Happy New Year.

The bubbles in the sink were piled up to his elbows. Implausible immensities of white foam. So much waste for one load of after-dinner dishes, but the elder passives had all gone to bed and the skinny whisper above the sink was alone. Tonight, the air was heavy and huge. The darkness was tangible, so they closed the windows against it.

Patron Petros was dead.

A cyclorama of snow raged beyond the casements. It roared and rattled the wood. The wind slipped through the cracks and stalked around the kitchens on cold, massive cat feet. Carmine opened the windows anyway. Let the wind shoot past his face, muss his scarlet curls just like he used to. Snowflakes stiffening into ice, shooting off his cheeks like sparks. His wet hands were flashed from frozen to numb, his fingers felt huge damp swollen in their skin. Flakeglass blue eyes peered out into the winter’s night, daring the cold to take him. Shatter him over its knee. Slender fingers slipped into his pockets and procured the cigarettes he’d given him. Rolled impossibly thin, impossibly long in violet paper. Sealed at the seams with gold paint.

Where did you get those?

Places, he’d said. He’d smiled. I have my ways, Red.

It wasn’t tobacco in there. Something dizzy. Something better. He never told him that.

Carmine was not sweet, or kind, or smart. But he could light a cigarette against the wind, and sometimes that felt like enough. Carmine was full of useless skills. Milk white, the half-moons bruised under his eyes looked as they’d been layered on in watercolor, endless shades of blue and purple. Broken vessels stood out in pink rivulets. A necklace of bruises, fading yellow like old parchment. The shiny white tissue spilling over his back like the vast tangle of tree branches remind him of him.

Did you hear?

Yeah, I…the Astronomy Tower, right?

Right. I don’t even…

And their eyes would touch him, briefly. Not briefly enough.

And the boy blinked up, cow-eyed and peaceful from his dishes.

And he said: He turned his head into coleslaw, yeah. I ent his widow or nothing. Fuck off.

Carmine wished Petros had just swallowed arsenic or flayed his arms open in the tub. At least his head would’ve been all together. His skin had been warm and brown like leather. Had freckles, just like he did. Hands as huge as dinner plates and they tasted raw and real. Like dirt. Like plants.

Carmine mouth swirled with smoke. It squirmed hot in his lungs. He huffed it out, pink lips a perfect rosebud, grey smoke catching in the silver-blue latern light. It burnt his eyes. His ibis-long lashes fluttered, like nervous butterflies.

Everything had the volume cranked down, when the wind was rushing in his ears. Distantly, he heard the sound of water striking stone. Hard and fast.

“Sweetheart,” he growled to the storm. “Darlin’?”

The sink was overflowing.

“Didja see the sky or the snow last?”

Flooding over the stones. The suds swelled at the edges of the sink and they spilled too. Carmine blew out smoke. It climbed towards the ceiling, like a flowering vine.

Let it flood.

Aurelie had been at Brunnhold going on three years now, and she still got lost in the hallways. The red walls looked so much scarier, so much more the same, at night when she was cold and alone. She'd thought perhaps to sneak out while her ancient bunkmate was deep in slumber, and explore the kitchen by herself. She'd been working off and on as a drudge there for some number of weeks, but just the other day she had been put on emergency preparation duty. It was just simple tasks, cutting vegetables, watching to make sure things didn't burn, that sort of thing, but to Aurelie it had been magic. Not the kind she could have learned here, if she hadn't been... Well... Magic, though, all the same.

Her slippers were too big for her, reducing her to a slow shuffle. It had taken ages to get this far, to the kitchens. Gloriously empty, at this time of night, she just knew it was. Who in their right mind would be in one of the kitchens at this time? Conveniently her own self was forgotten. Slowly, she shuffled towards the back, only to hear-- A voice! A boy's voice, and she could smell something burning, something that didn't smell like a kitchen smell.

She let out an involuntary squeek. Who was there? Oh, if it was a patron-- or worse, a matron-- she would never hear the end of it! Sneaking around like this was a beating or worse. She wobbled, but instead of putting her hand on something solid, it ended up on a slightly overhanging cutting board. The board clattered to the floor, the sound seeming far, far too loud in the relative quiet of the kitchen.

Snow twisted and whistled in his ears. Somewhere, still in the kitchen, the splashsplashsplash of the water spilling onto the stones thundered onward. He was alright with the sound. It was peaceful, constant. (Not many things here were, not anymore.) It all ran together. Watercolors, sounds bleeding together. That sink? Not a sink. It was outside, surely. Amid the snowbanks. Somewhere, rushing, getting everything soaked.

That clatter, however, was not.

Carmine was jolted by the noise, jumped out of his skin. All these people, creeping around in the dark and not telling him things, making noise, knocking things over, talking, staring. Hated it, hated it. Six years of all this had turned his nerve endings to something frayed and barely there.

“What d-d’you…” He’d surely yelped, loud, because his throat felt raw.

That stupid purple cigarette hung limp and awkward in the pale phosphor lamp-light. This wasn’t all so artistic, so painful, once he opened his stupid eyes. The snow was blowing into the kitchen hard, the sink was overflowing, and a little girl was standing a massive puddle with a tray her feet. And, as a background detail, Petros was splattered all over a stone walkway as of exactly five this morning.

These things happen.

“You…what are you doing down here?” Brittle, maybe. But not wrathful, not hot. Carmine sounded far away. And he was. Carmine was out in the snow, somewhere, attending to that sink.

But what he could see here and now,the thing was so tiny she looked like she would fall under the weight of her own hair. “What…what are you, ten? You should…be in bed. Or…something.” The heavy drag in his voice said he should probably be sleeping, too. Yes, Carmine was tired. But it was that kind of ground down to the bones tired that transcended sleep entirely.

"I- I was just--"

Not a patron, then, and Aurelie was relieved. Comforted, maybe not, but relieved nonetheless because she couldn't imagine another passive turning her in for being out of bed after hours. Still, he wasn't very nice and she'd not quite gotten used to being around boys who weren't the hired help or Father. This one scared her, standing as he was in the phosphor light with his purple cigarette. The lighting did Carmine no favors, nor did it help her nerves. Water was seeping into her too-big slippers.

"I'm t-twelve!" A child's protest at being called a baby. She wasn't a littling, to be shuffled off to her bed by a nursemaid or rude boy. Who was he to push her around, anyway? She lifted her chin stubbornly, but the wobble in it gave her away. It was still so dark and cold and scary here. The wind and the snow blew in from the window and she thought suddenly of hot chocolate and home, of her sister reading to her by the fire all Achtus long. Her chin dropped again.

