Placenta’s main reception climbs cylindrically up two floors of wings like an apple core. Cushioned between gilded balconies large panes of glass, which out of hours rest ash speckled and sorry for themselves but as Placenta awakes reflect the fire they touched in life blazing in magnificent hues of arson. One-way windows they hedge a dozen densely sound padded cells or Valve cubicles which allow for a private view of the unique amity of underworld bubbling beneath them.

Sitting alone, not happy to be in such a public place at all, Faith was listening in on Ferret curiously. She'd been forced from her run down flatshare leased as a 'holiday let' by a dodgy landlord for purposes of tax evasion by what she'd first thought was an earthquake. It wasn't. Someone had punched a hole through her privacy ward to display her location, cracked the ceiling and burst two thirds of the plumbing. She didn't have the money for another deposit and it was more likely her landlord was going to declare himself the tooth fairy than give her back her old one. She was here to see Jez for a new, better privacy ward.

Jezabella of House Pursan was selectively either Jez or Bella depending on the presence or absence of a plethora of glitter frosted wigs. Once only an innocent boy smirking naughtily behind his mother’s hijab, sometime in the late nineteenth century he swore devotion to Astaroth in exchange for eternal youth. Captivated by Jez’s beauty Astaroth granted the wish but took devotion to new planes of intimacy. There is not a legitimate witchy working that is not known by Jezabella. He, she, is one of the most prominent dandies of the damned and High Priest(ess). To be in Jez’s good favour is to open gold leaf encrusted doors for gossip, contacts and a wealth of resources. Jez’s sour side is renowned for landing imp and incubus alike pushing pennies in the public sector.

Faith had ran into Jez early on in the evening, aiming to beat the crowds, in the narrow networks of halls which lock Placenta together. Placenta's corridors were the only part, other than the bar, which Faith had ever actually been in and made up a claustrophobic limbo between the russian roulette of heaven and hell one had equal opportunities to walk in on should they verge through any door leading off. As well as the fluffy wallpaper, Faith wasn't so keen on, they were lined in enough bare skin to trigger an oxytocin release and their air was saturated with a strung out heat haze of bodily IC; a miasmatic babalon of demonic subreeds.

Having watered herself liberally with dutch courage pre-club gin, upon meeting Jez, overjoyed to see a familiar face, Faith staggered a fatal fork in the road between hugging him and throwing up over him. "Faith, my darling, my wicked little witchlet" Jez's diamante tipped shellacs had tilted Faith’s chin back appraising her from several angles as she gazed up into Jez’s effeminate, Islamic features.

"You my girl are evaporating in front of my very eyes. We have some exquisitely glacierized gonads. I will have someone fetch them for you. A far more substantial snack for my recherché"

Faith had blanched the colour of pea purée "No, no. No. No, no"

Jez, who was Jez in wild silk and Gucci sequins, then decided to strike up a conversation dishing on his calling a summit which ritualistically eclipsed in Verrine’s demise. Normally this would have been very interesting to Faith, at that moment, it wasn't, she just wanted the ward.

Apparently, it was all to do with AA. Astaroth Academies are a centuries old chain of elite, all girl boarding schools. They scout young girls talented at tapping and channelling external sources of IC. At this stage these girls are referred to as witchlets. Over the course of two decades of training the girls are sorted into one of sixty nine school houses. Each house corresponds to one of the sixty nine noble, upper-order demonic clans so listed in the demon directory Pseudomonarchia Daemonum. On completion of their training they go on to serve in a legion of their house of the 69.

Astaroth Academies is so named for three reasons. Firstly its previous name was in sanskrit and tricky to pronounce without severe nasal congestion. Secondly it was recently acquired by an unknown buyer. The buyer remained anonymous although they were clearly demonic as the entire chain was given an efficiency boosting, factory format makeover and transformed into academies. Thirdly, Astaroth at the very top of the second level of the Hierarchy is the deity of the witches.

