Part your lips, let the breathing slow; Ignore your mind for your heart, it knows where to go. Settle down, sink into the earth; Let the doubt wash away, in your gods be assured.

"I demand to know where you're taking me."

"You wanted drink and clean clothes, yes?"

"Yes - this is neither of those."

"Soon, Mr. Lutton, soon." Iyan wanted to strangle Tehn. It simply wasn't fair, this manipulation. Even as much as he wanted to be rid of the albino and his hypnotic eyes, there was something almost chemical that pulled Iyan along. They clearly weren't headed anywhere that would produce clothes devoid of the swell of water, nor near the smell of food, even something as plain as Wendy's shoddy bread.

Tehn soon wheeled Iyan around the side of a tent-like structure, hastily erected once the Catrodeans had mostly all made their ways through the constructed waterfall. "Sit," he commanded gently, pushing on Iyan's shoulders until the bruised and battered guest complied. "Wait here." Before Iyan could ask anything else, Tehn flitted away, leaving behind the smell of pinecones and cherries. Had he always smelled like that, or had the feast begun in earnest? Iyan had yet to see anyone other than Wendy with food, now that he thought about it, and this concerned him. Was this not the third and final day, the time for feasts? Perhaps Wendy had lied. It would not have surprised him - as willing as the odd woman was to walk with him and divulge her opinions about her family and friends, she was still a native to this horrible place, and ultimately unsympathetic to making Iyan comfortable. Was misdirection not an excellent way to reduce comfort? Iyan had seen a cat once, smacking a rabbit around instead of simply killing it, until the poor creature succumbed to a nervous dizziness. He would not have thought it possible for a rabbit to faint, but it appeared very much as though it had, overwhelmed with movement and fear.

A clatter sounded behind him, and he looked up to see the twins slide into view. The dark cloaks were now gone, replaced instead by a stark nakedness above the waist. It should not have surprised Iyan to see this, but it did - especially fascinating was the tattoo that lurched from the pale, bare arm of one twin to the next.

"What is that?" he asked softly, pointing to the inky shape that bound the twins together. They smiled and shared a look.

"Our oath to one another." One twin nodded in serene approval, and they grasped hands. "A memory of our promises, kept and unfulfilled both."

Iyan blinked at them. It would have surprised him in no ways, if these two were the strange others they had warned against when he first arrived, the night they constructed their wards against evil and the like. They seemed very much like the sort of lost souls who had run away from something sinister, only to be pulled back and twisted by its bizarre influence.

"Which of you is Adolset?" he asked, as the name came quite suddenly to the forefront of his thoughts. Where had he heard the name, and why had it taken so long to remember? Iyan hated this forgetfulness, this unreliability of the memory and the mind. He would have to do better, lest he forgot the important things and people in his life. What would he do without Aunt Myra's lessons guiding him, or without Kairie's kisses and caresses in his days of freedom, once he escaped?

Sharing an unsettling laugh, the twins sat themselves down beside Iyan and began to touch him, prying the damp clothes loose from his scratched skin. "I am called Adolset," one said, and the other added "I am called Audor." There was no difference in their appearance at all, and Iyan immediately realised it was quite useless to have heard their names at all. Still, at least the name in his memory hadn't been from something imagined. Perhaps it had been from a hallucination - Kairie was not the only who inhabited his mind, it seemed. Distraction abated, Iyan attempted to shrug off the twins' touches, but two was a great deal more than one, and they soon succeeded in rendering him naked on the forest floor.

"I am beginning to dislike you all intensely," he stated, feeling the blush of anger and embarrassment cover him more than his clothes had. This only earned him a headful of laughter and a bucket of exceedingly cold water from behind, hidden by a tree and dumped unceremoniously onto him by the reappearing Tehn.

"Now that you're naked," cried the albino, seeming to delight in the shrieks of Iyan, "we can prepare you for the final test of worthiness!" It would have been an odd thing to witness, the usually demure Tehn howling like he adopted Fetrick's energy, had Iyan not been doused in his worst fear from behind. The ensuing preparation saw him humiliated by little more than strangers, and by the time it had concluded, Iyan was quite sure he would never be able to clean himself without being reminded of the horror being powerless to the ritualistic cleaning of insane men.

Now cleaned and stuffed into new clothes (which, really, were hardly more than elegant rags, so little did they actually cover and conceal), Iyan was ushered blushing out of the clearing and onto the path once more, winding and twisting into the dark of the woods. It would have been dark, Iyan noted, perhaps a day or two prior, but the excitement in the air was personified by the lanterns and lights struck up around the trees. Had he stumbled across a hidden village? Perhaps they were magical trees, so abundant were the lights. At any rate, the Catrodeans had transformed the scenery into something magnificent, as reluctant as Iyan was to admit it. The only thing he noted that was of some cause for alarm (and what a great deal of alarm this was!) happened to be the groups of people scattered about, curled up in one another's arms, tangled into clusters of limbs and sweat and flesh. This was hardly a feast!