"I j-just wanted to... wanted to..." The boy didn't sound angry with her, just very tired and far away. Her bunkmate Louisa sounded like that sometimes. Louisa was very old, and told Aurelie many horrible things that made her clutch her pillow to her chest at night, heedless of the unforgiving mattress beneath her head. It was a poor substitute for a sister's hand and a soft plush osta (Marie, she'd called it), but it was all she had to keep away nightmares when Louisa told her stories of beatings and burnings and accidental deaths. She thought Louisa was not a very kind lady at all.

Joseph Harrison Abernathy. Two years done and a lifetime left to serve for his crime. The crime of living cost one high, it seemed. Two years and Joseph didn't cry himself to sleep anymore, pounding his little fist into the pillow and ripping at his sheets with frustration. But he'd discovered how the beatings gave him something to fight. It was certainly something to do. Excitement couldn't be found in scrubbing floors, or washing dishes, or laundry, or sewing. But the beatings and the slaps and the dark of the cellar made things feel a little more like living. He wasn't sure how. It was probably masochism, but somehow it felt normal. Easy. It was better than swallowing orders.

And orders were not supposed to take him to the kitchens. But that was the reason he tromped into them now in his oversized shoes and oversized blue uniform. A black kitten in an old blue blanket. A scratchy blanket. He clomped into the kitchen at a march and stopped. His sharp blue eyes widened at the sight of the water, and the cigarette (he was only mildly envious, really) and the girl with her shivering little body and the ginger boy with the cigarette. His eyes narrowed when he too shivered. The window was open.

"What the clock?" he hissed. He fixed the girl in his cat's glare.

“Right, twelve, whatever...” he mumbled. He wasn’t going to fuss over the girl’s age. She could be seven, for all he knew. “Jus’...don’t stand in the water. You’ll catch cold ‘r’ somethin’.” Some small part of him wanted to shamble over there, turn off the sink, get the stupid thing a heel of bread and shoo her off. “What? You hungry or somethin’?” Through thick voice and heavy eyes, he was trying to summon up something that sounded gentle. “Here, there’s—oh, for the love of ffff--“

Whatever offer he was going to give the girl was cut up in annoyance when the second little thing showed up. What was this? Did all the littlest kids have some sort of convocation in the kitchens in the wee hours of the morning? Bitty Jo. Of all the mousy, meek little boys that could have wandered out here, it had to be that ornery beastling.

Why here, why now? Carmine just wanted to be here, with his godsdamn window, with Petros. Why was he up, anyway? Waiting for someone, that’s what it felt like. Sometime soon, all this reality would roll over him like a wave. But he wouldn’t drown, nah. He’d learn to breathe water, if he had too. He’d breathe smoke.

For now, Carmine was numb in ways beyond the cold.

“Good Lady, Jo,” he murmured to the window. Pale eyes trained hard on something out in all that flat whiteness. “I jus’ dunno what the clock is goin’ on anywheres any more. How ‘bout you tell me?”

The boys were simply multiplying. For Aurelie Steerpike, what had been a bit trying on the nerves now became more than a little bit frightening. For all that the second boy didn't seem much older than her, she was alone, at night, in the kitchens, with two boys, one of them older. And she was cold, and wet, and standing in a puddle. The slippers were new. She tried to step out of the water, but by this time it had sopped into her poor, dear slippers so thoroughly that all she managed to do was make her own, smaller puddle to stand in.

It didn't help that the new boy was glaring at her. What had she done? She had a vague terror of boys, encouraged by the matrons and older girls about her. Better be terrified of them, they always said, than to be to interested. Being too interested in boys always led to trouble. What kind of trouble? she would ask, and they would just shake their heads and tell her she would find out soon enough.

Aurelie didn't like boys, she decided, if all of them acted like she was a terrible bother like these two. Well, the older one seemed like he might be a proper sort, if he weren't sitting in the window smoking and scaring young ladies. Which she most certainly was, and not a child at all.

"I was going to... to..." To cook something. Oh, but she couldn't say that! What if he were just as dreadful as he'd looked in the phosphor light, all wreathed in smoke?

Aurelie seemed to squirm a bit under his glare. He let her loose, like an osta that's become bored of staring down a sparrow. He turned his cold eyes back to the other boy. And he was a boy. Sixteen, but this one seemed nothing more frightening than a child. The cigarette he had looked out of place on him—he looked like a child in his father's boots, trying to be a free adult by merely putting something on.

Joseph glared at the water splashing on the floor and the window open, back to the cigarette and then to Carmine. "I'm not here to rat you out for flooding the place or having that. If that's what you mean..." he replied quietly. His lazy eyes blinked slowly and his tiny mouth formed a twisted bud. Truly, he couldn't care less about what rules other passives broke. Joseph was no stickler, no Matron.



He didn't look back at the girl this time. He could hear her well enough to see the anxious expression on her face. He didn't respond to her hesitant, breathy little voice, either. Joseph considered rummaging around in the cupboards for something to occupy him. The boy began strolling past the counters. The image of gleaming knives, all lined out nicely in shiny, ascending rows in a rolled out wooden drawer seemed appealing to his mind at the moment. He envisioned them stuck in the wall. Like darts.

"What?" Carmine sighed. "What were you going t'--" he glowered at the that little boy fussing around the drawers. "Fer fu--clocks, Jo, stay outta those knives. I don't want nobody else doin' themselves in."

As little affection he had to spare for Jo, he didn't want to lose to many more. Not so soon, and hopefully none so small. Stupid Brunnhold. Stupid tiny things, turning him into somebody's mum all fretted with a lady's nervous condition. Visions of little white arms all cut up and little bodies shivery-wet from hypothermia. Worry, worry. He didn't bother to close the window -- it had to stay open, for some reason. Old stories, older than he could remember about...

Ghosts?

The glass was frigid under his fingers, veined with rivers of ice. He let it stand open. The stone floor was positively freezing beneath his naked feet, but he padded over into the water anyway. Little thing in a puddle, ugh. Her slippers only made it worse. In one unwieldly motion, he heaved her off the floor and with (some...well, a lot) of difficulty and flopped her on the counter.

"You...like....you can't go trackin' water everywhere. We don't need any more of a damn mess," he muttered, shuffling away. He ducked down and plucked off her slippers, holding them in his fingers like two dead, waterlogged ducks. Wet, white. "It'll getcha si--for Alioe's sake, Joseph clockin' Abernathy, get outta those damn knives!" he snapped, a tenous touch of nerves caught in his voice.

Not that Quilp would ever admit it, but being Professor Mulch's personal butler was far from a walk in the park. Quilp liked to present himself as the perfect butler, and a good servant was of course open to every whim and desire of their master, and that was to be expected. It's just that the professor did seem to have a great many of them.

Take for instance, this very moment. Quilp had learned that Mulch was intending to spend an evening in the Stacks with an old school friend and Quilp had presumed that an early night, once Mulch's room has been tidied, his papers organised, nightshirt laid out and bed turned down would be the most sensible option so Quilp could be up with the larks the next morning and enjoy another productive working day. Clearly, Quilp had made a grave error in judgement as Mulch had returned, demanding nourishment, which Quilp had none to offer.