Astaroth is the deity of the witches as it is the only deity of the Hierarchy both willing and capable of putting up with that many dippy summonings per day. Beelzebub will, for example, also humour a witch and produce a result tenfold the power of one invoked from Astaroth, however it requires an unusually powerful witch to tap Beelzebub and if said witch was stupid enough to bother the deity with UV protection fields, PMS soothing serums and Tweet bumper charms they would entirely deserve the influx of cerebral maggots.

Presumably the girls had been possessed and began switching allegiance from Astaroth to Verrine. Verrine displacing Astaroth as the deity, and primary IC tap of the witches, would have meant disaster. The summative power of witches would have been cut by over half and all would have been inflicted with chronic itchiness of the foot sole.

The 69 had grown weary as AA graduations drew near faced with the prospect of assimilating into their ranks a crop of brain glazed Verrine apostles. Fifty three of the sixty nine solicited a petition to have the girls allegiance to Astaroth reinstated to the owner of Astaroth Academies Enterprise Trust. The overall process took two months and eclipsed in a battered returnal with a thinly scrawled No in red ink and a heavy hand. The petition was passed to Jez. Jez received it, having watched Astaroth's first POOF decline on record and called coven which diluted Verrine. POOF.

"Bollacks, Verrine was framed" Faith had declared tartly

"Yes" Jez sang "There hasn’t been such devotion to a single entity in adolescent girls since that Bieber boy. Thankfully Bieber fever, unless Lucifer, you know Bieber is his type. Or those, tut, you know, oh, One Route? No. The band? Ah, regardless, it will fall to the history books as the Blue Plague"

"Blue Plague" Faith repeated

"Mm, yes well you see, our first sign was that this many girls simply don’t voluntarily dye their hair that colour. Verrine is not a very flattering shade of blue. Plus lilac ombre? Big. Massive. I can’t stand ombre. But my assistant assures me this Pinterest person loves it. Royal aquamarine simply does not win over the clash of follicle titans: Osborne circa mid-noughties meets that, the vlogger?"

The girls appeared to be possessed by Verrine but weren't, Faith thought frantically, someone framed Verrine to appear to jeopardize the legion witches just so Jez and the covens would bring Verrine down! Faith glanced at Jez "Hu? Oh, the one that leeches gullible pre-teens with the promise of soap?"

"Yes, darling, you showed me that video, the candle?"

Faith shook her head violently “Nah, the one I showed you was big on soap”

"These are interesting" Jez had plucked the dark glasses Faith had shoved up onto her crown

"Yeah, well, the press are following me" Faith spluttered incredulously

"Yes" Faith really wished he'd stop saying yes "I know darling. Fabulous, isn't it? Very Jackie-O" Jez had drawn in a breath through his teeth inspecting her outfit as though a cat had thrown up over Faith

"I need a privacy ward, a strong one" Faith had tried patiently. It was no use. He'd told her it would have to wait, patted her on the head and shoved her in here for safekeeping. Which was suspicious.

Faith pouted listening as Ferret grew increasingly inebriated. She was sure she'd seen him somewhere before.

"Nah, they're pirates. Them. Them, there" Ferret was raised in his seat gestating and looking back at a young, sandy haired boy "Right, see, 'tween us traders, smuggling, piracy, there an animosity. See DED doesn'ne give a definition. 'Tween the two. We're, well, SMARTER. 'N passivists. Them lot, who ah brootal, don't ever get in ruckus with 'em or I'll keelhaul ye meself, think we're introverts, nancies, think we haven't any crewmanship. Densely, think the debate could be rested with rum. Well we drink beer don't we!"

An olive skinned, middle aged man with a barrel belly chimed in "If they're carrying an oiled leather briefcase, likely they're dealing Oseleo, or Oze"

The boy with a slack mouth looked between the two older men "What's..?"

