It had only been night one of escaping Delilah, and it already felt… wrong. She stared up at the ceiling of the room she was given by the boat captain that wanted to help her. She could see the wall of her room to the left. Blank white, cold metal she could feel against the back of her left hand. Yet it was still off.

Finally, she swung her legs over the side of her bed. The room was the same as the night before. An abandoned journal with a goodbye note from some Serkonan musician, his guitar laying across the desk. Maybe she'll try to learn it at some point, now that it is available. How different could it be from the harp she had in the Tower?

She tried to open the door. It was blocked. She couldn't even move it an inch as she slammed her entire body weight into the wooden planks, rubbing her shoulder as it became sore. She couldn't believe she fell for this, on top of being dethroned - how the hell was she even going to fight the Watch and escape this time? She was *barely* lucky escaping Ramsey.

With a quick look over her shoulder, she now knew she wasn't on the ship at all. The back wall of her room wasn't there, completely open to a whole new space. The Void.

Not even a gust of wind disturbed the Void. Islands of small rocks float aimlessly. Some pieces of… What would she even call it? Real life? But this was just as real as her world. A whole new strange place that no one alive, with a small handful of exceptions, have survived seeing.

Rocks formed a walkway. Leading from the opening in the walls, out into the Void. She had nowhere to go but forward. Even the simple task of stepping out of her room was a feat - it truly was absolutely nothing. Nothing of importance, anyways. Islands, some just pieces of streets floating through the space, some with street lamps or parts of a carriage rail.

She had only taken a few steps, and she already felt like she was being watched. Someone right over her shoulder, staring down at her, and she couldn't even tell their intentions as her pace quickened along the platform. Something was coming towards her. It was coming quickly.

Soon enough, she was sprinting along the platform. She ran right past what looked like a doorway, nearly launching herself to float helplessly through the Void before barely stopping on the very edge of the Island.

"Empress Emily Kaldwin," A man's voice said behind her. She turned immediately, not believing who she was meeting for a brief moment. The Outsider stood inside that doorway, hands folded in front of him. His clothes were ancient - nothing like any of the paintings in any recent history textbooks. The strangest thing about him were his eyes. Black on black, staring as though he were reading her mind as she thought about her surroundings; almost like he was giving her a minute to take in her environment and who she was talking to before continuing, "I'm a friend of your father's from the bad old days. 15 years ago, when you really changed. I think you miss those days, don't you?"

She couldn't even think of something to say as she watched the Outsider, the very being she had been taught her whole life to avoid. He paced in front of her, as though he were impatient with her for not realizing something yet. What did her father do? Demand the Mark? Bargain? Out of all the people in her empire she could anger, the Outsider was the *last* person she'd want to piss off.

"I watched as your whole world changed 15 years ago," He finally continued, disappearing and reappearing as he pleased, as though he was just pacing across the platform like a few moments before. A small cloud of black smoke billowed wherever he appeared, "I watched those men try to get their greedy hands on your little empire, watched that man with the strange mask rescue you. I thought the excitement was over - but someone pulled the rug right out from below your feet."

"What do you want?" Emily didn't know where she got the courage to be so blunt. She rarely had it in court, not in fear of some petty nobleman, but of a group of petty noblemen deciding to go up in arms because she had the audacity to harm their tiny egoes. But she was on edge right now, she wanted to cut to the chase, and then get out. She had no interest in staying if the Outsider just wanted to make fun of her for her failures.

"Calm down, Empress. I'm not keeping you here for much longer. Actually, I came with an offer. My Mark." Was that so hard to just say from the beginning?

How much would this cost her? How quickly could his Mark get her throne back? She turned away from the Outsider, pacing along the platform quietly as she thought over what she could do. Against a witch like Delilah, it wasn't much. She *took her father's Mark, and encased him in stone, for fuck's sake.* What else was she doing to Dunwall? She had to have more tricks underneath her ugly sleeve. The Outsider was staring into the back of her head as she paced down the platform and turned around.

What happens if she's caught? A Mark like that would be damning evidence of heresy, a crime which everyone in the Abbey immediately executes anyone and everyone for. She could remember the overseers leaving High Overseer Cambell to the rats 15 years ago. They would have a field day with a fugitive like herself. Who knows how many they would kill after finding their dethroned Empress with the mark.

She would just have to… not get caught, right? Delilah was a threat worth eliminating everyone in her path for. Guard, Watch, Overseers alike. Everyone that helped Delilah and her conspirators. The Mark would be a massive advantage against all her enemies, even if she didn't know how high the cost would be later.

The Outsider appeared in front of her, head tilting to the side. He was studying her, "Don't want it? You really are as interesting as your father. I would love to see you take down Delilah without it."

"I'll take it." Just like that, the Mark seared through her skin, burning from the inside out. It wasn't like anything else she had seen before, not even anything in the long books Overseer Martin made her read covered what the Mark actually *looked* like. As quick as he appeared, he was gone again. Emily turned around to meet him back at the doorway just to find a whole new path to cross.

If she focused hard, she could see what the Mark was trying to tell her; a purple and black streak coming from the Mark, which faintly glowed on the back of her hand. It aimed towards a high up island, far out of reach where she could jump. With a gentle *thwip, she was stumbling onto that platform. A smile cracked across her face at her newfound power. She'd *love* to watch Corvo try to keep up with her like this.