Being, however, the exemplary butler that he was- Quilp had taken it upon himself to personally fetch Mulch some food from the kitchens.
As he trod, silent as the grave- as all passives ought to be- right down to his tiny footfalls, Quilp practised his master's food order. His memory was, he thought- exceptional, his mind so attune to his master’s needs that they could be one. This thought filled him with pride, to almost claim oneness with a galdor was the highest accolade a passive could ever hope to achieve!

Entering the kitchen, however, Quilp’s mood fell drastically when greeted with three younger scraps, loitering in the kitchen, out of hours and most likely without permission! His thin lips curled as he surveyed them. The girl he didn’t know- another snivelling little girl too wet to be of any use to anyone yet, though Quilp would soon see to that. The younger of the boys, Abernathy, was a trouble maker- Quilp knew that at the very most and the older….well, the older was one of the worst kinds of passive. Arrogance.

Lisette had arrogance abound. His arrogance had seen him cosy up to that soft Patron Petros. He’d sucked his dick to get out of doing any work and had thought he was better than everyone else because his breath stank of patron cum. But Ernst knew better. Ernst knew what he was, a lazy ungrateful, dangerous bastard just like the rest of them.

Petros had succumbed to his terrible moral failings in the end. And in a way, it was probably for the best. If a passive wasn’t productive, he may as well be dead. Petros with his head all caved in the way it was was about as useful now as Lisette was, smoking out of the window trying to impress the younger ones like he was the king of Brunnhold.

“Well, we seem to be having quite the party in here,” said Quilp sharply, announcing himself to the room. “Do you have permission to be here? I don’t have to remind you that if you’re caught smuggling food the punishment will be severe.”

The little girl had rather pretty hair. Passives had no business looking after their hair- it was a vanity that Quilp never subscribed to, his black hair never long enough to run a finger through and he longed to take a pair of scissors to the girl’s.

“Tell me Lisette,” said Ernst with a sly grin, “you’re not throwing dear Petros a funeral party are you? Rather a small turn out...rather a small legacy," he ended with a sneer.

Aurelie's eyes were wide and round as the saucers she set under teacups, fringed all about with that delicate filligree of red-gold. She'd been set, none too gently but not with any real intentional violence, on the counter and her slippers had been removed. She'd liked those slippers-- they seemed like the might last her a long time. This was only confirmed when her bunkmate had tutted over their fineness. Pretty little girls, she'd said, have every advantage in the world. Even passive ones. Aurelie hadn't really understood-- she'd just snatched them up when they appeared in the bin one day, just like everyone else did. They didn't even fit. But she was starting to understand her bunkmate was not a nice lady, and that she really shouldn't take anything she says to heart overmuch.

"Thank y--" She started to say, trying to remember her manners. But then he just appeared in the room, and Aurelie Steerpike couldn't help but cringe. For all that she was scared of boys in general, this one was scarier than the rest. She'd heard tell of what he'd done before to that poor girl, in whispers when he passed. Even Louisa spat when that one came by. Unconciously she leaned away, trying to make herself seem smaller and less noticeable. Louisa really, really liked telling the story of the girl from years ago.

"Funeral party?" Had someone died? Then Aura remembered-- someone had. That Patron, hadn't he? No one would tell her the details, so she assumed it to be quite grim indeed. Harriet was sixteen and knew all about it, but she just shook her head and said he'd gotten out as best he could.

The silky scrape of finely sharpened metal whispered in the kitchen. Ernst's arrival had drawn Joseph's eyes like a pair of magnets and the boy gazed blankly at him, like one who was not entirely in tune with what his eyes beheld. Joseph had pulled back into his thinking, whirring mind when that stickler of a passive had marched into the kitchens. Fun was just going out of its way to come to him, it seemed. Joseph allowed himself a leer on the inside as he drew forth the knife.

In a flash, the metal had buried its tip into the wall, a swish announcing the muted crescendo of its arrival in the fine wood. Joseph turned his gaze to the knife, and found, to his delight, that it'd stuck there. A real leer spread across his face and he drew out another knife. He held it up and wiggled it casually in his fingertips, like someone might expressively handle a champagne glass at a fancy party. If one really did such things at fancy parties.

"For Patron Petros," he announced, taking an honorary bow to the knife. He figured it would piss Ernst off something fierce. He then turned back to his 'audience', his wicked snarl looking almost joyful as the wild light in his eyes turned them electric blue. "Who wants their turn, eh? How 'bout you, Ernst? Care to live a little?"

To tell the truth, Joseph had never liked, nor disliked Petros. He was another scrap who was stuck in the same shit-hole as he was. The same bars, the same prison, the same walls. No sense of camaraderie emerged at the thought of such things, and Joseph did have to admit that he thought the man more than a little weak for making such a mess of his head. Theatrics, or whatever jumping from the clockstopping astronomy tower was supposed to be, didn't have much room in Joseph's book. Still.... Ernst’s behavior irked him even more.

One might have suspected that a warning tinged the edges of his voice, or a threat, or an ominous prediction. Or it could be that Joseph was just a masochist. He certainly did like the nice little nick that the knife would produce in the wood. "I know you like darts, Ernst.... Everyone should like the game of darts...."

"How 'bout you go fuck --!"

Up and bristling like a cat. Good Lady, where did that come from? Some hot bubble of vehemence buried in the tiny birdcage of ribs, bursting open like a ... like a head on pavement, really, spilling and getting all over everything. Was that his hands shaking? It's the cold, that, he was shivering. They were all shivering, here.

"I don't give a...I don't care, it ain't like..." It didn't mean shit. It was just a filler, just a shield flimsier than wet paper.

Ernst was bad fucking news of the highest caliber, and there was no Petros and his whip to laugh behind. Carmine knew, knew, knew that little girl had been fucked up past repair. At least with Petros he could piece himself together again, slowly, with enough sinew and twine. There might be some snarls in the stitches but it was nothing he couldn't just ignore if he really wanted to. But that girl was royally messed up beyond fixing. But there was no helping that one. She felt nothing, was nothing.

...Maybe, then, he should focus on dangers at hand, what was happening now instead of what was then. It's just that he didn't, maybe later, because even now as he was hissing at Ernst, he was still glancing at all those godsdamn doors and windows, expectant. Petros was moving somewhere beyond the wall. Had to be. It's a fucking joke, ha ha, except nobody was laughing.

Somewhere, somewhere, the clink of rusty garden things on the stone floor. How he'd love to catch that tongue his teeth and feel those leathery hands sweep the red red walls above his head and his breath would just stop in his chest and he'd be nowhere at all. Words like 'honor' would be completely foreign to him, suddenly.

