Harmony

It was equally as bad as it looked. It was every bit as incriminating as it was made out to be. Every sin was laid bare in the darkness, where candlelight meant to warm so gently instead clashed with the flame so far below. They’d accounted for slip-ups. They’d accounted for holes. At no point had they accounted for complete and utter capture, all eyes wide and flooded with horror. No one moved. No one breathed. For the four words that tumbled down the steps of the blossom into the depths of the Cursed City, there was no viable answer for the Velrose Acolyte.

“What are you doing?”

Sonata’s voice was unsettlingly calm. “Helping the acolyte escape” was not a reasonable response, honest or otherwise. There was always damage control. Of even that, Octavia had no idea where to begin. She wondered if she remembered how to speak at all.

Sonata didn’t press her for an answer. Instead, her eyes drifted to the furious gaze so far below her. Balled fists and trembling arms matched terribly well with radiating ire. Clad in wavering black, blighted by the updraft descending from on high, it was yet another contrast versus her pearl-enveloped counterpart. One was quiet. One was not. That, too, was of note.

“You’re the acolyte, correct?” Sonata asked, her tone deceptively soft. “I don’t believe we’ve met.”

Her words were somewhere between pointed and polite, tinged with something Octavia couldn’t quite pinpoint. It did little to shake Selena, her expression absolutely vicious.

“It was you,” the Velpyre Acolyte spat. “This whole time. Everything.”

Sonata blinked, her expression scathingly neutral. “I’m not sure what you mean.”

“I’m sure you don’t. You don’t know anything, after all,” Selena growled. “You know nothing of suffering. Just know, if nothing else, that you are the one who has absolutely ruined my life.”

“Do not speak that way to our acolyte!” a man at Sonata’s side snapped, lurching forward. “Know your place, you worthless flame!”

Sonata raised one hand, quickly and silently. He, too, fell silent instantly. “My apologies,” the man muttered.

“You are not to leave Velpyre. I know you know this,” Sonata continued.

Sonata received an answer only in hatred alone, venomous eyes hurling poison high aloft the steps from the darkest depths of the flame. The look on Selena’s face was absolutely horrifying, and nothing Octavia had ever seen the girl craft before. Once more was the world of the blossom and the flame beyond her. She didn’t dare interfere. She hardly dared breathe at all, her heart threatening to burst at any moment.

Josiah was at the Velpyre Acolyte’s side immediately, unhesitant steps leaving Selena well behind his back. His voice was steady and calm where his eyes were not, and Octavia was not at all ignorant to the way his hands trembled somewhat. “This was my fault, Lady Acolyte. This was my idea, and I planned this myself. Selena had nothing to do with it.”

“She had everything to do with it.”

Sonata didn’t quite shout so much as she did raise her voice just a bit too sharply. It was more than enough to make Octavia jump. It was, too, more than enough to clash with the visage of the gentle angel of the blossom she knew. The way the Velrose Acolyte narrowed her eyes, plagued with a hostility Octavia couldn’t imagine tethered to her, was deeply unnerving. “The acolyte is solely responsible for her faults,” she insisted.

“Let me through,” Selena demanded, her voice low and her words painfully slow. “Now.”

“Return to the church,” Sonata ordered, just as slowly. “Carry out your duties.”

There was no warmth. There was no happiness where the Velpyre Acolyte had been finally granted such just moments before. There was no softness where the Velrose Acolyte had showered a city in much of the same. They were not those she knew, for as fleeting a time as Octavia had known them. Two new acolytes stood before her, hateful and judgmental in equal measure.

“I won’t.”

“I will not ask twice.”

“I won’t go,” Selena repeated, each word razor-edged. “I won’t let you control my life anymore.”

Sonata inhaled sharply, exhaling just as such. “Very well.”

White robes, crisp and pristine, were traded for lilac. The men who made way for yet others at Sonata’s side were still and peaceful. The soft hues that opposed their own garments were more than enough for Selena’s rage to fizzle and die. What cursed her face was something closer to raw terror, if not still plagued with the slightest drops of ire. That, too, was a face Octavia had never seen her make. Selena hardly had the chance to run. Even if she tried, she surely wouldn’t have gotten far.

