of

following his sister; and with an outburst of splenetic humour told

her that he would follow her through the darkness by the light of

her hair, and of her beauty. At this she turned on him, and said

that there were others beside him that would rue her hair and her

beauty too. "As he will," she hissed; "for the hair remains though

the beauty be gone. When he withdrew the lynch-pin and sent us over

the precipice into the torrent, he had little thought of my beauty.

Perhaps his beauty would be scarred like mine were he whirled, as I

was, among the rocks of the Visp, and frozen on the ice pack in the

drift of the river. But let him beware! His time is coming!" and

with a fierce gesture she flung open the door and passed out into

the night.

                               ***

     Later on that night, Mrs. Brent, who was but half-asleep,

became suddenly awake and spoke to her husband:

     "Geoffrey, was not that the click of a lock somewhere below

our window?"

     But Geoffrey-though she thought that he, too, had started at the

noise-seemed sound asleep, and breathed heavily. Again Mrs. Brent

dozed; but this time awoke to the fact that her husband had arisen

and was partially dressed. He was deadly pale, and when the light

of the lamp which he had in his hand fell on his face, she was

frightened at the look in his eyes.

     "What is it, Geoffrey? What dost thou?" she asked.

     "Hush! little one," he answered, in a strange, hoarse voice. "Go

to sleep. I am restless, and wish to finish some work I left undone."

     "Bring it here, my husband," she said; "I am lonely and I fear

when thou art away."

     For reply he merely kissed her and went out, closing the door

behind him. She lay awake for awhile, and then nature asserted

itself, and she slept.

     Suddenly she started broad awake with the memory in her ears of

a smothered cry from somewhere not far off. She jumped up and ran to

the door and listened, but there was no sound. She grew alarmed for

her husband, and called out: "Geoffrey! Geoffrey!"

     After a few moments the door of the great hall opened, and

Geoffrey appeared at it, but without his lamp.

     "Hush!" he said, in a sort of whisper, and his voice was harsh and

stern. "Hush! Get to bed! I am working, and must not be disturbed. Go

to sleep, and do not wake the house!"

     With a chill in her heart-for the harshness of her husband's

voice was new to her-she crept back to bed and lay there trembling,

too frightened to cry, and listened to every sound. There was a long

pause of silence, and then the sound of some iron implement striking

muffled blows! Then there came a clang of a heavy stone falling,

followed by a muffled curse. Then a dragging sound, and then more

noise of stone on stone. She lay all the while in an agony of fear,

and her heart beat dreadfully. She heard a curious sort of scraping

sound; and then there was silence. Presently the door opened gently,

and Geoffrey appeared. His wife pretended to be asleep; but through

her eyelashes she saw him wash from his hands something white that

looked like lime.

     In the morning he made no allusion to the previous night, and

she was afraid to ask any question.

     From that day there seemed some shadow over Geoffrey Brent. He

neither ate nor slept as he had been accustomed, and his former

habit of turning suddenly as though someone were speaking from behind

him revived. The old hall seemed to have some kind of fascination for

him. He used to go there many times in the day, but grew impatient

if anyone, even his wife, entered it. When the builder's foreman came

to inquire about continuing his work Geoffrey was out driving; the

man went into the hall, and when Geoffrey returned the servant told

him of his arrival and where he was. With a frightful oath he pushed

the servant aside and hurried up to the old hall. The workman met

him almost at the door; and as Geoffrey burst into the room he ran

against him. The man apologised:

     "Beg pardon, sir, but I was just going out to make some enquiries.

I directed twelve sacks of lime to be sent here, but I see there are

only ten."

     "Damn the ten sacks and the twelve too!" was the ungracious and

incomprehensible rejoinder.

     The workman looked surprised, and tried to turn the conversation.

     "I see, sir, there is a little matter which our people must have

done; but the governor will of course see it set right at his own

cost."

     "What do you mean?"