Shove the pieces of his head back together and line his teeth up in a nice little row, make his smile sweet to see. Slender fingers kneading at the base of his neck, smoking those weird cigarettes talking about going across the walls. Sitting beneath the huge thicket of briar roses, years growing up a massive trellis and then dying in midair. The shade was immense and secluded and smelled like dead flowers and it was the place where he first kissed him, oh my -- snuffing his stupid cigarette in the grass first, decisive, then taking Carmine's face in his hands like two big parentheses. It didn't hurt, didn't always.

"At least people l-liked him you frog-faced cocks--" Too close to home, that. He faltered. "...your mama prolly had a plowfoot stable boy slippin' it to her somethin' awful before she popped out your ugly self! No wonder ya smell like horseshit!" he spat. Carmine almost wanted to be scared, but it was hard. Being whipped to ribbons might actually help this.

So what if it hurt now. So what if the inside of his cheek was still pulp. So what if his mouth was still swollen raw. People could say unnumbered wretched things about Carmine, every last one true, but they could never say the boy wasn't faithful to the last. Perhaps the welt still sore on the nape of Carmine's neck was as close to 'goodbye' as Petros ever got.

"You aren't no better than he was, slittin' your eyes up at little girls like your gonna -- gonna -- Joseph, for fuck's sake!" he snapped, voice ragged bordering on quivering, the back of his hand flashing out and slapping the boy on the back of the head.

“Eh, ye ought not t’be fickling with those who got better t’do, kettlehead. And simmer you all, this ent a time to be making a ruckus. None of us wanna get our erses tanned.” The lad who entered the kitchen with a towel over his shoulder didn’t look like much; a smudge of brownish hair, eyes like dirty snow and charcoal. They had a certain sheen, though, and his awkwardly long arms and legs were tense. The awkward intensity of that glare was all focused on Ernst, ready to spark like flint. He’d heard the rumors, didn’t like them and liked their originator even less. A butler, for godssakes, to one of them. He’d never say what Carmy had, but he would defend the redhead’s right to say it.

Harold smiled wanly at his roommate, memories shared in the lines of pale, young skin that were never spoken of. All the wounds were ripped open fresh, or perhaps the wounds never healed. Either way, they leaked puss onto the friends and now the stains ran bone deep. It didn’t matter if Carmy has cursed Alioe herself, there was camaraderie there to be unshaken by anything but the frailty of the flesh. It happened more and more, as though things dead had started to haunt long before their demise.

Through the day he’d been a shadow behind Carmy, though he was usually put to the rough work and tonight was no different. Coals for the baths, shoveling and working the lawn. It hadn’t been hard, trading shifts to be close to his bunkmate, a promise of some favors and a night out on the town, giving up his only freedoms for more work. It only was a little bit of the secret cash they pair had been saving up… not like Carmy remembered the whispered plans of aeroships and bombs, escaping to be pirates and explorers and great lovers of everything. Not like he should remember, not like the sacrifice was anything new or different to Harold. Same old, same old.

Turning to Joseph, he raised a brow and swatted at the air, as through striking the knife down. “And put those away, we’ve had enough of it today.” He’d not seen the mess, but he’d been working the morning shift in the underbelly. “We’re all frazzled, an its later than hell. C’mon.” It wasn’t much, but he was enough. He’d have to be, because Carmine wouldn’t have much else now. He’d have to do with the dead eyes redhead that night, but now there was fire brewing and he’d not let the idiot go in alone. It was almost with anger that he was here to comfort his best friend, because he’d been able to ignore so much for so long. He couldn't ignore it any more, though, not with wind like howls clawing at them, with eyes like daggers and daggers like eyes peering at them, with little girls and soaked slippers quietly standing guardian. Ignorance was no option.

Damn Petros’ eyes, Harold hoped he’d only seen the ground when he decided to foul everything up. Astronomy tower, blast it all. He couldn’t have been more of an ass, making more of a mess, could he? It was all he deserved, to see neither sky nor sun when he hit the ground. Sidling up to the sink, he stopped the tap and threw the towel down to the floor, soaking up some of the pooling water. Harold made order, always had, of the messes he saw in life. Submerging his hands in the greasy, soapy water, he turned those dry, walled eyes on the other passives, especially ernst. The shithead would have something to say, he knew it. “Now, I sees we got ourself a congregation. I’ma say that less you’re names on the roster for dishes, sweepin or fire tending, be at your business.” He was always like this. He would always be like this. As long as Carmine fouled things up, he’d be there.

Anything else was unimaginable.

Ernst watched Joseph fling his knives, flinging his own ego about the kitchen and smiled, a slow twisting of his long thin lips- it was a smile that still ran through that girl's head, even now. It was a smile that kept her head down, her fingers nimble and when she cleaned the cookers no one did a finer job. Ernst was very proud of that smile. Passives stay laborious, Brunnhold stays glorious.

Because what these silly little things forget, with their knives and their words, was that their power was fleeting. Joseph had a knife now, but he couldn't tomorrow, or the next day- he wouldn't have one when he (and marked assured he would) didn't do his job properly, when Ernst would be there, to deliver his stinging justice at the tip of a whip. The same went for Lisette, there was no Patron Petros to hide behind any more and Ernst never forgot.

When Harold entered, Ernst could appreciate what he was saying- damn right it was late and Mulch needed his food, it was his job- but so was disciplining wayward passives, not just a job- it was a calling, from the minute his flesh had made contact with her bone Ernst had felt his true vocation. He worked tirelessly for the galdori and one day they would thank him.

"The little slug is right, go about your business, Idle talk leads to idle minds" he turned cold eyes on them all, "and it's very late. I don't have time for your silly little games Abernathy...and neither will you, for a very long time. Double shifts for the rest of Achtus and no mealtime privileges for a week." Ernst's memory was impeccable, Abernathy was not just a trouble maker- he was violent and dangerous, he made a note of that. Break him now before he got any stronger.

Though he didn't show it, Ernst resented what Carmine had said about his mother. He'd heard worse, oh my yes, shouted by little scraps as he tied them to a post, shut the door and left them in darkness, but that didn't mean that Ernst didn't boil below the surface. A volcano under a layer of ice. If the ice broke, Carmine didn't have a chance of getting up.

"Same to you Listette. And since you like being under someone's wing so much your extra shifts will be served with me," he would be terrible, Ernst knew that, deliberately try to make a hash of everything. Which worked out perfectly as Ernst would be deliberately looking for any excuse to punishment. In a way Ernst felt sorry for Lisette, Petros had done a terrible job with this one, kept him away from the healing powers of hard work, stopped him from doing his penance to the galdori, rotted his core. Ernst prayed he was not too late to fix this. "And just so you know, I am better than he was," he said coldly to Carmine, those beetle black eyes dead as Petros', there could have been maggots and flies tunnelling inside of him too, beneath his uniform his skin too could have started to fester.

