"He opened a pit below the school, to pull in those he sensed had contact with her. And bring other people with it as well. We were caught by demons, restrained. Some people tried to fight, but... Well, there wasn't much hope at the time."

Deep breaths now as he got to the hard part.

"The three of us, Sooraya, Cessily, and myself, were chained to rocks and questioned. None of us had answers, he couldn't remember the illusion. The demon Belasco decided the best way to get the other two to talk was to torment the weakest, the human. He..."

Don't stop. Can't stop. Keep talking. Talk until you can't talk anymore. Keep going. Ignore the pain. His hand comes up to rub worried circles at his chest.

"He tore me from the pillar and held me up. And his free hand plunged into my chest, gripping my heart. He squeezed and it was agony. And then he tore my heart out."

That earns a bitter laugh.

"It takes time for short term memories to encode into long term in the brain. This means that traumatic memories don't always linger, because they never get encoded to be remembered. Apparently my brain is fast enough to have processed hanging there in his grip as he held my heart up. As he crushed it in his hand. As he tossed me aside to the ground."