Ira was so close he could taste the ash and sulfur. As the last few Faun stepped through the milky-toned gate, Ira prepared for his turn. He calmed himself with a handful of anchoring breaths and scrubbed his knuckles at the edges of his tear-rimmed eyes. Ira had never cried this easily before--he didn't know what had come over him. Or, he knew exactly what had come over him. It was a needle sharp ache embedded behind his ribs--he just couldn't place a name to it. It had always been there. For as long as Ira could bear to recall, making it easy to ignore. But lately  it seemed to be growing stronger. It had burst forward in the alley a couple blocks south from Eden, and Ira had yet to fully shove it back down since. 

"You ready, kid?" 

Ira sucked in a wince of air and turned to glance at the girl leaned against the bar to his left. She had placed her elbows on the smooth wooden table and planted her chin in her palm. Her Fae-Iron bo leaned against the side of her leg, as docile as a guard dog. 

"Yeah." Ira answered. He forced his shaking legs to take his weight, carrying himself away from the stool he had been previously wallowing on. 

Ira did not often spend time in clubs. Never could he have imagined how one might look to be abandoned. From the stained glass windows lining the highest edges of the walls, warped and pink sunlight filtered in from the oncoming morning. 

Monday. Ira realized. Not that it mattered--not that he would stick around to see it--but somehow it was amusing. It was just another endless Monday in New York City. 

The tables and chairs sat in their collected towers against the furthest wall. The music had been shut off hours ago. The half-full bottles of liquor sat still on the shelves behind the vacant bar. The building was perfectly silent. Preserved, like an echo. 

The gate carved into the rustic red brick wall swirled with fog, an old dusty mirror. Ira walked towards it as if drawn in by a trance. Was that it? Was it really that simple? Melchior was just on the other side. His fingers extended, reaching for the misty surface. 

"Whoa, hold all of your horses, cowboy."

Ira winced by reflex as his wrist was caught, pulled away from the rippling surface of the doorway. He twisted, turning to face the Third Prince. His eyes raced down to the skin of his arm, where the Prince held him in a viselike grip. 

"What?" Ira balked. 

"It's an expression." The Prince explained. "It means to slow down. I don't really know why-" 

"It's like stop your horse, boss." Mayvalt interrupted. "I think it's pretty self explanatory."

"A Heimrian couldn't pick up a horse to stop it, Mayvalt." The Prince scoffed. 

"Yeah," Ira grumbled. "That certainly wasn't my problem with it. Why are we stopping?" 

Ira tugged on his arm. His efforts were as valiant as an earthworm pulling on the roots of an oak but the Prince let go instantly. His hand returned to the hilt of his kris instead. "You're not ready yet." 

For one singular second--Ira tried to swallow those words. He imagined that the Prince probably had a reason to deny his crossing, that it was for the best. And then the single second passed--and Ira's cheeks flushed with red. "What? What do you mean not ready?" He growled, temper flaring and heart rising to meet it. "Angels, what's your problem? Why do you keep cutting us off every time we get close? Do you even want this mission to succeed?" 

"Kid-" Mayvalt tried, but Ira whipped around on her next. 

"You, too! You Just keep halting us! You refused to ease the Faun's crossing, you're inventing missions to see more Princes! I just want to find-" 

"You agreed that finding the Fifth Prince first would serve as an advantage!" 

"Then I take it back!" Ira yelled. Or maybe he just spoke but the quiet walls of the club clung to his voice, lifting it up into the steel support beams strung across the ceiling. "I'm going straight to the pit--I'll get Melchior myself." 

"Okay, easy." The Third Prince pitched in. Ira hated the way his voice sounded. Calm, cool, as soft as velvet on his skin. As if he was speaking to a wounded animal. "I have to agree with Mayvalt-"

"Of course." Ira muttered. 

The Third Prince kept talking. "-that finding the Fifth Prince is more important for you two. The Tachtadh isn't a place for the vulnerable. It's full of only the worst monsters. And well, since I'll be visiting anyways--I'll find your pet." 

