“As Marlowe, Milton, Goethe, and every other writer who has meddled with the Devil has discovered, the chief difficulty is to prevent this sympathetic character from becoming the hero of the story.”
— Dorothy L. Sayers, in the foreword to The Devil To Pay
𝐁𝐋𝐎𝐎𝐃 𝐁𝐑𝐀𝐖𝐋 : 𝐑𝐎𝐔𝐍𝐃 𝟏. / post-defeat in the fighters’ area, VALENTINE, the leader of the glorious and noble HOUSE OF BEETLE, pays a visit to the flower of hokuei, the HOUSE OF FIREFLY’S most beloved YENA. — @cruellove
valentine enters all places in hokuei as if there is no question or conceivable objection to the possibility of him begin there. not as if they belong to him — no, for there is a vast divergence between being seen as emperor and master of all under the sun and moon, and being the shadow that walks the liminality of both realms. not a figurehead on gilded puppet strings playing at dominion and mythos-making. where he has won the right by supremacy and notoriety, others make do with the weapons and craftsmanship available to them.
as leader and string-weaver, he harbours a healthy admiration for those that recognise the relationship between performance and power.
hokuei’s flower lies crumpled at the edge of the room reserved for the champions of firefly. a throng of admirers and sycophants pressing upon her like a relentless tide swallowing a single floating water lily. valentine pauses at the threshold and his very presence — the scent of something ancient and abyssal, incapable of being translated into language that fits within the sovereignty of mind and speech — directs every head to turn his way. power, in the end, has a way of overriding even the most fervent flames of devotion. valentine inclines his brows.
the room empties at once, infatuation-addled suitors sent scattering in flurries of bouquets and declaratory wreaths. yena floats amidst a sea of blooming flowers, a small, wilted thing designed to pluck at the heart strings.
“i had a gift prepared in the event of your victory,” he begins, casting an appraising glance around her dais meadow. the stench of sweetened roses and lilacs, lovesick languages of undying devotion, sears at the senses. “but it seems you are not lacking for consolation prizes. nor plentiful distractions to soften the sting of defeat.”
Jury’s still out on whether all this matters. Valentine must feel it, the way Kiyori’s throat closes in disgust at all this excess: the throne they didn’t want and the view they didn’t care for and the private attendants that — frankly — annoyed them. In another life, they would have been like that, flitting about aimlessly, with no purpose beyond serving overfull platters to men that would never go hungry, too weak to tread any path outside another man’s will or whims.
It doesn’t worry them that their contempt would be mistaken for ungratefulness. A man like Valentine would know that instinct differs from action. And because they are in Hokuei, Kiyori lowers their head and bows, offering a smile — small and real — as they rise. “Thank you,” they say, in the language of Hokuei’s outsiders. “I’m grateful you invited me.”
It’s not necessary, really, to use words they were never raised to speak. Valentine would know Hokuei’s mother tongue. He’s tread this country’s soil for far longer than Kiyori’s been alive. But this, too, is reverence. A way of stepping back and saying, I am the outsider here.
Only in their daydreams would anybody honor Kiyori with that same distance. Jury’s still out on whether Valentine’s godhood matters. But perhaps Kiyori envies where he stands: too high, too far, and too dangerous for anyone to want to touch. Does Valentine know? Kiyori would tear the world apart for that kind of power.
They still wait to be told to sit. Another smile cuts though their lips, polite and easy. “Who are you betting on?”
as a king or lord would, valentine acknowledges the ceremony of their gratitude. the vein of due deference, consummately imparted. the curiosity of kiyori is that though they see no particular value or need for it, they understand the concessions of aristocracy, the trappings and vagaries of influence. valentine observes them, composed of utmost courtesy as they perform the invisible rituals of nobility and hierarchy.
in time, perhaps they will even find them better tailored to them and bespoke. perhaps.
