Antiusurpation and the road to disenshittification
THIS WEEKEND (November 8-10), I'll be in TUCSON, AZ: I'm the GUEST OF HONOR at the TUSCON SCIENCE FICTION CONVENTION.
Nineties kids had a good reason to be excited about the internet's promise of disintermediation: the gatekeepers who controlled our access to culture, politics, and opportunity were crooked as hell, and besides, they sucked.
For a second there, we really did get a lot of disintermediation, which created a big, weird, diverse pluralistic space for all kinds of voices, ideas, identities, hobbies, businesses and movements. Lots of these were either deeply objectionable or really stupid, or both, but there was also so much cool stuff on the old, good internet.
Then, after about ten seconds of sheer joy, we got all-new gatekeepers, who were at least as bad, and even more powerful, than the old ones. The net became Tom Eastman's "Five giant websites, each filled with screenshots of the other four." Culture, politics, finance, news, and especially power have been gathered into the hands of unaccountable, greedy, and often cruel intermediaries.
Oh, also, we had an election.
This isn't an election post. I have many thoughts about the election, but they're still these big, unformed blobs of anger, fear and sorrow. Experience teaches me that the only way to get past this is to just let all that bad stuff sit for a while and offgas its most noxious compounds, so that I can handle it safely and figure out what to do with it.
While I wait that out, I'm just getting the job done. Chop wood, carry water. I've got a book to write, Enshittification, for Farar, Straus, Giroux's MCD Books, and it's very nearly done:
Compartmentalizing my anxieties and plowing that energy into productive work isn't necessarily the healthiest coping strategy, but it's not the worst, either. It's how I wrote nine books during the covid lockdowns.
And sometimes, when you're not staring directly at something, you get past the tunnel vision that makes it impossible to see its edges, fracture lines, and weak points.
So I'm working on the book. It's a book about platforms, because enshittification is a phenomenon that is most visible and toxic on platforms. Platforms are intermediaries, who connect buyers and sellers, creators and audiences, workers and employers, politicians and voters, activists and crowds, as well as families, communities, and would-be romantic partners.
There's a reason we keep reinventing these intermediaries: they're useful. Like, it's technically possible for a writer to also be their own editor, printer, distributor, promoter and sales-force:
But without middlemen, those are the only writers we'll get. The set of all writers who have something to say that I want to read is much larger than the set of all writers who are capable of running their own publishing operation.
The problem isn't middlemen: the problem is powerful middlemen. When an intermediary gets powerful enough to usurp the relationship between the parties on either side of the transaction, everything turns to shit:
A dating service that faces pressure from competition, regulation, interoperability and a committed workforce will try as hard as it can to help you find Your Person. A dating service that buys up all its competitors, cows its workforce, captures its regulators and harnesses IP law to block interoperators will redesign its service so that you keep paying forever, and never find love:
Multiply this a millionfold, in every sector of our complex, high-tech world where we necessarily rely on skilled intermediaries to handle technical aspects of our lives that we can't ā or shouldn't ā manage ourselves. That world is beholden to predators who screw us and screw us and screw us, jacking up our rents:
(Maybe this is a post about the election after all?)
The difference between a helpmeet and a parasite is power. If we want to enjoy the benefits of intermediaries without the risks, we need policies that keep middlemen weak. That's the opposite of the system we have now.
Take interoperability and IP law. Interoperability (basically, plugging new things into existing things) is a really powerful check against powerful middlemen. If you rely on an ad-exchange to fund your newsgathering and they start ripping you off, then an interoperable system that lets you use a different exchange will not only end the rip off ā it'll make it less likely to happen in the first place because the ad-tech platform will be afraid of losing your business:
Interoperability means that when Amazon rips off audiobook authors to the tune of $100m, those authors can pull their books from Amazon and sell them elsewhere and know that their listeners can move their libraries over to a different app:
But interoperability has been in retreat for 40 years, as IP law has expanded to criminalize otherwise normal activities, so that middlemen can use IP rights to protect themselves from their end-users and business customers:
https://locusmag.com/2020/09/cory-doctorow-ip/
That's what I mean when I say that "IP" is "any law that lets a business reach beyond its own walls and control the actions of its customers, competitors and critics."
For example, there's a pernicious law 1998 US law that I write about all the time, Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, the "anticircumvention law." This is a law that felonizes tampering with copyright locks, even if you are the creator of the undelying work.
So Amazon ā the owner of the monopoly audiobook platform Audible ā puts a mandatory copyright lock around every audiobook they sell. I, as an author who writes, finances and narrates the audiobook, can't provide you, my customer, with a tool to remove that lock. If I do so, I face criminal sanctions: a five year prison sentence and a $500,000 fine for a first offense:
In other words: if I let you take my own copyrighted work out of Amazon's app, I commit a felony, with penalties that are far stiffer than the penalties you would face if you were to simply pirate that audiobook. The penalties for you shoplifting the audiobook on CD at a truck-stop are lower than the penalties the author and publisher of the book would face if they simply gave you a tool to de-Amazon the file. Indeed, even if you hijacked the truck that delivered the CDs, you'd probably be looking at a shorter sentence.
This is a law that is purpose-built to encourage intermediaries to usurp the relationship between buyers and sellers, creators and audiences. It's a charter for parasitism and predation.