     "That 'ere 'arth-stone, sir: Some idiot must have put a scaffold

pole on it and cracked it right down the middle, and it's thick

enough you'd think to stand hanythink." Geoffrey was silent for quite

a minute, and then said in a constrained voice and with much gentler

manner:

     "Tell your people that I am not going on with the work in the hall

at present. I want to leave it as it is for a while longer."

     "All right sir. I'll send up a few of our chaps to take away these

poles and lime bags and tidy the place up a bit."

     "No! No!" said Geoffrey, "leave them where they are. I shall send

and tell you when you are to get on with the work." So the foreman

went away, and his comment to his master was:

     "I'd send in the bill, sir, for the work already done. 'Pears to

me that money's a little shaky in that quarter."

     Once or twice Delandre tried to stop Brent on the road, and, at

last, finding that he could not attain his object rode after the

carriage, calling out:

     "What has become of my sister, your wife?" Geoffrey lashed his

horses into a gallop, and the other, seeing from his white face and

from his wife's collapse almost into a faint that this object was

attained, rode away with a scowl and a laugh.

     That night when Geoffrey went into the hall he passed over to

the great fireplace, and all at once started back with a smothered

cry. Then with an effort he pulled himself together and went away,

returning with a light. He bent down over the broken hearth-stone to

see if the moonlight falling through the storied window had in any

way deceived him. Then with a groan of anguish he sank to his knees.

     There, sure enough, through the crack in the broken stone were

protruding a multitude of threads of golden hair just tinged with

grey!

     He was disturbed by a noise at the door, and looking round, saw

his wife standing in the doorway. In the desperation of the moment

he took action to prevent discovery, and lighting a match at the

lamp, stooped down and burned away the hair that rose through the

broken stone. Then rising nonchalantly as he could, he pretended

surprise at seeing his wife beside him.

     For the next week he lived in an agony; for, whether by accident

or design, he could not find himself alone in the hall for any

length of time. At each visit the hair had grown afresh through the

crack, and he had to watch it carefully lest his terrible secret

should be discovered. He tried to find a receptacle for the body of

the murdered woman outside the house, but someone always interrupted

him; and once, when he was coming out of the private doorway, he was

met by his wife, who began to question him about it, and manifested

surprise that she should not have before noticed the key which he now

reluctantly showed her. Geoffrey dearly and passionately loved his

wife, so that any possibility of her discovering his dread secrets,

or even of doubting him, filled him with anguish; and after a couple

of days had passed, he could not help coming to the conclusion that,

at least, she suspected something.

     That very evening she came into the hall after her drive and found

him there sitting moodily by the deserted fireplace. She spoke to him

directly.

     "Geoffrey, I have been spoken to by that fellow Delandre, and

he says horrible things. He tells to me that a week ago his sister

returned to his house, the wreck and ruin of her former self, with

only her golden hair as of old, and announced some fell intention.

He asked me where she is-and oh, Geoffrey, she is dead, she is dead!

So how can she have returned? Oh! I am in dread, and I know not

where to turn!"

     For answer, Geoffrey burst into a torrent of blasphemy which made

her shudder. He cursed Delandre and his sister and all their kind,

and in especial he hurled curse after curse on her golden hair.

     "Oh, hush! hush!" she said, and was then silent, for she feared

her husband when she saw the evil effect of his humour. Geoffrey in

the torrent of his anger stood up and moved away from the hearth;

but suddenly stopped as he saw a new look of terror in his wife's

eyes. He followed their glance, and then he, too, shuddered-for

there on the broken hearth-stone lay a golden streak as the points

of the hair rose through the crack.

     "Look, look!" she shrieked. "It is some ghost of the dead! Come

away-come away!" and seizing her husband by the wrist with the frenzy

of madness, she pulled him from the room.

     That night she was in a raging fever. The doctor of the district

attended her at once, and special aid was telegraphed for to London.

Geoffrey was in despair, and in his anguish at the danger of his

young wife almost forgot his own crime and its consequences. In the

evening the doctor had to leave to attend to others; but he left

Geoffrey in charge of his wife. His last words were:

     "Remember, you must humour her till I come in the morning, or

till some other doctor has her case in hand. What you have to dread

is another attack of emotion. See that she is kept warm. Nothing

more can be done."