“there is no need to thank me. i welcome you as an honoured guest.” the formality of the proceeding is shaded with approval, fondness even, in the brief stretch of his smile. rarefied for its few and far between appearances in the view of anyone that matters. “the view from up here is much superior to the areas reserved for the houses, no?”
them, and us. an imperceptible distinction by the casual articulation of it in valentine’s small talk. he gestures for kiyori to sit, another subtle allowance of favour. the velvet-cushioned chair beside him is empty, a seat second only to the emperor’s throne and view of the spectacle beneath them. even valentine’s own house members have not been afforded the privilege, and they have been well-trained and tamed enough not to reveal any reaction towards it. an introspective sound hums on his lips. “i prefer to bet on outcomes. it matters not who wins, but which house.”
valentine signals for an attendant, who accordingly pours himself a glass, and then one for kiyori without word. being seated beside him is all that needs to be said. “and you, kiyori? are you placing any bets? or do you have your hands otherwise tied by spiders’ financial affairs?”
an innocent question, by all intents and purposes. let us see how kiyori handles the balancing act of tact against deference.
there must be a word for this kind of love — one where you hold the knife and i press my hand into it, watching it slice through palm and trusting that you won’t push it into beating hearts. you trusting that i’ll cut myself on the edge. knowing that i want to. the blade to my blood, the bane to your boredom.
kisa grins.
masks are slipped off easily, no need for guises; finding different games to play. valentine does not touch the wine and the scientist takes it as an invitation to drink themselves, taking small sips before setting it back down on the table.
“i don’t particularly crave respite tonight — not when nothing’s even happened yet.” mischievous smiles, a flash of boyish devilry when they turn to look at you again. there is no attempt at hiding how eyes linger on how the other sits like a king above a stadium of blood, teeth tugging at the edges of lips.
“what better game is there to play than god? what would you like me to see you as then?”
your pupil is a troublesome one — this you knew the moment you took them in. still, there is some semblance of studiousness in them, heads turning to the stage in quiet concentration.
quietly, the voices press their mouths to ears, eyes, lips. you can hear both worry and ignorance, wagers and bloodlust, feel it trickling down throats and cutting skin; voices growing from a whisper to a screaming, tidal waves of words, feelings, dreams crashing into lungs, throats working on swallowing —
“i hear — “
he says your voices and you are never sure if the screaming is you or another’s, if it is in your throat or in your head.
“ — tybalt, for the first round. the rest — i can’t hear, not right now. the other bets are too… noisy. am i right?”
faint blood suffused through the air, pervasive as light particles and shadow, coasts along strands of scent and sound and adrenaline roar. freshly spilled, too sweet and raw for carrion-eaters. all places in hokuei are slaughterhouse places. charnel houses for the meat and feasting of the food chain — a thing no more pragmatic or mundane than a fact of basic ecology.
valentine has been so long a vampire that he no longer needs to close his eyes and tongue for the sight. he sees it omniscient, ubiquitous.
the little deviant of firefly house toys with predatory instinct, steps into valentine’s own abattoir a creature as if presumption alone absolves him of becoming prey. he observes him drink, mouth pressing to the rim of the glass, irreverent. crave. a note of disdain colours the word in valentine’s consciousness, souring the metallic saccharine of first blood. his gaze diverts, an eye cast towards the battle unfolding amidst the grandstands below.
“you would do well to temper those instincts.” axiomatic, edifying. this is not a game for children, as much as the boy still reeks of fledgling hunger and the insatiable grasping at want that stains all immortals of his youth. letting a shade of disapproval dip into the surface of measured voice, valentine levels the full brunt of scrutiny upon him. “especially when one possessing such a utilitarian gift against an opponent elected not to enter the games. did the good doctor not see fit to name you a champion?”
the point, dear student, is that you see me as whatever you want to see me: the unyielding teacher. the master with the velvet-gloved fist. the god you desire so desperately to go your knees for. the leviathan sleeping beneath your bed and your bones that holds you captive and prey, the one that reminds you of scalpel tenderness and the caress of being dissected by the one who knows each organ of you by name.
valentine leaves the question unanswered, rhetorical as perhaps intended.
“when you are as ancient as me, little one, you will find that godhood is a transient hunger.” opiate of the masses, anaesthetising to those unwilling to open their minds to the true and unbearable meaninglessness of existence. and gods are easy to kill. “only a fool would desire to be something so fallible and arbitrary. a god is worshipped with prayer and incense; a wolf is hungry and kills to eat its prey. which is the one in control, and which is the one given power by the weaker?” power lies in the undeniable. no deity has ever existed without doubt.
kisa goes still, their incessant, humming energy tapering to a finite point of concentration. watching someone slip into the reaches of their power has always been fascinating; valentine has observed lightly with the sight enough to anticipate the locking of his ribs, mid-breath and part-bloodshot. in the beginning, he braced for it, closing his mind into a still, equanimous pool, infinity stretching in all directions.
ever since he learned kisa only listens to the screaming, he hasn’t bothered to expend so much as an afterthought to stillness. what would you hear, little monster, if you knew how to discern me from the rest?