But as bad as that is, there's another aspect of DMCA 1201 that's even worse: the exemptions process.
You might have read recently about the Copyright Office "freeing the McFlurry" by granting a DMCA 1201 exemption for companies that want to reverse-engineer the error-codes from McDonald's finicky, unreliable frozen custard machines:
Under DMCA 1201, the Copyright Office hears petitions for these exemptions every three years. If they judge that anticircumvention law is interfering with some legitimate activity, the statute empowers them to grant an exemption.
When the DMCA passed in 1998 (and when the US Trade Rep pressured other world governments into passing nearly identical laws in the decades that followed), this exemptions process was billed as a "pressure valve" that would prevent abuses of anticircumvention law.
But this was a cynical trick. The way the law is structured, the Copyright Office can only grant "use" exemptions, but not "tools" exemptions. So if you are granted the right to move Audible audiobooks into a third-party app, you are personally required to figure out how to do that. You have to dump the machine code of the Audible app, decompile it, scan it for vulnerabilities, and bootstrap your own jailbreaking program to take Audible wrapper off the file.
No one is allowed to help you with this. You aren't allowed to discuss any of this publicly, or share a tool that you make with anyone else. Doing any of this is a potential felony.
In other words, DMCA 1201 gives intermediaries power over you, but bans you from asking an intermediary to help you escape another abusive middleman.
This is the exact opposite of how intermediary law should work. We should have rules that ban intermediaries from exercising undue power over the parties they serve, and we should have rules empowering intermediaries to erode the advantage of powerful intermediaries.
The fact that the Copyright Office grants you an exemption to anticircumvention law means nothing unless you can delegate that right to an intermediary who can exercise it on your behalf.
A world without publishing intermediaries is one in which the only writers who thrive are the ones capable of being publishers, too, and that's a tiny fraction of all the writers with something to say.
A world without interoperability intermediaries is one in which the only platform users who thrive are also skilled reverse-engineering ninja hackers ā and that's an infinitesimal fraction of the platform users who would benefit from interoperabilty.
Let this be your north star in evaluating platform regulation proposals. Platform regulation should weaken intermediaries' powers over their users, and strengthen their power over other middlemen.
Put in this light, it's easy to see why the ill-informed calls to abolish Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (which makes platform users, not platforms, responsible for most unlawful speech) are so misguided:
If we require platforms to surveil all user speech and block anything that might violate any law, we give the largest, most powerful platforms a permanent advantage over smaller, better platforms, run by co-ops, hobbyists, nonprofits local governments, and startups. The big platforms have the capital to rig up massive, automated surveillance and censorship systems, and the only alternatives that can spring up have to be just as big and powerful as the Big Tech platforms we're so desperate to escape:
This is especially grave given the current political current, where fascist politicians are threatening platforms with brutal punishments for failing to censor disfavored political views.
Anyone who tells you that "it's only censorship when the government does it" is badly confused. It's only a First Amendment violation when the government does it, sure ā but censorship has always relied on intermediaries. From the Inquisition to the Comics Code, government censors were only able to do their jobs because powerful middlemen, fearing state punishments, blocked anything that might cross the line, censoring far beyond the material actually prohibited by the law:
We live in a world of powerful, corrupt middlemen. From payments to real-estate, from job-search to romance, there's a legion of parasites masquerading as helpmeets, burying their greedy mouthparts into our tender flesh:
But intermediaries aren't the problem. You shouldn't have to stand up your own payment processor, or learn the ins and outs of real-estate law, or start your own single's bar. The problem is power, not intermediation.
As we set out to build a new, good internet (with a lot less help from the US government than seemed likely as recently as last week), let's remember that lesson: the point isn't disintermediation, it's weak intermediation.
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
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In GRRM's world, its pretty fucking clear that usurpers never win. Maegor died without kids, Aegon, son of Alicent, and his children died (I do feel bad that his kids died, they were innocent), even Aemond died without issue [he was regent for a while], and Robert Baratheon died without legitimate issue and he usurped the Targaryens. You know which bloodline did survive? The Targaryens through Daenerys, so, you know, the author has put it right in our faces that these three men weren't supposed to have the throne in the first place, for all they sat on it.
Even the damn Blackfyre's died out in the male line, which is another glaring indicator that usurpers and would-be usurpers, don't live long even if they do "win" for a brief amount of time.
The rightful Kings and queen's bloodlines survived despite the usurpers best attempts to end them. Aegon the Uncrowned and Aenys' line survived through Jaehaerys, Rhaenyra's line survived through her sons and their descendants, and Aerys and Rhaegar's through Daenerys and Jon Snow.
In GRRM's world, usurpers don't get a happy ending and he's made that pretty clear so people who support Aegon the usurper and Robert Baratheon can cry that they were rightful Kings all they want when their direct bloodlines literally no longer exist save for bastards on Roberts side lmao
EDIT: the Baratheon male line, if Stannis doesn't have a son, is also pretty well done and finished. Stannis is the last legitimate male Baratheon left. His daughter Shireen is the last legitimate female Baratheon left. Even more proof for ya.
The knight gave his heels to his mount and started off again.
Dany rode close beside him.
