Karlach pressed her hand to her chest, her eyes fluttering shut as she felt her engine's warm, harsh beating. Her lips were pressed together in a thin line, tears burned at the corner of her eyes and she started tracing along the lines and scars across her chest. She hated being reminded that something so intimate had been taken from her. Her heart. It was a million different shades of wrong, the idea that she'd never be able to give it to someone she cared about. She often wondered what the demons had done with that piece of her.

Had they thrown it out? Burned it? Those thoughts didn't make her ache nearly as much as the idea of Zariel holding it somewhere in her castle, in a jar. Karlach gritted her teeth and her eyes opened, meeting the big starry sky. Everyone else was asleep, leaving her alone with the burning pain in her chest, and the heavy weight on her mind.

Karlach hadn't been allowed to keep anything from her parents when she was brought down to the hells. Her father's hat had been taken, her mother's bracelet sold, the only things she had left of them were in the mirror. She was the striking image of her father, tall with a sharp face. Her mother's influence was in there in small subtle ways. Karlach's mother had always told her that she'd given Karlach her heart, and that is what Karlach shared with her.

The two felt for the world in the same way, Karlach had vivid memories of laying on her mother's chest and feeling their hearts sync... she doubted her metal heart would be capable of matching someone else's. For years she didn't think her heart could feel at all. Zariel had taken away her mother from her, the last remnants she had, and even now that she'd escaped the threat of having to go back was looming over her like a tidal wave, or a blade about to fall.

"Damn her," Karlach muttered, rolling onto her side and curling up tightly. Her nails dug into her chest and she started sobbing, hot angry tears. Her flames rose up around her until she was giving off more light than the fire coals.