I feel like there should be a caveat that the stories in this series are not necessarily understandable without reading them all in order. I just finished reading them all (and holy hell, I will never write anything that good so I think I may never even bother in this fandom, because damn) but came across a few passages where I said "Wait, I've tried to read this before and not gotten it".

YMMV.

But. Oh so very, very dark and deliciously good.