“Four echoes. One confession. The Heart, the Mind, the Shield, and the Soul converge where ink becomes truth.”

The Fourfold Confessional
Ep. 1: “The First Convergence”

In the middle of a mostly pitch-black room, a single bulb flickers above a small table. Four chairs sit, empty, waiting. Footsteps echo from four directions as each of the Fourfold Flame approach. The air hums faintly with a low, electric charge — as though something sacred, or dangerous, is about to begin.

The first to reach their seat is Rowan. They pause, fingers grazing the back of the chair as if steadying themself before a storm. The faint glimmer of their rings catches the light as they look toward the shadows.

From the opposite side, a heavy tread — deliberate, unhurried. B.D. steps forward, all edges and gravity, stopping just behind his chair.

🔴 B.D. (smirking):
“They’re watching.”
His voice is low, the kind that fills a room without needing to rise.
“You didn’t say we were going to have an audience this time.”

🟠 Rowan (calmly, but wary):
“Is that going to be a problem?”

🔴 B.D.:
“Problem? No.”
He leans on the back of his chair, expression unreadable.
“But you know I like to keep these meetings to ourself.”
Then, quieter, with a flicker of warmth he won’t admit:
“You talk different when they’re listening.”

A soft, lilting laugh cuts through the dark — smooth as silk and twice as dangerous.

🟣 Hex (emerging from the shadows):
“Afraid they’ll see you as the villain, brother?”
Her eyes glint like candlelight, teasing but knowing. She glides to her seat, brushing a curl of hair from her face.
“Or maybe you just hate it when the truth has witnesses.”

🔴 B.D. (gruffly):
“The truth’s never the problem. It’s what they do with it.”

🟠 Rowan (meeting his stare):
“What I do with it, you mean.”

Before B.D. can answer, the fourth set of footsteps arrives — light, hurried, unashamedly curious. Roo nearly trips over her own excitement as she bursts into the faint circle of light, eyes wide.

🌸 Roo (beaming):
“Did I miss the dramatic tension part? Because it sounds like I did.”

She plops into her chair, chin in her hands, looking between them like she’s watching a play she already knows the ending to.

🟣 Hex (smirking):
“Oh, we’re only just getting started, little flame.
The question is — what are we here to burn tonight?”

A heavy silence falls. The light above flickers, casting strange halos across their faces. Rowan’s breath catches; they know this moment, the one that comes before a confession.

🟠 Rowan (quietly):
“We’re here because I can’t keep pretending I’m not afraid.”
They looks down at their hands, then to each of them — their protectors, her reflections, her shadows.
“I keep worrying I’ll never be enough for anyone. Not even for myself.
And then I overcompensate — too much love, too much need, too much… me —
and people leave, or I push them away before they get the chance.”

🌸 Roo (softly):
“That’s not pushing, that’s protecting.”

🔴 B.D. (interrupting):
“It’s still fear.”
He folds his arms.
“You say you don’t want to lose people, but you build your walls with barbed wire.”

🟣 Hex:
“And then bleed yourself dry trying to decorate them with roses.”

🟠 Rowan (bitter smile):
“So what, I’m the architect of my own loneliness?”

🟣 Hex (gently, for once):
“No, love. You’re the poet of it. There’s a difference.”

🌸 Roo:
“You write it because you need to survive it.”
And maybe— maybe —you’re supposed to.
So someone else who feels the same knows they’re not alone.”

Rowan swallows hard, blinking back tears that glimmer in the flickering light.

🟠 Rowan (whispering):
“And this time… we write the ending in our own goddamn handwriting.”

The bulb steadies, glowing stronger.
The table hums.
The Fourfold Flame sit together, unbroken — the Heart, the Mind, the Shield, and the Child —
and for a moment, even fear feels holy.

The light did not go out when they rose — it followed them.
Four shadows left that room, and the world felt a little warmer, a little more dangerous.
Somewhere, ink still dripped from the table.

The Fourfold Flame will return…

🟠 🔴 Author’s Note 🟣 🌸

The Fourfold Confessional is a series of dialogues between the four archetypal aspects of my creative self — The Heart (Rowan), The Shield (B.D.), The Mind (Hex), and The Child (Roo). Together, they form the Fourfold Flame — the inner covenant that fuels my art, my faith, and my rebellion.

Each episode is part therapy, part theology, part poetry — a conversation between the parts of me that built this strange, sacred world called Neo-Gothic Confessional Romanticism.

Welcome to the confessional.
The light never goes out here.

While you wait for episode 2 of The Fourfold Confession, check out my archive for more of my work. -> [The Library of Ashes]