āStill,ā she said, āthe common people are waiting for him. Magister Illyrio says they are sewing dragon banners and praying for Viserys to return from across the narrow sea to free them.ā
āThe common people pray for rain, healthy children, and a summer that never ends,ā Ser Jorah told her.
āIt is no matter to them if the high lords play their game of thrones, so long as they are left in peace.ā
He gave a shrug. āThey never are.ā
Dany rode along quietly for a time, working his words like a puzzle box.
It went against everything that Viserys had ever told her to think that the people could care so little whether a true king or a usurper reigned over them.
Yet the more she thought on Jorahās words, the more they rang of truth.
āThe same year a certain Clemens, who had been a slave of Agrippa and resembled him to a certain extent, pretended to be Agrippa himself. He went to Gaul and won many to his cause there and many later in Italy, and finally he marched upon Rome with the avowed intention of recovering the dominion of his grandfather. The population of the city became excited at this, and not a few joined his cause; but Tiberius got him into his hands by a ruse with the aid of some persons who pretended to sympathize with this upstart. He thereupon tortured him, in order to learn something about his fellow-conspirators. Then, when the other would not utter a word, he asked him: "How did you come to be Agrippa?" And he replied: "In the same way as you came to be Caesar."
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->derek/oc. explicit; contains d/s dynamics, degradation, biting/blood drinking, descriptions of violence and torture, and the usual derek things.
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It takes less than a week for curiosity to eat through Derekās resolve completely. IzsĆ”k speeds things along by bringing up weird shit every chance he gets and then waiting, perfectly poised, for a shift in Derekās expression. Itās always some off-handed mention when itās just the two of them. IzsĆ”k will help him prepare for another guest appearance at another dreadful party, presenting him with a fresh towel after a shower, tying his tie, and then heāll sigh in a wistful way and say, āYou never have liked these little soirees. It was much easier when Ferenc was here, wasnāt it? He bore the burden of public scrutiny with such ease.ā
And what the fuck is Derek supposed to do? Not ask questions? Not think about why IzsĆ”k will stare, studying his face expectantly, and then suddenly laugh and mutter, āPay me no mind, sir.ā He tells himself itās just IzsĆ”k being his usual freaky self, but has he always been so strangely in tune with Derek? Did he always stand so close and act so concerned over every little thing? Fussing over him when he bangs his knee on a table, or after a particularly public breakup? Itās fucking weird. Derek tells him itās weird, and IzsĆ”k just smiles peaceably and goes about his business.
Three days after the museum, IzsĆ”k is drinking tea at the kitchen table while Derek eats lunch. His father is out with Clarice and the house is blissfully quiet. Derek is texting Emilia, who is hysterical and wants to break up with him again over some new bullshit that Derek canāt remember and doesnāt care to figure out from the vague hints sheās dropping. Heās sure he can talk her into a night out and a quick fuck with the right combination of sweet talking and apology gifts. He wouldnāt bother, but his father chewed him out about how it looks when he brings a new girl to every social function. People notice, his father claimed, and people talk. Derek rolls his eyes just thinking about it. His father keeps a girlfriend for a few months and now he thinks heās some kind of fucking expert on monogamy.
And then, out of nowhere, IzsĆ”k breaks him out of his thoughts. āAre you feeling restless, sir? I had something in mind, if you are interested.ā
āUnless itās something to get Emilia to calm the fuck down, Iām not interested,ā Derek says. He only looks up from his phone when he hears the scrape of IzsĆ”kās chair across the table and sees him coming closer. He stands behind Derek, rests a hand on his shoulder, and leans in to peer at the phone screen. His touch, light, weightless, totally innocent, makes Derek burn with desire.
āI see. Sheās upset that you have taken other partners.āĀ
Derek rolls his eyes. Of course itās that. Nobody can keep a goddamn secret anymore. He wonders which one of them couldnāt keep their mouths shut. Regina? Francine? Couldnāt have been Laney, because Laney...
Derek swallows hard at the thought, the memory. Standing here in the kitchen when Emilia called him sobbing, saying her two-faced bitch of a friend was comatose in the hospital. Car accident. She never woke up. IzsĆ”k had looked up from organizing his fatherās day and watched as Derek took in the news. There was something knowing in his eyes, and Derek remembered suddenly how IzsĆ”k had uncorked a vial of chicken blood and flicked it after Laney.
Thereās no way. Derek repeated that in his head like a mantra whenever he caught himself starting to believe it. The blood of a black-feathered hen. No fucking way. He looks over his shoulder at IzsĆ”k, at the eyes gazing back at him and awaitingāsomething.Ā
āYou got a spell for this?ā Derek says. Heās perturbed when IzsĆ”k smiles, like heās delighted to be asked.
āOf course, sir,ā he says. He retrieves his tea and strides quickly to the kitchen sink, dumping the rest of it down the drain. Derek watches him pluck the damp bag of herbs out of the cup, shaking the rest of the water out, and setting it on a plate. āYou may watch if youād like,ā IzsĆ”k says.
āI donāt care,ā Derek says. And he shouldnāt. But his gaze is drawn back when he sees IzsĆ”k pull a lighter from his pocket and flick it until a little wavering flame appears. It looks like heās trying to light the tea bag on fire, but itās too damp to catch. Some foul-smelling smoke sizzles to the ceiling. IzsĆ”k whispers something, not in English, and Derek just stares.
