#horst cabal

[beedokart]

Johannes Cabal, necromancer of some little infamy, has opinions on swords.

Namely that he doesn't like them much.

[acerbaa]

johannes + horst's first and second deaths

[gummie-shark]

Johannes Cabal: The Necromancer, pg. 66

He smiled a smile that made spiders run for cover...

[thedevilscarnival]

"[Horst] seems affably dim, especially with his brother, but the dimness is an affectation, an act he and Johannes play." <- what if i jumped off of a cliff. what then. what then.

[wrowimages]

there's a strange man at the carnival

[bros-before-dinooos]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Soooo, I finished it. And after reading over it a million times I think it is done.

While I wrote a steamy chapter of another Cabal fic I thought to myself: what if Johannes somehow forgets there is a hickey on his neck and Horst makes a few deductions on his own.

And it kinda became it's own little fic. It is short and fun and awfully domestic, because I love the idea of the brothers just doing normal stuff.

[galaxyofgover]

Finished reading "The Fall of the House of Cabal" the other day, from the Johannes Cabal series. Decided to flex the fanart muscles for a quick Johannes and Horst picture.

[surfinthehighway]

I didn't do a liveblog of the first Cabal book when I first experienced it, but some moments that stood out to me when relistening that I would like to dig deeper into sometime if I have a chance over the next couple of days:

Horst and Johannes reuniting in chapter 3.

Johannes' conversation with Frank Barrow in chapter 12. It says a lot about Johannes' motivations and how he sees himself. When I first listened to the book, this is the scene that really sold me on the character of Johannes.

Some half-liveblogging half-analysis on the climax of the first book:

I didn't jot down the chapter, but on the topic of things that sold me on Johannes' character: Johannes tricking the Devil out of Leonie and Nea Winshaw's souls. It's extremely interesting when you are unfamiliar with the character to go "oh. he's desperate enough to kill a baby?" "oh, no nevermind. he's still awful though for getting the mother's soul." "oh, no nevermind."

That said it ALSO bugged the heck out of me that Horst just killed himself not knowing that Johannes was going to do that. That was (and probably still is) my biggest issue with the story.

Now that I am 0.1% more familiar with Johannes as a character, my instincts are telling me: I don't think he would kill a baby that's antithetical to what he does. I want to believe that he was initially not planning to dupe the devil, but that that changed when Leonie signed the contract which is something he never wanted her to do. The extra blank contract just further cemented this resolve (and could act as a decoy so that the Devil wouldn't look too hard into what Johannes' real plan was.)

Regarding Nea Winshaw.... IIIII can see it going either way, whether he would have wanted to give up her soul without challenging the Devil a little for it or not. However, because Johannes is soulless and unsympathetic (for lack of a better word), I am going to assume that he would have given up her soul if it wasn't for Horst. Because this gives Horst's death more of an actual story purpose.

It also wouldn't be out of character for Johannes to do something in service of what Horst really cares about. He offers to preserve Alisha the moment she dies. They're on a lot worse terms here, but maybe Horst actually dying gave Johannes enough of a guilt trip to throw Nea Winshaw in the mix while he was already doing it.

That is complete speculation based on the other stories though and not something I considered as a first-time reader.

This is a lot longer than I intended it was meant to be four bullet points before bed.

I also put in my notes "Is it supposed to be ambiguous if Johannes was under the influence of the anise seed demon when he led the woman to sign a contract" because it begins being mentioned in his conversation with Horst during that whole debacle and we see it making him more impulsive to hurt Frank Barrow.

(I am going answer my own question though and say I'd prefer it if it wasn't demonic influence because I think that Johannes should have agency to make terrible decisions.)