     Late in the evening, when the rest of the household had retired,

Geoffrey's wife got up from her bed and called to her husband.

     "Come!" she said. "Come to the old hall! I know where the gold

comes from! I want to see it grow!"

     Geoffrey would fain have stopped her, but he feared for her life

or reason on the one hand, and lest in a paroxysm she should shriek

out her terrible suspicion, and seeing that it was useless to try

to prevent her, wrapped a warm rug around her and went with her to

the old hall. When they entered, she turned and shut the door and

locked it.

     "We want no strangers amongst us three to-night!" she whispered

with a wan smile.

     "We three! nay we are but two," said Geoffrey with a shudder; he

feared to say more.

     "Sit here," said his wife as she put out the light. "Sit here

by the hearth and watch the gold growing. The silver moonlight is

jealous! See it steals along the floor towards the gold-our gold!"

Geoffrey looked with growing horror, and saw that during the hours

that had passed the golden hair had protruded further through the

broken hearth-stone. He tried to hide it by placing his feet over

the broken place; and his wife, drawing her chair beside him, leant

over and laid her head on his shoulder.

     "Now do not stir, dear," she said; "let us sit still and watch.

We shall find the secret of the growing gold!" He passed his arm

round her and sat silent; and as the moonlight stole along the floor

she sank to sleep.

     He feared to wake her; and so sat silent and miserable as the

hours stole away.

     Before his horror-struck eyes the golden-hair from the broken

stone grew and grew; and as it increased, so his heart got colder

and colder, till at last he had not power to stir, and sat with

eyes full of terror watching his doom.

                               ***

     In the morning when the London doctor came, neither Geoffrey

nor his wife could be found. Search was made in all the rooms, but

without avail. As a last resource the great door of the old hall

was broken open, and those who entered saw a grim and sorry sight.

     There by the deserted hearth Geoffrey Brent and his young wife

sat cold and white and dead. Her face was peaceful, and her eyes were

closed in sleep; but his face was a sight that made all who saw it

shudder, for there was on it a look of unutterable horror. The eyes

were open and stared glassily at his feet, which were twined with

tresses of golden hair, streaked with grey, which came through the

broken hearth-stone.

[junker-town]

SB Nation reviews: Sarah and Duck

Image: BBC

Graham MacAree: So. Sarah and Duck: a great children’s show, or the great children’s show?

Ryan Nanni: The only children’s show. Much like there are many stars but only one sun, Sarah and Duck is the center of our peaceful parenting entertainment system.

GM: It feels like most children’s shows accept that they’re going to slowly drive parents insane and so don’t bother with mitigation strategies.

Whereas Sarah and Duck doesn’t hate us.

RN: No, and this is because Sarah and Duck presents a world that seems much like our own but is, in fact, radically different. Let’s start with the first and most meaningful change: in this universe, all children are quiet.

GM: I wouldn’t swap my children for Sarah. But also, I wouldn’t not swap my children for Sarah (children, don’t read this).

The quietness is so impressive compared to, I don’t know, Paw Patrol. Their introductions couldn’t be more different.

RN: Everything that happens to Sarah and her friends on this show is met with the quiet version of the appropriate emotion. You fall down, and you wince quietly. You get a great present, and you grin and let out a tiny squeal. You eat something that doesn’t taste good, and you stick out your tongue and say “yuck” very softly. Not a single child lives this way, but that doesn’t make it any less aspirational.

GM: Sarah and Duck takes the presumption that quietness is coupled to ‘boring’ and demolishes it through ... I don’t know, sheer surrealism?

Those episodes must be hard to write — there’s no formula. If there’s a problem it’ll get resolved, but the shape of the problem and the shape of the resolution are not telegraphed at all. And mostly interesting, quiet things happen, and are reacted to, quietly. And then the curtain comes down seven minutes later. It’s fascinating that they’ve managed to construct a passable world out of these vignettes.

