The ropes have scraped a raw path on him. He shudders, remains silent as Asmodeus tightens them further, will not deign to speak. He knows how he must look - white scales, white wings, brilliantly shining, scarred with black rope and red winding along his body from where scales had been rubbed raw, then off completely. He imagines himself, red on white, and thinks of the saints and the stories that sprung up after their deaths, thinks of bodies left pristine, smelling sweet, where the only marks of their martyrdom are red thread to mark their death wounds.

"Don't you like this game?" Asmodeus asks softly, a barbed tail trailing down Dominic's underbelly.

Dominic is silent. He cannot - will not - speak. To do so justifies this, or is a lie.

Better to remain the silent martyr, he thinks, and turns his face from Asmodeus's smile.