Thatās when Emilia messages him back after a solid ten minutes of the silent treatment. She says she canāt stay mad at him and asks to meet up later that night. Derek stares at the text in disbelief, then looks up and finds IzsĆ”k standing there, watching him. Smiling.
āYou may ask me questions, if you have any,ā IzsĆ”k says. āI wonder if you remember this one.ā
āWhere exactly am I supposed to remember it from? Iāve never seen that shit before.āĀ
IzsĆ”k answers automatically, like heās been waiting for this. āCsejte, 1578. I performed this spell for you for the first time.āĀ
Derek doesnāt know how to react, so he doesnāt. āYou did not.āĀ
āI did,ā IzsĆ”k insists.
āYou fucking didnāt. That doesnāt make sense.ā IzsĆ”k frowns, opening his mouth to disagree, but Derek gets up, leaves the table, and goes out to the pool to soak his feet and avoid whatever it is thatās happening. IzsĆ”k knows better than to pursue him and gives him space, but itās too late. Derek is thinking about chicken blood. Heās thinking about headless girls encased in ice. Which is weird because heās never seen that before, but something about the statue at the museum, about the things IzsĆ”k said, put a distinct image in his head. Heās hungry. He wants to taste somebodyās blood. He feels himself salivating when he remembers biting IzsĆ”kās neck and he wants to feel skin give beneath his teeth.
āWhat the fuck,ā he mutters to nobody. He kicks at the water until dusk, until his erection is gone and his father comes home with Clarice and IzsĆ”k is busy with other things so Derek can avoid his eyes and that look that knows too much.
*
Four days after the art museum, Derek wakes up and his dick is so hard it hurts. The dream snaps out of place and tries slipping away before he can remember it, but he holds tight to everything thatās left;
A castle. Stained glass windows. Stone archways. The snow-covered courtyard with its frozen women like grotesque, grasping trees. Long corridors and echoing screams. He stood eclipsed by flickering candlelight and writhing shadow, walking barefoot through puddles of blood. There were bodies dangling from the dungeon ceiling, hung from meathooks and impaled in iron cages. Slit throats. Dangling entrails. They wept and moaned above him, and their blood rained on his skin. These were his kills. He hunted them himself, hung them like trophies. He reveled in their pain. Silhouettes played across the walls, human and beastly shapes that grew and warped and twined together in obscene dance. Derek felt these shades watching, but he didnāt fear their gazes. There was no need to perform for them.Ā
And IzsĆ”k was there, smiling gently. He wore nothing. He was deathly pale, unmarked as though the blood couldnāt touch him. Derek was possessed by the need to dirty him. He reached desperately, his grasp leaving bruises, dragging IzsĆ”k through red rain and filth. He was tainted slowly, a splatter across his shoulder, a rivulet dripping down from his scalp. It fell in heavy clots in his lashes. Derek pressed him against the cold stone wall, his wandering hands smearing abstract shapes over IzsĆ”kās skin, and then he licked it off of him with long, slow drags of his tongue.
It was so fucking stupid. Heād never do that in real life. But just thinking about it gets him even harder. Derek palms himself through silk pajama pants, shivering, leaning back against the headboard. Heād never be so tender and gentle. But in the dream, IzsĆ”k looked at him with this passion, this reverence, like Derek was God and that castle dungeon was their private, depraved heaven. It was so vivid. The musk of all that flesh and blood was heady and visceral. He slips his hand beneath the waistband of his clothes. Itās pathetic. Jacking off has never been so disappointing. He can see it when he closes his eyes, dreamlike and hazy; bodies and darkness. IzsĆ”k beneath him, his hands framing Derekās face, his eyes glazed with wanting. He twists his palm around the head of his cock and imagines itās IzsĆ”k doing it, IzsĆ”k between his legs and covered in blood.
Itās not the first time heās fantasized about IzsĆ”k, but it was always different before. More impersonal. IzsĆ”kās mouth around his cock. IzsĆ”kās hips moving against his. The way IzsĆ”kās back arches and his muscles all go taut while Derek fucks him raw over his fatherās desk. But this is so much more heated and detailed. Itās not just the sensation or the view, itās how IzsĆ”k looks at him, how he talks to him. Itās how he knows Derek in intimate and frightening ways, and doesnāt expect anything more of him.
In the dream, IzsĆ”k worshiped him. He got to his knees and the sight of Derekās body, his apparent desire, the hard cock swollen against his abdomen, seemed to mesmerize him. He looked up at Derek as he pressed a kiss to the head of his cock, drool and precum on his lips. His tongue caressed Derekās length from base to tip and his hands smoothed along his thighs. He moaned shamelessly, the sound vibrating against Derekās flesh as he suckled on the sensitive underside. He mumbled something, unwilling to pull away and cease pleasuring Derek for even a moment, but Derek understood somehow. He knew what he was trying to say; Iām yours.