RN: Sarah and Duck embraces two truths that help with that, I think. The first is that problems come in various sizes. Sometimes your bouncy ball is insufficiently bouncy. Sometimes your yard floods. Both are stressful! The second truth is that resolution often is a matter of shifting your attitude, not changing the world around you. Take an episode where Scarf Lady wants to sell knit goods in the park, but the weather’s too hot for hats or sweaters. The answer isn’t to make something else. It’s to find a different use for those items, so a hat becomes a Frisbee, and a sweater becomes something comfy to sit on in the grass.

GM: The wool Frisbee didn’t work very well, but yes.

Apart from quietness, one of the things I most love about Sarah and Duck is that it is relentlessly, relentlessly kind. The combination of the general placidness and active acts of goodness make it extraordinarily soothing.

RN: There’s not really a mean character on the show, is there?

GM: No. Although Plate Girl is sort of jarring — while she’s not actively antagonistic to Sarah or Duck, she’s a little antagonistic to the ethos. I used to have John in that category too, but Season Three redeems him so thoroughly his appearances in the first two seasons are retroactively better.

Who’s your favorite character?

RN: Probably Moon. He’s got a surprisingly developed backstory and a lot of layers considering the character could literally just be “I’m the Moon, and I hang out in the sky at night.” What about you?

GM: I love Moon as well. It’s the kindness again, I think — we get to see him develop into an extraordinary painter over the first two seasons, and rather than flaunt his skill he is almost perversely appreciative of Sarah’s role in getting him started. I’ve actually started trying to steal his reaction when someone compliments his work: “Do you really think so? That’s very kind of you!” which is a step up from my usual “Well, obviously.”

But since you’ve already picked Moon, I love what they did with Duck.

In a kid’s show about a little girl and her duck, you’d expect them to have the duck talk. Duck doesn’t talk. He’s more communicative and thoughtful than the average duck, but mostly he’s sort of a nuisance who’s just in it for the bread.

RN: They also don’t do the typical kids show thing where Duck only plays one type of foil. He can be the troublemaker, or the coward, or overly helpful, or just tag along.

GM: Right. And then in Season Three, almost a hundred episodes in, they decide to make him preternaturally good at decorating cakes, which is a great delayed payoff to his being fundamentally a duck in all other ways.

RN: Here’s a tricky question. Most television for children is overtly about teaching. Do you think Sarah and Duck adheres to that? If not, is that a strength or a weakness?

GM: Not exactly. But I’m not convinced teaching small children matters much anyway. Really, what you want is to inspire a deep and (hopefully) insatiable curiosity about the world.

By setting up a really interesting world with a coherent, if bizarre, internal physics, I think Sarah and Duck does do that. Things happen pseudo-logically and in repeatable ways. Exploring the world has payoffs in an episode, and well after the episode.

RN: Yeah, the world of the show is oddly fascinating. There are adults, and most of them have normal jobs. (The Cloud Captain is a notable exception.) There’s a big department store and public transit. (Though the bus can also go underwater.) Also all the children seem to live by themselves, but they do responsible things like grocery shopping and cleaning up.

GM: Do they live alone? It’s not clear to me whether the Narrator is an actual presence in Sarah’s life or not.

RN: Let me amend my statement: no child on the show ever refers to their parents or a guardian of any sort.

GM: Right. But the Narrator (he’s played by Roger Allam, who is probably the single biggest reason the show is Quiet) is sometimes obviously Sarah’s dad and sometimes sort of a ghostly presence in her adventures. The show is totally uninterested in resolving this, which is the right approach, because the revelation would be uninteresting.

RN: Wait, I did think of a slightly mean character: Scarf Lady’s nemesis, Hat Lady.

GM: I hope they get further into the backstory behind their relationship. Scarf Lady has enough history to merit her own spin-off show, and Hat Lady is a great pseudo-villain in both episodes in which she appears.