"He's not-" 

"Just an expression." The Prince surrendered.

"That excuse won't save you forever." Ira grumbled. "Then what else? Why can't I go?"

"You are going, darling." The Prince sighed. 

"Ira." Ira corrected. "Then let me actually, y'know, go."

"Not looking like that." Mayvalt piped up. She opened her flat palms and dragged them up and down, fanning Ira from the top of his curled yellow hair to the bottom of his polished black oxfords. 

"What's wrong with how I look?" Ira scoffed. His cheeks flushed red, lighting up his freckles like stars painted across the Milky Way. 

"You look like a bone-snatcher, for one." Mayvalt coughed. "And a Heimrian second." 

"I am." Ira grunted. 

"Yeah but don't make it so obvious, dear." The Third Prince said. "You wouldn't go to a Knicks' game wearing a Gators' jersey." 

"Gators?" Ira choked. "Like Florida? The football team?" 

"Yes, exactly." The Prince clapped. "You get it."

Ira pressed his fingers to the bridge of his nose and scowled. "No, I don't even think you get it." 

"You're mixing sports up again, boss." Mayvalt whispered. 

"Okay, well, who cares?" The Prince sighed, shrugging his shoulders beneath the pristine white fabric of his dress shirt. "Who even watches sports anymore?" 

"A few million people." Ira muttered.

"Point being!" The Prince continued. "You need to blend in." 

"How?" Ira grumbled, looking down at his neat Bishop attire. He had gotten dressed that morning to convince the highest authority of his guild that he was their poster child. His black dress shirt, cotton stiff, covered his chest. His white starch collar cut into the skin of his pale throat. His sleek black shoes scuffed the slicked and shined club flooring. 

"Dress down for the occasion." Mayvalt suggested with a half-hearted shrug. 

Ira clenched his fists at his side. It was all just ceremonial nothings. Fabric, only as meaningful as he made it. He had never wasted time on presentation before. He had completed his entire pilgrimage in a plain white T-shirt from a pack he'd bought at the convenience store. He didn't know why it suddenly felt so difficult. 

His hands went to the leather strap around his chest. Ira lifted the Vestige from his shoulders and bent, laying it gently at his feet. His human worth couldn't be held together by the viselike fit of his cloak. He was no less of a Bishop--not even in Hell.

His fingers moved to the buttons holding him together. He undid them, one at a time. Slow enough to hide the tremble in his hands. Mayvalt turned as red as a fire engine and spun around on her black leather boots. 

"R-right here?" She choked, pressing her palms to her eyes. 

The Third Prince didn't flinch--and somehow his lack of shame was even more embarrassing than Ira undressing in the middle of Eden. Ira met his golden gaze head on, biting down the scarlet flush in his cheeks. It seemed like a competition. One he wouldn't let the Prince win. So he didn't look away, not even as he replied to Mayvalt.

"Calm down, this isn't that type of club." He joked--even though he wasn't entirely sure. He had never been to Eden during business hours. 

He peeled off his black cloak, carelessly tossing the ceremonial fabric to the floor. It crumpled in a very unceremonial heap opposite the Vestige. Ira lifted his arms, crossing them over the white T-shirt he wore beneath his Bishop attire. Only then did the Third Prince surrender, breaking off his gaze to look down at the kris in his grip. Ira's victory felt very underwhelming. There wasn't much sport in competing against someone who seemed in a perpetual state of boredom. Well, there wasn't much competition in a competition Ira had entirely invented in his own mind either. 

"Are we ready to go yet?" Ira asked. He bent at the waist and reclaimed his Vestige from the floor, sliding the leather sheath back over his shoulder. 

The Third Prince glanced up from absent mindedly admiring his weapon. He stared past Ira, locking eyes with the pink-haired Faun towards his back. She nodded once, dragging down her chin with a stiff jab. 

"I'll go first, kid." Mayvalt said. "Can't have your energy signature rupturing the gate on me, can I?" 