Derek bites his lip so hard it bleeds, desperately fucking his fist. Itās too hot. He has to throw off the sheets and pull his pants down around his thighs but heās still sweating, his head pounding. He still feels the stagnant dungeon air, the blood drying to his skin. He remembers the way IzsĆ”k bobbed his head, the hot slide of his lips and his tongue at the base of Derekās cock when he started to deepthroat him. IzsĆ”k gagged and squirmed but he didnāt pull off, didnāt even try. Derek wasnāt holding him still because he didnāt have to. They didnāt speak to each other, but he understood in that moment the depths of IzsĆ”kās devotion to him. He knew IzsĆ”k would do anything for him. Would kill for him. Would give his own blood, his own body, if it would satisfy Derek.
āIām gonna cum,ā he says, panting. IzsĆ”k is too hot and wet and perfect around his cock. He thrusts deep, feels his balls slap IzsĆ”kās chin and he grinds against the back of his throat, and IzsĆ”k chokes on a moan. His worship becomes even more fervent. His hands grip the back of Derekās thighs, squeezing his ass, spurring him into more violent movements and keeping them locked together. He wants everything Derek has to give him. He accepts it all, the hunger and brutality, his every whim and desire. When Derek cums down his throat, IzsĆ”k gags on it, his hands tightening on Derekās legs, but he stays. He looks up at Derek through hazy eyes and swallows obediently. He lets Derek soften in his throat, sucking gently as though to milk him of the last of his climax.
Derek lays there, dazed and confused, realizing heās alone and his sheets are soiled. It takes time to catch his breath. He lies in his own mess, eyes closed. Heās still there, in the castle dungeon. The dreamfog begins to clear. He isnāt standing anymore. Heās reclining, encased in liquid warmth. When he moves his hands, red swirls around them. He licks it off his fingers. Itās hot, metallic, and sickly sweet. Itās so clear, so detailed and real, that Derek is startled to open his eyes to the dark ceiling of his own room again.Ā
Just a dream, he tells himself. His heart is still racing.
*
Five days after the art museum, Derekās determination to ignore all the strangeness is shot. Pretending that everything is fine and he isnāt turning into a fucking vampire goes from a chore to a battle of epic proportions against his own body. Heās hungry all the time, his libido is out of control, and he has to bite the inside of his mouth to keep himself from sinking his teeth into anyone else. He takes Emilia out to see a movie and he canāt focus on anything but her neck. The way the light plays across it, the moving shadows, the outline of her muscles every time she swallows or laughs. He imagines himself biting her, his jaw clamping down on her throat like a wild animal. He tells her he has to use the bathroom halfway through and jacks off in a stall fantasizing about tasting her carotid artery.
Asking IzsĆ”k is out of the question. His pride wonāt allow it. IzsĆ”k is already smug as fuck about all of this, sneaking up on Derek constantly and asking very pointed questions about how heās feeling or whether heās had enough to drink, all with that fucking smile on his face. He retreats to his room in his fatherās house, blessed with a rare moment of privacy, and gets online. The tentative approach doesnāt get him far; a quick online diagnosis gives him two types of cancer. In desperation, he starts trying the things heās heard IzsĆ”k casually mention, names he canāt remember right and places he canāt spell.Ā
Inevitably, he finds her. Frozen in time, she gazes back at him from her lofty position atop a webpage detailing her atrocities. One hand rests daintily upon a faded red tablecloth, the other holding an embroidered handkerchief. She isnāt smiling and thereās a weariness to her regality, a thinly veiled disdain in her eyes. Derek feels that he knows her, that he recognizes that quiet sneer. Heās seen it in the mirror before. A strange, twisting feeling knots up his stomach, and he doesnāt fully understand it, doesnāt know what all of this means, but he knows something has happened to him. Some change has taken root.Ā
He almost isnāt surprised when IzsĆ”k speaks as though suddenly materialized behind his chair, āYour father sent me, sir. I am to prepare you for this evening.ā Derek turns and examines IzsĆ”k, searching for things he hasnāt noticed before, or things he didnāt want to notice. His easy, eager submission. His smile. His eyes that know Derek, know what he wants, what he needs before Derek himself is even aware. Eyes that have seen centuries.
āWhich one?ā Derek asks.Ā
IzsĆ”k tilts his head, silently seeking clarification. Heās smiling very slightly. Did the Blood Countess see this same smile? Did it greet her before grand balls, assuring her of the safety of her secrets? Did it welcome her to the dungeon, her private sanctuary?
āShe had accomplices,ā Derek says. āServants who helped her keep things quiet. Some of them were questioned at the trial.ā He doesnāt clarify; doesnāt have to. IzsĆ”k listens patiently, his smile widening as though this is precisely what heās been waiting for. How long has he waited? Derek wonders. How much longer was he willing to wait? āThere was one man who helped her torture her victims, but the rest were women. One was her old wetnurse, and one was one of her personal servants. The other two were witches or something. Right?ā Dorottya and Darvulia. He didnāt bother to learn the rest of the names, but he memorized those. One of them was important. One of them mattered more than all the rest.
IzsĆ”k hums thoughtfully. āThat is what many people say, yes.āĀ
Derek stands up and hits him. Itās sudden, impulsive, happening so quickly that he doesnāt realize heās done it until his hand starts to sting. IzsĆ”k touches his reddened cheek with soft, uncertain strokes, as though heās just as surprised. The way he looks at Derek is wrong. Not disdain. Not disappointment. Elation. The joy of a long-awaited reunion.
āWhich one are you?ā Derek asks.
