"Now my neck is open wide/ Begging for a fist around it/ Already choking on my pride/ But there's no use crying about it// I'm heading straight for the castle/ They want to make me their queen/ And there's an old man sitting on the throne and he's saying that I probably shouldn't be so mean/ I'm heading straight for the castle/ They've got the kingdom locked up/ And there's an old man sitting on the throne and he's saying I should probably keep my pretty mouth shut//

- Castle

:/:

"Do you know where he is?" Bella asked, pacing back and forth. After much explaining by Joshua, who had not quite forgiven himself for activating the spell so quickly, she had only just managed to grasp the idea of her living.

"We think he's in the Jezequel House", Lily replied, trying to avoid Joshua's glare. He soon took off, leaving his number with Olalla since he has taken a certain 'liking' to her. "Our agents have been tracking him ever since your, um..."

"Death?" Bella finished. "So, if you know where he is, why do you need me?"

"He doesn't remember us, Bella", Garson exclaimed. "He doesn't know any of us".

"But, you're his family. What the devil would make him do this?"

"The devil indeed", Garson muttered. "Remember Keres?"

"I think every corpse remembers its murderer", Bella answered, the night of her demise running to the front of her mind. God, this was just so weird. She stopped pacing for a moment, turning towards Olalla. "Can you drive?"

"Yes", Olalla murmured.

"Can you take me to him? Hyde. I'll talk to him, I can only try".

"Let me come with you", Lily added. "I've got MIO behind me and a gun at my side. I could be helpful".

"Fine", Olalla murmured, noting the MIO car parked outside. "But, if we're fighting a battle, we need soldiers. 'Cause right now our army is a spy, a landlady and a monster. We need someone who knows their way around a rifle. And I know a person. Get me on the phone".

:/:
"What took you so long, Elvina?" Keres hissed, seeing her emerge from the trees. They had moved their operations to the Jezequel church, where they would put the last touches to their plan in place. Hyde was lingering inside near the portal, which gave Keres the chance to catch up on what had been happening.

"I'm sorry, Ma'am. Semira was not an easy person to track, but..." the Succubus started, passing over the Jezequel Amulet. Keres smiled, baring all her sharpened teeth.

"Yes", she whispered. "Finally. The last instrument".

"Um, Ma'am there was someone else there. Another woman talking to Semira". Keres furrowed her brow in puzzlement, then realised.

"Dark hair, wearing green, Russian accent?" she asked, and Elvina nodded. Keres scoffed, Lottie had made it out alive after all. "Remind me to kill that girl when this is over". Keres lifted the amulet up by its chain, staring into it. Such power wasted on such a infantile brat. "Did you do as I asked? Is Semira dead?"

"Weak, but not dead, I'm afraid".

"You've failed me?"

"I- I brought you what you needed", Elvina stuttered. She knew from the moment she handed that amulet over she was no longer needed, but she would have thought Keres might have been merciful with her. Though then again, Keres was a manipulative woman, and never liked to leave trails.

"And you left a witness. Semira was never really with Tenebrae anyway, so what's stopping her from going to MIO, hm? The Jekyll's?" Keres snarled, then calmed for a moment. It was almost a calculating calmness, cruel in her glare that quietly was working out the best way to dispose of this person. "Succubuses are hard to kill, you know. It takes a lot to even pierce their skin. Physically, they're invulnerable. However, mentally..." she lulled, with a glint in her eye. "That's a different story".

"What are you going to do?"

"Shh", Keres hushed, putting a finger to her lips. Lifting a clawed hand to Elvina face, she cackled as the Succubus fell to the ground, clutching her head in pain. The vampire queen held her ground, watching as Elvina fell to the ground, completely lifeless. All Keres did was laugh.

:/:

"So, Keres and Hyde are working together. Why?" Bella commented, getting into the front of the car. Lily sat in the back, and Olalla was in the driving seat; luckily not in her Hyde state. Though they had protested, Maggie, Ravi and Garson had gone back to the house, abiding by Olalla's wishes. The car they sat in was smart, with grey fabric seats, black dashboards and laminate interiors. On the steering wheel was a logo of a triangle with an 'M' inside it. Olalla guessed it was MIO's mark.

"We don't know", Lily answered. "However Keres was presumed dead, so the fact that she's back is worrying all the same".

"She was dead?"

"Yes. Believed to have been shot by Captain Dance", Lily replied, and Bella didn't ask any more. The only information she could take from any answers MIO gave her was that things seemed to have fallen apart since Hyde's disappearance. "So who's this person you know then?" the agent asked Olalla.

"A friend. Well, a friend of my brother's", Olalla answered, turning a corner. "She lives up on the border of the city. Nice lady, just don't peeve her off or she'll probably shoot you". Various shops passed the window, but up ahead, on the side of the road, was a woman that caught her. She was dressed in black and green, with bobbed brunette hair, and looking rather stressed. "Lottie?" she murmured to herself, driving slightly faster down the road, then slowing down in front of her. The car immediately caught Lottie's eye, and a relieved smile crossed her face.

"Oh thank God", Lottie exclaimed. Olalla gestured to the back door, and her sister got in, sitting next to Lily.

"So..." Olalla started, looking behind her. "Where the Hell have you been?"

"The Jezequel Amulet, inside it there is a maze, of sorts. Called the Puzzlebox. When we were looking for Robert, Tenebrae put me in there. And our father, he..." Lottie explained, biting her lip. Her and Louis didn't leave on the best of terms, and she felt absolutely terrible. He had been through so much, and she hadn't been a good daughter to him.

"You saw our father?" Olalla asked.

