Revenge. It was a sordid desire that we many fell weak to. A need that often led to violence and death. We had initially split to try and find Kent, I with Isaac, Beckett, Anatole and Aristotle. It was Isaac who suspected Kent might have gone seeking vengeance on the remaining members of the Brotherhood- Bishop Vick and a Nosferatu known only to me by name, Brother Kanker. So we had headed in the direction of the domain in Downtown where Strauss was keeping them. It was halfway there that everything turned to shit.

A ghoul greeted us on the main streets, a tattooed, six feet something, all muscle, pale skinned man who barely looked human anymore. He had had numerous abuses to his body- ear lobes pulled down and punched through with holes, a piercing in either nostril, one at the left eyebrow and two gold clamps on either ear, all probably to detract from the minute horns growing up under the flesh at the top of his brow, barely concealed by his mop of greasy auburn hair, and the misshaping of his jaw that pointed down like an exaggerated cartoon, and the bumps on his shoulders just visible beneath his jacket that suggested shoulder guards though I knew it was flesh and bone. He was a Tzimisce ghoul, the flesh manipulation was enough of an indication without the red edging his eyes, the hint of hate and bloodlust in the pupils, the bloodstain at his lips and the crimson staining his fingertips. He smiled at us and raised the object in his left hand- it was Kent's black leather jacket only it had holes in it now and a slick smearing of blood that the jacket couldn't absorb.

"Sascha Vykos, my master, has requested that we delay the inevitable and you follow me if you want to see the pretty one again," the ghoul addressed us a deep, rumbling voice. His hateful gaze darted up to Beckett. "You must Beckett, he is eager to meet you again."

"I'm sure he is," Beckett retorted sardonically, "but alas, I am not so eager, rarely does Sascha choose to meet one under peaceful circumstances."

"Can't even decide if it's male or female," Anatole murmured sardonically, "but I'm the mad one."

"You are the mad one," Aristotle scorned, "all religious zealots are mad."

Anatole clamped both his hands over his ears and chanted, "la, la, la, can't hear you traitor, I am deaf to the sound of a snake tongue!"

"She has advised she will make permanent scars about the Toreador that she will never heal," the ghoul warned as he wisely chose to ignore the mad squabbling. He took a care to emphasise 'she' but whether it was because Beckett had chosen 'he' or Anatole had mocked about it I didn't know, maybe Sascha was identifying as a she these days.

"Isaac," I piped up fearfully, "Kent would never recover from that." I looked to Isaac and saw him frowning back at the ghoul as rage danced in golden gaze.

"A jacket is no proof of captivity," Isaac countered.

The ghoul shrugged. "Any other proof would have meant mutilation. He was easy to spy, rambling about the Brotherhood taking everything from him as he hurried up the streets. You should thank us, he was running too fast, the humans would have noticed."

"You would be foolish to deal with Sascha," Aristotle spoke up, "he is a deceitful, manipulative liar."

"Just like you," Anatole remarked brightly, he had removed his hands in time to hear the remark. "Ugly and mad like you too," he added with a grin.

Aristotle bristled at the accusations and frowned at Anatole. "Beckett I understand you may have been lonely for a Malkavian after our parting but you seem to have gone from bad to worse with these two." He nodded ruefully at me.

"I'm not Malkavian," I said woefully, "mortal first when building sandcastles on the beach to keep Charlie away, the white wolf watched high from the cliffs, then killed on the beach by the mad poet. I fought the ancient and the mad master rewarded me with mortality to save me from the ultimate destruction when the web is broken. My first sunrise was by the beach. Everything important happens on the sand."

I clenched my fists as I glimpsed the beautiful snake charmer dancing again, twirling and swinging veils as she spun barefoot on the sand. She paused and looked at me with a silvery gaze. "I want only to save my twin," she murmured to me. "Find us deep in the sand."

"Who's Charlie?" Isaac pried thoughtfully.

I stiffened at the name and shook my head. "Now must be time for Kent."

"That dumb Toreador has run into his own fate, leave him to it," Aristotle said haughtily.

"No!" I shouted in protest. "No, I won't leave him! I won't! I'll go alone!"

"You won't," Isaac said sternly as he grasped my right hand tightly.