Every man that swiftly descended the steps did so with horrifying speed, for what they were to offer the Velpyre Acolyte alone. Not once did they trip, nor did they hesitate to claim the stairs two at a time as was necessary. With what little light Octavia’s pupils could steal in the darkness, she could at least find the way by which lilac matched with lilac. It took her less than a moment to make the connection, and Selena’s screams were a solid indicator in and of themselves. Somewhere between growls and shrieks, their firm hands clasping in excess around her every limb did little to stem her frantic flailing. Her size versus theirs meant nothing. Where the Velpyre clergy could lay siege to her four times over, she gave them no reprieve.

Josiah struggled in a different way entirely, practically lunging towards the man gripping Selena’s left arm into dust. His own grasp was desperate, and he strained with sharpened eyes as he tugged futilely at a grip far stronger. “Let her go!” he shouted, his voice shaking.

It earned him violence. Where he’d managed to compromise Selena’s restraints in one place alone, it was not to be for long. The swift motion of a ruthless touch meant to quell the acolyte now crashed down upon Josiah in full, the back of the man’s hand slamming fiercely against the boy’s cheek.

The force was immense to a startling degree, more than enough to leave him staggering. It wasn’t enough to deter him entirely, and he attempted yet the same again with his face more than reddened. The second time, it was no longer open-handed, and he earned a full fist for his efforts. The fearsome blow directly to his teeth sent Josiah hurtling to the ground, crying out in pain all the way there.

“Josiah!” Octavia cried out herself, still more than frozen in place. It was the first way by which she’d shattered a silence of her own making, let alone intervened. Renato did so physically, racing to the boy’s side for what little could be done without words. Josiah was bleeding, notably, one stream of red delicately trickling from his lips. Still, his fearful eyes were on Selena alone, writhing and screaming even now.

“Leave him alone!” Selena screeched. “Leave him alone! Get away from him!”

And yet, there was another whose gaze fell only to Josiah in turn. He had the leeway to peel his eyes from the Velpyre Acolyte, for how those around him held fast where he was vulnerable. “You were aware of your task.”

His wounds were of little concern, apparently. Josiah’s breaths were labored, his motions panicked. “This would’ve--”

“Gather your belongings and do not return,” the man ordered.

“Listen to me!” Josiah begged.

“I will not repeat myself.”

“Josiah!” Selena shrieked, still squirming and writhing endlessly in the throes of her restraint. It was all she could do to scream his name, kicking and flailing at that which she could not reach. “Get off of me! Get off! Josiah! Josiah!”

“Lady Acolyte, I beg of you, please! Forgive her! Punish me if you want, but please, just spare her!” Josiah pleaded, his panicked eyes cast hastily aloft.

“This is her retribution alone,” Sonata insisted sharply.

“I’ll do anything!”

“Josiah!”

“This is the path she has chosen, and so, too, must she pay the price.”

“Josiah! Josiah! Josiah!”

“Sonata, please!” Octavia begged of her own accord, burned by the cycle of prayer and denial before her. In the face of an angel of judgment where once had been mercy, she could hardly hope for the latter. Still, to hold her tongue would’ve killed her.

“We will talk. Return to the church, all of you. Forget this task,” she spoke plainly. Her words dripped with disappointment, if not disdain at worst. Her expression offered only more of the same, and it scorched horrifically just to incur. Octavia was nauseous.

“Sonata, please!” Octavia cried once more.

And yet, the Velrose Acolyte had already turned her back on the flame, indifferent to the suffering and sorrow of her counterpart in the darkness. Perhaps she was satisfied with the outcome. Perhaps she’d lost interest. One of those was far more disgusting to consider than the other.

“I’ll kill you!” Selena howled. “You bitch, I’ll kill you! I swear to God, I’ll kill you! I’ll kill you!”

Her obscenities earned a tightened grip--if it were possible, for how their violent grasps were already dying her skin a permanent red--and a forceful blow. Bound as she was, it was all Selena could do to cry out in pain as one man struck her fiercely across the face. It did little to stem her verbal hostilities, and she hurled every hateful word imaginable up the steps and into the blossom. It mattered not that the Velrose Acolyte couldn’t be bothered to bear witness to the girl’s struggle. It was more than audible, and Selena made doubly sure of that.

“Stop it!” Viola pleaded, tears pricking the edges of her eyes. “Leave her alone!”