RN: You mean how she’s just casually an Olympian? Or at least the equivalent in this universe, since the Olympics would absolutely sue a TV show for kids.

GM: And owns, for no apparent reason, a jet-propelled hot air balloon? And a talking bag?

As an aside, it is pretty great that everything talks in Sarah and Duck except the animals.

RN: There’s a talking CAKE. Cake winds up living in a bakery, where he watches dozens of his baked brethren sold for consumption and is ... never bothered by it, I guess? Sometimes it’s best to not think too hard about the logistics.

GM: Rainbow is also fun, especially when they start using the mechanics of him getting yanked around by the weather to tell stories.

The way Sarah and Duck manages to expand everything that happens into something else down the line is magnificent. The show has huge, intersecting plot arcs!

Granted, those arcs don’t matter, but the intricacy gives the illusion of a huge world the writers are exploring, rather than one they’re creating per se.

RN: I think that goes back to the spirit of curiosity you mentioned. Sarah and Duck doesn’t focus a ton on existing character dynamics. It takes them into the world and shows them new people or objects or experiences, and it treats them all as equally interesting. And it reflects something very true about children: fascination can come from anywhere. (Any parent who has given a child a Christmas gift where the ribbon was more intriguing than the toy knows this to be so.)

GM: Ultimately, I think Sarah and Duck is trying to be a kids’ show in that it’s built to show off the world through children’s eyes rather than a show built to amuse kids with shiny lights and loud noises.

There’s an ugly cynicism to most children’s entertainment which Sarah and Duck completely elides.

RN: I agree. In most shows, the adults are there to teach and guide the children. The adults in Sarah and Duck aren’t really much wiser or more capable, they’re just older. In many ways, it’s about the value and joy kids find in doing things independently.

GM: The care and craftsmanship isn’t just in the writing either. The overall aesthetic is beautiful, and the music and sound design is gorgeous.

RN: Is it fair to say the visuals are beautiful and complex in their simplicity?

GM: Yes. But also, the attention to detail is stupendous. Watch what the characters and environment are doing when they’re not the focus of a scene, for instance. It all ties back to the world feeling like a place to be inhabited and explored rather than one being sketched in on the fly.

RN: The music is extraordinarily pleasant as well. Most scenes are highlighted by just one or two instruments playing a calm, friendly tune, and the original songs are 1) short, 2) easy for a child or their tone-deaf parent to sing, and 3) again, not shouted.

GM: My one-year-old thinks the ‘theme song’ is shouted.

RN: Again, the show’s quiet is purely an aspiration, not a reality.

GM: Speaking of aspiration, one of the few things keeping me sensible in the year of our lord 2020 is that Season Four is going to be announced. I suspect it won’t be, because that’s how the world goes ... but wouldn’t it be nice?

RN: Season Four would be a wonderful surprise. But if we have to spend 2020 rewatching old episodes, well, that’d be pleasant, too.

Style 10

Content 10

Overall 10

[iamthechocobabe]

A True Nightmare

....what have I done?  Just...what the actual fuck am I doing? WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK AM I DOING????? 

A soulmate AU based on Ardyn’s history with his own Soulmate. 

A/N:This is not an Ardyn Soulmate love story. If that’s what you’re hoping for, you’re gonna have to go somewhere else. 

Aw, shit. Tagging the senpais: @cupnoodle-queen @bespectacled-girl @nifwrites @roses-and-oceans @gladiolus-mamacitia @themissimmortal 

A True Nightmare A Soulmate AU based on We Intertwined by @nifwrites

~Prologue~ SFW Word Count: 1,713

"We're done, milady-you can get up now," 

Sighing deeply, Aryelle stretched her neck after going at least three hours without moving, feeling some of her bones pop while doing so. Tossing some of her ink black hair that reached her lower back over her one shoulder, Aryelle picked up the skirts of the midnight blue dress she wore for the occasion and went over to look at the painting that her fiancee had insisted for the wedding announcement, though she hated the idea of sitting for so long for something so trivial. It was done, though, and she was all the more relieved. 