Ira couldn't find the words. Not that he would have been able to spit them up past his heart hammering in the pit of his throat. He nodded at her. She stepped towards the milky white pool. She stuck in the tip of her bo, swirling the fog with the end of the Fae-Iron staff. The mist collected along the carved wildflowers decorated into the sides of the weapon, dripping along the pole like molasses. 

"Getting second thoughts, darling?" The Third Prince challenged. 

She glanced over her shoulder at him. "Second, and third, and fourth thoughts." 

"Feel free to stay here." The Prince shrugged. 

Mayvalt laughed, tilting her head towards the beams strung across the unreachable ceiling. "Sap, and let you have all the fun? Don't be greedy, boss." 

"Greedy?" He mockingly gasped, pressing his flat palm to his chest. "Me?" 

"Catch you on the other side, boss." She dismissed. Mayvalt turned to face the gate ahead of her. It was hard to see the sides of her face through the wild curls of her strawberry colored hair--but Ira could hear her grin in her voice. She stepped forward into the white wash, disappearing in so few seconds it was hard to believe she had been there at all. 

Eden fell into a quiet calm that unsettled Ira's stomach. The Third Prince might as well have followed through the gate with how absent his presence was in that space. He was as still as drywall--and just as hollow. Ira tapped his palms against his thighs to force a sound into the heavy air. 

"Well," he choked, "I guess that's me." 

Ira forced his tensed muscles forward, creeping towards the brick wall. 

"Darling." 

Ira flinched, glancing over his shoulder at the devil to his back. The Third Prince set his kris against the wall and moved towards Ira, extending his palm. Ira stared down at his stretched fingers, trying hard not to recoil from them. Ira knew how his delicate fingers looked as they danced over piano keys--as they curled over a sword. How they looked dressed up in heavy golden rings, and how they looked resting over his own skin. Or someone else's skin--but it replayed in Ira's mind. And now they were in front of him, offered and waiting, and he didn't know what to do with it. 

"Wh-what?" Ira stammered. 

"I'm going to give you a little strength." The Prince explained in his stone-blank voice. "Your soul isn't meant for what's beyond this gate." 

"Strength?" Ira repeated. 

"If it makes more sense to you this way, think of it as a patron angel offering a blessing." The Prince said. 

Ira's stomach curled at the implication that the Third Prince of Hell could ever be his angel--or that the magic he had to offer was anything akin to a divine blessing. "You may be an Ely, but that doesn't make you an angel." 

The Prince lifted one of his oil-black eyebrows, posing it above his yellow cat eye. "We'll have more time for moral debate once we're in Hell, so come on--give me your hand." 

Ira released one tensed breath and slowly extended his hand across the gap between them. The Prince's fingers found him there, slipping effortlessly around his own. Ira's pale skin grew even paler when placed against the Third Prince's mellow olive tone. The Prince bowed his head, his golden eyes drifted shut. Ira had seen that quiet expression more times than he cared to count. The Prince always got that way when trying to rouse up the energy inside of him. Ira's eyes flickered over his expression, studying him. 

The Prince was--as much as it pained Ira to admit--handsome. As designed and polished as a mid-century painting. His raven black hair had been neatly styled. Someone, although it was hard to imagine the Prince in a Supercuts, had shaved the hair on the back of his head, leaving it an inch shorter where it grew towards the back of his neck. Where it grew longer towards the top of his head, he imprisoned it back off his face with gel--which this close, Ira found it had a scent slightly of lime. It was the only trace of the Prince that stuck on the world around him. His skin itself had no scent, no heat. It was as formless as ice. Ira thought then that it was a good idea to keep his oil-black hair from his face, since it was something worth being displayed. Full of sharp edges under his olive skin. The Prince's yellow cat eyes flickered upwards, meeting Ira's scrutiny. 

Ira flinched, forcing his eyes down towards his shoes. He cleared his throat and shifted nervously on the balls of his feet. "So, we good to go?" 

"You just want me to release you." The Prince said. He spoke with a light teasing tone--one most likely meant to calm Ira, but that did the exact opposite. 

"Very much," Ira muttered. 

"Just a second longer, darling." The Prince said. 

"It's Ira." Ira huffed. 