“Stand down!” Sonata boomed.

Her ferocious voice echoed heavily down the staircase, rippling into the darkness below. Octavia’s heart nearly exploded, only partially from fright. It was the first time she ever truly feared the Velrose Acolyte. Days ago, it would’ve been an impossible concept.

“This is greater than you all. This is beyond the scope of what you understand, and you must leave it be. Return to the Velrose Church at once. I will not repeat myself,” Sonata called clearly.

Selena never once left the grasps she’d been ensnared in, still kicking and battling desperately to no avail. She stayed that way as they departed, captive to the Velpyre clergy that dragged her ever deeper into the darkness. It was only as Sonata’s visage grew ever more distant that the Velpyre Acolyte’s pleas changed, the frantic name on her lips a different flavor entirely. She’d already screamed it dozens of times over, and yet now did so in excess. He did the same right back.

“Selena!” Josiah shouted, her name on his tongue shaky all the way out. “Selena! Damn it! Selena!”

“Josiah! Josiah, please!”

He wasn’t content to stay tethered to the ground, even for what Octavia knew was to come. It was his third attempt. She never made it far enough to beg him to stop, even as he lunged yet again. He stumbled all the way there, sprinting haphazardly and nearly collapsing at least once. “Selena!” he cried yet again.

This time, it wasn’t his face. It was his stomach, and the kick that he earned in full to his torso was enough to knock him backwards. He crashed to the ground remorselessly, hitting his head in the process as he gasped from the impact alone. For once, he couldn’t get up. Renato at his side for a second time meant nothing, and Harper was equally as powerless. Where he could hardly breathe, let alone move, let alone stand, it was the acolyte’s name that feebly fled his bloodied lips again and again and again. It was reciprocal, albeit ever more distant. It was the worst duet of panic and fear Octavia had heard in her life.

There was no winning a battle with Velrose. There was no winning a battle with Velpyre. If the might of Valkyrie’s Call was anything to go by, Sonata could very well kill them at her leisure. In the wake of two acolytes, apathetic and tortured alike, only tears remained in their stead. They were not Octavia’s alone, although the Maestra offered up her fair share. The candlelight that spilled from the blossom above was taunting, a false Heaven that thwarted the flight of an angel so unlike Sonata.

For all that lay unknown of the blossom and the flame even now, pain was unmistakable. Where the song of Valkyrie’s Call resonated so splendidly above, it was Selena’s cries that echoed for far too long in the darkened streets below.

To return to Sonata immediately would’ve been foolish at best and incredibly dangerous at worst. The embrace of the Velrose Church was impossible to escape, for how the steps of the flame had so lifelessly ejected them into the hollow blossom once more. The sanctuary was once safe and peaceful, and now Octavia feared for what may have spread. Whether they were, at large, known to be complicit in the attempted elopement of the Velpyre Acolyte remained to be seen. So, too, would it remain to be seen whether they were in danger by now.

Four of the five left. Octavia did not. Where they sought air and reprieve from the suffocating confines of the church, she refused to leave the basement. She didn’t blame them in the slightest for their hurried departure. Under other circumstances, she perhaps would’ve done the same. They hardly spoke, plagued by permanent silence. What was to come was a concern that ate away at her soul. It was only the second-most violent blight on her insides, given how her heart was ravaged each time she laid her eyes upon the iron insignia.

Stradivaria was her sole comfort as her eyes lay glued to the plate, once more the only barrier between the Blessed and Cursed Cities alike. To know of who lay below, suffering in the darkness even now, was sickening. Not once had she stopped wondering as to Selena’s fate, and with every fleeting reminder came a wave of nausea. She clung to the case of the violin for dear life, resting her head against the rugged material as her leftover tears spilled over. Octavia didn’t bother to wipe them away.

Even hypothetically, it was a reflex to imagine Priscilla in her own shoes. The Velpyre Acolyte would’ve gotten along with her, maybe. She’d made it to Velrose, although Velpyre had laid out of reach--and not necessarily in a bad way. If she could turn her eyes skyward and ask as to what could’ve been done, she would do so in an instant.

“Stradivaria,” she murmured aloud softly.

She knew she’d earn nothing. It wasn’t a deterrent. Already, her tears were back, and she cursed its case with them unflinchingly.