"Just a few finishing touches," the painter said as Aryelle observed the painting, her nose crinkling at the sight of her looking so...fine. 

Aryelle wasn't used to 'fine'. She was used to her simple dresses, the simple farm just outside The Crown City-she was used to a simple life. Now, engaged to royalty, she spent nearly every single day on the go, attending galas, royal gatherings, etc. The painting that had her fine dress and jewelry, her pale skin, red painted lips, the shadow and glitter over her emerald green eyes-it was a reminder. A reminder of who she should be, what the people wanted her to be, not who she really was. 

Touching the star-shaped soulmate mark on her left wrist, Aryelle tried once again to block out the memory of how she came to be in a position of such fine lineage, engaged to the new King of Lucis. How she had discovered a gentry man sleeping in her families barn, how she tried to get him to leave because he was scaring the cows, how in the process he accidentally saw her soulmate mark. 

How he stared at her when he realized they were destined for one another, as if she was now all that mattered in his eyes. 

Shaking the memory from her mind, Aryelle nodded her approval at the anxiously waiting painter before turning to the two Crownsguards that followed her everywhere she went and left the room with them in tow. She hated never having any real moment of privacy, but it was the life of royalty...the life she was now destined for, whether she approved of it or not at this point. 

The sound of the fabric of Aryelle's skirts moving through the halls was the only noise at this time of the day as she walked to her rooms, the rooms of a future queen. The memory came back, how he insisted on courting her, how he treated her like royalty...

How she had fallen in love with him. 

"Milady," Aryelle was grateful for the interruption of the memories that plagued her for three months now and turned to face the quivering young man who she recognized as one of the many Crownsguards. "His majesty needs you," 

"Now?" Aryelle was exhausted after having endured three hours of what she felt was absolute torture. The thought of facing her fiancee was a new kind of suffering she'd rather not endure. "Tell him I’ll see him at dinner," 

"It's urgent, milady..." the man paused and averted his gaze before he said his next words. "He's here..."

"Who is..." Realization hit Aryelle and she fought the panic trying to take her breath as she faced the Crownsguard. "Are you sure?" 

"They caught him trying to sneak into your rooms," 

"Astrals," Cursing, Aryelle bit her finger to try and calm her nerves unsuccessfully. The Crownsguard, never leaving, looked at his future queen with sympathy as her breath quickened and she fought the panic rising in her chest-everyone had sympathy for her. "And I am required to be there?" 

"The King said you must be there," 

Of course-he had to make his statement. She waited until her breath slowed again before heading to the throne room, knowing they wouldn't bring him forth until both Aryelle and the new King were present. Present for the King's show of power. 

Aryelle waited patiently for herself to be announced before she was allowed to enter the throne room-in private, she was herself, very small and timid, but she knew how to act in front of the courts. Walking with the grace and coldness of any matriarch, Aryelle went to her King and her fiancee's side, the King's crown almost looking silly on him compared to his golden blonde hair and thick mustache. No one else seemed to think that the new King looked false...no one else seemed to think he was unfit to be on that chair. 

No one thought that except her. 

"Must I be here?" Aryelle asked tiredly as the King set the guards to bring the prisoner into the room, the many advisers all set up around them to watch as the scene would unfold. How the King would demonstrate to all of the delegates and all of the world that he was now in charge. 

"He must know," The King said, his cold gaze never wavering. "He must know that you are my future wife now," 

"But-" Aryelle's protests were cut short when the doors opened and the former King of Light, the fallen King, practically strolled into the room with no assistance from the guards that surrounded him. 

"Ah, Lorin," With a gracious bow, Ardyn looked back up at the man who was his cousin and was next in line after a new King was demanded for. "I must say, that crown looks rather silly on you," Aryelle shivered when Ardyn looked at her with a look of fondness that she used to adore. "Doesn't it look silly on him, my dear?" 