“yes. you can.” valentine commands. “listen deeper. you are treading water on the surface, do not linger in it. submerge yourself. are the things you hear any more terrifying than what you have tasted yourself?” tybault, valentine concedes, because the small-minded populace of hokuei could not fathom a house leader falling in the first round. and yet... a baser inclination. the yearning for blood on the colosseum floor, ichor spilling from olympus’ summit. besides, he knows tybault’s opposition. knows the unholy blaze of the destroyer within him.
“they are animals, nothing more than beast or cattle. listen for the instinct that we all harbour in our veins. the braying of livestock hungry to be fed. the cry for a killing.”
it was almost too easy, they think. a quick peek around corners, a little close listen in the kitchen — he doesn’t even have to try, really, to find an attendant’s uniform and a mask to don, their trademark mane twisted into a neat bun at the nape of their neck.
“compliments of the house, sir.” a swiftly-nabbed drink is placed on the table next to valentine, the scientist having little to no trouble finding his teacher’s booth and waltzing right in with the last-minute disguise. you would think security would be a little tighter, really.
“shall i close the curtains, sir? some privacy?”
you know how canines grow in the backs of throats for that voice the crawl out of those lips. this was not a guise meant for you, anyways — not unless you wanted to play.
“must be dull up here, all alone. blood was not meant to know distance like this.” fingertips dare to graze shoulders, fireflies leaning down until you are nearly cheek-to-cheek despite eyes being trained at the stadium before you.
“who would you put your wager on tonight if we were all in the ring and you were our god, watching?”
insolent thing, valentine muses, smile tempting to grow like weeds that can only survive in dark. did they truly believe that all they would require to conceal themselves from him was a mask? as if he couldn’t count the beats between muscle pulling against bone, the self-satisfied pleasure caressing down vertebra.
“and which house would that be?” quite pointedly, his gaze snaps from the arena before him to the intruder. as he speaks, a hand stretches out to lift the crystalline glass of chilled wine. “you could be forgiven for lack of insight into the tangled web of council politics.” the tone is academic, didactic, save for the underbelly of cool disparagement. “but it’s no secret that there is no love lost between the mother of spiders and i. so it certainly couldn’t be our patroness of wine and revelry.”
a flick of slender fingers fit for the dismissal of a faceless attendant. he has little patience for charades, even ones as charmingly sealed in pantomime as this.
and always with these little transgressions, darting minutely forwards to toe a line across the boundary between sanity and propriety. if he hadn’t invested so much time and consideration in them already, he’d consider them forfeit to their own audacity. more fearful creatures have certainly died for less.
“you’ll find solitude is an enviable respite before the evening is over, particularly if the amount of blood yen exchanging hands and illegal trade taking place has any part to play.”
he still hasn’t touched the wine, for all that it must be perfectly decanted to have crossed the threshold of the house of beetle’s designated area. an open snub of tricks and flimsy farces. and here he thought he’d taught them better than that.
“do you think i deign to play god, kisa?”
lesson number one: you will learn nothing at this altar of blasphemy if your intention is to claw at the gates of a hollow pantheon. the purse of his lips is lenient, still. patient. “why don’t you tell me who you think i’m wagering on, who you think i believe will win. what do your voices whisper to you?”
skin unzipped, lungs, ribs, liver, open for viewing like a museum, closing time’s in ten minutes. stripped to your bones and you think maybe this is what defines a person. the way they pulse. every inhale, exhale. the curve of their ribs, one, two, three. everything flowing.
the empty spaces between the insides of them enough to slip your fingers into. enough to hold the parts of them in a fist.