"I know." The Prince agreed distantly. He gently pulled on Ira's hand, and Ira allowed it with clenched teeth and stiffened limbs. He raised the surface of Ira's knuckles to his lips. Ira's heart dropped, where it met the bottom of his stomach it popped. 

"What are you-" 

The Prince pressed a kiss to the skin of Ira's hand. Where they met, he felt flushed by heat. Electric sparks which raced up along his arm, leaving his hair raised and prickled. Ira yanked back--breaking free from the Prince's too-hot touch. His hand fell through the air, leaving behind a webbing of invisible lightning. 

"What the f-" Ira sputtered, reaching for one of his favorite words. 

"Huh," the Prince muttered, screwing up his eyebrows into confusion. 

"Huh?" Ira choked. His cheeks rushed to fill with heat. "What do you mean 'huh?' You just kissed me! Without permission!" 

"It was only your hand." The Prince said. "You really are a choir boy." 

Ira sputtered. His hands flew to his Ossein blades, where they rested on the hilts. "I'm a knight! Sworn to kill your and your demonic kin--I'm not some fair lady and I'd greatly appreciate it if you never did that again." 

The Prince tilted his head in the same manner as a scolded dog. "I'm Silver-Tongued, I can't exactly help it. And I may need-" 

"-Si-sil--I don't need to know what you do with your mouth!" Ira screeched, hissing and spitting as fitfully as a cornered alley cat. He rubbed the surface of his knuckles off on his pant leg, frowning. "Okay, great. I'll just be off now-" 

"Dar-" 

"Ira!" He snapped. Ira turned on his heels, his head bowed to hide the embarrassingly flushed features of his face. 

"Ira." 

The Bishop froze, turning to ice beneath the thin fabric of his plain white T-shirt. His heart ka-thumped down to the bottom of his ribs, where it sat puffing out air like a deflated balloon. 

How, he whimpered to himself, is that somehow worse?

He took one deep breath and turned to face the Prince, his expression as muted as he could contort it to be. "What now?" 

"I suspect you'll want an apology from me." The Prince said. 

Ira scoffed and turned his blue eyes towards his shoes. "Forget about it. Find Mel and we'll call it even, okay?" 

The Prince shook his head. "I didn't mean for that little attempt on your palm." 

"Attempt?" Ira questioned. 

Ira was a knight. Or, he liked to think so. His mentor had trained him to be one. He had stood trial, he had hunted He-Goats, he had somehow managed to survive battle. In all of those instances--Ira's instincts had never led him astray. He had relied on them, the only defense between his throat and bared fangs. They had never let him down--not until that moment. For some reason, some incredibly stupid reason, Ira didn't react. His feet stayed glued to the floor as the Prince struck--viper quick. His fingers were colder than steel where they caught Ira's jaw, holding his face still. But Ira didn't twist--he didn't even think of it as an option. Everything contained inside his skull turned into TV static. The Prince's lips came down on his. The jolt that followed was the first thing to break Ira free from his daze. His feet came unstuck, stumbling back. The Prince hooked his arm around Ira's waist and followed. Ira tripped back, landing with a thud against the red brick wall. The Prince's body became the cage that held him there, pinning him to the wall. His heart whalloped against the inside of his chest. 

The Prince's skin sent chills racing down deep towards Ira's bones, but where their teeth clashed violently Ira felt fire-warm. Sparks flooded into him, numbing his gums, filling his throat with tightness, and turning his vision as foggy-white as the portal to his right. It was the same as that night--last summer, when the Prince had used Ira as a conduit for his power. Ira was becoming a lightning rod. 

The Prince pulled himself away--not far enough away to release Ira from the wall, but enough for Ira to gasp for oxygen. He sucked in deep gulps of lime scented air, trying desperately to still the dizziness clouding his brain. But he didn't need to see the Prince to stab him. Ira's hand dove for his Ossein blade. The Prince caught his wrist, stilling it just at Ira's hip. 

"You can't hurt me with that." The Prince laughed. 

