The island of Thaxos, intended to be my new home in Elysium, was a necrotic sore on the waters of the Holy Lands. It was the inverse, the opposite, and the antonym to everything that made up the soul and essence of the other places here. The brightness without a visible source that suffused everywhere else was dimmed and lessened here like a cloud had fallen in between its shores and a shining sun. The beaches were formed of coarse and gritty black sand that reminded me of ground coal, every plant that pushed its way out of the lifeless, inhospitable rocks was a pale and strangled imitation of the beauty found on the other isles.

“Bit grim.” I commented to Callidas. “Almost feels like it’s angry.”

“To me, Thaxos always looks like it had been poisoned.” He muttered in response, his eyes locked on its craggy peaks and monolithic pillars of volcanic rock.

I didn’t contradict him aloud, but silently I disagreed. The isle of Thaxos, domain of the resident Lord of Sutures, didn’t looked poisoned. Poisoned implied that it was weakened, that it was vulnerable, that it was wasting away internally. This island did not look weak or vulnerable, it wore decay and disorder like a badge of pride.

Thaxos was not poisoned, Thaxos was poison itself and anyone too weak to meet its forlorn gaze with a glare of their own would crumble away into dust long before it did.

When the Larua servants brought our ship to the lonely docks, I was first off the ship, eager to stretch my legs on my rightful property as Lord of Sutures. I took a deep breath in, surprised at the temperature change and climate shift that came when I left the safety of our ship to stand on the docks. The air smelled of salt and rust, which was odd given the rest of the waters around the Isles of the Blessed were freshwater, and the winds that whipped by were cold and filled with vapor where the rest were warm and dry.

“We’ve got a welcoming committee coming.” Callidas said, pointing.

A horde of brown robed, white masked Laruas were walking down the splintering docks to our ship, led by a Larua dressed in black who wore a red mask. They definitely hadn’t been in my field of vision when I had last looked at the dark shores, yet here they were despite that. A hidden passage? An illusion perhaps? Invisibility?

“They won’t hurt us.” I promised Callidas who looked disturbed.

It surprised me that he looked so bothered, but I guess seeing a mob of servants who you knew were stronger than you and who were walking with purpose straight at you was the silent fear of every master. Fortunately, I had been both slave and master, both man and demigod, both servant and king, and my greatest fear wasn’t to be usurped but how long it would take to reclaim my glory or steal another’s.

I stood forward, walking past Callidas and leaving him behind. My strides took me to the red masked Larua faster than the horde was trudging menacingly towards me.

“Hail.” I said. “I am Adrias Heraklion, the Lord of Sutures and your new master.”

The brown robed members of the Laruas knelt immediately but the red masked one only observed me, making no move to humble himself.

“I know your name, Adrias Lucion. Ever since you claimed your title. We all know it.” The apparent leader of these Laruas said.

“You can talk?” I said.

“Yes.” Red Mask replied.

“Remove your mask.” I ordered him.

The head Larua pulled back his black hood and untied the knot holding his mask to his face. Underneath it he was almost a normal servant of Elysium, completely red eyes with no other color or features in them, but his mouth lacked the characteristic golden stitches that stole theit power of speech. That wasn’t to say he had never had them, his lips were peppered and scored with scar tissue that stretched when his expression changed or when he shifted.

Callidas came beside me.

“Who allowed you to remove your stitches? This is forbidden-“ He blustered.

“Take him back to his ship.” The unstitched Larua commanded the others.

Three of the brown robed ones grabbed Callidas. Each of them had unnatural strength, enough one would suffice, but together they completely immobilized him. I remained calm, this was a strange place with rules of its own. Its climate and topography made that visible enough and this further did so. I needed the help of these beings to conquer and destroy Elysium as I had promised. This was one footstep to getting out of the Underworld and retaking Governorship of Apollo system and I had to keep an open mind.

Callidas kept shouting even as the ship we had come in on went out back to Poros.

“What is your name?” I asked the leader.

“I have none. It was taken from me.” He replied.

I thought of how Maximos had called over one of his personal servants with a number.

“They took your name; did they give you a number?” I asked.

“13.” He replied, his scarred lips warping with the word’s syllables.

“13, do you and your fellow Laruas consider me to be your master?” I said.

“It is the will of Hades.” He replied.

“That’s not an explicit yes.” I said.

“Not yet.” The Larua said.

“That seems like something the High Council might be displeased to hear about.” I said softly. “Sounds almost rebellious.”

“We obey true authority. There is no rebellion in disregarding a lesser master before a higher one.” 13 answered.

I considered his words closely. There were a number of ways I could interpret them. ‘We obey true authority’ could imply that they did not consider a Lord of Sutures to be rightfully holding the position until they passed some kind of test, but the part about ‘disregarding a lesser master before a higher one’ implied a lot of… interesting things.

I studied the motionless others, looking away from him but still keenly watching him in my peripheral vision. “Tell me, 13, is Hades a lesser or a higher master?”

His scarred lips made for a revolting smile.

When he said nothing in response besides the hideous grin, I picked a new question.

“Why are you telling me this? Whatever you have is endangered by so brazenly speaking so to someone you have told you won’t obey fully.” I said.

“The Lord of Sutures is seldomly seen.” He said, still smiling.

“But he is no doubt seen at some point if only on occasion.” I countered. “Eventually, you’ll have to put me in the position to risk this… operation you have going on Thaxos.”

“Why is this role open?” 13 said, ignoring my question to ask of his own.

I paused to think. Elysians wouldn’t age so it wasn’t like whoever my predecessor had been had passed away.

“The person before me got tired of the unpleasant and this bleak place. Decided to spend their time getting drunk on beach chairs.” I said, though I didn’t believe it.

“She didn’t get tired, she died.” 13 responded. His smile was really starting to irritate me.

“You Blurred her? You expect me to believe the High Council didn’t give a full-on examination of an immortal’s passing? Or that they didn’t give her Nectar to bring her Blur back to Brighthood.” I said skeptically.

“I said she died, not that she Blurred.” 13 said. “It was ruled a suicide when they searched this place.”

My mind whirled. How was it even possible for a ghost to die? Fade, yes, but to die a second time? It didn’t make any sense. What did it even mean for such a thing to happen? Did you go to a second afterlife?

“I don’t understand any of this. How did you permanently kill the dead? Who are you really obeying? Why are you serving Elysium if they treat you so terribly and you don’t really serve the Lord of Sutures? Why are you telling me this at all?” I said.

I didn’t get their goals or their reasoning. What did they want me to do? Why not just pretend to work for me if they wanted to escape detection?

“If you come with me, you’ll know the answers to all those things.” 13 said, reaching out to touch me.

I stepped back out of his reach. I couldn’t fight all of them, I probably couldn’t fight more than two, but I needed time to think.

“Whether I escape the Underworld or not, I’m burning Elysium to the ground.” 13 said in the tone of an orator reciting a philosopher’s words.

They were the promise I had sworn in the bathhouse after I had the female Larua remove her mask. The only problem was-

“-I didn’t say those words aloud.” I said. “You can read my mind?”

“At times.” He replied. “In select situations. You asked why I’m revealing all this to you and it’s because I know that you, Adrias Lucion, are not a friend to Elysium and because our true master wishes to see you.”

When the swarm of brown robed Laruas came for me this time, I let them take me, their touch as light as their low-quality clothes were rough.