— venetta o.
i. VISUALISATION.
over millennia, valentine has honed his ability to be near imperceptible when in use. naturally, he has to be physically looking at someone in order to execute it, but his innate stillness, the uncanny ease of a being who has existed unchanging and undying for centuries, lends itself to observation and fleeting scrutiny.
in battle, stretched to its very extreme, the arteries around his eyes will engorge with blood and become starkly apparent, spidering out from his eyes to the apex of his temples.
the sclera of his eyes have been known to flood red — quite literally from the blood vessels of his eyes becoming so inflamed they have spilled over into his corneas.
ii. SENSES.
as the ability is a visual one that heightens his sight to the point of seeing through skin and flesh, the rest of his senses fall into a dull, numbing roar of white noise. it is surgical and scientific, like a microscopic lens taking live biopsy samples of the human body and anatomy, splicing it into a hundred different frames, refracting it from every angle like a kaleidoscope. manipulating the layers of skin, flesh, sinew, tendon and bone allows him to detect infinitesimal movements. blood pumping through veins. a sudden surge of adrenaline to the amygdala. musculature tensing in anticipation. heart palpitations. breath flowing through lungs.
there is some resettling of the senses that occurs after extended or strenuous periods of use, where his body has to readjust, fine-tune itself back to its resting state.
iii. STRENGTH.
throughout each era valentine has lived through and seen warfare, his ability has been an invaluable and near indomitable weapon. being able to sense the movements of his opponents before they can even anticipate themselves what they will do and how they will move has allowed him to cut through battlefields of a hundred mortals and hordes of vampires. his fighting style is threadbare and ruthlessly efficient, expending only the minimum amount of energy required to veer from an oncoming attack and launch an appropriate assault. even amongst vampires, his speed is considered something of a phenomenon and anomaly. in fact, he is merely reacting to an enemy’s next move before it is made.
the true strength of his ability lies off the battlefield, in the courts of empire and caliphate. combined with rigorous, exhaustive study of human behavior, physicality and body language, he is able to decipher and predict instinct and manoeuvre. you see, the body betrays that which the mind seeks to conceal. the heart, nucleus of everything, and the pulse, cannot lie to someone who can read its signs like scripture. amongst humanity, valentine’s ability granted him notoriety and inimitable power — the untouchable awareness that he was always ten, twenty steps ahead of all those around him, capable of dissecting someone before him down to their barest instincts in seconds.
beyond being a walking polygraph machine, it is almost impossible to lie to valentine. (for humans, it is completely impossible.) save for those who have indiscernible control over their own bodies and reactions, he can see a lie being written in the body before it even wets the tongue.
iv. WEAKNESS.
at maximum levels of exertion, valentine must remain immobile while using it. it draws too much focus and concentration for him to divert energy to any other part of the body. in this brief window of time, it is possible to incapacitate him and even strike him down. when pushed to its limit, his powers cast the rest of his senses into the abyss and it requires a period of recovery time equivalent to how long the ability was used. in the aftermath of using it all full concentration, he will also be rendered temporarily blind — a consequence he loathes and avoids having to face other than in exceptional circumstances.
prolonged use of the power for light purposes or brief moments of time causes his eyes to be extremely sensitive to light. this is one of the major reasons valentine’s quarters and the house of beetle’s headquarters are perpetually dimly or barely lit.
medium uses will induce headaches — ones he has learned to ignore and subdue with compartmentalisation.
v. FUNCTION.
due to his age, experience, influence, etc., valentine no longer requires the use of his ability on a daily basis. as a younger vampire in his early centuries, he frequently relied on it to carve his pathway forwards to greater prestige and power in human hierarchies. in hokuei, valentine sits at the very apex of the kingdom. his innate ability to read people — their intentions and motivations, their camouflaged emotions and swallowed thoughts — without using his power, is something he prides himself on.
as a member of the high council, valentine oversees the court of justice with his fellow house leaders. when faced with a defendant that is particularly elusive or a criminal case that is especially complex, he will use his power as required to monitor the trial and its participants as it unfolds. when dealing with adversaries, he will occasionally make use of the ability to reinforce a line of thinking or confirm a suspicion. valentine’s power is well-known to the population of hokuei. often, due to the fear he can instil with a single glance and the creeping terror that he may be using his power upon someone, he doesn’t even have to use it to feed into its mythos.
vi. OTHER.
valentine rarely, if ever, uses his ability on the members of his own house. his understanding and awareness of each of them is so absolute that to turn his sight upon them would be either a mark of condemnation or punishment.
sadistic bastard that he is, valentine lives for the split second doubt that one experiences when he looks at someone and they can’t quite tell if he is actively using his power or not. he luxuriates in. loves it. awful, terrible old snake man.
“Horror, we know, is real. The rest is a dream, pretense, or a children’s story we cannot quite abandon. Heaven and earth recoil, and we admit the truth of cataclysm– that, yes, this happens. This is the way things are.”
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