Before the curse, Joaquin had never considered that pain had a sound.
It was like the sky before a storm, the air taut and stretched like a violin string. It wailed as if clawed hands tore wire strands to tinnitus unraveling.
But there was a pattern in it. Like someone playing the saw on your bones. A bass drum beat vibrating through your brain meat.
Joaquin heard it when the demon of the north star struck him with soul sickness and wind howled through the cracks of him. He heard it when he and his coven argued and came to blows; it was like Sam’s black eye sang. He heard it when Andros broke his heart, then his flayed affections began to whisper in the dark.
He tried to shrug it off. He tried to ignore the strange sense the curse had awoken in him. He tried to believe that it was in his head, just a fae illusion.
But he found himself looking for the sound. Longing for it. In the chaos of a fight, he hunted for it. When he made sacrifice to the Midnight Teachers, he ached for it. When he danced around the bonfire and the flames kissed his cheek, he would hear it and he would sigh.
Because it had begun to make sense. He could hear … not quite words, but *meaning* in the pain-song.
“Go here.”
“Help them.”
“Sorrow.”
Simple things. Strange things. Worrying things. And usually deciphered too late to do any good.
Joaquin began to hope that maybe, just maybe, that if he could only learn to listen better, then maybe he could make a difference. Maybe he could discern a pattern in the meaning. Maybe it would not always end in sorrow. He became reckless. After all, if he got hurt (or if he hurt someone else), that was just an opportunity for more half-heard prophecy…
The fairy who cursed him visited Joaquin in hospital.
“Do you understand now?” they asked, in their voice that crackled like old modems.
“I don’t know.” Joaquin’s throat was raw from old screams. “I only have the edges, not the middle. I feel like everything is edges now.”
“Everything was always edges. Sharp as yearning. Bitter as boundaries.”
“Is it real? The poem in the ache. The omen in the agony. Or do you just want me dead?”
“I want you to learn to understand.” The fairy tutted and the hospital lights cracked. “But I don’t much mind if the lesson kills you…”
“Understand what? The noise in the pain … where does it come from?”
“The world, of course. Pain is just a signal. And you, witches, you are the earth’s nerve endings. Just conduits, usually. But if I turn up the volume! Then we can eavesdrop on the worldbrain.”
“Why?”
“Because something is wrong. Very wrong. Its usual confidante, um, let’s say: ‘ghosted’ it.”
“Why me?”
“You were around. You wronged me. This will probably still kill you.” The fairy smiled its oil-slick smile. “But won’t it be nice for you to die *useful*?”