Just like in the dream, IzsĆ”k sinks to his knees before Derek. The movement is slow and graceful, as though heās done it a thousand times before. He takes one of Derekās hands in his and holds it as though itās something precious. āI am the one who did not betray you,ā he says, pressing his lips to the back of Derekās hand. The gesture is gentle and intimate, stirring something violent within him. He wants to hurt IzsĆ”k. He wants to dirty him. He wants to thank him for coming back after all this time, saving him from suffocating in his own constant performance, but he only knows how to lie about gratitude, not show it for real.
The one who didnāt betray him. Derek turns the words over in his mind to admire like precious stones. He remembersādid he read it somewhere, or does the knowledge come from somewhere else?āthat the countessā servants were called to stand trial. Each one confessed to the atrocities, the beatings, the bloodletting. The man. The wetnurse. The servant. Even Dorottya broke her vow of silence and servitude to testify against her mistress. They all betrayed her.
All but loyal Darvulia, her devotion unending. She wasnāt there that day. Already dead, some stories say. It doesnāt matter. Derek knows what became of her now. He threads his fingers through IzsĆ”kās hair.
āI donāt get it,ā he admits. āI donāt get how it works. But I believe you. I see pictures of her, and I know weāre the same.āĀ
IzsĆ”k nuzzles against Derekās palm like an animal, a pet seeking affection. Itās intoxicating, the power he holds, the total submission IzsĆ”k gives him, unchanged by the centuries. It feels right. It makes sense the way a dream does in the midst of it. āI couldnāt save you,ā IzsĆ”k murmurs. āI was not strong enough then. This time will be different.āĀ
Derek is too caught up in the thick need in IzsĆ”kās voice, the curve of his spine as he leans into Derekās touch, to understand the words right away. āSave me from what?ā he asks, but IzsĆ”k is already standing, stepping away from him. Derek isnāt done with him. He yanks him back by the forearm and bites him without warning, leaving the shape of his teeth in his earlobe. āSave. Me. From. What,ā Derek growls, each word punctuated with a nip to IzsĆ”kās delicate skin. He bruises so easily.Ā
āFrom your family,ā IzsĆ”k gasps. He holds onto Derek, moves against him shamelessly. Derek feels how hard IzsĆ”k is and smirks against the fluttering flesh of his throat. He slides his thigh between IzsĆ”kās legs, giving him the privilege of rutting against it. IzsĆ”k is so needy, so desperate to serve and explain as he chases his own pleasure, his words coming in breathless pants and whines. āJust as it was before, your own blood plots against you. Your father, heāoh, sir, please!āĀ
Derek canāt pay attention to whatever IzsĆ”k is trying to tell him. It doesnāt matter. Nothing is more important right now than getting inside of IzsĆ”k and tasting him. āOn the bed,ā he demands, and IzsĆ”k obeys without question. Theyāre all over each other. Derek savors the roaming worship of IzsĆ”kās hands down his biceps and across his chest. It feels good. It feels right. He canāt get undressed fast enough, still shedding clothes as he nips and licks at IzsĆ”kās tempting neck, and IzsĆ”k is so good and obedient, turning his head to give Derek better access. āYou really are mine,ā Derek says.
āAll yours, sir,ā IzsĆ”k says. Derek has barely touched him and he looks blissed out already, eyes glazed, a delirious smile on his face as though just being in Derekās presence is the greatest of pleasures. He unbuttons his shirt further, exposing a tantalizing flash of his collarbones and old, faded marks Derek left days ago. āTake me. Drink from me. Do with me whatever pleases you.ā IzsĆ”kās nails sink into his shoulders as he pulls himself up enough to whisper against Derekās ear, āPlease, master. Iāve waited for you.āĀ
The final, worn string of Derekās self-control snaps. He bites into IzsĆ”k like heās meat. He hears skin and tissue give beneath his teeth, splitting, squelching open, tastes the tangy burst of IzsĆ”kās lifeblood on his tongue. He ruts against IzsĆ”kās hard, twitching cock, trapped between their bodies, and IzsĆ”kās head falls back in ecstasy. Derek sucks at the wound and tastes IzsĆ”kās tenderness, the sharp sweetness of him. Itās so good, so right and familiar. IzsĆ”k was born for this, born for him. He would never belong to anyone the way he belonged to Derek, would never know anyone as deeply, would never want anyone as wholly. Somehow, arched and gasping, IzsĆ”k moves himself, grinds slowly against Derekās achingly hard cock. He reaches between them and guides Derek to his twitching, anticipating hole. Derek slams inside of his welcoming, tight heat and his eyes roll back in his head. Nothing has ever felt so good.
āYouāre mine. My loyal little toy. My cockslut,ā Derek hisses, unclamping his jaws from IzsĆ”kās neck just to find a new, fresh spot to taste. IzsĆ”k shudders around him, beneath him. His legs open wider. Derek hooks IzsĆ”kās ankles over his shoulders and bends him in half. Itās new, doing it like this. Heās fucked IzsĆ”k while looking at him a couple times but never staring like this, never pressed chest to chest and sharing breath. IzsĆ”kās lips are right there and he moves without thinking, swooping in, crushing their mouths together. So soft and tender. His teeth crunch through IzsĆ”kās lower lip and blood gushes into his mouth, heady and intoxicating. āCanāt get enough of you,ā he moans into IzsĆ”kās mouth.