I felt a sharp spark of surprise and intrigue from Beckett and turned my gaze to his burning crimson one. "Even after all you suffered under the Tzimisce you would go back to them?" Beckett queried curiously. "After they enslaved you and tortured you and made you forget yourself? All that and without hesitation you would go after the Toreador? He did choose to travel on his own in a weakened state, it was foolishness on his part," he added dryly.

"He's been hurt too, he just wanted the pain to end," I protested, "she took something from him. Kent's big brother, Kent came to the ivory tower when no one else would, Kent hugged this form when it was ugly and crippled and every other Toreador squirmed, Kent always comes!" I felt tears burning at my eyes as a wash of memories of Kent and I rushed over me. Much of my time as a Kindred was still hazy, I remembered the emotions and the more important details I thought but so much was still lost to the trauma of turning into a mortal and then a Tzimisce ghoul and then a Gangrel ghoul so close together. I remembered the beach again only it wasn't frantic pawing to make the sandcastles high as quickly as possible to please Charlie, it was competing with Kent to make the grandest one for the crab king. Kent always complained, Kent was always embarrassed but Kent always gave in anyway. When the pretty women in Hollywood had pointed and sneered and laughed at me sitting on a swing Kent had come over, flustered and grumbling that I should get off because I was too big and looked silly but then he pushed me anyway and he smiled when I laughed.

"Isaac please," I begged, "Kent always comes for me." I started to sob. "Kent came to the Tzimisce den twice, he hates them and he fears them but he came, he came!"

"Shush," Isaac murmured, "we will go Ariadne."

"I won't," Beckett surprised us both with a calm refusal.

"Master?" I pulled away from Isaac and looked at Beckett in a stunned disbelief.

"Young one the Toreador is doomed and it is a trap," Beckett said frankly, "Sascha does not play fair and he does not negotiate or meet for peace talks. He wants you to torture you to learn about the Aralu but you know that, you've been saying it ever since we found you in Valyrion's den. He is going to destroy Kent no matter what, slowly to get the truth from you, quickly if you don't come. Avoiding this trap would be kinder to Kent."

"No! NO! NO!" I shrieked.

"Young one don't be foolish."

There it was, a command from master that I had to obey. I looked at him seriously and said firmly, "it's not foolish." I turned and started walking towards the ghoul. "Where is he? Take me there now!"

"Us," Isaac snapped as he seized my hand up once again.

"No," I said pleadingly as I glanced up at the Baron, "he wants me Isaac, maybe if I go alone he'll let Kent go."

"Ariadne I'm not repeating before," Isaac said firmly, "you were alone with them before, twice not it's happened, there can't be a third time."

"We'll get a head start at least," Aristotle remarked unkindly. He, Beckett and Anatole were watching us walk towards the ghoul without protest. None of the three made a move to intervene or help.

"No we Judas," Anatole snarled sullenly. "She knows the way, I have the map, I have the key but what does she have? God guides me, who guides her? Must be faster than the Tzimisce."

"They will use you against me, you and Kent, and how could I live with that?" I squeaked quietly to Isaac. "I can be silent until they release Kent, I can do that much, negotiate that far I think, even if I scream, even if he screams, I can keep silent, Uncle Charlie taught me silence even when I want to scream."

"Uncle Charlie?" Isaac looked at me oddly then, his eyes filling with horror as he pondered at my words. "Ariadne no," he snapped as he pulled me to a halt and his presence filled his voice, "I will not allow this!"

I looked at the mad pair, Anatole and Aristotle, who watched us curiously. They made the master stir within me constantly, he loathed being so close to the web and yet so far from it. "Do something," I begged, "just this once." Both Malkavian and yet they were as chalk and cheese or pandas and unicorns, complete opposites. One fair and religious, one dark and logical yet both mad, both with a streak of cruelty, both eager for knowledge, both in a quandary over whether they wanted to lose the madness or further it. I thought of the ancient, angry voice trapped inside me. 'Please,' I begged mentally, 'I can't lose them all tonight.'

"I owe you nothing but I am bored in this mortal husk of yours so for my own humour and a desire to see this Baron scream I will comply," the voice answered through me.

Anatole and Aristotle linked hands suddenly.

"Vision of death, see her dead a thousand times over."

The power flowed through me and into Anatole and Aristotle, enhancing their own powers as they spread their terrible gift of mass hallucination onto the streets. Only the ghoul and I were immune though not by much. I caught a glimmer of the terrible vision, a faint outline of a beautiful raven haired woman in old fashioned Victorian clothes smiling sadly at Beckett before she burst into flames over and over again. I filled with grief as I felt Beckett's surge through me, grief, guilt, sorrow and rage, it all collided into me at once.