"Yes. He's been trapped in there for years", Lottie lilted, not noticing how excited she was becoming. "But, he... he sacrificed himself so I could get out".

"Well, you've missed quite a lot", Olalla replied, pulling away from the curb and started driving again. "Bella's back". The said landlady smiled, looking towards Lottie, and she looked back, wide-eyed.

Olalla kept her eyes on the road. It wasn't long to go. Though she was a country lass, Hilary Barnstaple was not someone to mess with; no vampire queen would dare even try.

:/:

Hyde sat, pondering the mural of Pan on the wall of the Jezequel church. The Hyde Sword and Jekyll Ring sat in front of him, and he was almost tempted to use them. He knew how much power he wielded with the sword, what about when he combined it with the ring?
Before he could answer his question, Keres slunk in.

"The final instrument, Hyde" she hissed, throwing it over. "We now can open the portal". Smiling, she traced a pointed fingernail down his jawline. "Are you ready to be a king?"

"Well, I always thought I'd look good in a crown", Hyde answered, smirking. He grabbed her hand, tracing circles on her palm, then looked at her, with an almost malignant look in his eye. "But doesn't every king need a queen?"

"Are you asking me, Mr Hyde?" Keres asked, knowing that she would never love a someone like Hyde. He lacked conviction, and deep down he was just a man. He was just a pawn in Tenebrae's plan, like all the other members of his freak-show family. Once the portal was open, the instruments would either kill him or drive him to become some wandering madman. Nothing, no man nor monster, could hold the power of all three instruments at a time. "Because if you were I'd say yes".

:/:
"How far away does this woman live?" Lottie asked, getting slightly impatient. They had been driving down the same country road for twenty minutes with no sign of a house anywhere.

"She lives on hunting ground. Only a few minutes away", Olalla answered, a barrage of questions about Lottie's disappearance entering her mind. She had said she had seen their father, but not given any other information about him. Olalla had always wondered about her parentage, but she always accepted they were dead and that Dance was her father.

"Our father was a good man, Olalla. Arrogant perhaps, but a good man nonetheless", Lottie started, sensing her sister's doubt over her departure. "Tenebrae lied-".

"Even if they did he still be dead. Look, haven't you thought that it was just a trick. If this 'Puzzlebox' is what you say it is, then isn't it possible that he was an illusion?"

"I saw him, though. It wasn't a trick".

"Then why isn't he here, Lotts?"

"I told you, he sacrificed himself to defeat Abbadon".

"You mean the Prince of the Abyss, Abbadon? The one that cannot leave Hell". Lottie couldn't quite get her head around it all. Surely it couldn't have deception. Well, could it? The Puzzlebox was meant to scare you, and nothing scared Lottie more than her past. Her past contained things to be ashamed of, things that she couldn't change. Though however much she ran from it, it always seemed to catch up with her. Lottie stayed quiet from then on; it was obviously a sensitive subject for her sister. "Anyway", Olalla started, but was cut off by the sound of two gunshots. Emerging from the trees was a short woman, dressed in a brown overcoat and bucket hat, with two rifles strapped to her back, a sword from her belt and a metal briefcase in her hand. A small smile crossed her face seeing the car, and she walked over to it, getting into the backseat. "Bit of an overkill, Hils", Olalla commented, looking behind her to reverse.

"What? You said it would be dangerous", Hils lilted. "So I brought my best. Been testing them out this morning. Beautiful piece of kit".

"What's in the case?" Bella asked curiously, as Olalla pulled out back onto the country road.

"Fifteen black monocane bullets. Gift from MIO", Hils answered, not realising that the representative of the said organisation was sitting right next to her. Both Hyde sisters raised their eyebrows in confusion, and Lottie looked straight at Lily, waiting for an explanation to why MIO was supplying a friend of theirs with something that could possibly kill them. Lily shrugged, matching their confusion.

"Nothing to do with me", she replied.

"So what's the plan?" Bella said after an awkward minute of silence.

"We find Robert, destroy the instruments and kill Keres", Olalla murmured.

"Well, the last bit I will be glad to do", Bella exclaimed, smiling.

:/:

Placing the Jekyll Ring on handle of the Hyde Sword, Keres ripped the amulet from its chain and connected it to the device. Hyde stood chipping bits of stone off the tomb, like an idle school boy, waiting for her to complete it. He watched her attentively, her nimble, sharp-nailed fingers breaking through the metal links on the chain. Suddenly, she stopped, sensing something. Someone.

"Olalla", she murmured. "She's approaching".

"Who's she?" Hyde growled, and Keres smirked. It amused her to see Hyde like this.

"She's one of my vampires. A rogue".

"Shall I deal with her?"

"No, let her come. I'd like for her to see our good work, see how late she is to stop it". Picking up the combined Pan Instruments, she took a moment, then passes it over to Hyde, who held it instinctively. "Are you ready to have some fun?" she lulled.

"It's all I've ever wanted", Hyde replied in a mischievously cheerful snarl...

:/:

"Is it left or right for the church?" Bella asked. The 'army' had left their car down near The Black Dog public house, and were now making steady progress up the hill to the family church. Well, sort of. They had seemed to had become disorientated and, as hardly any of them had actually visited the church, were now almost lost.

"Well", Hils started, going up further ahead, eyes widening at what she saw. "I'm no geographer, but I would say head towards the blue light coming from the church doors".

"No", Olalla breathed, and Lottie looked just as alarmed. But there it was, no one could disagree that there wasn't the cyan light of the portal shining out of the doors of the Jezequel Church. "Hyde... What have you done?"

:/: