Editor's Note: The following contains spoilers for the first seven episodes of The Fall of the House of Usher.

Things are swinging in the seventh episode of The Fall of the House of Usher. They swing like the pendulum from the episode's title, an homage to the Edgar Allan Poe short story The Pit and the Pendulum. The board is swinging after the six consecutive deaths of Prospero (Sauriyan Sapkota), Camille (Kate Siegel), Napoleon (Rahul Kohli), Victorine (T'Nia Miller), and Tamerlane (Samantha Sloyan). Back in the '70s, young Roderick's (Zack Gilford) opinion is swinging in court, spelling his rise through the ranks of Fortunato Pharmaceuticals as well as the virtual end of Auguste Dupin's (Malcolm Goodwin) career, at least for the time being. And, in the 2020s, a quite literal construction beam swings in the air, bringing about the death of the last of the Usher children.

"The Pit and the Pendulum" marks the downfall of the oldest of Roderick Usher's (Bruce Greenwood) many kids and the would-be heir of his entrepreneurial empire. Having devolved into the purest form of cruelty against his wife, Morelle (Crystal Balint), Frederick (Henry Thomas) is finally punished for his actions in an episode that is unmatched in how it portrays the evil of its main characters. Following a series of cryptic stories that have only amped up the mystery about what exactly is the curse surrounding the house of Usher, "The Pit and the Pendulum" is also a particularly revealing episode. There is, of course, still a lot to be uncovered in the miniseries' finale, but The Fall of the House of Usher Episode 7 lets us in on a lot of the secrets that have only been suggested so far, from how exactly Roderick betrayed Dupin (Carl Lumbly) to what happened between the Ushers and Verna (Carla Gugino). Suffice it to say that, in the end, no one has their hands clean. Well, maybe Dupin. And Annabel Lee (Katie Parker).

"The Pit and the Pendulum" Reveals What Happened Between Roderick and Dupin

Poor Annabel really thought her husband was going to be a working-class hero. She even took her children to watch him spill the beans on all the scheming Fortunato Pharmaceuticals had been doing, forging signatures on papers for clinical trials. Alas, as Dupin himself puts it, Annabel Lee was the only good Usher to ever walk this earth, and she shouldn't have expected so much from Roderick. But, then again, Dupin shouldn't have either.

After helping Dupin get confidential documents from Fortunato's archives proving the company's malfeasance in its approach to clinical trials, young Roderick is ready to testify in court that his signature has been forged over and over again in said papers. His name has been used repeatedly as a kind of guarantee that patients have been well-informed about what they are getting themselves into. That's one hell of a crime right there, and so Roderick and Dupin are working together to make sure that everything will go according to plan once they are in front of the judge.

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But the plan goes down the drain as soon as Roderick takes the stand, and not because of some attorney or surprise witness for the defense. Roderick himself throws away his collaboration with Dupin and states in front of the judge that he was actually the one who signed all of those papers. And he doesn't stop there, either: when confronted by Mr. Dupin, Roderick claims to have been harassed into lying about his signatures, which leads to him being arrested for perjury.

Back home with Madeline (Willa Fitzgerald) and the kids, Annabel is devastated by what she has witnessed. Madeline, who had been in on the plan all along, tries to comfort her by saying that Roderick will have a lifetime of promotions ahead of him now that he has become Fortunato's most important employee. However, Annabel doesn't care about any of that. She simply wanted her husband to do the right thing. Realizing that her sister-in-law is indeed a decent person and wasn't just playing the good housewife for the money, Madeline leaves, disappointed, but content with what she and her brother have done.

Madeline Tries to Revert Her Agreement with Verna

Now in the 2020s, Madeline still hasn't given up on her climb of the power ladder. As the board gets ready to take a vote and possibly oust Roderick Usher as Fortunato's CEO, she secretly meets up with Arthur Pym (Mark Hamill) to try and convince him to back her. After all, Roderick will soon be unable to run the company due to his dementia. Besides, with her in charge, they can pivot Fortunato away from the addictive drugs that have caused such damage to their public image and into a new world of artificial intelligence — a world of virtual immortality.

But what good is there in dreaming about taking control of Fortunato if Ushers will just keep dropping like flies all around the place? Tormented by the death of Tamerlane and by her odd encounter with Verna, Madeline goes back to her childhood home, where she hopes to find the woman who has brought destruction to her once prosperous family. And, as soon as the door closes behind her, there is Verna, having a drink and sitting on the chair that will soon be Roderick's in his long conversation with Dupin.

"The Pit and the Pendulum" doesn't make it quite clear what the nature of Madeline and Roderick's agreement with Verna is, but it does tell us that there is a pact of some sort — one that can only be fulfilled through death. Madeline attempts to amend the terms of this agreement and even tries to get out of it by snapping Verna's neck, but Verna isn't one to be killed so easily. Heck, from the looks of it, she isn't one to be killed at all.

"Into the world together, out of the world together, or there is no deal." These were the terms of the contract, Madeline reminds Roderick as they sit together in Fortunato's basement, facing that ominous brick wall. The exact meaning of these words is something that Episode 8 will have to tell us, but they are enough to convince Roderick to kill himself with a Ligodone overdose. It is the right thing to do. It is the only thing that can be done. At least, that's what Madeline believes. As she leaves her brother's body behind, though, Verna swoops in to awaken him from his slumber. He's not getting out of it that easily.

Death Comes for Frederick

Madeline isn't the only Usher pulling her strings, trying to become the boss now that Roderick Usher is free-falling towards the end. Frederick is also moving stuff around, going behind his father's back to ensure that he will have the votes to become CEO. In order to put his best face forward, he decides to finally move along with demolishing the lab that Prospero used for his party, a job that his father had tasked him with long before the orgy was ever planned.

But, first, he's got to torture poor Morelle a little bit more. Keeping her isolated from everyone, including Lenore (Kyliegh Curran), Frederick has his wife surrounded by pictures upon pictures of their wedding day. With a nightshade paralyzing drug, he ensures that she is completely defenseless as he does things such as disfigure her mouth with a pair of pliers — a punishment for the allegedly deceiving smile that she offered him on the day that they first met. This proves to be a step too far even for Verna, who has grown used to the selfishness and cruelty of the Ushers. So, as Frederick is loading up his bag of cocaine to go witness the lab's demolition, she does that thing where she whispers something in your ear and has him add a bit of the paralyzer to his coke stash.

Upon getting to the demolition site, Roderick tells the staff to wait, as he wants to go inside and locate Morelle's wedding ring. Well, that, and he wants to take a piss on Prospero's dying place. Unfortunately, just as he has his little Freddie out, the paralyzer that he accidentally snorted kicks in, and he falls to the floor. Verna drops by, as she usually does, to give him a speech about how his death could've been different and how he pushed her hand with the pliers thing. Then, through a walkie-talkie, she fakes Frederick's voice and gives the demolition crew the okay to bring down the building. Swinging like a pendulum, a beam falls down slowly over Frederick, splitting his body in half.

And there goes the last of the Usher children. This, however, does not mean the end of the Usher dynasty. We have to remember that young Lenore, the best of them all according to Roderick himself, is still alive and kicking. Or is she? During Roderick's conversation with Dupin, Madeline has been down in the basement tinkering with God knows what, and she also had conscripted Lenore's help into her immortality through the AI project. Considering still the conclusions that she came to after her chat with Verna, and the text messages that Roderick has been receiving from his granddaughter non-stop, it's no stretch to imagine that Madeline has turned Lenore into something other than human. Or, even worse, into something other than living.