For Isaac there was another, the princess he kept losing was still holding his hand in his mind but now she was screaming and bleeding from her eyes and her mouth. I trembled to see myself in that form, wasn't one supposed to die instantly upon seeing their doppelgänger?

"Are you coming?" the ghoul snarled at me. He appeared sufficiently unnerved by the latest display of Malkavian power. "Sascha would like the the Gangrel but it's you she wants most of all."

I nodded agreeably. "Let's go."

The ghoul started to run, trusting that for Kent I would follow him. We darted down several narrow streets loitered with the unwanted of the Kine, hobos and trash ladies rendered numb with drugs, ill with the remnants of the Brotherhood or simply still from starvation, cold and neglect. A few struggled on admirably, taking solace in can fires and cheap booze. I was not surprised when the ghoul stopped at a sewer lid and lifted it up with ease. He gestured for me to go first, I supposed he wanted to close the lid to ensure no clues for following. Well it was okay, I didn't want them following. I dropped down into darkness and shit.

The ghoul led the way in darkness through a maze of underground sewage systems. Some of them had faint electric lights and paths for the workers whilst others were older and neglected. On many occasions I heard whispers and snarls echo up the tunnels but never did I spy anything. I thought of the cursed tunnels in Hollywood and wondered at Tzimisce beasts and Nosferatu. The golden king Gary ruled from the sewers in a palace of warrens filled with an odd mixture of technology and rot, Andrei had kept him there for a while, trapped like a rat. It was funny but the Nosferatu were only happy to be down with the shit when it was by choice, if they felt someone was holding them down there they were unhappy. Apparently dwelling in darkness and faeces had to be a choice.

I saw a torn flyer for the Brotherhood and shuddered as I felt Bishop Vick's cold, smooth hands running up my skin. It had not all been bad but it should have been, he was a monster but he had manipulated and used his presence to make it pleasurable. Just as Valyrion had manipulated for pain Vick had conjured bliss. I swallowed hard and clenched my fists again, understanding why Kent was still half-mad and suicidal. Jezebel had done the same to him, she had rendered him helpless and made him enjoy it. She had taken away all his control. It wasn't just the ugly deformities she had caused him, it was making him feel weak and helpless, that was much a bigger blow for Kent. Strauss had cured the ugliness and the blood disease but not the damaged psyche. Kent had always been cocky and confident, only once had that been taken from him, years ago by the Tzimisce and he had struggled to piece himself together after it, now here we were again, Kent was shattered and desperate to fix it with vengeance since Romero and I had denied him the sun. I couldn't have Sascha make it all the worse by delivering Kent more pain and making him feel helpless again.

We waded through ice cold, knee high water that was probably rife with disease though the rats swimming in it didn't seem to mind. We moved under rusted, half-fallen grates and pushed through old gates with their locks long rotted away. I don't know how long we moved for and I wondered if the visions of death enhanced by Malkav had faded away. The mad master had faded to silence again and I wondered at his helping. He said he wanted me to live now to take him to the desert, surely this was going against that? But then he did like chaos and surprises and wasn't I delivering that? Maybe he wanted my death again, maybe he was fickle. I didn't know, I didn't care, hard enough to keep guessing at my minds without wondering about his.

Finally, we made it to a large chamber that stank of death and was spoiled with entrails and body parts rotting in small piles. The light came from iron torches hanging on the walls and a few large oil cans that burned with smokey, amber flames. Bloody shackles dangled from the walls, one set with a pair of arms still in it though no body was attached and another set with poor Kent captured in them.

As far as torture dungeons went it was alright, not quite up to scratch for the Tzimisce, the torn flyers of red skulls in stars had me suspicious that this had been a certain Nosferatu's haunt first.

"Where are the others Mutt?"

There was that voice, smooth and neutral in all ways. The owner strode up to us, coiling out a sharp claw in a theatrical welcome to me.

"They wouldn't come," the ghoul answered with unease, "something happened and the Toreador tried to stop her." He nodded to me.

Sascha frowned before striking his arms in a cross and breaking them rapidly. I marvelled and filled with horror as the ghoul shrieked in pain and his face bubbled and boiled as bubbles of flesh rose up in his cheeks. "Since you did bring her I won't kill you," Sascha murmured, "but you may get on your knees and crawl away like the useless Mutt you are."

