Another evening of rain whispered dreams of cleanliness to me in my sleep. I woke in a start, a vision of a shattered padlock in the cellar, the echoing thunderclap of iron chains snapped, the instantaneous collapse of time. Through the window, the frost white moon blazed amidst a thrash of soaked branches and curtains of rain. The frenzy of the storm was naked, unsheathed in the moonlight. In the dark mirror across the room, I sensed myself, watching the watcher, the eye beholding the beholder, wondering what does it see, who is the one who toils in the cellar, scouring scrolls of Baal, listening for eternity's promise in the screams of the penitents, letting the blood of angels, opening the wound to close the circle. "It is I, lord," I called to the puppet master in the mirror. He met my rapt gaze. As the exquisite sensation of righteous judgment swept over me, mounting me like a steer, the rising wails of the storm outside drowned out the incessant cries of the damned below.