She sprinted across the platform now, quietly flinging herself from island to island with ease. Her smile disappeared in an instant at who she saw before her, frozen in time. Delilah. Sitting comfortably on her throne, surrounded by four people.

Emily walked towards them carefully, almost scared that they'd see her. She inspected Delilah - it was like the Void itself was on her clothes. Rippling off her shoulders. *"How did she come back?"* She thought to herself, pacing around the other four people at her side.

She could recognize three of them. Kirin Jindosh, a natural philosopher banned from the Academy; Breanna Ashworth, leader of the Oracular Order; and the Duke Luca Abele of Serkonos. Emily had met them all at some point in Court. Asking for funding for some project, for some law or decree to be repealed or established, or something or another.

Except for one. Emily stopped beside them, studying them carefully. A person, hunched over, with a hood and a bandage covering their entire face except for one grey eye. No weapons visible on their person, but Emily could tell just from looking at them that they would probably be the worst to deal with out of the bunch. Danger *radiated* off them.

*"They're not with me. The Outsider just showing me who I'm up against this time,"* She thought to herself, stepping away from the five people frozen in the Void, still taking a look over her shoulder to make sure they were exactly where she left them.

A new place in the Void called to her. A tugging of sort, sounding almost like a heartbeat. It got louder the further she ran, the gentle noise of her landing wherever she aimed barely audible, even in the Void. The islands led her to a straight pathway now, which she walked carefully in case there were any surprises.

At first, all she saw around the corner was a pedestal. Old cloth was draped over it, as though it was thrown into place. The heartbeat she was hearing raced as she closed in on it, eyebrows creasing as she looked down at it.

It was a heart. A human heart, with some contraption in it to keep it beating, but it wasn't inside anyone. A small apparition appeared over it, right between the falling cloth that swayed very gently with the new activity.

"Emily…" The apparition said, her voice was in and out, almost… wobbly. Like she was trying her best to stay present, where Emily could hear her, "It's been so long, and you've been through so much." With more focus, Emily could see the contraption in front of her better, and recognize the apparition speaking to her.

"Mother, you're here, but you're not." Emily said, eyes squinting as she tried to fully see her mother again. Her mother wore the exact same outfit as she did 15 years ago, blood staining her chest where the assassin Daud stabbed her right through her heart. She even had the blue eyeshadow Emily used to want to copy so badly, but she was never allowed to touch her mother's makeup.

"The last of my essence, here for a while. I would do anything to cross this great expanse to take you into my arms again. Instead, all I can offer you is this. My gift and my curse."

Emily gently took her mother's heart into her hands, looking down at it for a brief moment, running her fingers over the contraption inside it. That was the spot where Daud's sword stabbed, carefully and meticulously held together by metal in a way Emily, or any scholar Emily knew, couldn't even hope to understand. It made her nauseous touching the wound, but she didn't show it on her face as she looked up at her mother again for an explanation.

"Just summon me to your hand, and I will guide you if I can," With that, her mother disappeared. Emily looked around for a moment, not seeing any way forward, and the way back being long gone. She looked down at her hand, squinting as she tried to focus her sight again, seeing her mother's heart in her hand. Turning slightly to the left, and it began beating within her palm, something inside it lighting up and exposing metal work and gears inside moving the muscle to guide her forward. Looking back up, there was now a trail of islands for her to follow in the same direction the Heart guided her.

With no urgency, she walked along each island, flinging herself from one to another, taking her time. Curiously she summoned the heart, it beating rapidly against the gentle wind, her mother telling her very little about the Void, *"There's no stars in the sky here," "We shouldn't be here. No one should," "In thousands of years, very few have seen this place. Three were empresses,"* before cutting Emily off with a curt, *"I have told you all I can about this place. Why do you ask for more?"*

Good to know that wasn't just the Outsider pulling her leg when he led her to the Heart. That was her mother, if she's ever heard any quote from her mother. She probably said the exact same thing, 15 years ago, when Emily kept asking questions about people invading the Tower, or about whatever secrets the Tower held. In hindsight, it was the best idea not to tell 10 year old Emily about every single secret Dunwall Tower held. She couldn't help but laugh at it, finally seeing what her Heart led her to.

A shrine, this time. Cloth draped over black wood with a salty smell, runes carved into the wood and inked into the cloth, not a single inch left without a rune. It called to her, humming and whispering to her unintelligibly as she approached. It made her skin crawl, but she picked up the whale bone runes carefully, tracing the same Mark on the bone, feeling the roughly carved bone.

"There's no one quite like Delilah," The Outsider said from behind her, hands folded behind his back as he began to pace along the island as he spoke. "I watched her pull herself up from blood and filth, learn how to steal from the aristocracy, learning skills of cunning and art that made sycophants fawn over her. All leading to what happened in Dunwall. And now she has a crown."

Emily opened her eyes again, laying on her back, staring at the ceiling of the room the ship captain, Megan Foster, lent her until she could set her government right. She swung her legs over her bed, looking at her left hand. Old bandages, black with no indication of their origin, covering the Mark she was gifted the night before. This time, she knew she was on the ship, because there was a note taped to her door with a crossbow. Not something she was extremely used to using at the moment, but a beautiful weapon.