“Stradivaria,” she repeated, her voice cracking. “I don’t know what to do--about anything.”

She expected the silence. To have her partner in her arms was peaceful enough.

“I miss her so much. I wonder if you ever miss her, too.”

Octavia closed her eyes, burying her face into the textured material as her shoulders shuddered. “What would she have done? What would she do now?”

There was a non-zero chance they’d be forced to leave Velrose. It would leave them right back where they'd started, if not worse off than before. Priscilla had been here. Sonata had seen her. Were they evicted from the Blessed City, the one shred of hope Octavia had scavenged from the winding path of fate alone would be snatched away. It was the most agonizing thought imaginable. Any physical ire she could incur from the Velrose Acolyte paled in comparison to the fear of being shunned.

She couldn’t face Sonata. She hadn’t the heart, let alone the energy. She wondered if the others had mustered the courage to do so, by now. As to what they would’ve said, she couldn’t begin to fathom. Perhaps she’d be forced to beg for forgiveness--if not mercy. If they were afraid, she could empathize. No one was more afraid than her.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered hoarsely.

She didn’t understand. It wasn’t a new concept, and she was growing used to not understanding anything. It wasn’t the blossom and the flame alone, really. To account for what she did understand was a trial. To account for what she was confident in, let alone what she could believe in, was infinitely more difficult. For at least one moment, she wondered what she was doing here at all.

Bang.

It was soft and muffled, stifled somewhere behind her own poorly-concealed sobs. She couldn’t pinpoint its origin, distant as it was. She nuzzled her face deeper into the case, shirking the outside world in favor of that which rested in her lap.

Bang.

It was louder, slightly. She raised her head, letting her eyes climb as high along the distantly-winding stairs as was possible. She strained, and yet found little.

Bang.

Octavia tilted her head. If it came from the top, it certainly didn’t sound that way.

Bang. Bang. They were seconds apart, steady and identical.

Ever so slowly, Octavia uncurled herself from the case nestled in her lap. Every bang was slow and even all at once, if not somehow louder with every iteration. She thought she was hallucinating the movement beneath her feet, initially. Still, the floor was most definitely wobbling in the slightest with each and every bang that followed.

Her eyes snapped to the iron plate she’d gazed at so half-heartedly minutes before. The little bell dangling so innocently beside it was not immune to every bang that followed. Once, it wobbled, somewhat. The next time, it offered a soft and pitiful chime, stolen by force.

Hesitantly, Octavia rose to her feet. It was with equal hesitation that she unzipped Stradivaria’s case with care, cradling the violin in her arms. For how the little bell only gave the most tender, fleeting chime with every relentless bang, she couldn’t help but watch. Her steps towards the plate were as cautious as they were curious, and she gripped either portion of Stradivaria tightly as each bang grew ever louder.

Bang. Bang. Bang. She held her breath and tightened her grasp.

The sudden, sharp creak of iron scraping stone was nearly enough to kill her. She wanted to run, and yet it was courage alone that bound her feet to the floor. Curiosity was a close second. She stole several careful steps in reverse, nestling the violin against her shoulder as she leveled the bow with the strings. Ignoring her trembling fingers was difficult. She didn’t bother trying to steady her breath, for how she knew she’d lose it so soon afterwards.

The metal barrier crawled along the cold stone below for what felt like far too long, offering up one noise much louder than that of every bang she’d come to expect. The screeching of opposing materials grinding against one another was borderline unbearable, and she winced at the way by which it echoed once more. When at last it stilled, the gaping path that plunged into the depths may as well have led to darkness incarnate. Velpyre was wide open. People left, sometimes. It made enough sense. Still, she didn’t dare lower Stradivaria. So, too, could she not fight the way her hands shook so fiercely.

The tap tap tap that followed was rapid in place of the much louder sounds she’d heard before. With no other noise of which to speak, it was only her own labored breaths that caught her ears. She could see nothing, no matter how desperately she tried to peer deep into the darkness below. It was as open as could be, a gaping hole of pitch black that offered only the unknown. The speckled candlelight amongst the walls meant nothing. She didn’t move. She doubted she could if she tried.

Every tap was louder. Someone was running. Someone was sprinting. Someone was ascending.