"It belongs on the true King of Light," King Lorin said, the jealousy seeping into his tone-a jealousy only Aryelle and Ardyn knew. "You were rejected by The Crystal, Ardyn-you are not that King," 

"Damn you and your crown," Ardyn said almost comically, as if he thought the situation was funny. "I am not here for it-I am here for her," 

Aryelle tried to keep herself level headed as Ardyn stared at her with the same fondness, tried to fight the cringe she felt when she saw Ardyn smile. "I know this isn't what you want, love," Ardyn almost whispered the words, the hurt and betrayal on his voice as he spoke. "I know what you want-I know you more than anyone. I was a fool for taking you away from that. But we'll go away, we'll-we'll go back to your farm. I always did imagine leading a simple lifestyle," Hope in his eyes, he raised his hand towards Aryelle. "Just...please. Please," 

"She has rescinded your hand and has accepted mine," King Lorin said, gripping the hold on Aryelle's arm tighter. 

Ardyn's look darkened, the anger now imminent on his features. "As if I were to care what a pompous-" Ardyn was struck from behind by a guard, forcing him on his knees. 

Aryelle couldn't stand it anymore-shaking away her fiancees arm, she approached Ardyn with the cold front that she had prepared for the world as queen. Kneeling down, she felt her face soften slightly and said her next words in whispers, not wanting anyone to hear her true pity for him. "Why did you come back?" 

"Aryelle, I-we are one soul. One person...please, I can't-I can't do this, not without you," 

"You have to stop," she whispered again and Aryelle began to notice the counselors getting antsy at her hushed tones, wanting to know if the future queen secretly supported the former king. "Please, leave and never come back," 

"But we're destined for the stars!" Ardyn shouted, not caring who heard her. And there it was-that saying. It was Ardyn's favorite term of endearment towards Aryelle, referring to their star shaped soulmate marks, hers on her left wrist and his on his right. 

Before, Aryelle had loved it-now, it sounded like a curse. 

Standing and putting on her cold front once again, Aryelle straightened her shoulders. "We are not destined for anything," she said, seething with the coldness of a harsh queen. "You severed whatever bond we may have had after you tainted yourself. You destroyed your destiny and mine, Ardyn," 

"I am not tainted!!!" Practically screaming, guards held Ardyn back as he tried to approach Aryelle, but she didn't flinch at his rage or his bitterness. "I am not tainted," he repeated, as if somehow saying it would make it true.

"I know what I saw that night, Ardyn," Aryelle said, the vision of Ardyn, her love's true nature, his ghostly white skin, his face cracked and leaking a disgusting oozing black substance, his unholy golden irises against black eyes now and forever haunting her. 

"I wasn't-" Ardyn tried to say, but Aryelle wouldn't hear it. 

"I know what I saw!" Tears threatened to overwhelm Aryelle, but she bit them back and forced herself to appear cool and collected once again so she could speak clearly the guards holding Ardyn. "Get him out of my sight and make sure he doesn't return," 

"Wait-wait!" Panic overtook Ardyn as he struggled against the guards dragging him away, now realizing that Aryelle never would and could accept him as he was. "Aryelle, please-please! Come back to me!" 

Aryelle forced her ears to block his desperate pleas, though they tore into her heart and made her want to crumple into a heap and sob. As she approached her fiancee again, King Lorin shot a smug look at Ardyn and Aryelle winced at the anger she knew Ardyn would show, almost knowing that his mental state would now be completely undone. 

"Aryelle!" Turning, Aryelle felt herself pale at the sight before her, the darkness that was now beginning to surround Ardyn as his true self emerged, the image that haunted her nightmares. Anger leaked along with the strange black daemonic substance as his eyes glowed like flames against the darkness surrounding him. "I will return for you! I will make sure you and everyone knows my redemption!!!" 

Closing her eyes, Aryelle tried to block out the sounds as Ardyn's cries were heard by everyone in Eos, his daemonic voice echoing loudly throughout the halls in the Citadel, throughout The Crown City, throughout Eos. "I will find you! We are destined for the stars! ARYELLE!"