"You'll learn that, Lisette. When the taste of his cum isn't swilling around your pathetic neck..." he'd taste blood with Ernst. "I'm alive and he isn't...he left you Lisette. You weren't enough , not enough to save him...a scrap can't save any body, all a scrap can do is work. And you've not been pulling your weight for years since you became the patron's fucktoy...but don't worry little fucktoy, I'll soon put you to rights."

He turned to the little girl. Still so soft around the edges, still smelling of Mama's hugs and kisses, still believing she had the right to be loved- oh, how he longed to help her! She needed to know what she was- just a scrap, nothing. And if she learned it, she would be happy, like Ernst. Not covered in scars, head out the window hoping for more like that damnable Lisette. "What's your name, scrap?" he smiled that same, nightmarish smile.

"I never forget trouble makers. These three are trouble makers and since you're associating with them I have to assume you're the same. Little girl scraps shouldn't be running around with boy scraps at night," his smile faded into something worse, voice devoid of all humour. "They'll lift your skirts and poke around your underneath...like they do to tumbles in back alleys," barked Ernst, his voice as harsh and as ugly as the words that he spoke.

Lisette was too enamoured by patron dick, the Abernathy boy was barely thirteen and Harold didn't have the balls for anything like that- but all the same. Brunnhold was mostly segregated for a reason, scraps breeding made him sick to his stomach, he was just teaching the girl a vital life lesson especially if she grew up to be pretty.

"You aren't a whore, missy are you?" The smile was back. " Do you lie back, tiny legs spread wide and let the boys slip off your little under things?" his lips twitched, nausea rose in his stomach and his fist clenched tight, his knuckles turning white. He wanted to hurt the child desperately, but he knew he had to be good, knew he mustn't go too far, passives couldn't work if you broke arms or legs and little bones did break so easily. Just keep talking . Ernst's self control was getting far better since the incident; he stopped a lot earlier now, when they could still scream.

"I knew some little girly whores...I shaved their heads bald." He reached out and stroked a strand of Aurelie's hair- his touch alarmingly gentle, maybe even tender if it had been from anyone else and he lowered his face close to hers, she would be able to smell soap and blood and whispered in a low voice "Pretty hair, would you like me to shave it? If I ever catch you so much as looking at Lisette or Abernathy again, I will take my scissors to those pretty red locks of yours and cut them all off."

He removed his hands from her hair, let a long cold finger slide down her cheek and under a trembling bottom lip. "And if I ever catch you out of line, out of hours or not doing what you were supposed to, little girl...I will cut you.Do you understand?"

Frozen, that's what he was. That firebrand spark was snuffed out like a spark underneath Ernst's boot heel. Tiny withered thing, like a weak blossom under frost. Withering back into himself, tiny and limp, as fast as he'd burst into color. Fucktoy. Pretty thing. Thing! Pretty thing, pretty thing. Porcelain and painted garish like some little wind up toy. Gears and glass eyes. Ball joints like little marbles. It's not he can feel it, anyway, so don't feel bad.

Harold was there, Harold helped, but-- Harold wasn't doing anything or saying anything, just washing those dishes with that far away look on his face. Wanted to seize him by the shoulders, wrench him out of the sink and shake him until his eyes rattled in their sockets. Harry -- Harry, you fucking coward, can't you see I'm dying over here, do something! After all this time of being defended by the man with the whip, he didn't know what to do when he was on the wrong end of it. Other than spit like a little cat and when that didn't work, just blink up at him all fish-eyed. Dead eyed.

Every word of it made him wince, remembering. His cheeks flared up fiery pink. It wasn't true, none of it. Nobody's toy, no! Petros had loved him, truly madly deeply. He'd said so, unnumbered times, there had to be the smallest granule of truth in there somewhere. His pale fingers, gnarled in nerves, latched onto Harry's shirtsleeve.

"He...he loved me. You know that. You know he did, he loved me. Loved me the best," Carmine whispered to him, bony shoulders touching over the roaring tide of the sink. "Tell me he did. Say, 'he loved you so much Car, he sure as shoot did'." A razor's edge of urgency clinging there, as if the whole clocking world was hinged on the answer. The world was freezing and the curve of Harold's neck was warm. He buried his nose there, eyes slipping closed. Helpless little dolly. He may have wanted to summon up more venom, spit and hiss, but he didn't think he could. It was exhausting, all of this.

Harold who'd been shadowing him all day, silent as a shade, never asking about it. He knew too much already, wordless queues left hanging like smoke in the air. When the night would be a touch too tangible and he'd go scurrying up the rungs of their bunkbeds, burying his face in the thistledown of Harry's hair -- he'd stopped thrashing around and calling him starfly by now. Harry would lay there, bony yet pliable, while Carmine nosed against him like a cat seeking warmth.

All that moving, he'd turned the volume down on everything but the warm pulse of Harry's jugular against his ear. His limbs unfolded when he felt Ernst slip past him, looming over the girl like that. Head lifting from Harry's shoulder, turning sharp and mechanical. Talking about her little skirt and her underthings and so many sick memories of some older boy tugging on his belt or twisting a hand in his hair when he was bittier than her -- just like Petros, worse than Petros, at least --

When Ernst's voice fell away, beyond the realm of hearing, and that hand slipping down her little face --

Carmine's knees snapped like rubberbands. The force of his body slamming against Ernst's back rocked his ribcages, slender little arms locking around Ernst's neck, boney knees digging at the older boy's hips for purchase. Ruined fingernails clawing at the curve of his throat, his cheeks. Running his hands all over little girls, little things, baby fuck --

"Baby fucker!" he shrieked, his voice shivering like the rest of him. "He loved me you clockin' baby fucker!" Whatever else was going to be screamed was muffled when his little teeth clamped around Ernst's shoulder.

“Little Shhii-” Ernst hissed as Carmine’s teeth sank into his shoulder. Tocking clocks! The boy had sharp teeth. And a tight grip on his neck. He struggled violently as a bander wolf, Carmine was a slight sixteen, still soft though his nails dug into flesh, ripped through skin.

Ernst drew back his pointed elbow and sent a blow into Carmine’s gut. It wasn’t much, with hands in his face, red hot rage in his ears and nose but it was enough and Ernst felt the hands on his neck loosen. “Bad mistake Lisette,” choked Ernst. “Damn fool scrap.”

Baby Fucker, that was new. Made Ernst’s body shake, to suggest he would debase himself, his body with the scrap whores and their quivering little mouths, bent over their work- trying to tempt him when they knew, they all knew those little whores that Ernst was better.

The golly ladies in the school would know it too, know that he wasn’t like the rest of them, he’d show them- how he could work. And sometimes, once or twice they would look at him and he would see that they knew how hard he would try to please them…golly women. Perfection. Not like these…these shit stains on the world Carmine insuated him with. It made Ernst feel physically sick.

Beat the bad thoughts out.