He practically erupted from the darkness, the one person whose breaths were perhaps more frantic than her own. His face was swollen, the blood long since dried. He was bruised. In no way did the brutality he’d endured stem his flight, and he raced with everything he had. In the brief moment he met Octavia’s eyes, she found only pure and unrestrained horror. She heard the screeching second.

“Josiah?” she asked, her voice trembling.

“Run!” he cried.

He made it three steps, and the world exploded.

From true darkness came unnatural darkness, bursting and surging in unfathomable plumes of disastrous violet. To a degree Octavia had never witnessed, the entrance to Velpyre erupted with a sea of screeching smoke. The sound was unbearable, nauseating as always and immediately cursing Octavia with fearsome dizziness. It was fast. It was faster than any murky indigo she’d ever seen give chase, crashing and rushing in the worst of tides at Josiah’s heels. Not once did he look back, every stone below now splashed with splattering violet and cloaked in the most toxic haze Octavia knew of. If there was a way into Velpyre, she would never have known. For now, it only screamed, and screamed, and screamed.

Josiah scrambled up the steps to the best of his ability, his rapid pace never stilling for a moment. In her hesitation, she was cognizant of the way he lunged for the hem of her dress. He missed. It was enough to make him pause, then and only then.

It left her staring down a wave of violet that could blot out the sky, for how it already threatened the room. Gone was every flickering candle, swallowed by violent clouds of gushing smoke. Octavia's eyes were wide. Running would do nothing. If she ever were to drown, it would be to violet alone, with Josiah at her back.

Protect him.

Origin of the demand be damned, she didn’t question it for a moment.

She’d heard that voice already, several times over. This time, she didn’t dare disobey, nor would she have reacted otherwise. Octavia's body moved long before her thoughts could catch up, and her fingers were flying before she’d so much as noticed.

She felt the heat. She earned the warmth. Her blood burned and her heart pulsed. Starlight was set ablaze in her veins and erupted in its own way. Each drop of brilliance that breached her skin was in stark contrast to violet besieging her on every side, and her song was a beacon in an ocean of screeching. It was all she had, lost in a sea of agony. She was looking down from above on a Maestra battling for her life. She’d never played this fast before. She wasn’t entirely certain it was intentional.

Her precious light blossomed, glowed, surged, hardened in a way she’d never seen. It was reflexive, the way she clasped them tightly in the embrace of the sun. Within its grasp, they burned in tandem. Pulsing radiance served as the only barrier between Josiah, herself, and the most horrific surge of violet imaginable. Every sharp note left it stronger, every strike of the bow left it brighter. She braced low to the floor, by which she could maximize her breathing room. It wasn’t quite scorching enough to set the oxygen within ablaze, and Octavia thanked any god that would listen for such a blessing. It gave her no room for reprieve, regardless.

Her radiant shield was all she could salvage in the depths of the screaming sea. The impact was immense when it came, and the sensation of her luminous bubble bending slightly beneath the crashing pressure was horrifying. It wasn’t enough to make her stop under any circumstances. She played for a life both her own and not.

She was aware of Josiah, motionless and breathless as he was at her back. He was still upon the steps, his footing stolen and his words just as absent. Octavia wouldn’t have had the focus to spare to instruct him to be still. She assumed he’d come to the same conclusion. So, too, was she far more fixated on the single instruction she’d been given. At the cost of her life, she would obey.

Octavia closed her eyes. Witnessing the blurring agony beyond her shimmering shield was already disgusting, her world narrowed to only the blackest violet that pressed forth endlessly. It was just as instinctive in the face of physical pressure, and she was vaguely aware of the way she was crying out. Every tendon and fiber of her muscles was straining terribly, every fingertip aching fiercely as it collided with rugged copper time after time. She was bleeding, maybe, and her movements stung. The speed was immense, and it was so desperately necessary.

To halt her song was to die, surely. To halt her song was to surrender another life not hers to give. It was all she could do to play and scream, challenging that which would scream back far more brutally. Where it would surge, she would shine. It was all she could do.

In reality, it only took several seconds. To Octavia, it was an eternity. There came a point when she met with slack, resistance lessened and pressure eased against her glimmering bubble. It was a catalyst for her eyes to open, and yet never for her song to cease. The violet that passed her by was slow, washing casually over her arching radiance as she sunk to the depths of an agonizing ocean. She was adrift, and she brought Josiah with her.