The ghoul bit back a groan of pain as he obediently dropped to his hands and knees and crawled away into the shadows.

I was surprised to find Sascha without allies, seeing only Kent in the room with him or her, I really couldn't tell. Sascha was an alien looking creature and yet somehow beautiful to look at, tall and slender with a face perfect and cruel. I looked to Kent, naked, bloodied and bruised in shackles, he was miserable, head bowed, eyes shut and a whimper escaping from his ruined, bloodstained lips.

"Let him go," I said, trying to sound firm rather than pleading, "you don't need him and I will tell you all you want."

"You will do that anyway," Sascha purred.

I tensed at the jarring sound of her voice as it came at me multiple times from multiple lips. I looked to what I thought were black tattoos on her body and shuddered as they moved when Sascha spoke again.

"I could torture you into it, rape the Toreador and make you watch, shift your flesh as you did and you would squeal then but that's crude. Andrei did that once to you, the flesh melding, and somehow you undid it, curious that. You will have to tell me all about that. It's repetitive and boring now and Valyrion raped you, fucked your mind and your flesh, yet he still didn't learn what he should have," He, she, hell I wasn't sure anymore, sighed out of one mouth this time and shook its head. Sascha turned from me and paced back to Kent, raising a right hand to run it down his exposed chest. "The Toreador is another matter. I feel Andrei's taint on him too, trussed up in chains but ignored, Andrei could have manipulated his flesh but he got bored and distracted and let the Gangrel lackeys hurt him instead." Sascha glanced over his shoulder at me and smiled. "We've had quite the chat these past few minutes, all about Abbey Ryan, the poor little pony lover and Sebastian, imagine an Anarch loving a Camarilla Prince." Sascha let out a mocking laugh at this.

"You don't need him," I repeated sternly.

"It's not need, it's want, I'm allowed to have wants now and again, I have you here because I need you and your knowledge and it's been a lot of effort of my part to get you," Sascha snapped, "but I'm annoyed you're alone, you've ruined a potentially beautiful surprise coming alone so I want something to make me happy and make up for that." He sank his claws into Kent and I winced to hear him yelp. "I'm taking the Toreador, I'm going to make a fine pet of him. Spoilt, cocky bastard, he called me ugly but he's going to call me beautiful soon, he's going to cry at my beauty and weep tears of blood anytime he's without my presence. I'll fix his warped love for the fallen prince, I'll give him a new love for me instead. I had a Toreador lover once," she added with a look of a lament, "I miss him still."

"Then you won't have the Aralu!" I snapped defiantly.

Sascha laughed. "Do you think you can keep the truth from me? Were you not Valyrion's obedient whimpering bitch not that long ago? Have you forgotten that? How you would do anything for him, anything to please, anything for attention, anything for another kick or beating just because it proved he noticed you?"

I shuddered and sank my nails deep into my palms so that they bled. I used the pain to steady myself to try and keep away from those horrible memories of Valyrion. He was master no more.

"No stories of the sand, Charlie was slashed down in the mind, no more control, no more truths spilling," I mumbled.

"Enough Myca, let's do this the easy way for a change, it's faster."

Another voice, a form in the shadows! My eyes widened with a new horror as I realised what I had failed to sense, a vampire manipulating the darkness to conceal themselves. I didn't know where. There was the sound of something screeching fast along the hard cement floor before it came to a halt against me, slamming against my ankles and sending me falling back into it. It was a chair. I heard heels clicking on the floor but could not bring myself to face this new horror.

"You ruin the fun," Sascha pouted.

"Your Toreador is your fun, play with him and I will talk with this one," the voice, a female, remarked coldly.

"No!" I protested.

A form came into my presence, a tall, beautiful woman, willowy in appearance with enviable olive skin and long, glossy, raven black hair. She oozed of authority with the severe beauty of a noble, a woman whose looks and poise came from breeding and did not require much effort to enhance. She was clad in a tight skinned, flowing dress of vibrant royal purple with belts of silver skulls and ankhs about her waist. She crossed her arms and smiled down at me. "Tell me all about the Aralu," she ordered in a calm, commanding voice.

She had a powerful gift of Domination and I was helpless to it. My mouth parted to spill all that I could as Kent started to scream.