He seized a chunk of red hair, pulled hard. Idiot Passives, this was exactly why Ernst kept his head shaven. Feeling soft hair between his fingers he yanked down, down onto the ground ,forcing Carmine onto his knees in front of him.

“I expect this is familiar,” he hissed, twisting Carmine’s hair this way and that. Pushed the boy’s head forwards towards his crotch, Ernst’s uniform smelt impeccable of course- he washed extra hard down there, til it hurt. Ernst imagined what went on between Carmine and the Patron, empty kitchens just like this, lonely nights- and good lady the nights could get lonely, breath heavy, fingers and hot mouths working away. Ernst felt a cocktail of white hot hate and revulsion.

“But you won’t get out of this one by sucking dick.” Carmine’s head was yanked back and Ernst surveyed him.

There was nothing to be fathomed from that cold gaze, there was no scrap of humanity in Ernst’s dead eyes, Carmine could have been dirt on the ground beneath Patron Petro’s ruined head. How could these scraps look so much like his beloved galdori…Carmine could have been any one of them, were he in a green uniform; noble arrogant features, fine bone structure. They hid their inner poison behind their looks, it wasn’t fair. He punched Carmine hard and didn’t even blink.

Carmine wasn’t galdori. Didn’t have the right to look like one. Ernst struck again.

“Loved you did he?” smiled Ernst, seizing Carmine by the scruff of his collar, “Where’s he now?” Ernst delived a blow from practised knuckles towards Carmine’s pretty little cheekbones. "Loved you right off that tower." No one loved scraps. Not other scraps, not no one… no one for Harold or Abernathy, the girl or Ernst- why should Carmine think he was better.

“A poke... in a storage cupboard... a quick fuck in a toolshed? That isn’t love, Lisette. Love is what they tell you so... you take your underpants off that little bit quicker...suck that little bit harder... take his cock that little bit deeper.... He fucked you, fuck toy.... And now you're fucked because he’s fucked himself…” Ernst chuckled, punctuating each pause in his speech with a blow to the face or a kick to the body“Fucking funny isn’t it?”

He kicked and scratched, punched and poked. Ernst was transformed from the obsequious little toad who served Mulch so dutifully, from the cold young man who’d threatened little girls and far far from a little boy who’d sat on Nanny’s knee and read stories to the human woman. There was no galdor, no passive, no man in Ernst only hot rage and a beast.

Got to be good. Got to stop while they still could scream.

Ernst spat on Carmine’s face, a thick wad of white- Carmine knew what that was like and straightened up, panting still. He’d stopped though he wanted to continue, wanted to beat all the shape out of Lisette’s face til he resembled his little lover and there was bits of his brain littering the kicthen. Ernst wiped blood from his knuckles onto his uniform and felt proud.

Another reason he was better than those other scraps, self control even in the face of adversity.

Suddenly, violence.

Before all the horrible, nasty things Ernst had said to her really soaked in-- oh, but she heard the malice in them, even a child could hear that loud and clear as it was --the ginger boy had launched himself across the room and there was yet another one. It was really far more than she'd bargained for, trying to come down here and bake muffins in the dead of night. Aurelie reminded herself strictly that Ernst was just like Louisa, mean and horrible but not to be taken seriously. She would be noble and strong and not let it get to her, like a prince in a fairy story. Her chin tried to stick out defiantly and her back to straighten, but both betrayed her with soft, crumbling weakness.

Instead, she drew her knees to her chest and tried to scoot back as best she could, away from snarling, snapping boys, more like banders than boys really. Make herself small, make herself hide, make herself invisible so Ernst would never, ever get that close to her again. She wished she was brave, but instead her heart thudded in her chest and she felt sick all over, her eyes hot though she was biting her cheek as hard as she could. Once she'd heard someone say that the best way to deal with people like Ernst was to never let them know you were afraid of them. It didn't seem to work so well for the red haired boy-- Lisette? Was that his name?

Aura tried not to cry. Boys really were horrible. She didn't fully understand a lot of what they were saying, but she got the general idea and it was awful. She hadn't wanted any of this-- all she'd wanted, honestly, had been free use of the ovens.

If Ernst was had any feeling in that self-righteous body of his, he probably felt the claw against his back. Scratch that, two claws, for Joseph thought that wielding two darts at once was far more impressive.

Joseph poked the knives at Ersnt's back, tickling the older passive's spine a bit through the fabric of his uniform. Carmine was a bloody pulp, nigh useless now. The girl was…well…a little girl, and Harry just didn’t seem the type for the job. Ernst had to leave.

"Easy now, Ernie," Joseph hissed, his blue eyes arrow slits. "I can't let Carmine have all the fun.... Care for a game of darts....?"

If there was anything to be said of Harold, it was that he didn’t need to think much before doing what he thought was right. Not that he was much of a philosopher, but when things got tight he always knew, instinctively, how he was going to continue, whether it was to walk away or actually act. This time was one of the rare occasions where he acted, because if he didn’t Carmine would be left bloody, the girl maligned by the stupid fucker Ernst, and Abernathy as dead as Petros. No one messed with the Personals of the staff. Unless they were stupid, broken, or moony. But there was too far, and little redheads and bleeding beautiful boys were beyond that wavering line.

Without a word of internal dialogue, Harold moved forward and grabbed Abernathy by the collar, dragging him back, flinging the younger passive against one of the counters. Harold was a silent lad, one of much action and only some bluster. Adversity made his mind blank of words, of description or poetry. It filled with action, purpose. Abernathy was too young for such a punishment as would come to someone who threatened a Personal passive, it was a bitter thing he’d only seen a few times. He’d take the boy’s damned knives, or hell, even a stab to the back if the kid was that desperate for blood. Ernst wasn’t to be harmed by anyone that couldn’t take the punishment later.

So it was with the knowledge that his back was the one to be split with a lash that Harold’s scarred, senseless hand found itself careening into Ernst’s face. The aim was to blank whatever of this night the cruel, evil son of a bander remembered. The butler would recall hitting Carmine, the humiliation of the redheaded boy, but he’d also remember the taste of blood and working class leather-skin, the dark glare of a young man pressed beyond what was normal. Ernst would understand the burden of real passives, the inner boiling that kept them inside these locked walls, the fear of the ticking bomb. Not all the danger was the diableire. That was just the most obvious of those secret explosions.

“You—fucking—toff.” Each word punctuated by another blow, Harold grabbed onto the neck of Ernst’s perfectly pressed suit, crinkling the starched, pristine fabric between his gnarled knuckles. Harold’s aim was faltering; he’d hit Ernst’s nose, then his jaw. But it was done fast, rapidly, with pent up aggression meant for both these abuses, and the tresspasses of the recently dead against the same beautiful victim.