IzsĆ”kās nails rake down his back hard enough to draw blood. Derek lets him. Itās better that way, more raw, more wonderful. He pulls back to admire the blood and saliva smeared across IzsĆ”kās lips, dripping down his chin. It feels like the desert in his room, the heat, the intensity, a soft body surrendering beneath him. He slams his cock into IzsĆ”kās helpless body over and over again, relishing the sensations, the sounds, the desperate raggedness of IzsĆ”kās breathing. He crushes IzsĆ”k against the bed and this time he kisses him. He shouldāve done it earlier. IzsĆ”kās mouth is so hot, so soft and slutty and wanting him. He sucks on IzsĆ”kās tongue as he fucks him into the mattress, hips pistoning, cock drilling into his pliant, shaking body.
IzsĆ”k has been wanton and shameless before, but this is more than that. This is devotion, Derek thinks. This is what heās always deserved. IzsĆ”kās thighs quiver as Derek pounds into him, so hard and fast his own legs are straining but he canāt bring himself to stop. The pleasure is blinding, a liquid heat in the pit of his stomach. Heās kissing IzsĆ”k in filthy, hungry ways that heās never done with any of his girlfriends, licking into him, tangling their tongues together, sucking on the bite he left for every bead of blood that bubbles to the surface. Heās going to cum. Heās going to claim IzsĆ”k so thoroughly, so completely, that heāll never be satisfied by anyone else ever again. Heāll worship Derekās cock just like this with his whole body. Heāll beg for it. Heāll beg for a chance to suck his dick under the table at dinner parties. Heāll thank Derek when he cums down his throat and swallow every drop.
IzsĆ”k is his. He might be Derekās fatherās assistant on paper, he might spread his legs for him sometimes, but heās Derekās. Heās been Derekās across centuries, across continents. Heās come all this way just to get on his knees before Derek, where he belongs. Derek squeezes IzsĆ”kās ass, digs his nails in. This is mine, he thinks. This body, this mind, this entire being. He stops kissing IzsĆ”k to nose against the other side of his neck, licking and teasing the unbroken skin.
Derek smirks against IzsĆ”kās hammering pulse. Heās close. Heās going to cum. He fucks IzsĆ”k deep, grinds against him, feels his balls roll over IzsĆ”kās smooth skin. āBeg me to bite you,ā he purrs.Ā
IzsĆ”k clings even more tightly, begs even more sweetly. āPlease, give me your bite,ā IzsĆ”k cries for him. āI need it. I was born to receive it. Please use me, make me yours. I should always belong to you, master.āĀ
Derek cums hard, buried deep inside of IzsĆ”k. Everything whites out, sight and sound and understanding consumed by orgasm. Thereās a sharp stinging sensation somewhere on his body, a pain that crests with the pleasure, intermingled too tightly to process on its own. IzsĆ”k writhes and whimpers through his own orgasm, his own cum splattering across his chest and Derek fills him. It feels like the aftershocks last forever, heat rushing through him, waves and pulses.
Derek is trembling when he pulls out of IzsĆ”k, watching IzsĆ”kās hole clench obscenely around emptiness as cum leaks out of him. Neither of them speaks for some time, basking in the completion of it all. Derek feels the world swaying as though heās riding a metronome, the call of sleep smothering and irresistible. He canāt believe how hard he came. Thereās still blood on his mouth and he licks his lips, humming at the taste. He feels someone touch him; IzsĆ”k, gentle and reverent. Tracing his muscles. Caressing his chest. He doesnāt cuddle, but when heās this tired, teetering on the edge of oblivion, he canāt complain.
He wonders if they did this before. If Countess Bathory laid with sweet, loyal Darvulia, cuddled like lovers. Just this once, he thinks, heāll let IzsĆ”k get away with it. For old timesā sake.
*
āmurmurs. Someone calling him. Calling his name. Softly and distantly, then loud. Close. Not IzsĆ”k. Not respectful enough.
āDerek. Get up.āĀ
A rustling sound, the scrape of curtains rising. Blinding, burning light assaults Derekās eyes and he groans, rolling over. God, what time is it? Sleep clings stubbornly to his mind, clouding his thoughts. Heās sore, mostly in his legs and back. Right, itās coming back to him. He and IzsĆ”k fucked last night. IzsĆ”k, Darvulia, hundred year old Hungarian witch, whatever. It was some of the best sex of his life. But usually, itād be IzsĆ”k who comes and gets him in the morning, so why is his father here, looming over Derekās bed and refusing to leave?Ā
āWhat?ā he says, groggy. His father is frowning in that tense, disappointed way that turns Derekās stomach. He sees it directed at other people mostly, former business partners, overambitious rivals, people who really, really fuck up. Derekās mouth goes dry. āWhat?ā he says again, struggling to sit up straight. What happened? What did he do? He canāt be mad about IzsĆ”k, right, itās not like they were being subtle. Did he forget something?
Derek looks at the window and fuck, itās late,he mustāve slept through an event he was supposed to go to or some shit. He rubs his eyes, pushing himself to remember. He thinks, maybe, there was some kind of afternoon social he was supposed to make an appearance at, but the details are foggy. Why is his head pounding like that? Itās like having a hangover. He feels like he slept for decades.