She hardly had the leeway to cast her gaze over her shoulder. It was to her immense relief that he was still stagnant, his panicked eyes both peering beyond her brilliance and tracking her every movement. Sparkling glass, born of the sun and twinkling with every terrified note, was all that stood between her and a fate she dared not imagine.

Where it was useless in the face of her luminescence, the ruthless smoke was content to climb high up the staircase. The sea she’d feared so viciously passed her by at last, surging aloft and beyond the basement. Octavia heard it screaming all the way up, horrific even in passing. Still, she didn’t dare stop. She wouldn’t stop. The moment she saw more, she felt justified.

It was born of the same genuine darkness and every bit as unnatural. It was slower, sprawling and spreading like the most toxic of fumes. It was still equally violet and equally loud, content to amble aloft in weak wisps and crawl along the stone at her feet. Like mist, it settled and shrouded. To inhale it would’ve been lethal, perhaps, and it was one more reason never to still her aching fingers.

The tap that followed was new, if not familiar in its origin. She found another tap, and yet another tap soon after. They were even. They weren’t frantic, nor did they speak to panicked sprinting. She burned brighter, shimmered harder, and doubled down with eyes equal parts sharp and terrified.

The face that emerged from the depths of Velpyre was far calmer, every step far slower than Josiah’s had been moments before. It took time for the darkness to surrender what little Octavia could catch on the edges of her brilliance. Where useless candlelight had been so remorselessly stolen and shamed by murky mist, it was the edges of her glistening barrier that she was forced to trust in.

She knew the lilac, traded from casual black and disheveled as it was. The hair didn’t fare much better, still spilled from its tethered home and yet now strewn aimlessly. There were new bruises, and they matched what Octavia had witnessed come to pass. It was no wispy trail that emerged from either shoulder, deceptively innocent as the rising violet would’ve been. Rather, it was a wave, billowing and pooling in a cascade that left steeping agony pooling upon the floor. In every step did it linger, puddles of suffering incarnate left stagnant and miserable. Octavia had seen Dissonance before. She’d seen Dissonant people before. This was unfathomable. This was impossible.

She didn’t so much shuffle as she did steal steps far too unnatural, painfully slow and enough to threaten Octavia’s veins. Were they not still bursting with brilliance, they may have burst outright from terror alone. Octavia didn’t dare break eye contact, although there was little to match--lightless and veiled by shading indigo as it was. She was lifeless, maybe. Octavia could truly have believed her to be dead, at that moment.

Octavia's radiant protection meant nothing, every audible sizzle well above the Maestra's own head doing little to deter the Dissonance-soaked approach. If she chose, she could reach out and lay her cold touch upon the sun. As to which would win out, Octavia couldn’t say. Octavia didn’t breathe. Neither did she.

Her gaze, murky as it was, fell to the floor. Josiah was strikingly still, his breaths just barely rattling as he met her with wide eyes. His own harbored something between terror and confusion, and yet he never pulled them away. To her credit, dead as her glare was, she met him with the same. Josiah blinked. Selena didn’t.

And when she tore her broken eyes from his at last, she claimed the stairs they’d surrendered in favor of desperate safety. Her movements were slow, initially. Every step was paced, if not heavy. Still, they quickened in the slightest. She was brisk. She was frantic. She was sprinting, stealing the steps so rapidly that Octavia feared she might stumble. She practically did, and there came a point where she was nearly clawing her way up the staircase.

What poisonous haze she’d left at her back trailed the acolyte, rising from the basement and following in her hurried wake. Flanked by malice on every side and saturated in much the same, she was a beacon of agony that surged ever upwards, carrying all that she could on her shoulders. If Octavia strained, she could hear screeching--so aloft and distant as it was.

Octavia hesitated to still her song. It took time for her to trust the fading fog, ambling behind the acolyte as it had mostly been. What remained was weak, clinging, skittering in a way she could hope to evade. She was paranoid. She peered down into that open hole from afar again and again. She fought for her fleeing breath again and again. She struggled to assemble a single sentence again and again, and she failed each and every time. She threw her eyes to Josiah’s own, and he was just as helpless as she was. Their panic matched. His might’ve been slightly worse.

In opening the entrance to Velpyre, he had unleashed Hell instead.