Before he’d really even started, Harold shoved himself back, heels coming to rest against the cavern of Carmine’s body. “Git out. You think yer better than us scraps? Prove it, and be the golly here. Mona me up, you fuckin toff. Magic me, or take yer sorry ass off so's I can Do. My. Job.” Harold’s voice was rough, not with rage but with disgust. Blood, his own and Ernst’s, smeared his bark-like knuckles where scabs fell away to reveal frayed skin, but he merely wiped the damaged appendage on his hip. “If ye wanna make it like a scrap, come at me then. We’ll do this the plowfoot way.” He didn't straighten. There was no honor in 'scrapping.' If Ernst so much as twitched too fast, Harold would go in blazing.

It was one of those beatings that should break people.

What he should have been thinking was, I will smash Ernst's face open.

What was really thinking was, my face. Whatever will become of my face. He pictured ground pork. He pictured tiny Christine, her face warped like a melted sheet of metal, her eye popped and her lid sewn shut. Thought of tangled fishing line on a riverbank, weaving the bits of his pretty face together like a ragdoll. It was only then that tears started flowing. His whole body shook, lungs convulsing out a sound like a hiccuping laugh.

He rolled on his side, hauled his knees up to chest. Clung to them. The beating had dragged his shirt up under his armpits and the miserable buttons of his spine were exposed to the kitchen. The movement rustled the fabric of his trousers and the fabric clung wetly to the crux of his thighs, and Carmine desperately told himself it was just the water. The scent of ammonia hit him like a brick.

Hard splinters of things floated in his mouth. Cutting his gums, scraping the inside of his cheeks. Carmine pressed one to the roof his mouth with his tongue. It was a shard of his teeth. Blood coated the inside of his throat, gurgled there around his ragged hitches for breath like a stopped up drain. He swallowed hard, taking in blood and teeth, licked his lips as if they were coated in honey.

The phantom drag of Ernst crotch scratched at his cheeks, his nose, his lips. Coarse fabric, but cool and clean. Rings of water soaked the knees of his trousers and bruises were blossoming on the bony jags of his knees and he was trying to pretend none of this was familar. Warm brown Petros leaning back against the counter with his turned earth and ozone smell, sink cranked up to drown dishes and noise -- these things were taken from him, stained with a burning flash of pale thighs and coarse black hair and 'fucktoy' and all at once he was more afraid than he'd ever been. All at once his stomach clenched so hard it might have been trying to implode. Bile shot up in into his throat.

The thin walls of his stomach heaved and pitched itself up into the hollow cage of his ribs. Carmine's belly made the perfect wine glass curve of a 'U', and everything -- bile and blood and cum -- everything came rushing out of his mouth. It felt like vomiting an ocean. When his eyes peeled open past the growing black clouds of bruises, he wouldn't have been surprised to see a beach of pebbles or a half dead fish flopping around in his puddle of filth. The sting of acid in his nose coaxed his tummy to writhe some more, but to no effect. There wasn't anything left. The only thing that leaked past his lips were quiet groans, weak little cat noises.

Over the sick sounds of himself, he'd heard the percussion of what could have been someone pounding out raw meat. And then he heard that voice, Harry's voice, and it was always so funny. Too deep and ragged for somebody still so young. You get 'im, Carmine wanted to choke. Rip eyes his out and eat 'em. You wonderful lovely stupid plowfoot-looking sack of spitch, you. He couldn't help growl at his himself, because his stupid eyes wouldn't stop streaming.

He flinched at first when he felt Harry's heel gently brushing against his stomach. Ice cold hands took hold the other boy's pantleg. His legs unfolded from his body. Now you're fucked, because he fucked himself. Who would have mercy on him now?, Carmine had wondered. Carmine curled his arms around Harry's ankles loosely, looking like one of those old pagan paintings of a snake coiled around some big divine bastard's feet. He pressed a bloody kisses to Harry's naked foot. Lips left a stain, like a noble ladies mouth painted with blistleberry. Maybe this, maybe, was what love felt like.

Oh, Harry. Deliver me. Oh.

The little dollie, wet in own his blood, vomit, and piss. The dampness in his eyes made them look a bit too much like glass, blinking flatly up at Ernst. He was shivering on the inside, didn't want to look at him. Lily white face streaked in his own blood, like war paint. Pretty crimson curls -- golly crimson, what a nice color -- caked in puke. Carmine Incarnadine. He didn't look like a dollie now. He didn't feel like one either.

As hard as Ernst would try to forget it- he’d been here before. Before he’d found himself and found pease in pieces he’d been here. On the wrong side of a fist. They all had been, once, little things spoiled by Mama and Papa and Nanny- taught how the world was to be by the sting of a whip and a kick to the shins. But it had been so very long since a boy with thick black curls had stood in Ernst’s place and taken blows that Ernst almost forgot what it was like.

Harry, here for the Lisette boy. Where had been Ernst’s protection? His patron and his friends? He had taken those beatings learned from them, learned to love them like a friend until it was his time to deliver the lessons. It was better this way. And each one of them deserved the pain. Ernst smiled through the blood in his nostrils as Harry struck, sincere, unnerving as hell. The beatings were always lessons, you must always learn from them…what kind of excecutor of golly justice would he be if he did not listen to his own advice.

And Ernst had learned that this boy, this quiet thing was to be made to pay. The gods had delivered a scrap to him, like hard clay which needed to be moulded in to shape.

The kitchen was a mess, blood dripped slowly on to the floor and urine seeped through Lisette’s trousers. Ernst would clean this all up, wipe the blood from tiles and wash it white and pure. He created the carnage and wiped it clean, like no passives had been there at all, leaving no stain on the world. Create desuctrion and then destroy it all over again.

Git out. You think yer better than us scraps? Prove it, and be the golly here. Mona me up, you fuckin toff. Magic me, or take yer sorry ass off.
Ernst snarled and it was hard to imagine that this hard face had ever smiled before. Magic..be the golly. He wished it, every day he wished to feel something beyond his fingers, the smalllest trace of a field till his head pounded behind his temples. To ask this of him. To ask the impossible made his heart ache for the galdori. But Ernst’s raw wounds scabbed over, hard and dark as he clenched his fist’s and spat on the floor.

“Stupid…” he hissed, flecks of spit and blood errupting from his mouth. “Why play the hero Harold?”

Straightening up Ernst looked down at Carmine struggling on the floor, hand clasped around his saviour. Saviour indeed. Cold eyes narrowed as he worked out how to save the saviour, to first destroy and then rebuild. “Assualting a superior is a grave offense,” he spat. “You know the severity it holds and that it affects the severity of my whip don’t you?” Of course he did, the scrap wasn’t an idiot.

It would take more than the lash to teach this one, this boy so intent on looking after his bunkmate. Ernst studied his uniform...stained crimson, how unfortunate.