His father paces halfway across the room. Derek follows the movement with his eyes and spots something at the foot of the bed. Is that blood? Dirt? Some kind of ugly stain on the sheets. They really got carried away last night, he thinks, but then he sees an arm.
Just an arm.Ā
Not IzsĆ”kās. Heās not sure why his mind goes there immediately, but itās not, he knows it isnāt. IzsĆ”k doesnāt wear flaking pink nail enamel with glitter. He just knows thereās a severed human arm on his bed and a bunch of stains around it. Definitely dried blood, but thereās dirt, too, like someone dug up a grave, and.
Thatās cum. Thatās definitely a cum stain. Derekās eyes slowly trail up to meet his fatherās. His father looks down at him and doesnāt say a word. Derek swallows hard and tries to think of something, anything, that he can say. Nothing comes to mind.
āIāve had concerns,ā his father says. Derek can barely hold his gaze. That judgment, that cold scrutinyāhe works tirelessly to escape it, to put on the most convincing performance he can. āYou donāt know the first thing about discretion. Thatās one thing. Itās another that you think Iāll clean up all of your messes for you.āĀ
Derek glances at the arm, sprawled grotesquely over his sheets. āI donāt know what that is,ā he says hoarsely. Obviously he knows what it is, but he doesnāt know how it got there.
āIāve been lenient,ā his father goes on, as if Derek never spoke. āToo lenient. Iāve turned a blind eye to most of your deviancy. But this? This crosses the line. I should have listened to IzsĆ”k sooner.ā
Derekās blood goes cold in his veins. āWhat does that mean?ā he demands. His father turns his back on him. Derek throws himself out of bed, rushing after him. āWhat the fuck does that mean?āĀ
āIt means youāre cut off,ā his father says. He doesnāt even look at him when he speaks. āI want your things out of here by tonight, but donāt go too far. The police want to speak with you. Something about graverobbing and desecration of a corpse.āĀ
Derek stands there numbly, watching his father walk out and the door slam shut behind him. No. He didnāt do it. He didnāt do any of this. He looks back at the arm hatefully. What the fuck is it doing there, ruining his life? Heat rises to his face, shame, humiliation. Maybe he was getting a little arrogant, brazenly packing his bags for his desert outings, leaving things lying around in plain sight, but it was always so easy to explain away. Heās good at his performance. No one suspected anything. If heās going to get caught, itās not going to be for some bullshit he didnāt even do. He wipes angry, helpless tears out of his eyes and storms downstairs. IzsĆ”k. He needs to find IzsĆ”k.
He runs into other housekeepers who pale and dart out of his way. Derek ignores them. He doesnāt care about any of them, his gaze lingering only if theyāre the right height, wearing the right uniform. No sign of IzsĆ”k in any of the usual places. No one in the kitchen. Not a soul out by the pool. He scares a gardener when he comes storming through but finds nobody else. His father has retreated elsewhere in the house and Derek finds his office abandoned, paperwork strewn across his desk. Derek sees several financial forms and summaries, land deeds, company assets, stocks and bonds. A copy of his fatherās will sits in the corner and Derekās heart stops.
Under the section for inheritors, his name isnāt listed. Neither are any of his siblings or cousins. Not even Clarice shows up anywhere. But one name does appear, getting absolutely everything his father could possibly leave behind.
IzsƔk Varga.
There is one moment of silence. A lack of comprehension. Derek reads the name several times before it makes sense. Then comes the storm building, the fire and venom churning inside of him, a tight, clenching pain in his chest. Disbelief. Bitter humor. A hatred so powerful it makes him lightheaded and hot in the face. He goes through the stages of grief in the span of a millisecond, mourning something he didnāt realize he even wanted, and a crazed smile stretches across his face.
Calmly and quietly, he goes upstairs and begins going through his things. He shoves his dresser out of the way and pushes aside a false wall panel concealing a large, musty-smelling duffel bag. He unzips it, checks the contents. Grains of sand trickle from an open compartment. Good. Everything he needs. Heās angry. He canāt remember the last time he was this angry, his hands shaking, his whole body seeming to vibrate with the need to stab and strangle. But thereās an excited edge to it, the sort of anticipation that comes with his vacations.
Iām going to fucking kill him, he thinks. Iām going to make him beg for death.
Heās smiling too big, too honestly. He feels giddy and he canāt hide it. A woman dusting in the hall gives him a wide berth when he passes, plastering herself against the wall. Heās a predator passing, a wolf with better things to do and bigger prey in mind. He licks his lips. His mask fails him. He doesnāt even try to pretend anymore.
"Nothing will keep us from knowledge. Nothing and nobody. Knowledge is power, and power can be wielded, bent to your will. You're right to fear us, you're right to fear the magic in our veins. We are the warlocks, the Usurpers, the Broken Clan. We are Tremere."
Clan 8 from the #13clanschallenge aka Clan Tremere
Challenge by @nana_cosa
These former mages have honestly fascinated me to the point of desperately wanting to play one at a LARP in the future.
The history, the hatred, the power. It's a rich and intriguing lore and one I would love to get even more acquainted with. I wouls also love to experiment with Thaumaturgy, no one would be safeš