"What's happening?" He turned away out of modesty, to which Tehn chuckled and gently pushed his head back.

"This is the final trial," he murmured, lips pressed against Iyan's neck, cool breath forming each letter. "Together, we continue on. Together, we bainsh our fear and embrace life."

The twins stepped in front of the vibrant scene and extended their arms slightly. "Come, Blue-Eyes. Be with us and know our world." Iyan's heart had begun to hammer. Whatever it was he'd been bathed in had coated him in some strange smell, or perhaps accentuated one that was already there, and it made him breathless.

"I don't... I don't want this," he tried to say, but Tehn had whirled him around, pressed their mouths together. The swirl of their breaths, wildly different temperatures, made it almost impossible not to gasp, something Tehn appeared to have been counting on. He pushed Iyan backwards, into the arms of the complicit twins. "Please! Please, just tell me where Kairie is!" The group began to laugh a horrid, hyena-like laugh that made Iyan's head pound. If he was going to have to join with someone in the flesh, why could it not be the one who'd lured him to this hellish pit of trees and darkness? Iyan wanted his crown back. It was supposed to protect him, mark him as this untouchable things, and he felt very much in violation of that at the moment. Before he could move much more, another group had fallen into theirs, and the writhing of limbs became indistinguishable. Was it his hand that held the pale neck full of bite marks and bruises? Were those the arms of the twins, wrapped around too many chests and backs to count?

Hours seemed to pass in the abyss of skin. The lights dimmed, by some unseen hand or an unfelt wind, and the breaths and sighs of the crowd appeared almost at an end. Iyan wasn't sure where he was, be it on the ground or on someone. It wasn't long before even that disappeared, and the forest lay in a strange, sobering stillness. When he was sure he wouldn't disturb any of the deeply breathing chests, he very slowly sat up and attempted to move to the side, trying to reach solid ground.

Eventually, he succeeded, and found himself kneeling once more on the dirt, his forehead pressed into the mossy root of a tree. Was this really all his life amounted to? You're a puppet and a toy, he berated himself, his face burning as tears pressed against his eyes. Your aunt wanted a friend, your uncle wanted a slave, and your lover only wanted your body. Your life.

In the darkness, a voice called out. It was not an audible sound, not quite, but Iyan heard it nevertheless. It was deep and familiar, like the rush of blood when one stands too fast, or the nagging thoughts he'd had when Aunt Myra died.

Part your lips, let the breathing slow.

He gasped and threw his head up, tears flying from his cheeks into the forest. "H-hello?" The voice sounded again, thundering in his very being. How had nobody else heard? Why were the trees still and unmoving in the face of this great voice?
Ignore your mind for your heart, it knows where to go.

"Who are you! I-I've heard you before," Iyan trailed off, mumbling the words as he recalled it was familiar. There was no particular sensation like hearing a voice, and this one was unforgettable. He had heard it when Myra died. What had it said? Why had it waited all this time to repeat itself? Iyan didn't want to hear anything else from it, especially not so relevant to the mess of sex he'd suffered through. The voice had other plans, and proceeded to cry out more, until Iyan was prostrate on the ground, sobbing into the dirt for reprieve.

Settle down, sink into the earth; Let the doubt wash away, in your gods be assured.

Iyan had heard all of this before. He had heard it all, in the back of his mind, like a song whose tune he couldn't forget. Why did it need to repeat itself? What horrible cosmic crime had he committed to press him into this rhyme from hell itself?

It was Kairie at last who found him, crying into a painfully clawed hole in the dirt. Her hair reached Iyan first, covered him in warmth not found anywhere else. This was different from the heat of the forest, or the heat of bodies against one another. It could have been a genuine affection that generated it, but Iyan was very tired of thinking so naively.

"What do you want?" he wept, buried in her arms like a child. "What do any of you want from me?"

"It isn't us, Iyan." Kairie began to hum a lullaby, something Iyan found blissfully unique and strange. No more nagging thoughts or loose ideas - just a simple tune, foreign to his tired ears. He continued to cry, but he was quieter, now. There was some peace in this, at least. How he'd missed her! He lifted his head, his pale-blue eyes gazing into her leafy brown ones. She smiled. I missed you, too, her face seemed to say, but something dark came over her expression, and she pushed him back against her chest.

"It's almost over," she whispered, stroking his hair back. "You're so close to freedom."

"I just want to go home," Iyan dared say aloud, but she did not appear to have heard him, too preoccupied in the upcoming events to notice. "That isn't too much to ask, is it?" His hair fell over his eyes and he allowed himself to be swallowed by the darkness one last time. Somehow, he knew Kairie would not be there when he awoke, and he wanted to sleep in her soft arms without any worry until she was gone.

He awoke too soon, he found some odd hours later, the smell of destiny and a heavy truth pressing down on him. This was the end, and he was alone for it.