Darrow lies naked, shackled, and entombed in a coffin of stone, deprived of sight, motion, and time. To keep his sanity, he repeats tactile rituals and recites stories in many languages, but the isolation breeds hallucinations and a taunting inner voice. He relives betrayals and deaths—Roque, Pax, Quinn, Tactus, Lorn, Victra—and wonders if Sevro, Ragnar, or Mustang survive.

He rejects the comfort of imagining an afterlife and tries to anchor himself by declaring it is only darkness. Memories surface of his capture: after Lorn’s death he was meant for Octavia’s Carvers, but the Jackal bargained to keep him, tortured him at Attica, and learned of his origins. Yellows fitted feeding and waste tubes to sustain his confinement.

The Jackal offered release to a life of ease if Darrow confessed defeat, with the price of his family’s lives, who are imprisoned in Attica. Tempted to rationalize the sacrifice as necessary for a greater cause, Darrow battles the inner voice that urges him to surrender. The thought of his mother, Kieran, and sister being fed to prisoners hardens his refusal.

Concluding that death is the only honorable escape from further betrayal of himself and Eo’s memory, Darrow decides to kill himself by smashing his skull against the stone. As he gathers for a final, fatal blow, the prison itself rumbles; the stone cracks and a blazing shaft of light cleaves the darkness, interrupting his suicide and heralding an imminent change.