Ira shivered. He was so close Ira could feel his words float across his skin. "Then no harm in letting me try." He hissed back. 

"If that will make you feel better." The Prince shrugged. "Forgive me?" 

"No way." Ira snapped. "Deal's off. I don't care if you find Mel or not." 

"Oh?" The Prince teased, raising his eyebrow. "So now you don't care if you find your little pet? Are you truly so taken by me, Ira." 

Ira's jaw popped open. Guilt threatened to spill from him, finding an even larger container than Ira's chest. Mel. His Mel was out there--and Ira had just--but it wasn't that sort of- "No! I didn't! You know what I mean! A-and don't call me that, either!" 

"Ira's your name, so you love to remind me." The Prince said.

"Just don't call me anything--and don't speak to me, creep." Ira huffed. 

"Ouch, that hurts." The Prince winced. "I told you that I would give you a blessing. And I do recall explaining that I am Silver-Tongued." 

"Yeah, sort of hard to give you the benefit of the doubt when you're still kabedon-ing me."

"I don't. . . know what that means." The Prince muttered sourly. 

"It means get off!" Ira yelled. He braced his flat palms against the Prince's chest and shoved as fiercely as he could. The Prince moved obediently back, releasing Ira from his confined placement against the club's wall. 

The Prince lifted his palms in surrender. "I tried to be a gentleman about it, but I'm weaker than I'd like to admit. It didn't work before." 

"No. I felt it! When you k-kis--touched my hand!" Ira corrected sharply.

The Prince tilted his head, furrowing his brows. "What?" 

"The spar-" Ira's words faltered on his tongue, blunted down into silence by the blank look on the Prince's face. Ira clenched his teeth together and turned his eyes down to his shoes. Just nerves? Is that really all it was before? He had to admit that it hadn't felt as strong as before--because it was through his skin? But then wasn't he just agreeing with the Prince that his hand could never have been enough? 

Ugh, angels. Ira cursed to himself. He placed his burning face into his open palms and sucked in a breath through his teeth. 

"And it worked now?" Ira muttered through the gaps in his fingers. 

"You can see for yourself." The Prince answered. 

Ira frowned, dropping his hands to hang at his sides. "What is that supposed to mean?" 

"Oh, I'm sure Mayvalt will tell you." The Prince shrugged. "Now you're ready." 

"For?" Ira whispered dizzily, but he knew. 

His eyes flickered towards the portal etched into the brick a foot to his right. The Prince didn't answer. He took a couple more steps back, leaving Ira space to gather his courage and step off the edge of his known universe. Ira almost laughed. Ten minutes ago, that seemed the scariest possible outcome to him--but now he knew there was something a lot more frightening. Sticking around to make small talk with the Third Prince. Ira's palms patted down the front of his shirt, smoothing out the ruffled material. His fingers tapped the hilt of both his daggers. His shoulders shrugged to adjust the weight of the Vestige slung across his back. He was ready. As ready as he ever would be. Ira pushed himself off the wall and stepped towards the white swirling gate. His fingers stretched out, dipping into the surface of the pool. It was nothing. There was no temperature, no swoosh of smoke. Just blankness as all consuming as the Prince. 

Ira turned, glancing at the Third Prince from over his shoulder. He grit his teeth together and lifted his chin. 

"Hey," he called. 

The Third Prince lifted his golden eyes to find him, meeting his gaze without hesitation. 

"I won't get the chance to say this to you again, so if you could hang onto it for me until the right moment I would appreciate that." Ira said. 

The Prince nodded. "Of course, darling. What is it?" 

Ira couldn't help the grin that split to overtake his expression. "Go to Hell, Beelzebub." 

The Prince laughed, rolling his cat eyes as he did. And Ira stepped forward, into the soothing white smoke. The nothingness reached for him, yanking on his skin. For one single second, it was as blissful as floating along the surface of the sea. And then the briefness passed--and Ira dropped. Falling head first into the space between worlds. His arms swung up, desperately grabbing for anything to hold. But there was nothing. Only white–until even that was gone. The fog disappeared into an ink black. But that might have just been from Ira passing out.