The olive skin man answered "Popular narcotic. A stunning viscous amber, extracted from the hypothalamus of sphinxes. The sphinx, is Ose, god of insanity, semi-carnated. Once extracted it's condensed with a progesterone derivative from nymphs and then bound with 6, 6- methydoxyl. At low doses its effects dance along the lines of an opioid DMT. Moderate doses suspend the user on a plane of unrelenting mental and physical ecstasy. High doses, well, those who OD habitually melt. The rosy pink lava produced is shipped to Level 2. L lust as when consumed with the right sprinkling of cocoa and matcha powder it proves quite the aphrodisiac"

"Those, those there" Ferret was enjoying himself "Are legion witches. Tight knit packs. Cliquey poster-children of occult. The scars, well they're branded with their house sigil. The more dutiful the servitude the greater the number"

Faith thought Ferret had very strong thighs to keep that kind of squatting position going "Those! Those, Suffragettes, like, freelancers. Benign anarchists. Spells for IC exchange. They're tricky to identify. But ye don't have to, the want for one is cursed to induce an appearance. Wielding a quote, which, boutique trade, is three times legion value. Institutionalists give 'em a hard time. Call 'em whores in the only derogatory sense one can be a whore in our world"

Faith gazed out the window murmuring "The PP. Zombified Nazis patrolling for Pardon abusers with the zest of a raid on a psychiatric hospital housing jews of ethnic minorities"

The olive skin man was trying to see over head "Brokers. Very important. Can't see any I know. Conduct an illegal slave trade of off the books minidems, largely sub-species with small, low-density cerebrum. They're responsible for record breaking cohort numbers of house trained chimera, hydra and nixies. All specie hijacked from Inferno's residential camps"

Faith frowned wondering what a 'minidem' was.

"Occupational hazard, tend tah be singed" Ferret nodded "See over there, in the, eh, watchya? Tut, got it alcoving. Tycoons, barons and fiscal-vested fascists of Foras 100. Look there's the buggar. Dats Foras, of the sixty nine. Bertie. Charles. Forbes. Sold his soul nineteen seventeen. Dat got me ten points in a cabin quiz once. No crewmanship my arse"

"Baroness Valefor, prominent restaurateur of level 3.G our Nigella Lawson" The olive man saluted an older woman with a quiff of lilac hair "House Vine, founders, station 666. Only station still parading Lucifer's political regime. That's Duke Vapular, co-owner of the interlock of correctional facilities which compose the majority of Level 9.T Treachery. House Malphas, harlett hoteliers of level two L, lust"

"Marquis Zuckerberg, of Facebook, 'as he got a level yet?" Ferret frowned nails deep in loose tobacco as he hunched over the table

"Holy shit!" Faith squealed leaping up "cool" her breath condescend on the window

Ferret's voice reverberated in Faith's charm boosted hearing "Those, are actual whores. Varied workforce. Humans, on short contracts. Miscellaneous demons, most, uniquely, multi jointed. Dominantly, incubi and succubi"

Attention sparked Faith sat back to watch several subtle variations of physical perfection, golden eyed, gliding below, parting crowds like supercharged fireflies a swarm of moths wearing little more than aztec-esque beading and inducing in Faith a spectrum of new insecurities.

Faith sniffed looking back at Ferret's table where the olive skinned man was explaining "Native to 2L they originate from the indigenous Cubi clan. DI dropped a cab directly through the palm raftings of one of their clan’s phallic shaped huts allowing the cubi economic travel to level 0 where they encountered humans and, much to everyone’s delight, copulated. The descendants are incubi and succubi. They carry a faint sheen due to the glandular secretion cubium, a form of glittery lubricant, and can metamorph their genitalia to preference. They feed from the faint IC traces of the partakers pleasure resulting in fluid sexual preferences. Both top floors of Placenta form a pleasure house ranked sixth on DamnedTourists.com and I believe this takes into account all main resorts of Level 2L"

“It’s de whores that hold the underbelly by de balls. Dem fat cats” Ferret saluted the Baroness Valefor’s violet french twist with his empty bottle “dancing monkeys. It’s what ya know. That's your warranty”

Ferret went to take a sip from his bottle before remembering it was empty “I need another. Get a round?”

The boy shook his head “Best not. I can’t feel my ears”

“Could ye feel 'em before?” Ferret asked very seriously

“Can’t remember” he mumbled

Ferret saluted him with his empty bottle “I’ll get yu another, migh’ bring it back to yu”