“But, since you seem so intent of sacrificing yourself for others…I’m sure the rest of them will be more than willing to do the same for you in return. A just reward for their selfless saviour I should think. Lisette, Abernathy and the little girl will report to me tomorrow, and every other day for the rest of Achtus…and you’ve just earned yourself a front row seat to their whipping, Harry. You really shouldn’t have tried to be a hero.” You really shouldn’t have told me to use magic, you little fucker -this is only the beginning. I can promise you that

"Is that all, are you quite finished? You could make their punishment more severe if you so wished...your call. Hit me again, see what happens."

He wiped a hand across his face and studied his blood now smeared on to his fingers, mingling with Carmine’s and Harry’s. All scraps, all the same. But at least Ernst was trying to be better. “Now…” he barked. “You’re right…get on with your fucking work!” he looked at the younger two, pretty little girl, impetuous little boy before turning on his heel. “ And if you don’t have anything to do, get to bed! ”

Now, now everything was too much and Aura cried for true. A thin, stuttered sort of sobbing that skipped and jumped from attempts to hold it back, but she couldn't. The kitchen, the place she really did love best, all stained over with blood and sick and violence. She wondered if she could ever forget the sight and like her kitchen again. It was a desperate sort of wondering, focusing on trivial things like the smell and the color of everything to avoid thinking about--

She didn't want to be beaten, she didn't. Aurelie wasn't even sure what she'd really done that deserved such a thing, other than to be out after hours. Was that what happened? She cried a little harder. It wasn't fair! She wasn't the one being nasty and horrible, it was all of them. Every last one of them! She hated boys, she hated them, and terror squeezed at her heart. She'd heard, about the girl, about-- Aura didn't want to end up like that.

Some bit, deep in her heart, cried out for her sister. Now would be a perfectly alright time to come and take her back, and tell them this had all been a mistake. Aura wouldn't mind that at all. She squashed it down, trying to think of princes. Be noble and brave, be brave, be brave. It was just so hard, without long-haired champions to protect you when just being brave wasn't good enough.

Scared as she was, she tried to make herself be angry, too, scrambling to her feet and the floor. Angry, she figured out, was easier. Blood-hot and bitter on the back of her tongue, angry was fast and angry was strong. Angry didn't stop her from crying, but it did let her fix a baleful eye on Carmine, pathetic and not so pretty curled up 'round the feet of the other one, the one who'd tried to be hero. That there was no such thing as heroes, not for them and not anymore, was slowly starting to become clear to her. It was all their fault. She could have just-- just run away and gone back to bed and forgotten she'd ever seen Ernst at all, if they hadn't been so. So. Abernathy, too! Him and his stupid knives, a little kid trying to be a scary grown-up man. Well, he wasn't. He was small and helpless just like the rest of them.

Small hands balled into fists, so deep and hard her nails left little crescents of blood in her palms. It stung. But not as bad as it's going to, later, her mind added with some measure of desperation. Aurelie was, for the most part, an unremarkable girl, rarely toeing too far out of line. She'd only had to be punished a handful of times in her two years here, soft punishments from matrons. No food, into the cupboard with you, extra duty, a few stinging slaps to knuckles or backside. Nothing, ever, like she knew was coming because of those boys. Oh, she hated them all, then, those terrible things and their stupid fights. She wanted someone to take her hand, just for a little bit. There was no one, so she took it herself.

"NO!" Joseph screamed. This was too much, too much. He was indignant, angry, horrified, and wrathful all at once. A knife in his hand slashed across the counter, scaring the wood. "You bastard! You damn, no good, horrid--! Die!" The young passive could no longer contain himslf, he brandished his knives. That girl, she had nothing to do with this. Poking a knife at a superior passive, Joseph knew what he was in for. This girl had done nothing.

"She did nothing, you piece of shit! Nothing! Who the hell do you think you are?! You're a scrap! Just like us! You're not a golly! You're just a scrap! Just a scrap!" Joseph slashed the counter again, another deep scar. Another scar he would probably have in his own skin. Another blood blister split open on his hide to show for his time.

“Why don’t you go jump off a tower?" Joseph snarled at long last. “At least everyone would want you to.”

Another failure. He never did anything right and this was just another sacrifice that went to waste. His bloodied hand hung uselessly at one side, not enough energy to ball into a fist, not enough care to fully relax. Why did everything he tried go so horridly wrong?

Watching Ernst's back, he spoke to Abernathy, understanding the helplessness of watching someone being punished for a crime only partially committed. "Calm yourself, lad.No use in diggin' the grave deeper for the lil un. You're right, ent her fault." It was his, Harolds, for doing what he should have done, not what he needed to have done. There was that fine line between the right thing and the real thing, one that Harold had thought he'd known. Obviously, he was still the lame, stupid child his parents had happily left at Brunnhold, unready for a life among the galdori he despised and resembled. Bristles still twitched along his spine, ones that would cling until the rage was gone, until his bloody mind was sated with red on rust, blood on brick. He could wait though, wait for as long as needed.

Grabbing reign on temper and shame, Harold turned to look at the desperate crowd left in the kitchen. Carmine was... he'd deal with it later. Carmine was an issue that, if even considered, would preclude rational ability. Abernathy seemed shaken about the fight, the girl on the verge of a childish breakdown. Walking to the still slightly overflowing sink, he grabbed a forgotten dishtowel and soaked it in soapy water, dropping it to the floor near Carmine's mess. His would be a long night, the kitchen was still in need of cleaning, the halls were likely filthy where Enrst dribbled blood on the tile. He wanted Abernathy to take the girl away, get her to bed, but he couldn't bring himself to order the others around. He was the eldest, but it didn't feel right, not after what he'd gotten them into.

Looking at Carmine, Harold fought the anger and wretched guilt that flooded into his throat. Stupid ass Carmine, he'd brought this down on them, as inevitable as the redhead's powder-keg of a life was. The pathetic mess that was one of Harold's closest friends sickened him, made his gut roil and he wanted nothing to do with him at all right now.

Still, if he did nothing, nothing would be done. Hands deep in the sink, making all the water pink, he spoke softly, as though the guttural thing that had pounded Enrst's face in was never real at all. "Joseph. You oughtn't to bait those who have power over you, it'll get more than yourself hurt. Keep your knives where they hide, and don't be flashing them where gollies can see. It's no good, specially with pets like Ernst." If advice was all he could give that was worth anything, then might as well give it freely. "You oughta get yourself to bed, gonna be a rough month."

His eyes caught on the child's, her sea-glass stare as liquid as dishwater. "An you as well, girl. Here--" He shook his damp hands, and kneeling, he opened the cupboard below the sink. "Ent much, but it's what I used to sneak into the kitchens for." In his pale, ugly hands was a wrapped sweet, the cheapest kind that shatter on the tongue but are so saccharine as to make up for it. Awkwardly, he tossed it beside her, wrapper crinkling. "It's all I can offer ya as an apology."

He still awkwardly ignored Carmine, unable to even summon the courage to offer his friend a hand.